A laborer uses his body. A craftsman uses his body and his mind. An artist uses his body, his mind, and his heart.
The weekend was fast and fun. As usual, the abruptness of Monday morning has me at the secret office a little later than usual, and fairly under fed. I need one hour after wakeup to have any kind of an appetite, and sometimes the timing of that throws me off for a whole morning.
At present, I’m starving.
On Saturday I used the morning for arranging and cleaning up since the creation of Hollow Way Studios. Lots of furniture shifting and tossing and more clearing out the unessential. The afternoon was for training.
(BTW, why Hollow Way? My neighborhood of Manhattanville used to be called Hollow Way during the colonial wars and was the site of this important battle.) (And it sounds nice and black metally).
After about 2.5 hours of sparring and hitting the heavy bag, I was starved. I took in 8 grams of creatine powder, whey protein and three granola bars. About 10 minutes after consumption my body filled in. All of that good sugar reaching into every trained muscle. It felt very good. I continued eating clean for the rest of the day and into Sunday.
Sunday was a three-parter. Morning still more cleaning up at my place, and eating, and then an afternoon jam with a friend in Hollow Way. I went to train for an hour and found myself 6 or so lbs heavier than two weeks ago, and looking very filled-in. It’s was nice to be back at my ideal weight, finally, though it’s not all real yet. Much of that was from massive consumption over the weekend– in a few more weeks it’ll be solid again.
After training, a new-ish friend came over to cook and watch the last UFC fight (which I downloaded the same day). I had resisted doing stuff like that for a few months, but I guess it’s time for that, now. It was a full day and time moved quickly.
When she got there, she said my place reminded her of a gallery and she loved it. That was nice to hear because emptying it out was a risk.
If she or anyone else didn’t like it much, would I care?
Maybe a little.
We hit my favorite super market and grabbed salmon and spinach and rice and some other things that I didn’t really know, and came back and cooked and chatted and listened to Agalloc, and had a nice, relaxing time. We talked a lot about dating and stuff like that. Not my favorite topic. Not at all. But she was into it so I went along, contributing when able, though never getting too personal. By the time I had the place to myself again I was full and tired. It was midnight.
I forgot to work on my presentation for tomorrow night’s final aesthetics class. Dang. It’s a group thing, which sucks. Once it’s over, I will probably never take another course in my life.
Though I suppose I’ve said that before.
There’s a paper that’s supposed to go with the presentation and I haven’t even thought of what to say yet. I have until tomorrow, with two full work days between now and then.
These little stresses will be a welcome absence after tomorrow night.
Continuing to take classes has kept me socializing and interacting with people. Were it not for that, I’m not sure what I’d be up to when not at home alone or traveling or working or training.
If I didn’t have a reason to socialize, I might just disappear into my work, which probably isn’t great. I was never good at finding that balance, it never came naturally to me. Attending courses seems to always lead to new connections with people, new groups, things to do and people to see– and have salmon steaks with on Sunday nights.
So, good Monday to you. May the rain of NYC this morning cool your tempers and souls as it has mine. Let’s do one novel thing today before it’s over, and let’s not have more than one cup of a coffee and see what happens. Let’s bite down hard when punching the bag later and fall asleep exhausted from intensity.
