If you've ever use a PC, you've probably had to reboot the machine at some point. A program or three freezes, the thing slows, and your only recourse is to press Ctrl-Alt-Del and reset the thing.

This is what I want to do for myself this week. I've been working hard, and I can feel my batteries running down a bit, and I feel a few extra pounds on me. After tomorrow, I am off for a few days. No work responsibilities, no constant BlackBerry checking, no pressure.

Only time to reconnnect with me. Three books to reread, a little writing to do, three miles a day to walk, and a recommittment to healthy eating. And thinking--what comes next for me, professionally and spiritually?

Over the past few months, I've sort of lost the plot, and have been caught on the hamster wheel of existing and not living.

I am looking forward to what comes this week.

If there is anything that I've learned over the past few weeks, it's this--your life can't be ruled by fear. Fear will be ever-present, but you can't be overwhelmed by it. You simply can't. You have to forge ahead in the storm, no matter how difficult the winds get. And battered as you may be, remember that the sun always shines through.

When British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan was asked what was likely to blow governments off course, he said, "Events, dear boy, events." And the reason why I haven't blogged or posted any poetry over the past few weeks is because of events. Not personal events, but work events, and trying to make sense of what has been happening globally for the past two months. Needless to say, it's been a tad stressful. Just writing this makes things seem a little less stressful. I'm looking forward to looking around in Gaia again.

If you've read the Alchemist, or any of Paulo Coelho's work, you'll love this--Coelho did an interview today, and you can listen to it here. I'm listening to it now, and thus far, it's about the movie coming up based on the book...

Here is an interesting exercise. How well do I know me? How well do you know you?

Let's take the quiz...

I am--shy. Still am, at first. I am slow to warm up to people. But I do, especially if you are special.

I think--I can always do a little better. In what? In the things I do in life.

I know--I can love someone special truly and deeply

I have--a thing for double cheeseburgers

I wish--I could go bald. I love that look.

I was--hoping it wasn't going to be hot today.

I hate--nothing. Life is too short to hate. (Well, I do hate the Washington Redskins)

I miss--Brussels. It is a second home to me.

I crave--those double cheeseburgers.

I search--for higher awareness.

I wonder--what it's like to fly like a bird, or swim like a fish.

I regret--not having flowers in my hand that one time.

I love--jazz, brunch, a night drive, a kiss, the feeling of a job well done, traveling on an airplane.

I am not--an idiot.

I believe--in the best of what we can all do and be.

I dance--badly. But I try. I dance to my own rhythms.

I sing--Got to Give It Up by Marvin Gaye. Barely.

I fight--no one. I want my energy to build, not tear down.

I confuse--people.

I listen--to jazz, crickets, silence.

I can--be everything good I know I can be.

I am scared--of dying old and alone.

I need--an apple.

I am happy--when I can be everything for someone.

I imagine--living in a loft in Paris, writing and strolling the streets.

I tag--you.

I'm a jazz fan, and so I was pleased to see this story on Sonny Rollins, the great saxophone player. Today is his birthday, and for a man of 78, he's got a great attitude. Us young'uns may do well to take heed...

“I’m still searching for something. I came into music sort of late in a professional sense, and by the time I came out of high school, I loved music but I had no idea that I was competent enough to be a professional musician. I got that assurance from people like Thelonious Monk and Miles Davis, so I thought, ‘OK, I must be OK to be here.’ But I still consider myself a work in progress.

“I still practice every day and am still searching for my lost chord. And I still hear some music which I don’t get to enough when I play. Every now and then we have a successful concert and I think we’re getting there. But I haven’t gotten my music together yet to the point where I can really feel satisfied with it. I may never, but I want to get a little closer to what I’m hearing.”

He recalls the story of how Charlie Parker was once asked what he was going to play that night, and he said, “I’m going to play what happened to me today.”

“And this is jazz,” Rollins says. “To comment on what is happening in the world, on social conditions and all of these things. So what

I’m trying to do is changing because things change. …

“I’m still learning every day.”

My own bed. After a long travel day, it's hard to get to sleep in a hotel bed, or even worse, a couch. But when sleep comes, it comes very well.

Lately I've been dreaming a lot, or at the very least, remembering them. But one recent dream scared me a little.

In it, my mom was yelling at me, saying that I was writing all this poetry, but not living up to the words I wrote. Ouch. Now, keep in mind, I love my mom. We talk once a week and she's never yelled at me. So the meaning of this escapes me.

Should I stop writing? Do I need to pay more attention to what I write and how I live?

The memory of driving across the Brooklyn Bridge for the first time this morning. The big, cheese-eating grin on my face has to been seen to be believed.

In my job, there's a lot of stimulation. I have to read scrolling screens most of the day and capture the highlights and disseminate and process them. I enjoy it, but it sometimes gets to be too much, and I need to shut off for awhile. Sometimes a walk will do the trick after work. Other times, it goes back to something I did in kindergarten--a nap. Sometimes, it's the only way I can completely close everything off and recharge. One thing I've re-learned over the past year or so is that I have to listen to my body. It's always telling me something.