Astro Monk: the Awakener cont’d by Dave Weirdly
Can Toys Die?
So we find out why The Awakener is “The Awakener.” It can awaken inanimate objects and give them life. My niece once asked her Mom if toys can die. This stuck with me because it reminded me just how much we anthropomorphize ordinary objects. When I was a kid I did feel like objects were living beings. I thought some were watchers and others became alive when no one was looking. Have you ever had trouble getting rid of something? Something you don’t look at or use but for some reason you keep it around? It has meaning to you.
You’ve injected it with yourself and it takes on a life. This ability in a mutated form is what the Awakener does…burning an object with it’s gaze till it becomes alive.
Hall of Wonderment
I collect monster figures. My friend calls them my spirit shrine and I think that’s true. As a collective they have this weird presence. They are odd and fun to have around but I think what she was getting at was it goes to a deeper level; that it’s not just a material thing in having them around, it’s more a spirit thing. They are a portal that is my Hall of Wonderment!
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The 
dinner are huge portions of steamy white rice and vegetables, many grown on the farm. The company is a mishmash of volunteers from around the world, the US , France, Italy, England yet we all have something in common in the way that we have found ourselves here, in a post dinner trance, hot tea in hand playing a card game called 
got out and walked in the direction I knew the beach would be. But, after about a half a mile of scrambling over boulders while dodging a questionable smelling stream of black goo all with my big backpack on, it occurred to me that this might be wrong. I feel like an idiot now that I even walked that far knowing somewhere, in the back of mind, that there should be a dirt road or something. There was no way the volunteers were making this walk multiple times a week. Turns out, no one was making this walk, ever. I was nowhere. I confess, when I realized I was truly far from my real destination,there were tears, but only a few panicked ones that barely left my eyes. 
I made it back to the road just as the sun dropped behind some misty, green slopes near the pavement and I stuck out my thumb. It was nearly night and I was not at jihuay. In fact, I had not even begun the 30 minute walk to the farm yet. I had only had a very real detour. I was picked up by a nice couple who looked at me with a mixture of concern and fear as they asked where I was going and where I was from. I could barely answer there questions I was so relieved to be in a car for a moment. They dropped me at the Santa Rosa stop about 3 hundred yards up the road. I could have walked. I was so close and yet had gotten so very much off track. So close and yet, still at the top of a hill at night with the fact that my destination was down somewhere at the bottom. So I took out my light and walked. My feet were killing me and it was chilly. At this point I had already thanked my friend who gave me the bright orange, down coat I had been wearing that evening a dozen times. But it was still cold, probably from the thin veil of sweat that had appeared all over my body when I had to hustle back to the road and hitchhike, for the first time mind you. 
leveled off at the bottom and rounded a bend to find a large wooden gate off to the right. I had made it. “Fundo Jihuay” was written on the white plaster wall so I reached up and pulled the rope for the bell. I was quickly greeted by 2 huge ride guan ridgeback dogs and a smaller, silver mastiff puppy. These dogs would eventually be my friends but right now I was a stranger in the dark. At that point though, nothing could scare me, I was so numb with relief at arriving.
e world, and we have a responsibility to give them the tools with which to accomplish it! In that vein, we are very excited and honored to have Warehouse 508 be our guest programmer for our Youth Day theme! “
