Cafe Venus

I am really trying to work things out lately. I have been so terrified to go to class after being behind and having a bunch of stuff happen. I tried to go today, and like 20 things occurred walking out the door. If I just let all these little just stop bugging me, I could just go forward. But I never have been good at this.
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Gutschow opens with a description of a springtime ritual of the annual transferring of merit to the ancestors. This ritual would benefit the ancestors in whatever rebirth they might inahbit. Along with a celebratory feast, donations are made by the villagers on behalf of their ancestors. In this process, the donations made to monks’ order are far more generous and in greater number than that which is given to the nuns’ order. Gutschow describes an interaction with the monks where the monk suggested that she make merit through donations to the monastery and earn rebirth as a man in the next life. This was based on the assumption that by being born a male, men are reaping the rewards of a past life, while the women, in particular the nuns, are born female because of their failings in a past life. Gutschow replies to the monk that she hopes to be reborn as a woman, much to the shock and surprise of the nuns in attendance.
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Ever notice that the more solid and unflappable your faith is, the warmer it feels in your chest?

I’m really bummed . . . There’s so much I want to do, so much I want to become and I just feel so trapped. How can this be? At the end of this semester, I’ll be lucky to have the energy to step out of the house, much less try to do the things I get so anxious about not being able to do. I think school is a good idea sometimes and a bad idea other times. It’s a really bad idea for me right now, when I can’t just do what my heart tells me to do, which is run away — come back again another time. We’ll get it done then.
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Kim Gutschow’s preface starts with her first trip to Zangskar in Sept of 1989, when she and her brother rode on top of cement bags being hauled by a truck. The roads were unpaved and rutted. The truck that they were in eventually broke down and they hiked their packs to the next cement truck driving along the road to Zangskar. Eventually, after the truck had made frequent stops for water due to it overheating radiator, they arrive at Zangskar — hiking another 15 km to reach the central city. (more…)

So the interesting background to my sixth day of working at the Food Center. My good friend Kevin’s house burned down — it was the apartment above the Grand Canyon Youth, which also burned down. It made the Arizona Daily Sun. Kevin had been out of work for months actually.
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So I am stressed . . . . really.  I think about my family in Korea and I wonder if they are proud of me.  Or do they see the bumbling child I was and maybe cannot outgrow?  I don’t like all the pressure to not only succeed but to do everything else well; I want to live up to it — but I really can only focus on one thing at time.  American pressures aren’t really easier; to even have a good life you have to have a lot of money.  I love Flagstaff; if you’re careful and you’re healthy it’s a great place to start when you’re poor because the only expenses that you have are often predictable.  Medical expenses can set you back, but car expenses do not happen often and we have always managed around them.

I haven’t grown up in a family that ever secured their wealth.  It was unfortunate, since it was some bad decisions on their part, prompted by the feeling that they had no money.  This is one reason I think that I probably shouldn’t have attempted college right out of high school, but at the same time, I understood my mother’s fear that there was nothing interesting enough in my life for me to pursuit outside of getting a random nowhere job.  Had I not been religious, I would have tried to go to NAU, I think.  But I would have had to spend about as much money as going to Grand Canyon University, but my parents wouldn’t have had to worry about the car I think.  It would have been tuition and expenses rather than just tuition.

Had I money would it make this college experience easier?  Maybe.  Maybe not.  Maybe we could afford a personal chef so I wouldn’t worry about my diet so much.  But I can’t imagine in this current semester having much help from money that I couldn’t have had otherwise.  But I might have fought with my significant other less.  That would have helped.  Heck if somehow I had money, I may not have to finish right now or ever . . .

Also, if I could worry less about doing great rather than just doing it.  Making my work less about the grade than getting the work done.  Great now, I’m stressed!

I’ve been breaking some promises to myself lately.  And I’m about to have a mental breakdown because some part of Arys, won’t cooperate with Conscious Arys.  I have been pounding myself into submission into doing massive amounts of homework to catch up with my schedule, and neglecting working out and going outside, and having really any kind of life outside of homework.  My health is failing, which is really alarming me and the idea of sitting still for more than 1 hour at a time to do homework makes me panic.  I can’t look at the big picture, I panic.  If I think about anything related to school or graduation, I panic. So even when I do my homework, I can’t get anything done.

I can try to keep my promises to myself again, but I fear falling further behind. But I’m going to try to find an hour of fun for myself everyday and a half-hour of meditation. The funny thing is I meditated today, once for 10 minutes, and once for almost 30 minutes. It didn’t resolve the panic. But as I was laying in bed, I began to ask myself what I had done to myself to make me so psychotic. I just have been treating myself so ill.
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I have a paper to write. I can’t stand writing another paper. I just feel all wound up and pissed off right now. I was reading this article in Newsweek, Stress Could Save Your Life, that there was a question why we were not all emotional wrecks hiding in our houses. I’m totally there right now. I just want to hide in my house. I’m not looking at the future as a prospective one, I’m looking to just get to a point that I can collapse once graduation is done. I feel bad about this. This isn’t how I wanted to end my school years — I was hoping that I would have the energy to have lined up a job and I just feel like finishing school is more of a failure than I intended it to be.

I have yet another paper to write. I just want to do anything but write this. I don’t want to write the one coming up. I don’t want to go to class anymore and feel inadequate. What happened? How did it get this bad? I used to be in control of all my coursework and I’m just starting to disintegrate under the pressure. Why? I just don’t know. Up until the last two semesters there was never a question of me writing papers — now I’m considering doing the minimum work to pass.
I hate this feeling of utter uselessness . . .

So today I went to the food bank to volunteer. I hadn’t received a reminder from the volunteer coordinator to come in but I decided to show up anyway. Today we had Ben, Christa, Terrence and another woman whose name I didn’t quite catch. Once again, Carrie filled in for Bill because Bill was still struggling after his ulcer. We were once again making salads and steamed veggies. I found a box of triple washed romaine leaves of which about 60% were usable. Ben threw in some mesculun, cucumbers, and most of the tomatoes. I helped out with the bell peppers — we always have bell peppers. The main course was beef stew, and we had a ton of spring baby carrots with greens that went into the steamed veggie trays. It was unfortunate that they couldn’t remain whole, small, pointed and cute . . .

We also made a pile of bell peppers for later use. Ben and Christa discussed some issues with one of her children. Ben and I talked about mid-terms for both me and his grandson. Carrie who was making the main course, mostly canned beef stew with added veggies. That tends to be her fall back on main courses, switching over to canned reserves. She was also distraught this morning with her mother being in the hospital, hooked up to machines — I couldn’t determine why her mother was ill or what from, and I felt that it might be tacky to ask. There were also canned carrots for the stew — which I thought was unfortunate considering the boxes of carrots that we had. But perhaps there was a desire to save the fresher vegetables for salads and steaming and use the canned stuff for the cooking — but even that is questionable because the fresher vegetables would have more nutrients than the stuff that comes in cans.