Anchorage, Alaska

I'm in transit. Yay, airport wireless! Seven months in Taiwan and I didn't anticipate how good it would feel to be back in the U.S. I almost even just called it "America", which I avoid doing, as if Canadia, Brazilia and Nicaraguia aren't technically "America".

I'll be in the U.S. for two weeks, took a leave of absence from classes, and already have a plane ticket booked back to Taipei. Although I wonder how bad it would be to abandon the meager possessions I left in my apartment. The only thing of value is my cheap Konica-Minolta scanner, which is of no real value in the end. Turns out that photo store scans to CD turn out to be a coin flip better than this crap scanner.

If you're in the market to buy your own scanner, It's better to go all out and get a decent (read: more expensive) scanner. I digress.

Looking back at seven months, what a bone-head decision it was to move to Taipei. Another bad decision in a line of consistent bad life decisions I've made – a predictable consequence of a life motivated by suicide, or something along those lines. Whatever. I'm starting to wonder if it's not so bad to have a life motivated by the greed and material fulfillment. Motivated by making money, having a career, breeding having a family. . . no, I just can't see it.

I'm too pathetic to pursue a life of service, or something along those lines. Whatever.

So, looking back at seven months, what made me think I could actually learn that language? Mistake. Getting sucked into Hyun Ae's emotionally misguided manipulations was a mistake. If you have a boyfriend, act like you have a boyfriend. She has finally started to, but the damage has been done, and I know after we leave Taipei, we will not remain in contact because of her inconsistency. Anyway, mistake. Or karma.

Over the last seven months, my practice has been shredded to the point that even morning sitting has become optional. What the hell am I doing? I'm not going to be too hard on myself for that, though. I do agree with the idea from the Tibetan Book of the Dead that "who has a notion of practice can say that he or she is not practicing right now?" or something along those lines. Whatever.

All life, existence, and reality is practice. It is the path itself. Meditating on this moment itself, and all that my senses perceive, my surroundings, as pristine cognition, is practice. It doesn't, however, answer what the hell am I doing with my life.

Whoop, boarding. Gotta go.

3:00 p.m. - Taoyuan Int'l Airport. Indigenous tribal sculpture of a giant automobile gear shifter. Doesn't it make you want to grab it and ram it into fifth gear and drive, drive, drive! Curiously none of the other exhibits have anything to do with cars.

3:23 p.m. - 747.

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