2003-05-02 - 2:11 p.m.

When shit is thrown on the windshield of life, squeegee it clean and your view will be clearer than it ever was. As Jean Paul Sartre said, we are �condemned to be free�, meaning that at any and every given moment we are the only ones responsible for our choices. If those choices result in creating a negative downward spiral such as I was beginning to feel on Wednesday, then the responsibility for making the appropriate changes lie with me and me alone. I realized the day after my last journal entry that the reason I was beginning to feel down had very little to do with my bike getting stolen or the obliteration of the free-willed individual at the hands of society. Certainly those things impacted my feelings, but they were not the primary cause. I began to clearly see the positive correlation between my negativity and my ceasing to take a proactive approach to life.

So, I�ve taken a few steps to change things and today I can say that life is good again! Yay. Here�s some cool stuff going on:

1. I signed up for a drum building workshop this summer in Davis. I picked up a flyer at last year�s Earth Day festival and called for information several times, but I didn�t receive a return phone call for the longest time. Anyway, the instructor finally called a few days ago and I signed up immediately. I can�t wait! Only four people are allowed to participate in the workshop where we�ll build our own ashiko drum. When I didn�t get a call back I almost went out and bought a drum, but it wouldn�t have been the same. If I wasn�t going to build it, I wasn�t going to have it. Thank god it worked out.

2. I also signed up for twelve weeks of Aikido training over the summer. I got my Keiko Gi (training uniform) last night. Putting it on this morning, I was aching to go to practice right away! I don�t know if I�m gonna be able to wait until July. *sigh* In the meantime, I�ll have to find other ways to increase my Ki.

3. I�m back to reading. I don�t know what happened, but I seem to have inexplicably slowed the pace of my reading to a crawl. No more. In fact, I had a wonderful time reading one of my new books (yay libaree!) this morning. The book is an anthology of an anarchist journal that was published by Emma Goldman in the early 1900�s. I actually shed tears of joy reading an article by Voltairine de Cleyre called �Anarchism and American Traditions�. It seems that she wrote that article just for me. If she were still alive, I would hunt her down and smother her in kisses of gratitude. Hmm�I wonder where she�s buried?

4. I bought a new bike. It�s the same model as the one that was stolen, so I figure that I basically paid double the price for my bike. This one does not sleep on the balcony, however. She sleeps with me. If they want my bike, they�re gonna have to go thru me first. I love having a bike again. The few days of having to drive my car were torture. Yuck!

Anyway, I need to stop writing lest the day pass me by while I stare at my computer.