the tinyblog

putting out

I've got to get some new skillz. I love to help people. I love to provide value to the world, especially value that hardly anyone else can provide. I love to be able to provide value for value, and help people in kind when they help me, without being asked. I love to put out. When I put out, the world works. When I don't, the world breaks.

unskilled willing hands

I have two hands and am willing, and that is good. When I go to people's houses I like to wash their dishes and clean their kitchens. Even bathrooms are not too bad, especially if they start out really dirty, because then they look so transformed when I'm done. I like to weed. It makes me feel good, to do these little things for people that I know they are dreading anyway, but sometimes it makes them feel wierd.

massage

I can do massage. I do! I love it. But it's just so damn hard to get people to ask for it and show up for it. I can ask people if they want massage, but let me tell you how sick a person can get of hearing, "It's okay. I'm fine." I'm sure you are, you wall of man, you tide of woman. Plus. I know I'm the human bulldozer, not everyone wants to let me push and pull at them. And massage...it's so personal. People have to really let you in. It's even more personal than dishes. Well, to some people. But it's true I love to work for people that way, grabbing tissue and making it warm and liquidy. Another downfall is that it's more useful if you can work with a person regularly, and that's very hard to do in this busy world.

(Sometimes though, even one time can really help. I had a wonderful time the other day. I went over to a friend's house and he had an ice pack on his arm. He said he was getting tennis elbow and he didn't even play tennis! "Lemme at it!" I said, "it's tendonitis and you should have told me before." I pulled and dug at his arms for a half an hour and then he moved and twisted his hands in surprise. "It. It doesn't hurt. Hey, isn't that crazy? It doesn't hurt!" he said to the other people on the couch. "It feels like cool water running through my veins." he said to me quietly.)

10010100

Computer Skillz I have. That's for damn sure. I can program in a few languages. I understand the languages of display and the languages of the web very well. I know how to take people's gestating ideas and craft them into something and help them publish it. Publish. I can publish on the web and I can publish in print.

I know about filesystems and file types. I know how to make a computer usable...to put important icons where people will easily find them. I know how to research and find the best free piece of software for any job. I know how to help people organize information and display it. I know how to architect an idea and turn it into a computer program. I know how to get music in all it's formats and convert them, rip them and burn them and all the other violence you can do to music. I can write. Some would say.

But...I can't be in front of a computer endlessly. I have to find some things I can do to be useful that are not in front of a computer. I like the computer, I love the computer. I live the computer, anyone who knows me knows it's true. But as I get older I'm going to have to grow away from it. Perhaps as I make my fortune I can begin to step away from the stiff ways humans have to interact with computers.

pregnant!

I feel so pregnant right now. A few days ago I had some mad council (counsel?) of men, and it left me feeling full and generous and grown up and mature. Like I want to test my own mettle, cradle people, lift them up.

In February and March I get to teach another web class. Teaching is wonderful, but in order to teach computer stuff you have to sit and research and prepare course materials...in front of a computer.

I'm not talking about crafts... I'm talking about real useful skillz that if I spend my time doing them they actually make other people's lives easier. Like...carpentry seems cool. Trying my hand at little bits of jewelrymaking with Andrew Dunloy has been nice. I even tried a bit of bookbinding. It's just hard to make a new committment to something and be bad at something at first. I think that's a big part of the reason grown-ups get so set in their ways. They hate to have to do something and be really shitty at it for a long time. I do anyways.

Well, in the meantime...computers and massage and dishes are okay. I'm just thinking aloud. I love to put out.