And who are you really?

So I had two seemingly unconnected things come together in my brain to make a blog today. I kind of dig when that happens...

First off this morning I spent a lot of time on Goodreads rating books and I realized two things, first off I "really like" most things I read.  There were only a small handful of books that popped up on the list that I didn't like or even that I sort of liked. For the most part when I saw a book title I thought...Oh! I really liked that one! The second thing I realized is that I spent a lot of time exploring religion and spiritual thought. And for every title that I had read that popped up that came with a recommendation for another book I thought...oh I need to read this!

Okay...leave that thought for awhile and walk with me over here....

I used to have a very distinctive sneeze. Or sneezes I guess I should say. I never sneeze just once it's usually 3 or 4 times in a row. But the sound that used to come out when I sneezed was very distinctive. It was very high pitched and kind of had a lilt at the end. After years and years of being teased about it about 5 or 6 years ago I snapped and decided that that was it! I was changing the way I sneezed! And I did. When I would feel a sneeze coming on I would concentrate very hard on making the sound lower and not doing the lilt at the end. I just wanted to sneeze in peace. I could never change the multiple sneezes in a row but after awhile I finally got to the point where my sneeze was lower in tone and had no lilt and I could do it without thinking so very hard each time I sneezed.

Then this afternoon I was cleaning some things in the garage and thinking over a few things so my body was busy and my brain was busy and I sneezed. High pitched and lilt. Well shit. Isn't that funny? All this time I thought I had changed something pretty fundamental about myself and I hadn't. It was there all along just waiting for me to not pay attention so it could sneak back out. And it made me laugh. And I liked the way it sounded. It's very much my own sound. I've never heard anyone else sneeze like that and I guess I missed being me. Free to sneeze the way I want! Or something like that...

So then I started thinking about things that are just fundamentally me. The things that come out when I'm not paying attention. And I came back around to the Goodreads website. I really like most things I read. It took me YEARS to be able to admit that a book could be bad and that it was okay to put it down without finishing it. And when I do that I don't think about the book again, for the most part. A book really had to make me angry to stick in my head as something I didn't like (Jonathan Franzen I am looking at you here, oh and Justin Cronin, you can come stand next to him for the second half of The Passage) but for the most part the books I remember are the ones I really liked. I don't spend a lot of time dwelling on things I don't like. I just let them slide back out of my head.

And the spiritual searching? Yeah, that's hard wired in to me as well. If you read the background blogs that I referenced in yesterday's post you remember I was baptized in my parent's faith at 6 which is super young for my church. But I understood the rules of that faith and needed to follow them. But then I kept on following things and eventually my path led me right back out of their faith and in to my own. But I have never stopped looking at things. Wondering. Feeling. I love to hear what people believe and why. I can so understand people who feel closer to god when they are in nature. How it speaks to them. You all know how I feel about the ocean.  Well the mountains come a close second to that. Part of that is because I can just let my mind go and be, and feel, and question, and wonder, and marvel.

So what does it all mean? I have no idea. That's another part of me that just is me. I will always look for the thread that ties things together. I will always want to know what else there is going on under the surface. I will really like most things, I will keep looking for the big answers and well....I will sneeze the way I want to.  Deal with it.

Field trip!

Today C and I headed out to the coast. The weather was okay, not excellent, but okay. But we went to see a piece of history. At the beginning of the month a piece of debris from Japan washed ashore. But it wasn't just any old piece of debris, it was a 70 foot dock that had broken free during the tsunami last March. And for some reason I wanted to see it for myself.

And I am not alone. Since the dock washed ashore thousands of people have come to see it. The parks department said last year there were around 2000 cars through the parks department parking lots the first two weeks of June, this year? Over 12,000! All to see a piece of junk basically. Why did we all go? Why go look at it? I can't answer for everyone else but I thought I'd try and pin down why I went.

We could see the people there to see the dock before we could really see the dock!

I guess first off, if I'm being totally honest, it's because it was an excuse to go to the beach. I love going to the coast as you all know. And Newport isn't one we get to very often. It's another hour further away, it's not as California-like as Seaside so I don't love it as much. It's not close to Tillamook so there is no ice cream on the way back.... But it does have the Oregon Coast Aquarium and it's still the ocean after all so it will do.

But the real reason is that I had a hard time wrapping my brain around it. The whole thought of the dock being HERE when it was THERE. We all watched the footage of the tsunami with our mouths hanging open. Just to see the devastation was unreal. The water wiping out everything, lifting cars, trucks, buildings... And then to think that this dock had been part of that devastation but it wasn't done. It then floated across the ocean and ended up here on our beach. Just over a year later. And no one noticed it. There is a lot of hubbub about that right now. Because this wasn't a small piece of debris, this is a 70 foot long dock, and NO ONE saw it until it washed ashore! Isn't that amazing?

And here it sits.

Now one of the first things they did when it washed ashore was check it for radiation, safe. And then scrape all of the wildlife off of it so it didn't contaminate the shoreline with a host of non-native species. Then they just left it there. There is a lot of debate now on what to do about it. Taking it apart is going to cost money. Who pays for that? The company in Japan doesn't want it back, which is good because how would we get it to them anyway? There are some people who say, leave it there! Turn it in to a monument to the lives lost during the tsunami and let people come see it! There are others who want it off their beach. It's an eyesore! It's causing crowds! And then there are those that are concerned about the safety. It washed ashore during a storm, what happens during the next storm?

For me I am just glad I saw it. And touched it. I will be thinking about that dock, what it represents to me, for a long time. There is something to it, you know? Torn from it's moorings during a storm only to survive a perilous trip across the ocean to wash ashore in a sleepy little Oregon coastal town to be turned in to a tourist attraction....

Okay, or I just wanted to see it because it's cool. Because it came from the ocean. Because one of the things I love the most about the ocean is that it is vast. That the water washing up on our shore touched countless other shores and will do the cycle over and over again. I love the ocean because it makes me feel small and large all at the same time. And seeing this dock, knowing I might have watched it fall apart during the tsunami coverage and then be able to touch it here now?...well....yeah....it's just cool.

Yes, I made him touch it too....