TO SING YOUR OWN SONG

TO BE HUMAN IS TO SING YOUR OWN SONG
Everything I can think of that my parents
thought or did I don't think and I don't do.
I opened windows, they shut them. I pulled
open the curtains, they shut them. If you
get my drift. Of course there were some
similarities - they wanted to be happy
and they weren't. I wanted to be Shelley and I
wasn't. I don't mean I didn't have to avoid
imitation, the gloom was pretty heavy. But
then, for me, there was the forest, where
they didn't exist. And the fields. Where I
learned about birds and other sweet tidbits
of existence. The song sparrow, for example.

In the song sparrow's nest the nestlings,
those who would sing eventually, must listen
carefully to the father bird as he sings
and make their own song in imitation of his.
I don't know if any other bird does this (in
nature's way has to do this). But I know a
child doesn't have to. Doesn't have to.
Doesn't have to. And I didn't.
- Mary Oliver
Blue Horses

Gathered at Whiskey River

Image~ Everyone thinks its from Woodstock. Its from New Orleans, 1972, taken by George W Gardner

"Good. Now here’s what poetry can do."

"Imagine yourself a caterpillar.
There’s an awful shrug and, suddenly,
You’re beautiful for as long as you live."

~ Stephen Dunn, from Poem For People That Are Understandably Too Busy To Read Poetry (1966)

Gathered at Live and Learn

SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION

No longer sold at Six Flags, NASCAR, Walmart, or displayed at High Schools, County Courthouses, and government offices, this flag was removed shortly after being displayed at a Trump rally in Kissimmee Florida.
The flag was denounced by the Southern Baptist Convention last month. The Southern Baptist Convention split from Baptists in 1845 over the issue of slavery. The group had always embraced its “rich southern heritage”.
Hurrah for Dixie.

Here is a link to The Resolution. I have to hand it to those Baptists. Well done.

Excerpted:WHEREAS, In 1995, the Southern Baptist Convention repudiated “historic acts of evil, such as slavery,” and committed “to eradicate racism in all its forms from Southern Baptist life and ministry”...

WHEREAS, We recognize that the Confederate battle flag is used by some and perceived by many as a symbol of hatred, bigotry, and racism, offending millions of people...WHEREAS, We recognize that, while the removal of the Confederate battle flag from public display is not going to solve the most severe racial tensions that plague our nation and churches, those professing Christ are called to extend grace and put the consciences of others ahead of their own interests and actions...

RESOLVED, That we call our brothers and sisters in Christ to discontinue the display of the Confederate battle flag as a sign of solidarity of the whole Body of Christ, including our African-American brothers and sisters; and be it finally

RESOLVED, That we urge fellow Christians to exercise sensitivity so that nothing brings division or hinders the unity of the Body of Christ to be a bold witness to the transforming power of Jesus.

RIG AN ELECTION?

Shoot, I been rigging elections since 1972.

You can put this one in the freezer, boys.

THE DWEEB

I went to dinner with my beachcombing friend last night. She said she joined Match.Com.
“Its like a full time job. I got 100 messages a few days ago. I narrowed it down to one guy, and met him for a drink. He didn’t look anything like his profile. But in his profile he had on a hat and sunglasses so it was hard to tell. Really, he was a DWEEB. Just a dweeb. Why do people do that, with the hat and sunglasses? He kept saying “We’ll have to do this again”.

“We’ll have to do this again” he kept saying.

So we exchanged numbers."

I’ll tell you a little about her. She is a petite girl. She probably weighs about 100 pounds soaking wet with her clothes on. Curvy she is not. She had a breast job many years ago which she is proud of, and likes to go to nude beaches in warmer climes. She has a pixie face and is cute as can be. Her mouth is sexy as hell, like Michele Pfieffer. She does hair at an upscale salon. She is very stylish, has blonde hair with a few small streaks of blue just for fun.  

She tells me she gets to her car and the dweeb has sent her a message.
The same guy that minutes before was saying “We’ll have to do this again”.

His message says “I said we should get together again but I saw you when you walked away and you are just too skinny for me so I dont think so.”

“It was like a dagger to my heart” she says “A total dweeb was telling me I was too skinny my first time out on Match.com”

I tried to be sympathetic.

“Can I tell you the truth?” I said.

“Sure”

“The hottest sex I ever had was with a girl built just like you, only her breasts werent as nice.”
“Don't tell me that”
“No, really its true. Just like you. We had two bottles of wine, she tied me to the bed and for 8 hours it was pretty amazing.”

I’m not sure if she heard this last part because she had her hands over her ears and going “La-la-la-la-la”
I just couldn’t stop laughing. 

I hope it made her feel better.

THAT MUCH HELP

I wasn't sure I should do it. 

I wondered "Who would it serve?" 

The Head Doctor said I had to do it.

He asked me how did it feel after I did it.

“Like a 16 ton anvil wasn’t hanging over my head anymore”

“So who did it help? To whom did it serve?” he asked.

“It helped me” I said.

“That’s right. It helped you. How does that make you feel?”
“It makes me feel horrible” I said.

He looked puzzled. “Why?” he asked.

And I broke down.

“Because I’m not supposed to need that much help”

I guess we got some work to do.

BLACK LIVES MATTER

I saw a post last week that generated one of my weird dreams. I dreamed I was at work, and the boss and secretary were sitting there in my area. Suddenly the door opened and 3 BLM people came in with pamphlets. They introduced themselves, handed me the pamphlets and left.
My boss and the secretary looked at me and asked why they left the pamphlets. They seemed thoroughly confused by it. I told them:
“They left the pamphlets because…” 

Before I could finish the boss and secretary vanished. Like *POOF* into thin air!
But I continued, even though there was no one there but me:
“…because they want to have a voice.”

But it was only I that could hear.
Some dream, yes?

POLITICAL CONVENTIONS, 2016

Its incredibly interesting, whats going on with politics in the USA.
Trump is not a true rep for the GOP, or so says most GPO folks I know. That’s why in some weird universe I could vote for him. I could have voted for Bush too. But Bush is, in his own way, like Trump. If it were between Ted Nugent (a true rep for the GOP) and Trump, hands down its Trump for me.

Here’s another weird thing. I cant stand Cruz, but I admire what he did. Stood up there with zero support and refused to endorse Trump.. Now most everybody that loved him has turned against him.
Contrast that with Sanders, who stood up there and very eloquently endorsed his opponent with thousands of his supporters in tears and screaming for him.
I admire that very much too.

At first these two thoughts seemed incompatible. Hypocritical. But I think they do go together. I just cant explain how.

I knew a guy back in the day that used to drape himself in an American flag and ride a Unicycle off his dining room table. It was the high point of the evening, every night. That's why people went to his place to party. Half the time he crashed and half the time he stuck the landing pretty good. Either way everybody there yelled like crazy for him. He reminded me a lot of Dennis Hopper. But today he seems more like a metaphor for the GOP. Or the Dems, why not? Either way.

DAVE GIVES THE BALL A NUDGE

It appears that while my nephew Dave has been fighting the cancer, he has also built an open air pool hall in Dalaguete, Cebu.
Dalaguete is in the Phillipines.
Dave says:
“There are many ways to be positive about what's happening to my body. Cristina Renfro and I still have hope that medical science will deliver a breakthrough, but medical science needs to get busy. The clock is ticking. In the mean time, a more non-unicorn-believing way of being positive is for me to begin planning how to wind down this great adventure of mine on my own terms. I already know I want my ashes to be scattered on the small patch of farmland we have in the mountains of Cebu. It's quiet and peaceful with a cool breeze, a perfect place for my reclusive and mildly troubled soul. A few times a week, though, I'm going to float down to Dave and Tina's Place in Dalaquete to shoot some pool and be amongst happy people. When your ball stops for several seconds at the edge of the pocket and then mysteriously drops, that will be me giving it a nudge!
Cristina has a million more pictures to post of our dream open-air pool hall, from its construction to its blessing and grand opening yesterday. My meager savings wasn't going to last forever. I figured I could leave behind a big pile of medical bills or leave behind a big pile of medical bills and an awesome recreation center in my adopted home town. It was a no-brainer! We have a million people to thank for helping make this dream come true and we'll get to it, but for now I couldn't wait to post something. More to follow!”

WRITING WHEN YOU HAVE NO SOMEONE

Writing is saying to no one and to everyone the things it is not possible to say to someone. Or rather writing is saying to the no one who may eventually be the reader those things one has no someone to whom to say them. Matters that are so subtle, so personal, so obscure, that I ordinarily can’t imagine saying them to the people to whom I’m closest. Every once in a while I try to say them aloud and find that what turns to mush in my mouth or falls short of their ears can be written down for total strangers. Said to total strangers in the silence of writing that is recuperated and heard in the solitude of reading. Is it the shared solitude of writing, is it that separately we all reside in a place deeper than society, even the society of two? Is it that the tongue fails where the fingers succeed, in telling truths so lengthy and nuanced that they are almost impossible aloud?

 from The Faraway Nearby by Rebecca Solnit

Another post gathered once again at "Alive on All Channels"

THE MIDDLE EAST

 "In Iraq, the United States had intervened and occupied — and things had gone to hell. In Libya, the United States had intervened but not occupied — and things had gone to hell. And in Syria, the United States had neither intervened nor occupied — and things had still gone to hell."

GOOD ARTICLE HERE

SECRET LIFE OF PETS

I was thinking about getting me a puppy dog.
Then I went and saw "Secret Life of Pets".
Oh my god.
I thought it would be cute and funny and relaxing.
But no.
It was like Die Hard, only with animals. Car crashes, near death experiences, snakes, villains and weird henchmen everywhere, and a homicidal bunny. I left there wound up like an alarm clock.
May as well have been watching The Matrix.
I WAS thinking about getting me a dog. Now, not!

FIREFLIES

“And when you look at the sky you know you are looking at stars which are hundreds and thousands of light-years away from you. And some of the stars don’t even exist anymore because their light has taken so long to get to us that they are already dead, or they have exploded and collapsed into red dwarfs. And that makes you seem very small, and if you have difficult things in you life it is nice to think that they are what is called negligible, which means they are so small you don’t have to take them into account when you are calculating something.”
"...and I went into the garden and lay down and looked at the stars in the sky and made myself negligible.” 
― Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

image~ APOD, Fireflies and the Milky Way

THE DEAD GIVE-AWAY

I tried to keep a secret one time and before long everyone in the damn lunchroom knew. Its kind of like a joke, where you start it and pretty soon everyone is crying. That happens to me a lot (haha), just ask Dallas. Folks get together and try to do some good, try to behave like mature adults, try to make a statement on the current state of a affairs and then someone comes along with a bag full of secrets, a whole magazine full of secrets, and he lets all his secrets out and the next thing you know the whole bleeding country is in on a joke, a joke that isn’t very funny at all.
Like the time I took a bite out of Joannas sandwich and put it back in her bag. It was supposed to be a secret, like a funny (haha) who-done-it, but it wasn’t a secret for long because of my overbite, and the peanut butter and jelly on the corners of my mouth. That was a dead give-away. It wasn’t funny either, especially to Joanne who was pissed that some asshole with an overbite had secretly taken a bite out of her sandwich her mama had packed for her. Right there in the lunchroom, while she went to get her milk.
What was the country coming to, that you couldn’t set your lunch down for not even a minute?
And it wasn’t funny to me, me being absolutely horrified at what I had done, and the fact that it wasnt a secret, or the least bit funny-- which is what I was shooting for, haha-- at all. No sir, it wasn’t funny at all.

'THE MORE WE RUN FROM IT THE MORE WE RUN INTO IT"

Near the end of Part 1 of Ken Burns documentary on the history of Jazz, the great trumpet player Wynton Marsailles is presented with a quote from a white jazz player from the 20’s, who had said that blacks had nothing to do with the origins of Jazz. That it was exclusively a white man’s invention.
I love his reaction. At first he is speechless, numbed,  and then quite eloquent. 

SACRIFICE

“GK Chesterton once said that to criticise religion because it leads people to kill each other is like criticising love because it has the same effect. All the best things we have, when abused, will cause bad things to happen. The need for sacrifice, to obey, to make a gift of your life is in all of us and it’s a deep thing. In the Islamic world today, people are trying to rejoin themselves to an antiquated and ancient faith and the result is massive violence when they encounter people who have not done that. We’d say that sense of sacrifice is good but only if you’re sacrificing your own life; once you sacrifice another’s life you’ve overstepped the mark.”
― Roger Scruton, The Soul of the World

POLITICS IS SO BORING

Politics is so boring. I go home and turn the news on and before I know it I'm fast asleep, chin on my chest and drooling down my nice shirt.
What fascinates me these days is geography, and its cousin , geology. See, Lynchburg Va and Charlottesville Va are only 70 miles apart. but the two cities couldnt be more different.

In Charlottesville you have The University of Virginia (Mr. Jefferson’s School), Monticello, the homes of James Madison and James Monroe, Lewis @ Clark and, heading south toward Lynchburg, the Rockfish River and the home of “The Walton Family” (Goodnight John-boy). Charlottesville has a Whole Foods, Trader Jacks, a new Wegman’s on the way and every kind of International and ethnic product and produce you ever heard of. On July 4th a Naturalization Ceremony is held for immigrants acquiring citizenship.
In Charlottesville, the Earth is 4 billion years old.

But in Lynchburg, when Civil Rights Laws dictated that black people should have the right to swim in the Lynchburg Public Pools the decent, God fearing, people of Lynchburg decided to fill them all in with dirt. When those same laws dictated that black children had the right to a public education along side white children a young preacher named Jerry Falwell opened up “Christian Academies” for white children only. Today that has grown to be “Liberty University”, the largest Evangelical University on the planet.
In Lynchburg, the Earth is only 6000 years old.

Lynchburg voted overwhelmingly Republican the last election, and C-ville, that’s what the locals call Charlottesville, voted Democratic.
But don't lose hope. In the last election, when the kids at the Lynchburg High School held a mock election,  it was Obama who won in a landslide.

I find this infinitely more fascinating and instructive than any Trumptweet, or story about Hillary's EMails.

Largely gathered at Mrs. Neutrons Garage.

SO WHAT DO YA MAKE OF THIS?

I’ll send her a text.

Usually, it takes 6-8 hours to get a reply.

No matter how charming, witty and funny I might be, I cant seem to lure her into much banter.

When we’ve gone to dinner three times the conversation is lively.

So a few weeks ago I sent her a text. It took a day for her to get back to me. I’m used to it by now, right?

But I decide to just not text her for a while.

It takes 8 days, but I finally get a text. It says
“I’ll be off the grid for a while, so if you text me and I don’t text back, don’t think I’m ignoring you”
I said “Cozumel???”
She says “Bahamas”
And I say “I guess you know I have a mental picture of you walking down the beach, topless, like it aint no thing?”

No reply.

Now I’m getting nervous. Maybe I’ve offended her.

I give it five minutes and decide to call. Maybe I can mitigate whatever damage I might have done.

She answers the first ring.

“Hey!” she says.

“Hi Darlene! When are you leaving for the Bahamas?”

“I’m in line to board right now” she says.

So the last thing she thinks of before going on vacation for a week is “I better let steve know if I don’t return his texts its not because I’m ignoring him”

So I sent her a text yesterday.
“Are you home yet?”
she says “Yes. How are you?”

“I’m probably not as lean and tanned as you” I say.

No response.

But this morning @ 7:00am she sends me a text.

“It was horrible. I got a rash, cut my toe, fucked up my knee, have tummy trouble, lost my boyfriend. But I got a lot of reading done.”
So I say “Sorry to hear that.  A lot of that rash going around.Two friends went to Galveston and got it. That boyfriend stuff is going around too. I had that girl of mine come get her shit from my apartment 3 weeks ago. So when can you go to dinner again?”
And I got no reply!

Maybe I should have shown more empathy?

THE PROPHET

EXCERPT FROM "A PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION", 1991

"I recall when I was a little boy, going to the volunteer fire department Fourth of July picnic. My family doesn’t remember this at all, but they have very poor memories. ... I got the beans on my plate and I had the bun and I had just put the wiener in the bun and I was just squeezing the ketchup and the air turned white and it was snowing. Snow was falling and everybody was amazed and then somebody said, “oh no”, they said, “It’s fluff from the cottonwood trees, it’s just seeds coming down from the cottonwood trees”, and so, that was that, but then I looked down at my plate and there was nothing there. Now cottonwood fluff does not melt. Seeds don’t just disappear. It was snow on the Fourth of July. A snow flurry hit Lake Wobegon on the Fourth of July when I was a boy, but if you talk to anybody, including my family who was at the Volunteer Fire Department Bean Feed that day in 1951 on the Fourth of July, they will tell you that was fluff from the cottonwood trees that came down. I was the only one who knew the truth. A terrible responsibility for a child and one more reason to leave town, you know. There were too many things that I was the only one that knew them...

Stunning thought, but when God sends snow down on the Fourth of July, that indicates to me that he is talking to us in a loud voice and apparently I was the only one who saw this and therefore, the only one who might have a hunch what God was trying to tell us, but I turned down the privilege, thank you very much, no thank you. To be a prophet was too much for me then and it’s too much for me now. To be a prophet is hard work anytime and anyplace, but you never want to do it in a town of less than 2,000 population. If you live there and if you come from there. To stand and to tell people the truth that they have been successfully avoiding is not a pleasant business in a small town.

Back in 1918 in my town, back when the streets were lined with flags and when school children sat for hours of deadly nonsense about glory and honor and this war was a war to end all wars, this war would usher in a New World Order. Sat and listened to this there was a man on a bench outside a grocery store and turned to the man next to him and said, “I wish they’d take the flags down, I don’t think there’s any glory in this war, it’s just a bunch of politicians.” And the word got around town of this man’s remarks, this slur on our country ... and people would not speak to him again for a long time...

You have become a scourge. You have become a prophet and it’s time to time to hit the road Jack. You gotta get out of this town. Well, that never happened to me and I’m not ever going to have it happen to me. That’s what God was offering me when he had the snow fall on the Fourth of July and I saw it. He was saying, “Witness to people about this. Reveal the truth of this and be a prophet.” I said, “No thank you, I don’t want it.” He said, “This will be a great service to people whom you love, to tell them the truth”. I said, “Well they’re not going to thank me for it. I know that for sure. People hurt prophets. They throw sharp things at them. They rip the clothes off them and they make them sit for long periods of time in uncomfortable positions on top of sharp objects that are extremely flammable. That’s what they do to prophets. I don’t want that. I don’t want any pain whatsoever. I don’t ever want to experience any pain. Minor dentistry is more than enough for me. So, no thank you. I don’t want to be a prophet and tell the truth. What can I do that’s the opposite of that?” And so, I got into this line of work. Telling lies and I’ve never regretted it, which is a terrible thing to say in front of children. To say that you’ve spent your life telling lies, but I have and I’ve had a wonderful time, and I have been very well rewarded for this, and I have been congratulated by all sorts of people including members of the clergy, whereas if I had been prophet and told the truth, I would be broke and I would be unhappy myself and I would be despised and I would be condemned from most pulpits in the country. No thanks, I don’t really care for that. ...

No, it’s not that I don’t know what a prophet would say, you see. I do. It’s not for lack of a message. I’m not interested in saying it. If there were a prophet, of course, a prophet would tell us that America is a country that God has blessed so much, we have not suffered as other people have. We don’t know what suffering is like. We have not known war in our country since 1865. That experience of war in 1865 was so horrible in this country, the Civil War, that we did not lift our hand against anybody for years and years after that.

But over the years we’ve become so prosperous and we have developed technology that allows us to deliver war to other people, and it never falls on us. We have no idea what war is like in this country. Our soldiers know, but when they come back to tell us, we don’t know what they’re talking about. We don’t know what war is like in this country and so it behooves us to be careful. And to rain down death on people and then to gloat over it is not becoming in God’s eyes. This is not good. To rain down destruction from this country, which knows so little suffering that our own navels become the source of our suffering is not pleasant or good in God’s eyes. We should be very careful, very careful. This is what a prophet would say, I think.

But who wants to say it, because prophets have an approval rating of five percent, only in some places. No, I’d rather be in my line of work. ... God was disappointed in me at first, but He’s come around to seeing this more and more from my point of view. ... God made mistakes...you spread the truth around and it becomes common and people ignore it. ... Whereas, with someone like me, if I ever do tell the truth, people remember it. ... I remember every time I told the truth. Like a snowfall in July — you remember every time."
Garrison Keilor, 1991

NOT ALWAYS

"Let's face it. We're undone by each other. And if we're not, we're missing something. If this seems so clearly the case with grief, it is only because it was already the case with desire. One does not always stay intact."
- Judith Butler 

NOTHING EVER CAN

"What are we in the end?
Stories written on our spine,
a heart that broke too many times,
the mind that carries so many years,
the love that drove us insane,
the darkness that never left,
the light that entered,
the moments that left us with no words.
What are we?
Everything that sits silently right in the middle of our soul
that nothing ever can take away."
Kriti, via SL @ Assorted

ADULT SWIM

I was pulling into the parking lot and this dude in a truck nearly hit me. I stopped, hoping he would see me before plowing into me. He saw me just in time, looked embarrassed, and made an "I'm sorry I'm an idiot" gesture.
I smiled at him, made a "Thats OK" gesture because even though I haven't been in a wreck in almost 40 years, I still fuck up sometimes.
So I passed him by, grinning, and that's when I saw her, walking across the parking lot towards the swimming pool.
I had to laugh.
No wonder he nearly hit me.
And "Damn, Girl!".

ALTERNATE ENDING
"So I passed him by, grinning, and that's when I saw it, a tiger on a picnic table"

A TURKEY

"When you think that an egg is just a potential chicken, and that a chicken is just an ersatz turkey, and that a turkey is just a potential president of the United States of America, it kind of changes the way you look at an omelette."
Unremitting Failure

“The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected. Even when the revolutionist might himself repent of his revolution, the traditionalist is already defending it as part of his tradition. Thus we have two great types -- the advanced person who rushes us into ruin, and the retrospective person who admires the ruins.
GK Chesterton

"...ITS ALLOWED, NOT DECIDED..."

I’ll say God seems to have a kind of laid-back management style I’m not crazy about. I’m pretty much anti-death. God looks by all accounts to be pro-death. I’m not seeing how we can get together on this issue, he and I.
― David Foster Wallace
Gathered at Live and Learn

I posted this quote to FB. There were some interesting comments, including one from a girl that cares about me who thought maybe I was about to off myself. Or something.

Of more interest is this, from my friend Terry:
“Don’t lay so much on Him … He is a loving God. Sometimes bad things happen, there’s reasons for it in it’s own time. But make no mistake, it’s allowed, not decided. To think elsewise is to believe something is bigger than God … or whatever you want to call Him.”


And this from my friend Diana, a cancer survivor:
“I think we are born dying so live life to its fullest. I, personally, have had a few close calls to death….I want to live. God, whatever you call the supreme being, has let me down lot’s of times but hey, I’m still here and kicking and surviving…So I talked to the Man pretty much everyday…or cursing him, whichever the case may be, I believe in Angels too and have a few looking after me. Peace Out!”


And my reply to both of them:

“David Foster Wallace was a brilliant writer and a troubled soul who committed suicide in 2008.
I’d seen this matched up with Orlando on a blog. It made me think of a lot of things.
It made me think of the story of Job.
It made me think of the scene in Pulp Fiction where Jules and Vincent survive untouched a spray of bullets and Jules calls it a miracle.
And it made me think of all the things God has allowed man to do in order to prolong and improve life, like Diana’s cancer treatments, and possible common sense gun legislation.
God seldom steps in and stops bullets. We cant blame him for that. But he gives us the good sense to do something about it ourselves in time.
Or maybe I’m reading too much into it.”

"The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who in the name of charity and good will shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee."
Jules, Pulp Fiction

A SMATTERING OF FAITH AND DOUBT

"Great Faith and Great Doubt are two ends of a spiritual walking stick. We grip one end with the grasp given to us by our Great Determination. We poke into the underbrush in the dark on our spiritual journey. This act is real spiritual practice - gripping the Faith end and poking ahead with the Doubt end of the stick. If we have no Faith, we have no Doubt. If we have no Determination, we never pick up the stick in the first place."

Faith and doubt are supposed to be opposites, but the Sensei says “if we have no faith, we have no doubt.” I would say, also, that true faith requires true doubt; without doubt, faith is not faith."
- Sensei Sevan Ross, director of the Chicago Zen Center

"Faith and doubt in the religious sense are both about openness. Faith is about living in an open-hearted and courageous way and not a closed up, self-protecting way. Faith helps us overcome our fear of pain, grief and disappointment and stay open to new experience and understanding. The other kind of faith, which is a head filled up with certainty, is closed.

Doubt in the religious sense acknowledges what is not understood. While it actively seeks understanding, it also accepts that understanding will never be perfect. Some Christian theologians use the word "humility" to mean about the same thing. The other kind of doubt, which causes us to fold our arms and declare that all religion is bunk, is closed."

Unattributed

With thanks to "Alive On All Channels"

ALLIGATOR TALES

Prayers for the little boy and his family out in Orlando.

I was in Orlando, somewhere about 1994.

I took my fishing gear. Left the hotel and got on a tour bus with two rods and a tackle box. I had the driver stop and drop me off in a secluded area between stops. I stepped off into the lagoon, casting a spinnerbait.

“There should be some big ones in here” I thought to myself.

The lagoon narrowed, and I found myself up to my chest in swamp water.

It was about that time it dawned on me that I was wade fishing in the Alligator Capital of the World.
Unwise.

I headed for shallower water.
I casted my lure, and caught a fish.

At this point in the story I usually might tell you that as I was reeling in the fish, I saw the swirl of a tail, and suddenly a 20 foot gator was heading straight for me, his jaws wide open, and I would be gator food if weren’t for the aboriginal looking fellow who swung down from the trees doing a Tarzan yell and armed with nothing but a knife fashioned from an old Florida license plate and a lost Frisbee, wrassled, killed, cleaned, cooked, and ate of the gators flesh right there on the spot, offering me the prized “alligator cheeks” and a tasty remoulade and a Jax beer to go with.

But the reality is that as I reeled the fish in one of those tour busses that dropped me off came by and stopped, and people took pictures of me, the idiot wade fishing in the Alligator Capital of the World, fighting the fish. I tried to drag it out as long as I could and when I pulled my prize from the water it was only about 6 inches long,  and I held it high while everyone on the tour bus cheered.

And I got the hell out of that swamp. 

PULLING OUT SOAPBOX

On my Mom's birthday, June 11, 1982, she had a real bad stroke. I had gone in to work at 3:00, and got a phone call from the hospital at 6:00. She was in ICU. I left work to go see her. She was in ICU for a few weeks. She made a good recovery, was able to walk and talk and drive, but it took months of therapy.
The thing is, the day she had the stroke, on her birthday, I had not called her. I didn't have a card or present. I cant tell you for sure whether or not I even knew it was her birthday.
I would bet, at the age of 25, I was completely oblivious to her birthday. It haunts me a little, and it haunts me more on June 11ths.
I want all you youngsters to understand this:
Never forget to recognize your mama's birthday.
Ever.

LIKE IT AIN'T NO THANG

I went and had dinner with a girl last night.
She says “I like to go to the beach”
“Really? Like Galveston?”
She scrunches up her nose… “Eewww, no”
“Maybe Mobile?” I say.
“Nope”
“How about Pensacola then?”
“No way”
“So where then?” I’m dying to know.
“Oh Cozumel, or the Bahamas. Somewhere I can go topless on the beach”
I didn’t spew my tea or anything, but I swear I cant get the picture of her out of my head, walking topless down a sunny beach, like it ain't no thang.

WHAT DO PRINCE AND MY SISTER HAVE IN COMMON?

FENTANYL.
My sister and Prince both died of accidental overdoses of a drug called Fentanyl.
Fentanyl is an Opioid, one of the strongest painkillers available and commonly used to treat cancer patients. If you look it up, every other word is "fatal", "overdose" or "respiratory arrest".

Those who knew Prince said he had been addicted to pain-killers for a long time.
Those who knew my sister Lisa suspected that she might be.
As of yet no one knows where Prince may have gotten his Fentanyl, or if he had a prescription..
As of yet, no one knows where my sister Lisa got hers. All that is known is that she did not have a prescription and that the Medical Examiner found two "patches" on her body. We dont know if a friend had given them to her, or if a doctor had supplied her with samples. Apparently, this is not an uncommon practice.

A month ago I did a post about this drug. (Click here)
At that time I wasnt ready to tell the world, or most of my friends exactly what had happened to my sister Lisa.
But with the death of Prince by the very same drug, and at the urging some loved ones, the truth should be told.
As the article above indicates, addiction to painkillers has reached epidemic proportions in this country. People start out popping a few Vicodin's for a toothache, and the next thing you know they are stealing hydrocodone from their friends medicine cabinets, then they turn to heroin on the street because its more powerful and cheaper, and in some cases even easier to get.

Or in the case of Prince and Lisa, they moved on to Fentanyl, reportedly 50 times stronger than heroin and easy, very easy, to get too much of and die. According to the article above, it can also be purchased on the street, manufactured in China and marketed as China White.

But I really doubt Prince or Lisa went to the street for theirs. The stuff from the doctors will kill you just as quick.

When Lisa came home from California, some of her friends had expressed concern over her meds.
I remember telling them that if I had any indication she was having trouble, I would frog march her down to the Narcotics Anonymous Group that helped save my life.
But it doesn't work that way.
Something has to bring the addict to admit their powerlessness, and I was never able to do that for Lisa. Addiction is a cunning and baffling enemy of life, and Lisa wasn't able to do that for herself.

If you have to take painkillers, please follow Doctors orders.
And if it gets out of hand, listen to the message I heard back in 2008:
"That any addict can stop using drugs, lose the desire to use, and find a new way to live"

If you knew Lisa, you know she was smart, funny, warm-hearted, and loved life.
She had spent her life in service. She had a Masters degree in Sociology; Lisa worked for Child Protective Services, saving kids from the horrors of addiction, and counseling families struggling with these issues.
She would want her story told; that no one, not one,  is immune.
My sister Lisa would want you to know that.
We all miss her so.

MY MIND PLAYIN' TRICKS ON ME

"Here they come just like I figured
I got my hand on the mothe****ing trigger
What I saw'll make your ass start giggling
Three blind, crippled and crazy senior citizens
I live by the sword
I take my boys everywhere I go because I'm paranoid
I keep looking over my shoulder and peeping around corners
My mind is playing tricks on me"

THE BEST PEACH ICE CREAM

A few weeks ago I was helping her in her room. There on the dresser were tickets to a music show at the Hard Rock, for Friday May 27^th.

I thought “Well, she hasn’t invited ME to this gig. Who is the lucky guy? I’ll kill him.”

But the days and weeks passed, and while it stewed in my mind a bit, I wasn’t exactly ate up. For one thing it wasn’t the kind of show she would normally go to. There is really no telling how she came by these tickets. I learned a long time ago to fret over such things is a real waste of time, and can be pretty destructive to your soul.

And I did pretty good, putting it out of my mind, at least until the 26^th of May.

Suddenly I remembered it was tomorrow night, and there was not a mention from her of this music show.

In fact she had said she would be going to a funeral visitation that night.

Are you kidding me?

A funeral visitation?

That’s the oldest trick in the book!

So what did I do?

I got online to price a ticket to this show, in anticipation that I might show up and find out who this mystery man might be. Maybe if I wear a cowboy hat, or a suit and tie with a black wig, or my black tooth I carry with me for good luck, she might not spot me in the crowd!

I didnt buy the ticket. I knew better than to go. I learned a long time ago not to park down the street, knock on the door, peek in a window. You don't want to know. You THINK you want to know, but you really don't.
But, I'm human. I turned it over and over in my mind, just like I did during break-ups when I was 17, or 24, or 40 when I was going thru a divorce.

So the day of the show I talked to her. I asked her what she was going to do after the “funeral visitation” (yeah, right) after it was over at 8:00.

It was then she threw me for a real loop.
“How about if I come over and we make Peach Ice Cream” she says.

Peach Ice Cream?

Is she putting me on?

I call her bluff.
“Sure, come on over, I’ll get the ingredients”.

I got to tell you it was some really good ice cream, and we watched "American Masters: The Highwaymen", and I’m a real idiot.

THE SKY

"There are people who are always in love with the sky, no matter the weather. One day you will find someone who’ll love you the same way."
n. m., from a book in progress (via wnq-writers)

HOW MANY DID YOU KILL

"I met a man today who fought with the Americans in Italy in WW2.

He'd traveled with his dad to Europe several years before the war. When in Germany, he'd asked his dad, "Why are there so many soldiers? Why are there so many airplanes? What's going on here?" 

His dad told him that there would soon be a terrible war.

When this boy was 16, he enlisted and wound up in Italy with the American Army. He said that he decided to kill as many Germans as he could. This is what he told everybody.

He said when he caught his first German POW, both he and the German boy burst into tears.

Now, when his grandkids ask him how many Germans he killed in the war, he says, "None, I hope."

From "Regaining Your Soul" at QUIDNUNC 

THE BITTER HEART

Sometimes I think I have too big an appetite to be involved in this kind of relationship for this long.

They say if you get hungry enough you will eat your own heart.

Its bitter, very bitter, and almost thankfully,  there isn’t much left.

And I go on because there seems to always be a little more from where the last bite came from.

"In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, ‘Is it good, friend?’
It is bitter — bitter,’ he answered,
But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart."

Stephen Crane

THE SIMPLEST TRUTH

“...about man is that he is a very strange being; almost in the sense of being a stranger on the earth. In all sobriety, he has much more of the external appearance of one bringing alien habits from another land than of a mere growth of this one. He cannot sleep in his own skin; he cannot trust his own instincts. He is at once a creator moving miraculous hands and fingers and a kind of cripple. He is wrapped in artificial bandages called clothes; he is propped on artificial crutches called furniture. His mind has the same doubtful liberties and the same wild limitations. Alone among the animals, he is shaken with the beautiful madness called laughter; as if he had caught sight of some secret in the very shape of the universe hidden from the universe itself. Alone among the animals he feels the need of averting his thought from the root realities of his own bodily being; of hiding them as in the presence of some higher possibility which creates the mystery of shame.“
GK Chesterton

Credit~Live and Learn and Alive on All Channels

HOT WHEELS

Mike was my first friend in the sixth grade when I moved down here from Detroit.
I remember standing with him outside Shady Oaks Elementary, talking to this girl named Marsha. I don’t know what Mike said to her, but she took of running.
Well, my natural instinct was to take off and run after her, which I did.
Since she was in a miniskirt, she couldn’t run very fast, so it didn’t take long for me to catch up with her.
Once I caught up with her, my natural instincts took over again and for lack of knowing what else to do, I tackled her.
We both got up, looked at each other, and she started to running again.
Well, I guess my natural instincts weren’t as strong now that I'd tackled her once, and I could hear Mike hollerin’ at me, so I let her go.
When I got back to Mike, he was cracking up.
“Whats so funny?” I asked.
“You tackled her!” Mike says.
“Sure I did” I said.
“Well, don’t tackle girls. Especially, don’t tackle girls in dresses” Mike says, still laughing his ass off.
“Why not ?” I asked.
“Hahahaha! Do you really have to ask?” Mike says.
I thought about it a second. Then it dawned on me.
“Oh, yeah!” I said, and we went to Mike’s house to play Hot Wheels.

WHY I DONT DATE

Bought ticket for an event at the bequest of one girl.
She chickened out.
I asked two others.
They were otherwise engaged.
I asked another (#1) who said “Have you asked my friend (#2) if she and her son would like to go?”.
Apparently, she would like a chaperone, yes?
So I contacted #2; she seemed to be open to the idea.
So quickly, I bought two more tickets, only to have #1 say “I hate to be a fuddy-duudy, but, a rain check?”
So I ask #2 if she is still in. I'm wondering did #1 just shuttle me over to #1? Like maybe I asked the wrong one to start with?
#2 says “I told #1 it’s a bad time for me”
Well, guess what sister?
It’s a bad time for me too.
Now I got 4 tickets and I’m down to calling old lovers from 15 years ago, and two girls with boyfriends and saying:
“I need a date. Pays 20 bucks.”

TILL MY TROPHIES AT LAST I LAY DOWN

I see where people are complaining about a general feeling of entitlement running through the country, and blaming it on the particiption trophies that kids generally get when they go out for Baseball, Soccer, Pee-Wee football, ect.

Yeah, like participation trophies are suddenly ruining the country. I still have mine from 1970, where I shot a 121 in the Church Youth Golf Tournament. It really has very little to do with any of my current list of character defects.
See, thats the thing. I didnt tell the whole story. The next year I didnt get a participation trophy. I won the tournament. Shaved 36 strokes off my 121 and shot an 85. Sure I'd gotten better but mostly... I CHEATED MY ASS OFF.
Thats whats wrong with the country.
True story. The guy I beat shot an 87. He cheated his ass off too.

Just not enough.

So it ends up the Medalist trophy is worth exactly what we put into it.
Nothing.

So I kept the participation trophy, and gave the worthless Medalist trophy to the guy that shot an 87 a few years ago, and we had a good laugh, confessing our sins. He cheated too, but he went on and got a golf scholarship. He was good, a natural. In fact I'd taken him golfing the first time out in the 8th grade and he hit a hole in one on the 11th hole.
That first place trophy isn't worth a shit, but the story is priceless.

IF BY YES

“I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.”

― James Joyce, Ulysses

MY BIRTHDAY PARTY

I had a huge party planned for my 21^st birthday. Living in the Brown Trail apartments with Kem Keeton, I expected about 100 people. Never mind the logistics of getting 100 people into a two bedroom apartment.

At 7:00, there were probably 30 people there. The kitchen, dining room and living room were packed, and now the stairway was filling up.

Herschel and John came to me. We needed to make a beer run they said.

“I don’t want to go on a beer run!” I said. “I got chicks coming to this party, I plan to be here when they arrive.”

I’m not sure what my plan was for all these “chicks”, I just knew I didn’t want to miss anything.

But they were persistent, and talked me into going on their stupid “beer run”.

The beer run took us all the way to Majestic Liquors, way over on Randall Mill and 820. We bought the beer, got back in the car. I was eager to get back home, all those “chicks”, ya know?

But once underway, all of a sudden John wants to go to his house for a “Pot Run”. His house is way over in Richland Hills.

I’m livid.

“We got enough pot back home to invade Amsterdam. Take me home. I got “Chicks” coming over” I said.

It didn’t matter. My best friends were being un-cooperative, and 30 minutes later, with no “chicks” anywhere around that I could see, we were in front of Johns house. It was starting to get dark. I’d been away from MY PARTY for an hour and a half, and I had visions of all the “chicks” there were being scooped up by all my horn-dog  friends.

On my Birthday!

The nerve of those guys.

We were in front of Johns house, but no way was I getting out of the car.

“You just run in John, get yer shit, and run back out and get me back to my party!”

“No, you have to come in” John says. “I have a present for you.”

“No way’ I said “bring the present out with you. I’m not getting sucked into some black hole that is your house. I got chicks waiting for me.”

Well, the next thing I know, they have physically removed me from the car.

Now I’m stamping my feet in Johns front yard, having a tantrum, and all I can think to say, over and over  is “Take me home. I got chicks.”

Finally, Herschel grabs me by the shoulders, says “Look down the street. See all these cars? Where do you think all these cars came from.”

I look down the street. As far as I can see, there are cars parked, asshole to elbow, looking both ways.

It is a bit unusual.
“That’s weird. What ARE all these cars doing here?” I said.

Herschel shakes his head. “Happy Birthday asshole. If you will just come inside, we moved your party to Johns house. There was no room at your apartment. There are all sorts of chicks in there, waiting just for you. So do you want to come inside, or do you want us to take you back home now?”

I wish my friends Cyndy and Kathy were here to read this post.

They both passed the last two years, and Cynthia was always delighted whenever I would thank Kathy for the wonderful present she gave me for my 21st Birthday.

NOT HEROIC DEFEATS

"Roshi [his Zen Buddhist teacher] said something nice to me one time. He said that the older you get, the lonelier you become, and the deeper the love you need. Which means that this hero that you’re trying to maintain as the central figure in the drama of your life— this hero is not enjoying the life of a hero. You’re exerting a tremendous maintenance to keep this heroic stance available to you, and the hero is suffering defeat after defeat. And they’re not heroic defeats; they’re ignoble defeats. Finally, one day you say, ‘Let him die— I can’t invest any more in this heroic position.’ From there, you just live your life as if it’s real— as if you have to make decisions even though you have absolutely no guarantee of any of the consequences of your decisions"
Leonard Cohen

I often run across the first two sentences in this quote, and its good. But I think you have to have the rest of the quote, Leonards explanation, to really get what its about.