The view from my lanai this morning was crystal clear. Thanks to a storm system moving across the Pacific, the vog from the bubbling volcano has been blown away, leaving a razor sharp horizon line and a birds-eye view of the Kona coastline. After almost 5 years here on the big island, I’m once again packing my things and headed for a new environment.
I’ve adjusted and fallen into the rhythms of the island culture, found a way to draw off the volcanic intensity without being overwhelmed by it, found a way to continue moving forward despite the kick-back, do-nothing vibe that permeates this place.
Been working on the land, the Aina, most of time here, and this next shift will bring me back in direct contact, moving to an end-of-the-road, upcountry property in Maui. I’m eager to move on, been living in a 2 bedroom condo with all the conveniences of modern life for the past year or so, and while the bourgeois life has its perks, it dulls the basic survival skills that you use on a daily basis living closer to the land.
My personal and professional paths are beginning to intertwine in a very constructive and productive manner. While my revolutionary views have shifted in my time away from street activism, the anti-authoritarian and autonomous values I adopted during my time within the anarchist movement are still very much a part of my life. My focus has shifted from directly attacking the prevailing power structure to a more organic form of subversion, creating a more autonomous lifestyle by way of sustainable building and living practices. As the capitalist system dictates who controls the power (money), by living in a self-reliant, self-sustainable way, growing our own food, creating our own sources of energy through solar, tidal and wind generators, using bicycles and public transit instead of resource-guzzling automobiles, we can actually weaken the system by not supplying it with our money, the only thing that gives it power in the first place. (Check out the Creeper News 2.0 blog for more on this topic in the upcoming communiqué “Revolutionary Consumerism”)
Hawaii taught me this, in a large part, how to hold onto my core beliefs while still progressing on a professional level. I may be anti-capitalist, but I’m a realist as well, and I understand that in order to achieve the goals I want to achieve, it will take a certain economic foothold to move forward. We live within a society where money talks, and if you don’t have any, it’s hard to make your voice heard.
So I’ve developed a set of skills that have a decent monetary value, as well as the greater value of being able to provide for myself without relying heavily on external power structures.
Utilizing these skills as both a means of income and a way of creating alternative living practices and lifestyles, for the first time in my long journey through a sea of menial labor and customer service jobs, I finally have found an occupation that I enjoy. Not that my love of woodworking and carpentry is anything new, but combining it with the D.I.Y. elements of the sustainability movement and actively working towards creating more autonomous buildings and communities is exactly in line with the shift in consciousness I want to help spread in the world.
While my writing has taken a back burner in the past few years, the Egyptian Revolution and subsequent middle east and Wisconsin uprisings stirred up some inspiration and I’ve started a couple new projects that are starting to take form. Check out the Creeper News 2.0 facebook page and website for some of my more journalistic pursuits. I’m also working on a couple short stories and hoping to get back into the spoken word/slam poetry scene in Maui.
Going through my first Saturn Return has been powerful, humbling, and eye-opening. Beginning with my shoulder injury, the past 6 month or so have been kicking my ass.
As I meditate to try and relieve some of the pressure and tension, I’ve been flashing back to different memories, different points in my life where a decision was made or action was taken that dictated the course of the next few months, years, worldview, personality, etc. I marvel at the seeming cyclical nature of my life, this constant phoenix metamorphosis of death and rebirth on so many levels. I sink deeper, see how the patterns correspond to history, to the rise and fall of civilizations, the birth of ideas, religions, these basic patterns in human nature we all seem to follow, no matter how conscious or aware of our own behavior we may be. I’ve been re-questioning concepts of Fate, Destiny, recalling the stories of the three Norns of Norse mythology, questioning if indeed there may be some kind of underlying pattern to our lives rather than just chaos and the reaction of the choices we make. It seems the closer I get to my self-created (or was it? See, this is what I’m talking about) path, this balance of intellectual idealism and physical labor, the more doors and opportunities present themselves. The closer I am to the land, the more I help it grow and thrive, the stronger and healthier I become myself. Finding this symbiosis between myself and the land, my mind and body, my worldview and reality is something I continue to actively work towards.
I can’t say if I was called to Hawaii or the series of events and lifestyle choices in my early 20’s deposited me here, but I resonate with this place on a deep level and I’m not leaving the islands anytime soon. With my 30th birthday looming on the horizon, I have a deep urge and desire to move forward on my life’s path, buy a truck, get writing published, start a remodel/retrofit business, record an album, buy some land, build a house, grow some trees and plant some seeds, establish a base so I can travel around the world and have some place to go back to I can truly call my own. I realize this may not happen for a number of years, but by being proactive now, I’m optimistic that I can make this dream a reality.
As I develop my other blog to focus on political and revolutionary topics, I’m planning on shifting this site to explore more of my personal, creative projects. I plan on publishing some of my poetry/spoken word stuff as well as some sci-fi/speculative fiction stories I’ve been working on, alongside my rambling musings on the universe and our planet. Stay tuned, there is much to be said.
