Paradigms

We are all (or atleast most) of us contained within one or more paradigms, one or more ways of thinking. Most of us think we are right, most of us think our way is the best way.

If you work with our hands, you might say "the basics are what is important, nothing else, only what you can see and touch matter and the working man is the ideal!"

If you are an academic you might say "education and concise thinking are important. Only through a highly disciplined and trained mind can we approach the truth!"

If you are an artist you might say "only the unsaid is important, since we cannot say the truth we must not say it, and retain only a sense of it in our minds. We may portray the truth through something else, hold it up as a signpost or symbol. There is truth in the hidden, in the obscure!"

If you are religious you might say "my god is the truth, and no other god, no other religion has the truth. If you join us, you will be saved!"

If you are a businessman you might say "the dollar is the bottom line. The free market will adjust to fill the desires and attitudes of the people, it is a system very close to perfection. Only through investing and spending money can we be integrated in society!"

And so on ... so it is very difficult to be sure that we are correct, that we have any hold on reality at all. If we are honest with ourselves, we realize that much of what we think (if not the entirety of what we think) has been trained. If we change fields, change friends, change countries, the way we think can change dramatically, can flip on its fragile head, can change colours, change textures.

Sometimes I think silence itself ... the pureness of observation ... the pureness of any experience or thought or emotion left to its own is as close as we may come to truth ... but this is still my paradigm, my training. Where is truth ... where is reality?

New Job?

I'm thinking of quitting my job. I'm starting to apply to other jobs now. I just applied to work as a health care aide in an old folks' home. I feel dirty working where I am now ... I guess I though that as a landscaper, I would mostly be helping plants grow, helping improve the aesthetics of lots and gardens and such, not killing plants and spraying toxic chemicals. I had originally agreed to two weeks of this, so I will finish it, and if I cannot return to landscaping, I will find new work.

On a happier note, I met a lady in Ali's cafe the other day who is actively engaged in community work and helping out the homeless who is looking for someone to help her with web design and help advise her about certain technology related things. It is very exciting ... I told her I would be ready in a couple of weeks ... that's a push, but I might be able to learn enough to start helping by then. I'm almost through learning basic HTML, then on to a bit of CSS ... and that's the basics of what she needs done! It makes me happy right now to think that I can actually be helping people out!

Whitecourt

We're in Whitecourt at the Green Gables in after spending our first day spraying for Esso out in the boonies near Judy Creek.

It was a bit of an eventful day. I caught an edge on a dirt road and nearly flipped the spray truck ... luckily my reflexes were in good shape. While mud was flying everywhere (I was half on and half off of the road), I was able to keep relatively flat and steer myself back on to the road. We saw a few deer and were also stopped by the DOT for missing a truck check. He then noticed all the other problems with our truck, such as not having original registration and insurance with us (only copies) and not having our weight and company name listed on the truck, having amber brake lights etc. Needless to say, Delta valley is not known for its attention to detail.

Although most of the spots we are spraying are small, the one we are at now is quite large ... probably 3 football fields in size. We are spraying it all with high powered spray guns attached to water tanks on our spray truck. The hardest part, funny enough, is keeping oneself in a straight line. The problem of perspective makes it quite difficult: I've found that I've had to try to pick a single, distant, point and keep myself straight with that. While using rocks as markers.

Monsanto, Esso and Herbicides

So I was asked to go out to Whitecourt last week for work to go "Spraying". I was somewhat excited. It would be tough to be without Ali, but it would be near Jasper and we would be put up in a hotel.

Today we had our orientation and readied the spray truck. The orientation was with Esso/Imperial Oil. As images from a National Geographic expose on Esso in Chad were running through my mind, we were being told that Esso had a great concern for the environment and safety, and that we should too. I was then given the MSDSs (Material Safety Data Sheets) for the chemicals we would be using to kill plant life near Esso's more remote properties. Monsanto produces both of these: Roundup and some other product that starts with a 'B'. We spray these from a truck wearing full body suits and full face masks. We look like something out of the X-files.

And it feels like the X-files. It breaks my heart. Unfortunately, I am committed as I said I would go for a week or two. This is before I knew it was work for Esso using Monsanto products. I feel Nauseous. I feel awful. I feel violated. I feel like a character out of Oryx and Crake.

You see, I have been thinking about many things lately. I was talking with friend about philosophy and direction in life. He said that wherever we picture ourselves being "ideally" is where we should aim for. I feel like for a long time I have been hiding from myself in some ways. Part of me has always been ashamed of being Buddhist. Somehow the stigma of the contemplative life here has worn on me, and I wish not to talk about it. But my reaction to this type of work, to the useless killing of plant life ... to the indirect support of repression through corporation ... it brings my values into question ... I feel like my decision here is an important one. But how to live a pure life? It is so frustrating! Sometimes I wish I could hide from it all.

Sometimes, silence is very noisy.

Changes

Work, work. My Monday-Friday of late has been filled with landscaping. It's hard work, and my muscles are starting to feel tired. It's good in that, by the end of the summer, I should be in good shape. I've bought some protein powder so that I can have protein shakes to help me build some muscle mass. I've already made some improvement:
At work, I've also been driving bobcats, loaders (the big machines with shovels), dumptrucks and such, shoveling rocks and dirt, laying grass, planting trees, fixing cement curbs, and more to come, apparently. My boss is leaving the company soon too, and wants me to replace him, so it looks like I may be a crew chief within a month or two as well.

On a more personal front, things are also good. I met an old friend at the Edmonton airport during her layover between flights, and we talked about life. She is such a free spirit ... now moving to Iqaluit from Toronto to work as a journalist. I think the older I get and the more people I meet, the more I realize how much possibility and diversity there is. With each step into new territory, we change ourselves while also changing our environment. Nothing is stable, nothing is complete, and the more we see and do, the deeper we see into life. That star in our minds and in our eyes is fed, and we move forward, inwards. I love my friends ... all of them. It seems that we (the friends of my age) are also getting older ... moving into our own. Perhaps for the first time, taking responsibility for our lives and creating our own little worlds: having serious relationships and thinking of children, our future and our world. It is a weird, but happy, feeling.

Also, as an early birthday present, Ali bought me a keyboard!! Beauty! I can now play piano and compose! She is so wonderful ... she has such a beautiful mind and heart! I hope you can all meet her some day.

Web develop!

This page is great if you're interested in learning how to create web pages:

http://www.w3schools.com/

Finished my second week of landscaping ... and my muscles are tired! On Friday, we laid sod (grass) for 11 hours ... I will definitely be buff by the end of the summer!

Took my bike out for the first time yesterday ... it's so nice to be active again, and to not have to wear a winter jacket! There are trails along the river valley which I will have to check out soon.

I'm also starting to get into photography too ... what do you think?:

Spiderman 3 and german

I watched Spiderman 3 yesterday: THE WORST MOVIE EVER MADE!!! The first half was bearable, but the cheese factor approached infinity in the second half! It was awful! Spiderman in front of an american flag, a nice little, poorly done homage to godzilla, and lots of really bad acting and non-sensically shortened plotlines. If you want to see it, don't ...

I did however, have a great walk with Ali and had my first lesson in German! I learnt the alphabet and a few nouns like dog, tree, light ... I half forget them now, but I'm having fun!

Grades

I received the last of my grades today, and I'm pretty happy: A+ in Biology, A in Chemistry, A in Physics, A- in Genetics. This means I now have an overall GPA (Grand Point Average) of 3.96 and, for application to med school, my pre-requisite average is 4.0 (since Genetics is not a pre-requisite). Ahhh, it feels like a great load has been lifted from my shoulders.

The job is going well, although I've just learned that they don't pay overtime, which is odd. I'll have to call the government to see whether that is legal, and possibly find a new job, or ask for a raise to compensate.

Epic

These last few days have been momentous!

Saturday, we had a party and my brother (who lives in Fort St. John) came down to see me which was really nice: I haven't seen him in ages!

We had a barbecue, and a fire and had some friends over, it was great.
That night we had one odd encounter and one act of anarchism. We realized early on that we didn't have enough wood for the fire. After searching the block, we decided to steal from corporate america by removing the palates being used as blockades for the drive-in at dirty bird (aka KFC) it was beautiful!

We were also digging gardens. The back garden went really well, and the dirt looks amazing, I can't wait to plant!!
We dug out oval-shaped gardens in the front for flowers, and were asked by a pair of inebriated adolescents whether we were digging a grave. We told them that, yes, we were, and that our cat had recently died, may he rest in peace. They told us they were very sorry for our loss, so we took two pieces of the broken dirty-bird palate and some candles and prayed in front of the flower garden. It was great. Certain unnamed members of our party then sang the american anthem in front of the "grave" ... may they now rest in peace ...
I also started working as a landscaper this Monday ... what a hard shift, from brainwork all day to body work all day ... I feel exhausted. On my first day, the hiring agency couldn't find my resume, or the wage we had agreed on, and I was told on the spot that I had to travel South, outside of the city limits (probably 20 km away). "Oh, you don't have wheels?" They asked, which had not been (like many things, I was to find out) discussed over the phone when I was hired. Thankfully my brother was in town, and was able to drive me there on my first day. It was a disorganized morning, one in which I wasn't really sure that I would get a ride back home or whether I would be able to commute with anyone to and from work until my brother had left. It's all good now, and I'll be making $15/hr and working about 10 hour days for the next four months. I was told today, that I might end up being a crew chief as I seem "responsible", life is good!

Ali still loves her job at the library too ... life is good!