Enga mellom fjella

A small bit about me.

Folks are who they are. No wrong or right about that, unless one is trying desperately to be what one is not (if it is for learning purposes stretching ones boundaries is fine).

Funny you should mention Woodstock and Haight Ashbury. When I was in college I knew people who went to Woodstock. For me it would've been too much anarchy. Same with the Haight. My cousin lived there in the day. I can embrace much from that era but I am far too "conservative" personally. Same with the beats. I would've been the sober shy one hanging out with them.

Nature has always been important. From gardening at age 9 to the poetic sketches I still make. The starkness of this place I'm living in is not yet speaking to me. I have a hard time listening to rock and stone.

Politically I'm social libertarian. I'm no anarchist; but I ashew liberal control-freaks as well. Uneducated social conservatives upset me the most. I am anti-Fascist.

I am attracted to opposites, but revel in folks with my same personality (ENFP according to Meyers-Briggs). I'm an Idealist who keeps pointing out Reality.

I'm balanced brained, left-handed and if I were 20 I would have fewer gender issues as the lines have blurred. Oddly, I felt fine last time I visited Costa Rica. The machismo bothered me when I was a student there in university.

I was raised in a German, German-Irish, Polish, Italian ethnic Catholic-Lutheran blue collar area where books and higher learning were only of peripheral value. Music was essential though! My dad's deep Swedish roots and childhood in Oklahoma and mother's Puritan upbringing (ack) in Pennsylvania were factors as well. I was weaned on French songs and language as well as Japanese culture and poetry. As a teenager I read the Norwegian Ibsen when others read Shakespeare.

So no... I'm not exactly traditional in a specific-tradition way... as I down my julekake with coffee today.

I have vision and ambitions but no energy. Been that way all my life. Whether my vision was bringing diverse people together in my gardens for parties or helping interfaith groups or when I did newsletters. My ambitions never revolved around money, more a seeking of recognition. I still need to bring my writing up to that level that it is worthy of note.

Whether those I reach out to ever reach back, I can still contribute something to their lives that they seemingly can't themselves. They also enrich mine in ways they may not see.

Life will be long over before I finally understand it.

peace, Kåre.

This was in response to an insightful email from mrziggles:

Well, going by what you convey on-line, I see you as a neo-hippy, like somebody who would have fit in well at Woodstock or Haight Ashbury or even with the Beats of the '50's. Liberal, in tune with nature. You seem to have a softer, sensitive side. In fact, for a while I actually thought you were a woman.

I can see how somebody who was interested in a more traditional, ambition-oriented person would have trouble with you. And neither of you is wrong really.