"E-scape" and the Tree

It is ironic to me
how some seemingly
positive cultural adaptations

resulting in access to instant gratification,

is changing the way people see and experience the world.


From

sky-scape
 to land-scape

to house-scape

to screen-scape


and an even smaller

screen-scape of a "Lilliputian"

virtual digital dimension

in a smart phone.


I too cannot "e-scape" this,

as I have finally given in

and signed up

for a "smart" phone
"plan".


I had a beautiful,
perfect shaped giant oak tree
that Hurricane Ivan destroyed

and left as a shape of
a dinosaur skeleton.

I had lights around the tree
pointed up into the branches,

which often gave me a sense of bliss

standing in my back yard
staring up at the tree,

"land-scaped" by stars behind it.


I had no idea how much I loved that tree,
 
as I could not imagine anything
taking away something

so solid,

strong,

and alive.


Eventually after it was gone,

I realized how big and beautiful
the sky had become
in my backyard,

providing
even

a greater
sense

of awe
and beauty.


From the stump of the tree,

a twig grew that my spouse wanted me to clip,

but I refused to because it was what was left of my beloved tree.


I use to take a lot of pictures of my yard
and my plants who I felt like were my loved ones,

but when I first experienced immune system issues
and could no longer take care of them as I used to

I lost some of that close connection to my yard.

That twig I saved from the clippers 9 years later
has became a 30-foot clone of its predecessor

that for some reason I noticed today


in the same glory as the same tree

that was there before.


Life is amazing.

And so is adversity.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MbGTQbzou8


Autism, the Internet and "Ideological First Identity", a Collection of Thoughts:

http://katiemiaaghogday.blogspot.com/2013/05/autism-internet-and-ideological-first.html

"AutisticS Peeks!"


It's Good

to Hear

ya
:)!
*

(:@@
@:)
!*



AS
P:
Autistic Spectrum
Perception

and

Perspective

Challenging Alexithymia with Music

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SApGpWf2dg

"Challenging Alexithymia" by KATiE MiA/Aghogday
AKA "Nautilus", linked in the Blog post below. :)


Autism and the Nautilus:

http://katiemiaaghogday.blogspot.com/2013/04/autism-and-nautilus.html


I struggled with Alexithymia, off and on, during the course of my life.

The Piano helped me gain access and a language for emotions from age 12.

I also found it more fully opened a pathway of emotion in my brain, enhancing my verbal speaking skills in connecting with people.  My fine motor skills were not good, but never the less, I could play by sheet music well enough to gain a benefit.

My emotions were also generated by the "Spirit of Radio".  It seems like the "Spirit" of "Complex Emotion" and "Meaningful" lyrics in music is fading with time, with all the new available avenues to stimulate one's mind.


"The Spirit of Radio" by Rush:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZ84JkYDa3U

My favorite song to generate emotion from playing piano by Sheet Music is "Stairway to Heaven" by Led Zeppelin:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pPvNqOb6RA

I found much of my emotion in nature.  The song linked below, "Moonlight Feels Right", gives me a feeling of Moonlight, from a gifted musician who found a way to adequately describe moonlight in music and lyrics, in a nuanced upbeat way.  It is one of the few songs, I don't get tired of listening to.  It is mesmerizing to me in a happy way.


"Moonlight Feels Right" by Starbuck:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwOirZ-rg6Q

I always wanted to create music without a guide, and during a period of chronic stress when I found myself losing all connection to emotions, the result was the Piano music I now call "Challenging Alexithymia With Music" and "Nautilus".  I finally took the time recently to upload it to a YouTube video format, from a low quality recording I had off of a voice recorder.

Interestingly, part of how I was diagnosed with Alexithymia was when I could not describe an emotion for the music that I suddenly was able to create.

My spouse's brother has a gift of emotional insight.  He described the music as "a lonely ghost wandering the earth, not realizing they were dead".  My spouse had previously described it as what sounded like "a tortured soul".

I doubt anyone who has not experienced Alexithymia can personally relate to the music, in the context of Alexithymia.  Never the less, there may be someone out there that can. :)

Note:

The recording volume for this music plays very low on mobile phones and tablets.  The music sounds distorted when the volume is turned up.

I attempted a louder recording input version at this link: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkr5RSLmZnI
 
It plays at increased volume, however it still may sound distorted on mobile phones and tablets.

The sound does not seem distorted on Desktop computers at low volume.

A "Timeless" Song

"Dream Weaver" by Gary Wright:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-DmAh0dObI

I created a poll on the Wrong Planet website, linked below, where the issue of Alexithymia and whether or not emotions were evoked from the music and could be described in words, was discussed in detail.

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt225739.html


Autism, the Internet and "Ideological First Identity", a Collection of Thoughts:

http://katiemiaaghogday.blogspot.com/2013/05/autism-internet-and-ideological-first.html

"AutisticS Peeks!"


It's Good

to Hear

ya
:)!
*

(:@@
@:)
!*



AS
P:
Autistic Spectrum
Perception

and

Perspective

KATiE MiA/Aghogday: My Perspective on Life

I think I was born as a kind of classical pantheist,

as I saw patterns and connections in things
that were more of my thinking process,

along with the tactile sensory world,

than what I think most people may experience
as an internal dialogue of thought.


"Time" by the Alan Parson's Project:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3T6IsXyq68

I still have a vivid memory
of connection to everything in the world,

as if I had been here
forever,

before I was able to speak
that I cannot fully put into words,

from about age 3
looking out into the distance

over the river
I grew up next to.

But I think in some ways
I knew more about my existence then
than I do now,

as I could not separate myself
from what seemed

like a very old home of nature.

                                                    

I am glad I had the opportunity
to roam desolate pristine beaches

as a teenager and young adult,

without any fear,

and feeling one in being

with the waves,

white sand,

emerald green gulf,

sea oats and seagulls,

with no dramas in my head.

But even my ancestors could not experience that
with not being sure where their next meal
was going to come from.

Not likely that many creatures in the Universe
could experience a little slice of nirvana like that.

I can remember getting back into my car
and being jolted back into the reality 

of all that is the complexity of modern culture,

which at
that point

in time
 was so,
so limited

as compared
to today.

I was never quite the same
after home computers came along,

as I drifted further
and further

from a home
of nature.

The people I dealt with in the public
at that time,

in what was a “Cheers” like
environment,

was also a slice of nirvana.


Cigarette filled,

but the emotional contagion
of a hundred human beings

that are happy
that I had the privilege to serve

and make even happier, 

equaled the nirvana
of the walks

on the
sun-filled
beaches.

          

"Mr. Blue Sky" by ELO:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFtTTBDGlbk

I loved my exquisite sensory experience of life...

It was worth
not being able to touch

man made texture
without goose bumps

and an incredible feeling
of discomfort.

When I see Landon Bryce’s book,
“I Love My Own Autistic Self”,

the little guy on the front
is how I usually felt
inside

that people could only see
in the gleam
of my
eyes.


People often told me
they wished they had
what it was I had,

or wanted some
of the drugs I was taking,

but I had no idea what they were talking about
because there was nothing I wanted
but to exist,

for so many years…

It was a powerful feeling
that no one’s negativity
could take away
from me,

not even when the rest
of the world
told me

I was not
one of their kind.

Sorry,

that was quite a tangent,

but it is kind of therapeutic for me;

I hope you don’t mind…


My point I started off with was religion
and classic pantheism,

which is all of nature and science for me;

the cultural complexity of what has come
from human collective intelligence,

including all the strange oddities,
even the strangest of religious cults and beliefs.


But most of all

the reality of that beach

those waves,

and 

those grains of sand,

that do not exist

without me.

                                                   

A gift,

a wonderful gift

that was provided
by my father and mother,

and their ancestors

where there could be no break
in the chain of events

of human struggle

that all my ancestors experienced
to survive and reproduce,

and their rodent ancestors

about 75 million years ago,

and all the other ancestors not identified
and material substances that came together

to make that possible,

from the origin
of what is,

whatever
is, is.
That
one point

that I can only abstractly define
 because of the human collective intelligence

that provides the map

to what can be described,

as

one point

that we all share

that can never be disconnected,

as long

as we exist…

                                                    

Wow,
I just realized
that sounds kind of like
the intro

to the
“Big Bang Theory”
TV show…


And relatively speaking
the knowledge that I gained

that this is one sliver
of conscious existence

and what really is
a little slice of heaven
for some that do exist,

considering just the benefit
of a warm soft bed,
a hot shower,

and things
now considered
so mundane

that took billions of years
to come into existence

that were not here

a little over
a century
ago...


like toilet paper…


But I could never experience
that connection
of what 
is,

any
stronger 

than when
I
was
three.

I have everything
and everyone before me
to thank for that experience…
 
 Including collective intelligence
and the understanding 

of that one point
that still exists

in all of us

and everything else…


I never met a stranger,

not even a grain of sand
on the beach…


But I did not feel
a category,

a religion,

a race
or even

a gender
for myself,

which at least for me

enhanced the ability

to find a friend

in that grain 
of sand.

                                                            

I suppose it is
the immune system issues

and chronic pain

that has taken
some of that gleam
out of my
eyes,

but it still exists
in the eyes

in what
I perceive

of the
anthropomorphic
expression

of the cat
in my 

Facebook
photo.

                                        

Arthur

Who at 18 years old
is likely closer

to the wisdom
of that 

three-year
old

child


that only exists

in my memory

and pictures…


I sense that type of wisdom
requires no human intelligence at all

beyond the core
that is shared.

I think it can be lost
so much easier

in a human
into a little sliver of hell


somewhere outside
that balance of heaven.


Particularly
in lives

where
instant gratification

has become
the norm…


I am at the service
of my fully inside cat,

but he has never had that gleam
in his eyes,

or the same struggles
to survive.

Moby

                                                           

The yellow cat

in my Google plus avatar
on the “Autistic Hoya” website,

was a feral cat
that only knew struggles

in his several years of life
behind our house in the woods.

Yellow Boy

He became my emotions

after chronic pain
had removed them
from my existence.

He gained
a gleam in his eyes
of gratitude

to have a balance
in his life

when we
allowed him
a place

to gain
predictable
subsistence.

An identical yellow cat
that likely is his offspring,

younger and stronger

appears intermittently
out of the woods

and started to injure
our now neutered cat,

racking up $200 dollar vet bills,
every other week

so the once feral cat
has now been forced

to become
a fully inside cat.

I am watching him
slowly lose

 that gleam in his eyes,


with the call of the wild
slowly drifting away,
 
along with all the likely
incredible sensory experiences
that come with an outdoor world
 that the other cat 
that never gets injured 
in fights at age 18,
can still fully experience.

As I sit outside
toward the back of my yard,

in the afternoon sun,

he is pacing back and forth politely,
still with a humility of respect

for a place of subsistence

that keeps him from tearing
the screen of the patio.

Perhaps if he could speak
and let me know in words

what I was taking away from him,
I would listen.But I cannot bear the thought
of additional bloody wounds on his face.


But still I remember
what it means

to have 


that connection
and balance…

When I watch him
pace back and forth,

it is one
of the few things
in life

that will bring
a tear to my eye 

that reminds me
that I too

am still
connected.
:)



Other than that,
it could be

just a word
like Synesthesia

that seems
to trigger
something

in my brain

letting the brakes
off of logic

to move
into

figurative
space.


"Come Sail With Me" by Styx:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5MAg_yWsq8

At least for me,

even one word
can be a gift

that leads me
to a place
in words

that I don’t
often visit.
                                                        

*

KATiE MiAKind Autistics Taking in Everything Mindful in Awareness

(:@@@:)
Autistic Love
And the Science of Kindology
An Ideological First Identity

                                     

AGHOGDAY

Autism, the Internet and "Ideological First Identity", a Collection of Thoughts:

http://katiemiaaghogday.blogspot.com/2013/05/autism-internet-and-ideological-first.html

"AutisticS Peeks!"


It's Good

to Hear

ya
:)!
*

(:@@
@:)
!*



AS
P:
Autistic Spectrum
Perception

and

Perspective





Postscript


Visiting the Garden of  'Band Aid'

http://katiemiaaghogday.blogspot.com/2013/06/visiting-garden-of-band-aid.html





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