bear with me.

I'm going to ramble on for a bit.

Life is unerringly strange.

Every time I think I've got a handle on what just happened and what is coming next, I get thrown for a loop.

The current loop is in small part the mistake I made of watching a Woody Allen film, which has shifted my view of myself (as presented to the world), at least temporarily.

This film featured a character who was, basically, a conversational con artist.

No depth, no insight, just a rambling seduction of well placed of words and references.

While watching with a friend — this character was describing a past sexual encounter with someone they'd just met – I sat cringing. I asked, "I don't sound like this when I talk do I?" B— immediately replied, "I was just thinking she sounded like you."

I wanted to throw my shoe at the television.

I kept watching, hoping this person would redeem herself, that the character would develop. Considering it's maker, it wasn't a reasonable expectation or desire.

I wasn't a terribly good friend this weekend. It was a needed therapy to get out of my village, but I was distracted and withdrawn at a time when I could have spoken earnestly.

Everything seems so abstract and fractured right now. And such a long distance away.

I struggled with the words. I feel like I'm going to always struggle with the words.

I will never be an orator, most certainly; and I will never be a proper writer, but at least, for a while on the page or at the prompt of the flashing cursor I can get it out.

"It," Bobby Britain, being those words that are trapped and floating in my brain.

My parents have instilled in me numerous and equally bad habits.

My father is stubborn, and tends to be inclined toward an intense wave of angry silence in which he works his jaw and mentally fillets you. He erupts at some point, and an abstracted lecture begins in which past wrongs are brought to the table in addition to current issues. Nothing is ever forgiven, not really.

My mother uses angles to approach a topic, attempting to find the best way to come out with the upper hand. She also chatters on and makes every person she talks to the temporary center of her universe. Some of it is smoke in mirrors, some of it is manipulative, some of it is in earnest. When it comes down to it, though, she's a survivalist — and you can't really blame someone for that. Neither are fully coherent in their arguments.

I mirror these habits. Just like we all fear we will, and find it happening anyway.

The angry silence thing? I haven't mastered it; I'm working on its successful use — as in, avoiding eruption. I have this irascible need for people to know. Even though I know they don't care. I constantly want to work it out verbally.

The angles, I use them in an attempt to be understood, not to win an argument. Not that anyone seems to believe me — I find myself entrenched in verbal combat before I even realize the other person thinks I'm intent on walking away a victor. Then they think I'm being patronizing when I try to climb out of the conversational rabbit hole.

Nothing frustrates me more than the moment my inability to express myself rears its ugly head while i'm in a discussion with someone.

By the time we're on the same page — I've turned into Cecily Strong's SNL character: "Girl at a party you wish you hadn't started a conversation with."

I both love that bit and inwardly cringe while watching it.

Currently reading:

A Border Passage — From Cairo to America — A Woman's Journey

  —Leila Ahmed

On deck:

Night

  —Elie Wiesel, translation by Marion Wiesel

Now playing:

2 Albums | 27 songs | 1 hour, 46 minutes

Andrew Bird | Armchair Apocrypha (Album)

Andrew Bird | The Mysterious Production of Eggs (Album)

As to their mysterious production, in humans, we women have a set limit from the beginning. In hens on the homestead being prepped for storage... It's a trip.

Current (and past) Freewill horoscopes:

Week of 17 July:

Beginning in 1798, European cartographers who drew maps of West Africa included the Mountains of Kong, a range of peaks that extended more than a thousand miles east and west. It was 90 years before the French explorer Louis Gustave Binger realized that there were no such mountains. All the maps had been wrong, based on faulty information. Binger is known to history as the man who undiscovered the Mountains of Kong. I'm appointing him to be your role model in the coming weeks, Aquarius. May he inspire you to expose long-running delusions, strip away entrenched falsehoods, and restore the simple, shining truths.

Entomologist Justin O. Schmidt drew up an index to categorize the discomfort caused by stinging insects. The attack of the bald-faced hornet is "rich, hearty, slightly crunchy. Similar to getting your hand mashed in a revolving door." A paper wasp delivers pain that's "caustic and burning," with a "distinctly bitter aftertaste. Like spilling a beaker of hydrochloric acid on a paper cut." The sweat bee, on the other hand, can hurt you in a way that's "light, ephemeral, almost fruity. A tiny spark has singed a single hair on your arm."

Your homework is to create an equally nuanced and precise index of three experiences that feel really good.

Week of 10 July:

Expect nothing even as you ask for everything. Rebel against tradition with witty compassion, not cynical rage. Is there a personal taboo that no longer needs to remain taboo? Break it with tender glee. Do something playful, even prankish, in a building that has felt oppressive to you. Everywhere you go, carry gifts with you just in case you encounter beautiful souls who aren't lost in their own fantasies. You know that old niche you got stuck in as a way to preserve the peace? Escape it. At least for now, live without experts and without leaders – with no teachers other than what life brings you moment by moment.

"You can get a feel on Kaho'olawe of what it was like to live on Hawaii at the time of our ancestors," says Native Hawaiian Davianna McGregor. "We can practice our traditions there without it being a tourist attraction. It's one place we can go to be in communion with our natural life forces."

Each of us has a personal version of Kaho'olawe: a part of our psyche that has been stolen or colonized by hostile forces. To grow bolder in your explorations, you'll need to take back yours.

And these guys? In trying to find the least alarming picture of guinea fowl I could for a birthday greeting, I stumbled across this watercolour... I don't know what it is about it... 
It's perfect.

current..

deflections:

Yes, every one state side, Ebola has been confirmed in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

I'm not sure you get how this vicious virus works… or geography.

procrastinations:

I see you pile of exams. I will mark you eventually. However, since you have no bearing on the grades of my learners, and interrupt the precious little class time I actually have, I resent you, and therefore am going to ignore you for now. Take that, Namibian education system.

new responsibilities:

Math. Grade 6 + 7. I hope there isn't any geometry. SOHCAHTOA… and D = π x r… or something.

worries:

The status of ownership regarding my furniture as my best friend’s girlfriend moves in… Don’t get rid of my stuff, please… Alternatively, don’t be wierded out by living with my stuff. Advice. Don’t let N— fatten you up with his delicious food. I’ve lost around 40 pounds in the past eight months. I attribute this to the lack of his delish cooking. And not drinking beer every day.. And, you know, walking everywhere… Hi. We’ll meet eventually. 

media cravings:

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (film)

Much Ado About Nothing (2013 film)

Sherlock — His Last Vow (season 3 finale)

Crystal | Stevie Nicks

Who did that to you? | John Legend

Disclosure | Settle (album)

this week’s horoscope:                 

"The truth's superb surprise," wrote poet Emily Dickinson, may be "too bright for our infirm delight."
Sometimes we've got to be careful about articulating what's really going on. "The truth must dazzle gradually," she said. If it hits us too fast and hard, it may be difficult to digest. So did Emily suggest that we should lie and deceive? No. "Tell all the truth," she declared, "but tell it slant." This is excellent advice for you in the coming days, Aquarius.

According to Jewish legend, there are in each generation 36 righteous humans who prevent the rest of us from being destroyed. Through their extraordinary good deeds and their love of the divine spark, they save the world over and over again. They're not famous saints, though. They go about their business anonymously, and no one knows how crucial they are to our well-being. Might you be one of the 36? As a temporary experiment, act as if you are.

upcoming adventures:

Zambia and Malawi...

last month. eight months. notables.

Last year.

Managed to dissuade a stranger at staging by saying “I hope he writes good letters.”

I assume he was illiterate, as she disappeared a half hour later. Hope he was worth it.

Aided and abetted by a silk dress in a stolen moment in a stable.

Thank you, M—, I would have never paid that much for a dress shopping on my own.

Later, finding out dress was inside out... Thank you S—, I may never have noticed.

Survived a venomous snake in my bedroom.

Best friend fell in love. Finally.

Last month.

Recognizing enough Rukwangali to know someone was suggesting tutoring via pillow talk.

Finding someone who shares my circle of friends from Chicago living in Namibia?!

Hoba meteorite thanks to P— L—.

Last week.

A conversation, aided by Goats Do Roam

H: Oh, my god. I forgot to do my taxes. Shit, do you still have to file yours?

E: Hmm?

H: Did you have a job before Peace Corps?

E: Hey, I have experience, Hope.

H: That’s not what I’m asking E—. Did you file your taxes?

E: I have experience!

H: You’re drunk aren’t you?!

Saw a hippo in the wild for the first time.

Saw a hippo defecate for the first time.

Walked seven miles.

Sang I’m Gonna Be (500 miles) while doing it.

Da da lat da Da da lat da Da da lat da Da da lat da

Today.

Witnessed a giant armored cricket brave a nest of fire ants.

Watched him shake ‘em loose like a dog trying to shake rain off its fur.

Its the small things, really.
Eighteen months ahead to go.