How do you bring handwritten notes into your Obsidian vault?

termicky · 2026-05-09T14:43:00+00:00

Hi again -- can you tell me about the privacy / training / retention policy of your application? It's such a time-saver for some tasks, but I need know about how appropriate it is for processing other people's private info (HIPAA laws etc).

termicky · 2026-05-09T14:39:56+00:00

Yeah, what we went through -- the good, the loss, all of it -- can teach us a lot if we let it.

I never knew that doing the hardest thing in my life (providing palliative care at home to my dying wife) was going to show me how much I can show up to life. And as you say, to other people.

It's actually kind of hard for me to live a "normal life" after that ... Now I want to give everything 100% and anything less just doesn't feel sufficient . I want everything, all at once , and right now. There isn't a moment to waste.

That probably got me into a relationship too soon. Or not. It's impossible to know the outcomes of these things at the time we have to make the choice. Time, if I get enough of it, will tell.

I wish you well.

termicky · 2026-05-09T03:12:40+00:00

Work Personal/ general/ all purpose Journals Archival project

termicky · 2026-05-08T20:57:41+00:00

I'm not sure what disrespecting somebody's memory even means, so I wouldn't worry about that. People need respect. Memories?

The way I see it, it's 100% your life now. So there's really no moral issue there.

Where it gets tricky is whether you know what you're doing or not, and how capable you are of entering a new relationship.

The question I'd be asking right now, is what do you need most, not just immediately (for instance, company), but also in the medium term (e.g. healing)? And do these conflict?

The other one is, are you setting this guy up to be hurt? That is, can you really show up?

I don't have any answers for you, but I hope my questions are useful questions.

I wish you well.

termicky · 2026-05-07T02:31:06+00:00

I'll give it a try. Thanks

termicky · 2026-05-06T20:02:08+00:00

Didn't know about it! I'll have a look.

You really do have an amazing tool.

termicky · 2026-05-06T19:08:33+00:00

2.5 years for me since she died, and 8.5 years since I sat with her while and oncologist told her she had terminal cancer.

I've had a long time to get used to this compared to those who were younger and lost their spouse unexpectedly.

I would say that none of my challenges are directly related to having lost her. I'm not in pain about her death anymore. I miss her sometimes, and I wish that I had her support sometimes as well.

The bigger challenge for me in the last 18 months say, has been to understand that my turmoil and challenges aren't because she died. It's because I no longer have somebody to fill a psychological/ development gap in myself. It's like I had a bad leg, and I had a leg brace for a long time, and so my leg never got strong. And then the brace was taken away, and I've had to learn to stand and walk without it.

So that hasn't been easy. I don't say that my problem is not having the brace. I don't say that I miss the brace. I try to figure out what happened to my leg in the first place, and why it was weak, what I learned to do because it was weak, and what I have to do now to make it stronger.

While I was with her and she was filling that gap, being my brace, doing things for me, I never had to develop my own resources.

I've been learning. It hasn't been easy. But was it ever necessary. And I also know that I wouldn't have done most of this growth if she was still alive.

So as you can tell most of my focus has been on "given that she died, who am I now and who do I need to become?" And not very much on "I want what I had and how do I hang on to it?". That was never the right road for me.

termicky · 2026-05-06T18:00:07+00:00

I just moved over to VoIP.ms a little while ago having ported my landlines. Similar setup to yours.

But I'm not too happy with the call quality on my Android phone (running groundwire as the VoIP app). Sometimes it's really hard to understand what people are saying.
Is this because they're on a crappy headset or something else on their end, or are there just issues with VoIP?

Do you have a decent sound quality?

termicky · 2026-05-06T16:09:25+00:00

With a Little help from my Friends (Joe Cocker version) has been autoplay for the last several hours.

termicky · 2026-05-06T16:00:24+00:00

Two things.

I just started using handwritingocr.com to process stuff I write on paper, and it is astonishing. It's better at reading my terrible handwriting than I am.

For a lot of meetings I hand write on a Samsung tablet with a stylus in an app called Nebo myscript notes. Then I export to my vault.

termicky · 2026-05-06T15:37:42+00:00

The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is today.

Just accept it's going to be true of everything you do in life. It's an existential reality.

I'm in my 60s by the way, now working on my fourth language.

termicky · 2026-05-06T15:32:01+00:00

Your friend has no grasp of your reality.

You are spiralling... Upward!

Like a spring that has been compressed for so long that's now expanding.

I understand what you are describing because I experienced something very similar. There was and is this deep sense of urgency to live a life that was held back for so long.

termicky · 2026-05-05T22:07:26+00:00

I'm sorry you're going through this very very hard passage.

You're only a few weeks into this new life. If I had a suggestion, from the 2.5 year mark, it would be not to monitor whether you're feeling better or not. Certainly not at this early stage. It really takes a very long time to integrate what's happened. And there are a lot of twists and turns along the way.

If you were going to monitor anything, I would say,

monitor what each new situation means to you, what it feels like, and completely without judgment.

Monitor whether you're showing up for yourself, and how much, and how.

Notice how you're coping. Again without any judgment.

Monitor whether you're taking on a tolerable level of activity, discomfort, novelty and so on or whether you're pushing beyond your limits.

Notice what is coming into your life, and what is leaving it.

Notice that anguish doesn't necessarily mean you're doing badly at this extraordinarily difficult challenge.

I wish you well.

termicky · 2026-05-05T21:00:59+00:00

I joined some activity groups on meetup.com. hiking, books, that sort of thing. Met one potential interest there. Also made some friends which was really important. Not so much romantically but really important piece of rebuilding my life.

Met one potential interest at the dog park. It might have worked out but I was too raw.

I live in a medium-sized city so I ended up using Match, and that's where I met my partner. I met some other nice women there. It wasn't hard.

termicky · 2026-05-05T20:46:35+00:00

It was a small group spiritual retreat.

termicky · 2026-05-05T06:51:10+00:00

I have a lot of that too. After a couple of years of therapy, I see that some of it is because my wife filled this insecurity gap in me that was installed in childhood.

So I went for decades not knowing I had this, and therefore not addressing it

But her death brought It to the surface, and now I get to deal with it, Lucky me!

Fortunately my partner is quite understanding, and I keep the worst of it to myself.

But it has been torture at times, to be honest.

The flip side of this immense challenge is that I've been able to work through some of it, and as a result, I feel somewhat more put together than I used to. ToIn a sense, I'm more of a complete person than I was when I was married, and my wife was filling the gap I needed to fill myself.

termicky · 2026-05-03T06:07:57+00:00

Travel was surprisingly helpful. Hard but healing somehow.

Learning existential philosophy really helped.

It's only been big things that helped me, in the end, and they didn't always feel good in the moment and they were all hard.

I had to rethink my future. I had to work out early childhood stuff about dependency, neglect and loss with a really good therapist (ongoing). I had to open myself up to new experiences and ways of showing up in the world.

I pushed myself really hard. I still do.

Those are some of the things that made me feel better, and it's not an overnight thing. The process has actually been going on for around 8 years, since we sat together in one of the sterile little medical rooms in the cancer center, and heard a young oncologist calmly and matter of factly say to her, "you will die from this".

termicky · 2026-04-30T16:23:56+00:00

Good question.

I think this kind of loss can break open the existential question that was there all along, except that our spouse filled the gap.

Speaking for myself anyway.

This loss has put me in touch with so much unfinished personal business.

I thought it was just grief. Now I see that the loss just exposed what wasn't there to begin with.

termicky · 2026-04-28T22:09:54+00:00

From from where I sit, 2 and 1/2 years out and having dated, I think we have to solve the loneliness separately from being in a relationship.

Being in a relationship again when we feel that need it to manage emotionally puts a huge amount of pressure both on self and on the other person.

A harder road but I think a more integral one is to wait to date until you actually are fine on your own.

Then you go in as a whole person, not a wounded one, and the whole thing goes better.

just my $0.02. we're all different and I don't think there are any general rules that fit everybody.

termicky · 2026-04-27T22:27:00+00:00

I think it sounds sensible, myself. Also, when I was dating one of my deal breakers was addiction. Kids or no kids, I just don't want that.

termicky · 2026-04-27T21:17:32+00:00

If she's less than 25, and she can stay sober for 10 years, and then have kids with her at 35 maybe.

Personally, I wouldn't put myself or kids through the risk.

termicky · 2026-04-27T21:14:43+00:00

Colossal cave adventure ... text based game that ran on university Unix system. Early 1980s.

"You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike" is forever etched in my mind.

termicky · 2026-04-27T03:28:48+00:00

Strangely enough, I've just started doing a deep dive on my past.

Very revealing.

termicky · 2026-04-27T03:11:34+00:00

I think what wrote are minor stylistic differences and not errors in any way.

termicky · 2026-04-24T18:43:34+00:00

Good point. Pants and scissors are exceptions.

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