#and that its really the only environment for her that is conducive to fully truly healing and being at peace

[dbssh]

my take on starscream and windblade is i genuinely think their dynamic by the end of the series rocks. when starscream is incredibly fond of her and respexts her and sees her as not only an incredibly capable leader but a fundementally good and better person. and windblade is like 😬 starscream? well shes dead now so we never ever have to unpack all that. so uh. lets move on.

#SHE DOESNT FUCKING LIKE HER. #like i think if stsc had lived windblades general opinion wouldve been girl im proud of you and your #growth or whatever but like can you retire or something. stay away from me. #like i think wb meant it when she said she wanted stsc to get better and believed she could. but i dont think theyre ever going to be #friends. im of the opinion that death + the haunting is the best ending for starscream #and that its really the only environment for her that is conducive to fully truly healing and being at peace #like idk i think she was miserable and there would be no future in which people let her 'escape punishment' nor one where shes interested #in doing that even with bee and windblade in her corner. and i just idk #i think she needs space to be alone out from the public eye #and away from all the pressures that kept her spiraling over and over her whole life #and i just. the way exrid was set up i just dont think there was room for her to do that on cybertron #but i dont think shes healthy enough to realize that and leave #and i think 'noble sacrifice that returns her dignity and gives her comfort' #and 'true freedom to be herself no more and no less with the company of someone who actually likes and cares about her with no #responsibility or risk to her physical or mental health' #is like. really the best of both worlds i think it was good for her. #fix its where she gets brought back are cute and all but honestly i dont know. would she even want that. it would change everything #when shes finally for once comfortable and at peace #yk sometimes death is a GOOD THING IN NARRATIVES and she DIDNT EVEN REALLY ALL THE WAY DIE so like i thibk its fine. #i miss her tho. god i miss idw.

[beardyallen]

Bad news, guys...

Alright, so I’ve decided that, seeing as I’ll be visiting W-Town and the Great Wall again in May (when it will be waaaaay prettier), I’ll just do a post about it then.

Suffice it to say, it was a dope trip.

HOWEVER!!!!! I’ll tell y’all about my time since. The major highlight since the W-Town trip was obviously St. Patrick’s Day. I was somewhat nervous, given that most of the people I’ve met here probably wouldn’t want to celebrate the way that my family (which is way better at St. Patrick’s Day than your family, thank-you-very-much) celebrate.

There were no green alligators or long-necked geese, and that bleeding pub didn’t catch fire. Certainly not 12 times!! I suppose I still saw the same number of unicorns as usual, but I think I would have had bigger problems if there more.

My plan for that day was to make it to Paddy O’Shea’s Pub, the Irish pub of Beijing, by 12pm on the 17th. As it turns out, the Pub had started their St. Patrick’s Day celebration on the 16th because they knew some people wouldn’t want to be completely hungover for work the next day.

For me, though, 12pm on the 17th seemed a perfect time to start as it would be 12am on the morning of my grandmother’s would-be 91st birthday. I could go on and on about how wonderful that woman was, and how big of an impact she had on me, but I’ll just say this: she was a good Bud. I’m obviously incredibly thankful for this teaching opportunity, but I’m struggling with being okay about missing out on St. Patrick’s Day in Northern Michigan this year. At least I was there last year and for Christmas and the New Year. That will have to be enough.

Anyway, I went with ML, S and another neighbor L, none of whom have ever truly celebrated St. Patrick’s Day like an American, let alone a Sylvain, but they were open to trying. And I was the one leading the group, which I still think is strange as I thought I was the least capable of the 4 of us at guiding a group through this very Chinese city. Fortunately, that compass in my brain works just as well on this side of the world as it does state-side.

Oh, and I looked damn fine, if I do say so myself!

We were a tad late to Paddy O’Shea’s, but the beer came quickly enough, and it tasted almost as good as it would have at the Side Door Saloon.

I didn’t take a picture of the bangers and mash that I ordered, but I couldn’t have been more pleased.

One major difference between celebrating here versus back in the States: there were people born and raised in Ireland celebrating with us! And there was a really cute bartender from just outside Dublin that came to serve beer just for that evening...

OH! On the Wednesday before, one of my students asked if I was going to wear a green hat when I celebrated, and the rest of the room laughed. I didn’t get the joke, commented that I’d for sure wear my green tie but that I didn’t own a green hat. After inquiring about the hat, they shared that, in China, wearing a green hat sort of sends the message that you’re a cuckold. 

I would later find out the “historical basis” for this strange cultural faux pas: during the Warring States Era in China, there was a famous political icon who I was known to wear a green hat. Apparently he was a big deal, and he always wore a green hat. And then his wife cheated on him, so now a green hat means what it means. That’s it. That’s the whole story. It happened to one dude who happened to wear a green hat, and now it’s this huge thing that college students laugh about. *shrug*

Anyway, back to Paddy O’Shea’s. The bar itself was more “authentic” than I have grown to expect. I’ll probably pass the time in that pub a few more times before my time here is up. One of the key advantages is that it has a fully functioning website, which is something I’ve learned not to take for granted anymore. When I was searching in the days prior for a place to celebrate, I had stumbled across another bar: Molly Malone’s. Do not (I REPEAT: DO NOT) visit the website for Molly Malone’s. Especially at work. With the door open. When anybody and their mother could walk by.

The website, the one that the location on Google Maps and every other map app links you to, looks like a mid ‘90′s website with a few notable images. I’ll describe it for you to the best of my memory: the background is all black, all of the text is placed in little white rectangles, all of which span the middle 40% of the site and fit jigsaw-like to form one large rectangle of questionable links. The font itself is in a variety of cheap styles and bright, neon colors. Flashing text, coloring-changing text. The works. Again: it looked like a mid ‘90′s website. But not just any mid ‘90′s website.

A mid ‘90′s website with vulgar images that would make a 12 year old blush and fidget uncomfortably in their seat. I repeat again: do not visit this site! WHY IS THIS THE OFFICIAL SITE FOR THE WEBSITE?

And when I found out that, not only is this bar a real place that happens to be near a few foreign embassies and it is reportedly not-too-difficult to find a “lady of the night” in its vicinity, I wasn’t surprised? Why is it that those two pieces of information just “fit together?”

*sigh*

Paddy O’Shea’s, in contrast, is an upstanding establishment. And though they had started their party the day before and kept it going all night, the place was still in remarkably good shape, all things considered. Most of the seating was filled when we arrived, but by the time I left around 8pm (I’m completely guessing here; I have no idea what time it was), all of the standing room was occupied.

ML and S seemed quite gungho about having an Irish Car Bomb, while L was shocked that anyone would use such a phrase to describe a beverage. Unfortunately, ML had some grading to get back to, so they left before we ordered one, but not before some rando came by and spray-dyed my beard and S’s hair green.

The dude in the middle isn’t the guy that did the coloring; just another “victim.”

Not too long after, my officemate showed up; it was comforting to have someone there who had a decent grasp on the holiday!

The non-Americans left soon thereafter, but AL and I kept ourselves sufficiently “entertained.” His friend P was also meeting us! She don’t think she’s ever really celebrated St. Patrick’s Day either, but she joined AL and myself in our one and only Irish Car Bomb of the day. Kudos to her!

AL and I chatted the next day and confided that we were both a bit more pissed than we thought...

NR also came out to join us, but she didn’t arrive until after P was getting hungry. Although why she didn’t seem interested in bangers and mash, I have no idea. When AL and P left, P made sure to leave me with some chaperones, a group of ex-pats from several other countries who P had joined for a shot of Fireball. For some reason. P was terrified at the idea of leaving me alone at a bar in Beijing. As if anything could go wrong?! I was with my people!

Anyway, I chatted up a nice girl from Texas, mostly about teaching because what else do I talk about nowadays, and NR finally showed. The good sport that she is, she joined me for another beer, and then we left to find food elsewhere. The place was getting to be a bit to much; she had just arrived, my voice was on it’s way out, and her’s would have joined it not too long after.

As it turns out, there was a place just around the corner that specialized in Peking Duck, something that AL and I were both quite curious to try thanks to KFC’s interesting spin on it...

But again: my beard was green. And I wouldn’t say that I was loaded, but there were at least four rounds in my six-shooter, if you catch my meaning. And this restaurant was niiiiiiiiceeee!!! There were 4 different people who helped us before we got to our table: one took our reservation, another led us to the stairs, a third took us up the stairs, and a fourth led us the last 10 feet to our table.

In hindsight, I was worried that it was just the way-too-many-beers-prior-to-entering-this-establishment that made watching this guy slice the duck so fascinating, but NR mentioned the followed day that she found the experience just as captivating.

Also, I’ve never been one for bathroom selfies...but when (drunk) in Rome (and by Rome, I mean a restaurant that I have no business being in), you do as Romans do. (Fun fact: Roman’s invented selfies. #themoreyouknow #notfakenews #youhearditherefirst)

#romansdidntinventselfies #dontberidiculous #leavetheridiculousnesstomeandmygreenbeard

Seriously. This dude was awesome. I wish we had more footage...Guess you’ll just have to go there for yourself!

We also ordered several other dishes, all of which were amazing. Some shrimp, some part of a lamb, I think. All of it was good. Like everything else I’ve had in China!

All in all, the weekend was dope, the week after was less-so, and the coming weekends will be amazing. My students had their first exam this week, and on Tuesday I ordered an American cheeseburger and a Budweiser from a western-style restaurant just to see if it holds up out here. It was...so-so. Last night, I joined a couple friends for a drink at a bar called “Lush;” apparently it was open-mic night. One of the guys I was with was hoping for an environment more conducive to idle chit-chat amongst the group, so we ended up leaving after only one. I was displeased as I was having a great time. Guess I’ll just have to wander back out that way on my own sometime.

The plan for Sunday was to visit the Forbidden City, but I guess they ran out of tickets, so we’ll find something else to do. Will post after that. The weekend after is a Craft Beer festival that several of the faculty here will be visiting. I’m pumped.

OH! And I think I’ll be visiting Shanghai at the end of April! I didn’t know this, but apparently Shanghai was all grassland like 50 years ago! (This, according to one of the guys last night. Feel free to fact-check this.)

It’s going to be an interesting couple of weeks...

If only I could get my sleep schedule back on track. This whole “falling asleep at 4am and waking up at Noon” business is getting ridiculous. I blame my teaching schedule. #ishouldntcomplainbecauseimteachinginchina

Sláinte,

BeardyAllen

P.S. I’m super pumped for Shazam! And the End Game trailers are driving me up a wall...

[sarahburness]

What a Felon Taught Me About Living Life Fully

“Mindfulness means paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally.” ~Jon Kabat-Zinn

I met Damon as one of about twenty ex-cons on a hiking expedition up Pike’s Peak. Like the others, he was kind of free, kind of not, released on good behavior to the halfway house and rehab center at which I was interning.

Damon had very recently tasted freedom after many years in the clink, and he was an extremely severe and intimidating individual. A man of very few words, 220 pounds of solid, athletic muscle, and eyes as cold as ice. I couldn’t imagine too many worlds in which he’d really fit. Despite his callous nature, in the few moments we shared atop Pike’s Peak he became my unlikely teacher.

Damon told me that while he’d been in prison he spent approximately three years of seven in solitary confinement. In the heat of passion a barbell to another inmate’s skull earned him that severe punishment. He told me that for those three years in the hole he had only two books to keep him company, the Bible and the Koran, both of which he read cover to cover dozens of times.

That’s a long time to have with the ‘holy’ scriptures I acknowledged. So I asked Damon what he thought about them. “After all that time, did you find any connection to those books? The spirituality they speak of?”

Damon explained, as we looked out over the vast planes and neighboring Colorado Springs, that there was something more to life, more than what we see. But it isn’t in those books. The day he was released from prison he went to visit a relative in the hospital. While there he heard the cry of a newborn, a sound so committed, powerful, and pure that it brought him to tears.

“It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever heard,” he said.

I sat there in awe of this seemingly hardened man, this man whose senses were deprived for years in the hole—no conversation, no music, no change of scenery, temperature, or taste. Everything he knew himself to be beforehand must have dissolved within those walls. But they made space for something new.

This hardened yet highly sensitive man tasted the divine while hearing something that most of us either try to avoid or take as a sign of something being wrong—the wail of a crying newborn. In that meditative moment Damon tasted pure life.

Meditation is life.

I believe this highlights the biggest hurdle in unburdening the mind, reducing stress, conquering self-doubt, and tasting the richness of life—namely, an inability to be fully present without judging one’s immediate experience.

All too often we carry the burdens of yesterday forward into today. We carry beliefs and associated emotions from the past into this present moment. And we miss actual, novel experiences right before us. We fail to connect with those who are important to us. We fail to see the beauty in the wail of a newborn and hear instead…noise.

After decades of practice I still struggle to be where I am without judgment. In a discussion with my partner just last night I fell into the same old trap—I failed to see and consider her needs in that moment and instead saw the situation as yet another repeat of a prior conversation, albeit one with lingering emotional attachment. And surprise, surprise, we weren’t any more connected to one another after the conversation than we were before it. Moments like this aren’t always glamorous or pivotal insights, but they do reveal the symptoms for which meditation is the cure.

Prior to my conversation with Damon I approached the practice of meditation, like so many others, as something external to the basic things of daily life. It belonged in a quiet, natural setting. It was accompanied by an austere, formal tone. It was altogether different from tense moments and those copious, habitual activities that marked most of my days—the morning coffee, quick meals and conversations, the drive to and from work. It was often the practice that helped regulate, if not override, the stress and negativity accumulated throughout the day.

And while most meditation practitioners have heard things like “nirvana is samsara and “don’t wash the dishes to clean the dishes, wash the dishes to wash the dishes,” it’s still hard to believe that the mundane actions and experiences, the every day stuff of life is the domain of meditation. We almost can’t believe it at first. There must be something more.

But meditation isn’t a practice external to everyday activities. In application, it’s a practice that speaks to the quality of your experience with them. For there is the practice of meditation, which is often enhanced by natural, peaceful environments. And then there’s the application, the living connection that occurs within a meditative moment—the one lacking with my partner last night. This is fundamentally non-formulaic, non-judgmental awareness that only lasts for mere moments. But they’re awesome mere moments.

This application of egoless nonattachment that we call meditation belongs in the gritty trenches of life, not forests or temples. Fight with your spouse? This is the domain of meditation. Struggling with road rage? This is the domain of meditation. Barista gave you the wrong coffee? This is the domain of meditation. Noisy child? You get my point.

In all moments we can choose to react and operate from a state of preconditioned, habitual thought, or we can choose to breathe, to relax, and to see the novelty and beauty in this very moment.

This insight made clear to me both how important meditation truly is in living a passion-filled life, as well as how much conscious effort it requires. I realized it isn’t just a thing you do apart from daily life as and when you can, but its something you can do within every part of daily life, should you so choose.

Damon, who had never formally meditated, accessed and learned to apply the meditative mind after years of solitary confinement. Without pretense or dogma, he was my living example that nirvana is samsara—that the mundane can be divine. And while solitude is conducive to stillness, if one’s practice never integrates with the mundane ‘stuff’ of life, then we’re missing the whole point. Meditation is life.

About Tom Fazio

Tom Fazio is a martial artist, a peak performance coach, and founder of the mind-body integration system Weightlessness. Learn more about Weightlessness Training or check out Tom’s newly released In Pursuit of Weightlessness.

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