Filed under: entertainment., family, life, music, personal., random, youtube , humor, kids, life, parenting, random, youtube
March.10.2008. • 1:50 PM 0
rockin’ kids songs
• 1:38 PM 0
wrong side of the bed
It’s odd. Karen and I never really had sides of the bed early in our relationship. At some point it just sort of evolved that I slept on the left and Karen on the right. In our new house that means that Karen is always next to our door. The problem is that we leave the door open so we can hear Teagan. On top of that Teagan listens to music all night which can easily be heard with our bedroom door open. But wait there’s more— outside of the window that faces Karen’s side of the bed is a rather large, bright orange street light (that was burned out until recently). All of this has, in Karen’s eyes, resulted in her getting significantly less good sleep than me. So last night we spun our bed around (which we had to do because our mattress has a different firmness on each half) and I slept on Karen’s side of the bed. Needless to say I slept horribly and woke up feeling less rested, slightly grumpy and reluctant to get out of bed. Maybe Karen was right.
I wonder how I’m going to convince her to switch back?
February.28.2008. • 12:30 PM 2
our new pup prancing in the snow
It’s a good thing that our new pup took to the snow because we’ve gotten a ton of it this winter. Here’s a pic of her prancing in the snow— I was hoping to get a shot of her running through the yard with her nose plowing piles of snow to eat, but she is just too damned fast— so this will have to do.
Filed under: family, life, maine, personal., pics, portland. , dog, pics, puppy
February.27.2008. • 5:40 PM 0
more progress on the house
Despite the rough beginning to our week, when we woke to a house with no heat as a result of our aging boiler igniter and motor,progress on the house is marching on and its beginning to look like a whole new house. The siding on the front of our house is done, replacement windows are in and despite the 4” of new snow last night and the on and off snow/rain all day I came home this afternoon and was greeted with a view of our new metal roof on the addition (2nd pic).Now work is beginning on the inside— tomorrow the studio gets a skylight and the lower roof gets finished. We have just about a month and a half before its all done and I can’t wait!
Filed under: family, kevin + karen townsend, life, maine, personal., pics, portland., thoughts , home, home improvement, life, personal.
February.24.2008. • 2:28 PM 0
before and after
here is our house as it looked in Jan 2006
and here is how it looks now in February 2008
The updates and the addition are still going on despite the 4-5 foot piles of snow and the 12 degree weather. We are loving all the changes so far and just can’t wait for the rest of the work to be done.
Filed under: family, kevin + karen townsend, life, maine, personal., portland., random , home, home improvement, life, personal.
November.14.2007. • 11:40 AM 0
fun with poo
October.5.2007. • 10:41 AM 0
to the teeth
Last night I had an anxiety dream, this is the second one I’ve had in the last 2 weeks and before these it had been years since I had one last. Both of these dreams involve losing a tooth. I know that this is one of the archetypal dreams that Freud talks about, meaning that it is a fairly common dream occurrence. I have read and heard all kinds of interpretations of this kind of dream ranging from being concerned with appearance, potency or finances— but none of these make sense with my dream.
In my dream I am in my studio, frantically working. A large digital clock with glowing red numbers ticking backwards towards zero is hung on the wall. I specifically remember the time remaining as being 90 minutes and forty three seconds (90:43). Although I am alone I am aware that I only have this amount of time to finish the work for a critique— apparently I am in grad school in this dream. I look around my studio and there is nothing that resembles finished work, only sketches and ideas on paper litter the tables. I remember feeling nauseous and anxious with my heart thrumming wildly in my chest. I hear a knock on the door and standing there are my wife and daughter. My feelings of anxiety are replaced by a feeling of guilt, they are coming to get me… I am supposed to be done and ready to go do something with them.
The dream jumps at this point and I am walking Karen and Teagan to the car, Karen is reassuring me, telling me to take my time and not to worry. As they get in the car I feel a pain in my right top molar and realize I am clenching my teeth (both in the dream and in my sleep). When I realize I am clenching my teeth in the dream I stop, feeling my tooth loosen from my gums as I release the tension of my jaw muscles. The tooth falls slightly in my mouth and clicks as it touches the corresponding tooth under it, still clinging slightly to the upper gum. A feeling of panic returns as I reach in my mouth to pull out the tooth. In order to extricate it I must almost tear it out, the action is accompanied by a brief searing pain. Once out, I stare at the tooth and notice a fragment of red gum tissue adhering to one side of the tooth. I immediately feel flush, and can feel blood in my mouth. As I walk alone back towards my studio I stop every few feet to spit out the blood and gently probe the void in my mouth with the tip of my tongue. After the third or 4th stop I feel something sharp in the void, causing me to examine the tooth again. This time when I look at it I notice that it is missing the roots. Instead of being a whole tooth it is just the cap of a tooth, hollow inside with almost architectural supports that are distinctly untooth-like. As I keep looking closer I feel a jolt of current running through my body. I am looking at the tooth that has come from my mouth and I am seeing the shapes and structures that I am currently using in my work (outside of the dream)
Again the dream cuts and I am back in my studio the clock now reads 60:13 and is still counting backwards. The panic is back and I feel like I am sweating. I actually feel like I am on the verge of tears feeling in adequate as a father and as an artist and it is at this point that I wake up, soaked with sweat, heart throbbing and feeling as if I am on the verge of gushing tears.
One of the things I learned in the dreaming class I took in college is that the way you feel in the dream is often more important than what is actually happening. In this case: anxiety, fear and profound lack of confidence and competence both as a father and as an artist pretty much sum it up. The definition of the word ‘tooth’ combined with my feelings and the scenario in the dream make me feel like this dream is mirroring a situation in my waking life. The loss of tooth would leave me at a disadvantaged to process food and get what I need to sustain myself. If the metaphor extends outside the dream maybe my fear is literally that of not being able to do something that I feel is necessary to me. In my class I also learned that teeth dreams are often about transitions, as we lose our teeth as part of our transition to adolescence and ultimately adulthood . I think this is ultimately all about my decision to pursue a grad degree beginning in the summer. I guess somewhere inside me I am afraid of failing, afraid that I may not have what it takes to do what I need to do. It seems that I am concerned about having time, confidence and resolve to be able to be the father I need to be and the artist I want to be simultaneously. I noticed that I also used the word ‘guilt’ to describe my feelings at one point in the dream, and I do feel a bit of guilt/selfishness when I think about grad school— especially from a financial stand point. For me this dream is reassurance in an odd way. If this situation has made its way to my dreams in such a strong way it makes me more sure that it is something I must do, and these fears and anxieties are important things to not only acknowledge but also to address as I move closer to making the dream of grad school a reality.
Filed under: artsy., family, life, personal., random, thoughts , anxiety, art, control, dreams, fear, grad school, interpretation, teeth
September.30.2007. • 7:34 PM 0
going green
We decided to ditch our big suv and swap for this little green TDI (turbo diesel) beetle.
Teagan loves it but secretly wishes it was pink, Karen loves it and wishes she could actually drive it and I just wish it had a Sirius radio in it. Karen is getting pretty good at driving it, pretty quickly, especially considering she has never driven a stick before. It feels like a really good move on our part, besides being aesthetically pleasing in glowing gecko green it should also help us be a little greener. (it is supposed to get about 45 miles to the gallon in the city that is more than 2 times the mileage of our explorer)
July.29.2007. • 9:56 AM 0
not so mini cooper?
June.18.2007. • 1:45 PM 0
cross contamination
part one. [a full grown man can't escape the grip of the Disney channel]
Teagan requested that we tape a kids movie she saw advertised on Disney channel called Brink!, about a group of inline skaters (that includes a girl) who are ’soul skaters’ and all is good until one of them gets sponsored. So we tape it for her. Saturday morning she wakes up ready to go at 6 am, finally at 7 we got up and started watching Brink! After about an hour Teagan is bored so I turn off the tv. Later that night… I am sitting on th couch wondering what happens to Brink and his crew— this alone would be embarrassing but when you factor in the fact that I occasionally bop around the house singing Hana Montanna songs and you can feel my shame. Damn that daughter of mine, infecting me with all that Disney syrupy sweet shit. I swear they use some kind of mind control.
part two. [the four year old sounds like she hosts a reality TV show]
Teagan and Karen took me mini golfing as part of the fathers day extravaganza. As we are golfing Teagan excitedly looks at Karen after a good shot and says: “Congratulations mommy you are part of our top ten!” Now that alone would be funny but this morning at breakfast she blurted out some thing like: “that would be freakin’ crazy wouldn’t it? I mean, thats just like… crazy!” She also now refers to all of the people on her favorite shows/movies by their real names as opposed to their character names and tried to start calling Karen and I by our first names.
Filed under: entertainment., family, life, personal., reality tv, tv
