100 things about me, the sequel

I first did this meme just about a year ago. Some of it is outdated now, but I'd rather preserve that one in its entirety and attempt to start all over. And hopefully I'll cover some new ground. I haven't read over last year's recently, so I'm only going by memory as far as what I've already said (so there will most probably be some overlap). With that said, let's see how this turns out.

1. I love food. Eating (and the activities surrounding it- cooking, baking, shopping, dumpstering, and shortly, growing, hunting, and gathering) is a central focus in my days right now (and, I imagine, for the rest of my life).
2. I was a picky eater throughout my childhood. That abruptly changed when I became vegetarian, nearly three years ago. But really, that was just a different form of pickiness. And now, as an omnivore, I'm still picky. It's just now I don't like to eat things like hydrogenated oils or refined sugars whereas during my childhood it was veggies and anything unfamiliar.
3. I'm planting the beginnings of a permacultural garden in my backyard this spring. And I will be exploring the urban landscape to see what wild edibles I can gather - dandelions, lamb's quarters, acorns in the fall - and what animals I can stalk - pigeons, rabbits, opossums.
4. This focus on food is part of a larger focus on moving ever more deeply into my body, into the physical world, and out of my head and intellect. As I continually shed those mental chains that tie me down in this civilized society, I am also acting to free my body from the cultural chains of malnutrition, sedentariness, and the corresponding lack of physical, emotional, and mental health inherent in such a society.
5. While my family still pays for health insurance for me, I consider the investment in high quality, nutrient-dense, whole foods as my primary health insurance.
6. To use Sandor Elix Katz's phrase, I am quickly becoming a fermentation fetishist. While, as yet, I have only fermented wheat flour and various juices (with delicious results almost every time), I expect to explore the wonders of vegetable and dairy ferments soon. I'm still trying to develop a taste for pickles in the mean time, but then again, I've probably never even seen a fermented pickle! It's most probably just that I don't like such a strong vinegar flavor (however, homemade raw apple cider vinegar is quite refreshing as a tonic, I've found).
7. I'll admit that this focus on my own personal health has been a relatively individualistic affair. As I withdrew myself from the obligations of a religion, of school, and of our culture in general, part of what I retracted was my sense of duty to be of service to others, to humanity in general.
8. Now, as I am rebuilding my sense of belonging - to a community of people and to a place - my desire to help other people is again slowly expanding. But this is on a much more limited scope - I desire to be of service to my family, to my friends, and to the land I live on. I imagine my past sweeping aspirations to be of service to all of humanity are gone for good, along with my former liberalism.
9. As I've already hinted at, my second main, and growing, focus has been on building community. It's taken a while to fully reintegrate myself in my family after returning from my 9 month long excursion into dorm "life" (a pivotal period of growth for me that probably wouldn't have been possible without the physical separation from my parents, for which I am grateful). But I again feel very much at home here, which has in turn provided me the security to go out and build deeper connections with people, the potential beginnings of a tribe - just a twinkle in my eye at this point.
10. I have a lot of intellectual motivation towards jumpstarting this permaculture experiment in my family's backyard because it brings my two biggest priorities together - 1) providing food, 2) for not only myself, but for my family and friends as well. Also, 2b) this project combines my more personal anthropic interests with my desire to rebuild and nourish the wider ecological community that I am a part of. I expect the emotional motivation to kick in as spring grows closer. And, of course, this is all a nod in acknowledgment to times to come when I expect supermarket shelves to be much less burdened.
11. I retook the Jung/Myers-Briggs personality type test, and I'm still right there between ISFP and INFP.
12. Just from reading the descriptions of the types (or all the introvert ones anyway), I think I was more TJ when I was in school.
13. I also retook the Political Compass test, but I found that when I took it the first time, when I didn't have an answer to a proposition readily available in my mind, I fell back on my former liberal paradigm to answer them more quickly. So I decided to retake the test several times, playing with how I answered the propositions until I felt that I was answering all of them as true as possible to my current view of the world. It was rather hard, as some propositions just simply don't fit in at all (such as the proposition, "Controlling inflation is more important than controlling unemployment" - since I would like to see both money and work abolished). With that said, my final score this time around was economic: -.88, libertarian/authoritarian: -7.54.
14. I'm perplexed as to how I have a more moderate score on the latter "axis" this year as opposed to last year, when I scored a -8.41 (yes, I did go back to check on that). I don't know what I could be answering more moderately in that regard. Oh well.
15. On the Kinsey scale, I am about a 1.5. (that quiz I just linked to there is actually for the Klein scale, which is shifted one number up, meaning when I took it, I scored 2.5 overall. I don't know what Klein was thinking, making it so confusing.)
16. That said, the Kinsey scale is based on binary gender (only addressing the problem of the binary view of sexuality), and so that 1.5 does not take into account the possibility of sexual attraction to someone who is trans, intersex, and/or genderqueer.
17. I, myself, identify as genderqueer. So whereas in the past, I would have said that I was bi-curious, I would now use the term pansexual or omnisexual. Or simply sexual.
18. These are probably a lot of new terms for some people, but I've got yet another one for you while we're at it. I am also polyamorous. I have yet to actually be with more than one partner at the same time, but I am open to the possibility.
19. Actually, even with the one person I considered a partner in my history, it has always primarily been a friendship in my eyes. I prefer not to stratify different relationships into distinct levels of intimacy (with labels like partner). As with everything, it is a continuum, and polyamory is simply there as an explanation of why I would not artificially limit or cut off love where it is blooming simply because I'm already loving another person at a similar level of intimacy. Jealousy is for insecure people.
20. I haven't talked about this stuff here yet because abnormal sexual behaviors and preferences are rather taboo in the culture of my extended (Roman Catholic) family, and many people within my extended family read this blog. It still takes me a while, on occasion, to work up the courage to ruffle feathers and rock boats.
21. Also because of my Roman Catholic upbringing, I did not masturbate until I was a senior in high school (shortly after the time that I stopped considering myself Roman Catholic). I was socialized as a child to view sex and pleasure as negative and shameful. I grieve that that form of play was entirely absent from the whole of my childhood.
22. I am strongly resentful towards the industrial education I was subjected to and eventually subjected myself to which taught me to fear breaking from what is normal or expected of me. I have been so for some time now and am still figuring out how to move towards resolving some of the damage done. I consider this right here, this baring of my soul indiscriminately to family and strangers alike, as therapy towards that very end. It's the conversations that occur in real life as a result of this blog that actually do the healing. Every time I say something here that I fear my family will reject me over, and they keep on loving and accepting me for who I am, I heal a little more.
23. I've been in a relaxed, mostly pleasant, state of anomie since I left school (about 9 months now).
24. But I've recently begun to get more focused, developing my self-discipline, becoming more proactive. It feels good to not have someone telling me what to do, but also to start to have a clue as to what I want to do.
25. I'm a pretty spiritually focused person, but it has taken a long while to untie myself from all the bindings with which the religion of my childhood held me down. I miss the sense of community and the meaning of shared rituals, but when I've revisited such community and rituals (as an observer, a tag-along), it felt stale and almost tacky. Part of my renewed focus has been directed towards recreating rituals for myself and rebuilding community with whom to share them.
26. I am not a theist, at least not in the personal, big guy with a white beard, sky-father sense. I revere life and have faith in the universe that it will provide for me until it is time for "me" to compost and metamorph into hundreds of new living beings, just as so many formerly living beings live on through me (see #1).
27. I sense no inherent meaning or purpose in this life, in this universe, other than to play.
28. I don't use shampoo or soap ever when I bathe, and I bathe about every 10 days. Occasionally I use baking soda and/or apple cider vinegar on my hair.
29. I don't use deodorant. I hate the smell of deodorants and perfumes. Pheromones are a huge turn on for me.
30. . . . as is body hair. I don't shave, I trim. And the only thing I trim is what has come in so far of my beard (mostly a goatee at this point). My hair is blonde, but my beard has a sweet reddish twinge to it.
31. I still haven't cut my hair (it's been over a year and a half now), so it's getting a little longer than shoulder length in the back. I imagine I'll start cutting it again sometime this spring or summer, in stages, playing with it along the way. Or I might wait until I have more of a beard.
32. I am tall and very skinny. I have little hope of gaining weight, since both my dad and grandpa were lean until they became more sedentary, and I don't foresee becoming sedentary, even just considering all the biking to come.
33. Before I broke my left thumb in kindergarten, I was ambidextrous. Ever since, I've been right dominant. I want to recultivate my ambidexterity.
34. I have a small third nipple below my right one. As a kid, my mom told me/thought it was a birth mark, but it is the same color as my other nipples, and it has an indentation in the center, indicating an opening to a milk duct in my opinion.
35. I've heard of instances of male lactation. That possibility is exciting to me.
36. I wish I still had my foreskin. I feel overexposed and am definitely desensitized without it.
37. I only wear clothing for warmth and to not make other people uncomfortable. I do not have any body shame. I've been naked in regular social situations (i.e. with or in front of lots of people, and not just in the locker room) and have been completely comfortable.
38. I wear the same items of clothing day after day, only switching out individual articles when they actually become dirty.
39. I enjoy being very extroverted with my physical appearance- funny hats, dorky outfits, skirts, stick on tattoos .
40. It's counterintuitive, since I'm introverted in so many other ways, and this practice of wearing unusual clothing (or nothing at all in some cases) obviously draws attention to myself. But it kind of makes sense if I view it as a kind of prop I carry around to have something to talk about. Like readymade small talk.
41. I'm thinking about getting a real tattoo soon.
42. I am usually barefoot during the warmer half of the year. I'm still working on thickening up my soles. The other half of the year, my feet get too cold, even inside.
43. I've been told I am a good dancer. It takes a while for me to warm up on the dance floor though.
44. I like the taste of alcohol but not being drunk.
45. I do not drink coffee. I avoid most forms of caffeine most of the time. I don't like feeling jittery.
46. I have never smoked anything, and I have little desire to do so.
47. There's a fine line for me between outlets I use to numb and distract myself with and outlets I use to learn, expand, and be inspired. I refer mostly to the internet and movies.
48. I avoid televisions. The high pitched whistle they produce in the background (which you can really hear when the thing is first turned on) drives me crazy.
49. My favorite movie at the moment is shortbus.
50. I dropped out of college after freshman year because it was boring and expensive.
51. I view college as a kind of professional dominatrix that people go to because they are either habituated into submitting or they actually enjoy it. I wasn't enjoying the intellectual BDSM, and I certainly didn't want to pay for it, so I broke the habit.
52. However, I am not in debt as a result of that year, thankfully. And that is entirely due to the generosity of my family, both extended and immediate. Without their help, I would have almost no chance of making my way out of this prison.
53. My brother and I are unschooling each other. We read, we play, we construct things, we deconstruct things. We're exploring. And we're healing. Yes, there's lots of time for healing.
54. I am most awake towards the end of my day, and I get the most accomplished when other people are either not around or are asleep, so I usually consider myself a night person.
55. But I love sunlight! And early mornings are always so awesome when I see them (i.e. when I stay up all night). I'm attempting to wake up earlier these days, before my mom and brother get up, so that it's light out and people are still asleep. I've been enjoying that time, but it doesn't last long enough for me to be awake enough to accomplish anything. I'll keep experimenting, waking up earlier. The most important realization I had when I first started doing this is that I don't have to set a bedtime, only a wake up time, and then go to bed when I'm tired.
56. None of my physical senses are particularly acute or supernormal, but they aren't lacking either. I'd love to focus some attention on increasing how much I can perceive with them.
57. My intuition, what I would call a sixth sense, is off and on, but I expect I would notice it being much more accurate if I consciously put more faith in it.
58. I love being around nonhuman animals, but the idea of having pets seems silly to me. Pets either serve as surrogates to receive the excess affection and grooming energy that would, in a healthy culture, go into strengthening social ties with other humans, or they serve simply as commiserators in our cages of domestication. Or both.
59. That said, my family has two dogs, whom I love almost as much as the rest of my family.
60. I hate clocks, especially ticking ones. I never wear a watch. If I have to look at a clock, I find analog secondhandless clocks to be least offensive.
61. I also do not like mirrors at all. They usually serve only to spur on either one's narcissism or self-hatred, usually alternating back and forth between the two. I think the faces of my friends and family serve as reflection enough.
62. I really like other kinds of tools, though, like bicycles and the internet. And language and fire.
63. I've recently gotten really into yoga, and I've been going to classes. I hope to get to a point where I practice daily on my own.
64. I've been journaling more regularly in a paper journal, but I don't go very deep yet.
65. I started knitting a scarf last winter. At this point, it's still little longer than a foot long. It's my first knitting project.
66. Sometimes, when I'm in a good mood, I spontaneously sing songs or hum tunes or just make sounds.
67. I also relish in groaning while in pain or moaning while in pleasure.
68. When walking, I'll also spontaneously do a little dance or jig along the way sometimes.
69. There's a subtle change I've noticed within myself as I've grown older, which I don't like, that I tend to eliminate certain actions I've judged to be not energy efficient enough. Mostly, I think this has developed as a survival mechanism to have enough energy to put into schooling, and it's overall effect has been a reduction in my creative, spontaneous energy. Perhaps I can recultivate this lost energy by purposefully doing more spontaneous, seemingly frivolous (to my current, wounded paradigm) things, like playing outside in the dirt, or going on long walks with no intended destination (ooh, barefoot, too!). I think this could work!
70. I enjoy musical artists who use regular instruments in very unusual ways (like Sigur Ros) and others who use very irregular instruments in their usual ways (like Neutral Milk Hotel).
71. I squat when I poop.
72. I usually only know about current events (i.e. events going on at a level beyond my monkeysphere) through word of mouth or whatever filters through to the tiny portion of the blogosphere that I read.
73. My favorite general category of foods to eat, based on taste and how it makes me feel, is fats, especially saturated fats. Bacon, coconuts, butter, mmmm. I'm shameless about this fact.
74. I have no handle on the specifics of what I'll be doing two years from now, and while that fact leaves me feeling a little unsettled, I also find it very exciting.
75. I either want to die in a very exciting and dramatic fashion or in my home, conscious, surrounded by the people I love. I don't want to be a vegetable. I don't want to be a machine. I don't want to have a cabinet full of little orange bottles to keep my body from falling apart.
76. When I do die, I either want to be buried in a simple wooden box, or even better, just straight in the ground, by or underneath a garden, tree, or compost pile. And no dressing me up in a suit. I'd rather be naked, to be honest, but anything would be better than a suit. Make-up and formaldehyde are out of the question.
77. Death and destruction don't bother me nearly as much as they used to (like, say, when I was a pacifist vegetarian). I understand death and destruction to be integral to life and creation. Upon a little contemplation, I can easily reach a place of acceptance and courage about "my" inevitable end.
78. I like watching the compost pile shrink.
79. And, to quote Maude, I like watching things grow.
80. I've already grown a lot as a person, but I can't wait to see how much I change in the future.
81. When I was really young, I remember a friend and me eating ants. Even then, I had tendencies towards hunting and gathering.
82. I remember when I was about 8 or 9, a friend and I were play fighting with little swiss army knives. I got a cut on my hand. I think that might be the most dangerous, risky, "no-no" thing I did as a kid. Well, as a conscientious kid. My mom says that when I was an exploring toddler, I was climbing on an open window and might have fallen out if she hadn't sensed that I was in danger from a different room and came running. Anyway, the point was that other than these things, I had a very safe, bland childhood.
83. When I got legos, I would construct the models, roleplay a little bit with the characters, and then just put them on a shelf to look at and collect dust.
84. I got good at the school game sometime during first grade. That's when I first learned to feign enthusiasm. By third grade, I forgot I was feigning it.
85. I got good at the religion game around seventh grade. My service project before confirmation was probably where I first got addicted to the praise I received for doing such "service" activities. Anything to get in good with the masters.
86. I never cussed in grade school. One time, probably in eighth grade, I accidentally said "shit" instead of "spit", and I was so appalled that that slipped out of my mouth that I developed a sore throat. No joke. Another time, when I was alone in my bedroom, I whispered the word "fuck" to myself in the mirror to see what would happen. Nothing happened, but I was still a little scared. Another time, sometime after I learned that there was one unforgivable sin, I ended up accidentally thinking the thought of what I considered to be blaspheming the holy spirit, and I neurotically couldn't stop thinking that terrifying thought over and over again. Terrifying because I thought that it might mean that I was going to hell.
87. I don't let words have any undue power over me anymore. Fuck that shit.
88. At the point, or shortly after the point that I was at the peak of my religious purity kick, I actually felt like I had reached a peak in my spiritual journey, that there wasn't anything new to do or discover. I felt like I was sentenced to repeat the same exact experiences, cycles, and rituals for the rest of my life. Naturally, I found this prospect rather boring, and so began my descent from the formerly sisyphean hill of religion and the pursuit of purity.
89. I can't tell if I'm still descending or if I've started up another hill, or if this metaphor no longer holds any meaning or relevance to my life as I now live it. All I know is that I relish in being dirty, impure, fuzzy around the edges, contradictory, undefined, obscure, unlimited . . .
90. To quote the eight rather you didn'ts of the flying spaghetti monster, purity is for drinking water, not people.
91. Lately, I've become rather attached to thinking of St. Louis as my home. Apparently, if you touch the arch, you're doomed to stay here or come back here, so I've heard.
92. I have very little desire at the moment to live in the wilderness (and no desire to live in it alone). Instead I want to bring the wilderness back into this city, beginning with my heart. And then my yard. Then the neighborhood. Guerrilla gardening ninjas, woo!
93. Shortly after I started descending from the religion peak, I questioned whether I was already at the peak of my radicalism (although I didn't think about it in these terms, nor did I connect the two trains of thought). I thought to myself, what part of my life have I not radically changed my ideas about?
94. I saw the beginning of that transformation as my switch to a veg diet. Then I got more liberal and pro-rights.
95. Then, mid senior year, almost at the same time, both my politics and how I viewed my body had a major shift, into anarchism and nudism, respectively.
96. By the end of senior year, I dropped the RC church and unhealthy celibacy in favor of finally allowing myself to have a girlfriend.
97. Over that summer, I became anti-work, and at the beginning of college, anti-school and anti-civ.
98. By november of that year, I was no longer a theist. I've dropped the -isms as much as possible, and now I'm moving towards a focus on being pro- things.
99. And to complete the circle, I'm eating meat again, but with so much more consciousness and deliberateness about it.
100. I leave the question that spawned all this open, because without ideology, there's no possible end goal! Only the continued exploration and expansion of play and love.