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Feb. 9th, 2010

ocean by san base, searby friend

Awe -



What we most love to share is AWE!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/09/science/09tier.html
Cover of Breast Strokes!

The Book -

 

So, today, I am officially acknowledging and therefore announcing that the book is delayed.  It was to be released on February 14th and for a variety of reasons will not be released on that date.  The publisher asked me if I was upset, and I went through my bodily-mental-emotional-spiritual system and could find no reason to be upset.  There are many reasons one might be upset in this world, a multitude of problems that pain us all, but this does not seem like one of them.  The book will come out.  It is close.  I have seen the galley.  I am pleased and there is more work to do and so it is.  I know you are waiting, some of you anyway, and I apologize, and this part is totally out of my hands.  

Tonight feels like a wonderful night to be with all the joy my life entails.  My son Chris came by last night for dinner.  Now, that was fun.  Actually maybe you are interested in what he is doing.  Some people found this podcast technical, but anything relating to one's child is obviously the most fascinating thing imaginable.  

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2010/02/micro-inverters-vs-central-inverters-is-there-a-clear-winner

Feb. 7th, 2010

book lovers

Reading -

 

I doubt there is anyone who loves books more than I, though certainly equally is possible.  I still remember going as a child,  with my grandmother to a certain bookstore in Bloomington, Indiana, across from the university.  

I don't know that an e-book is the same as holding a book, a book that marks the paged days with spills, notes, and tears.  How well-thumbed is it?

Books are like The Velveteen Rabbit, made real as they are held, cuddled, petted,  and loved.

My calendar is The Reading Woman, naturally.  Here is the thought for this week.

"I've never known any trouble that an hour's reading didn't assuage."

Charles de Secondat



I don't think texting and reading on the internet count.  I think it means curling in a chair or under a tree and I suppose one can do that with an e-book, but oh, the feel of paper, the nod to the tree, the allowing the tree to continue to contribute even after death.



Alan - pansy -

Good Morning!

The moon is a shining crescent in the early morning sky.  One can only exult.

One of my favorite books is A River Runs through It by Norman MacLean. It is a gem.

I Google and this comes up. You can see what I mean.

http://www.generationterrorists.com/quotes/river.html

I am reminded because John McPhee in the New Yorker this week writes about fishing and the experiences he shared with his father. When his father is lying in a hospital bed after a stroke, and the doctor is insistent his father is essentially gone, McPhee sits by his bed and tells him about a fish he caught with his father's bamboo rod. His father's face is damp. Our face is damp.  This is how we share.

I have been feeling like it's Valentine's Day each day this year. I love to celebrate the heart.  Ted Kooser is one of my favorite poets.

Happy Super Bowl Sunday, whatever that means to you.  Oddly, I realize I know more about it from the food pages than anywhere else. How many super-large bowls do we fill with snacks and treats today?   Enjoy!



This Paper Boat

by Ted Kooser

Carefully placed upon the future,
it tips from the breeze and skims away,
frail thing of words, this valentine,
so far to sail. And if you find it
caught in the reeds, its message blurred,
the thought that you are holding it
a moment is enough for me.


"This Paper Boat" by Ted Kooser, from Valentines. © University of Nebraska Press, 2008

Feb. 6th, 2010

alan - joshua tree bloom

Communion -

 

I'm going to give another plug for the Winter Feast of the Soul.  The meditations are marvelous.

http://www.winterfeastforthesoul.com/


I am reading a book, Thinking like a Mountain, Towards a Council of All Beings.   It has different meditations.  One is honoring the water, earth, air, and fire of which we're made.  Another asks us to remember our evolutionary beginnings and to remember the evolution of organic life.  Remember back to our first cell awakening in the womb, to all the stages we have been through, fish, reptile, mammal.  Speak of what you, a human, can be now.

Imagine; envision; create.

This is an article on a cafe asking people to turn off their electronic equipment for a day and talk to each other. May your day be rich with communication and communion with yourself and others.  It is Saturday.  

Where I am, soft rain taps the earth, the earth without, the earth within. Response, is full.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/02/06/MNB61BTE83.DTL

Feb. 5th, 2010

mission blue butterfly

Evening -



Forget not that the earth likes to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair.

- Kahlil Gibran
book lovers

Jane Austen -

 

I love the work of Jane Austen and I am not alone.  Each of her books has been made into movies that are enthusiastically awaited and greeted.   Emma is currently being shown on public television on Sunday night at 9.  My women friends are ensconced on Sunday night in front of the TV for the latest reenactment.  Oh, you say the Super Bowl is on Sunday.  Emma!

That said what I find odd in this enthusiasm for her work is she was making sharp, satiric social statements.  She knew poverty.  She knew very well why a woman had to marry "well," and what it meant when she didn't.  I think her biggest statement though was that the "wealthy" had a "duty" to care for the "poor."  Mr. Knightly is admired because he cared for his estates and the people on them.  He respected intelligence and hard work.  He was a true gentleman and she tore apart those who strutted their vanity and paraded their fortune at the expense of those beneath them.

How can we have a nation so in love with the work of Jane Austen and yet voting against her point, and I need to remember that the elections are not as lop-sided as they seem.  I don't know why the Democrats are running for cover but I think we need to go back to our literature, to the classics, for the ideals we admire.  Look at Dickens.  He knew personally what it was like to have his whole family thrown into prison because his father couldn't pay his debts.  His books aren't exaggerations.  He wrote what he knew, what he saw, what he lived.

Tolstoy was a man of wealth, and he questioned it.  Our great literature, our art, asks us to look at all sides, but always to lean down and lift up.  I don't believe in absolutes, but I think the classics,  ask us, beg us,  to look at the whole of human life.   
Alan - pansy -

The state of CA -

 

I believe it is universally known that the financial state of CA is a mess.  

It seems "Carly," who wants us to think she is so well-known that she doesn't need to use her last name, is running against Tom Campbell, to represent the Republican party against Barbara Boxer.  Now, watching the "demon sheep" ad, I think Tom Campbell sounds like a decent guy. He is the one Republican who supported our Republican governor in trying to keep the state alive.  

So, we have a woman who was not helpful to Hewlett Packard destroying the one guy who might have had a chance against Barbara Boxer, and who knows, maybe her negative campaigning will work, but anyone who lives in CA, and thinks the "no new taxes" that the conservatives hold over our heads works must be crazy.

Alan posted this, this morning.  I think we need to look realistically at what is possible.  Every level of government needs more money.  Some people appear to have more money than they need.  Perhaps we should raise taxes on those who can afford it and rescue the nation as a whole.

  http://www.alternet.org/economy/145554/tax_the_corporations_and_the_rich_or_take_draconian_cuts_--_the_decision_is_ours


oregon, willamette, 1 proxy falls

Good Morning!

 

It rained heavily in the night and now we are tucked in fog.  It is comforting somehow to have the view so shortened, enclosed.  Perhaps it offers a respite from the news.  I am baffled by how people do not see that taxes pay for services.  They pay for our schools, roads, parks, and police and fire protection.  In the past, the wealthy have been more heavily taxed percentage wise because they were living above a basic survival level, or at least as seen by most people.  The ridiculous rise in housing prices began when people needed more than one home.  They needed two, three, or more.  People used to think it was luxurious to have inside plumbing, and then, two bathrooms became the norm.  Around here, houses have been built with marble bathrooms so huge and cold and mirrored and intimidating I wouldn't want to be alone in one.  I like cozy, thus, my love of fog.

My friend Elaine sent me this reminder this morning.  I think when each of us steps into the joy of our full potential, we will see that liberation ignite in compassion, kindness and the cultivation of humanity for all.  That is my hope.  That is my prayer.  


Marianne Williamson:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”



Feb. 3rd, 2010

goldsworthy - branch

A Soldier of the Great War!

 

I just finished reading Mark Helprin's book, A Soldier of the Great War.  I highly recommend it.  It is not a quick read, is a meditation, and worth the time it takes.  It is a wealth of information, a fantastic journey with a man as he looks back on his life, much of it spent fighting in the Great War, WWI.  It is a song of love, a journey uniting spirit and soul.

eagle flying

Emptiness -

 

I woke from a dream this morning that it was important for my health that I visit the ocean.  Rain had been predicted but the air and water were surprisingly warm.  Clouds circled around but not overhead.    I sloshed into the ocean as much as makes sense when one is fully dressed.  

I went with the idea of emptying.  I was thinking of the saying that we can't be filled when we are already full, so my intention was simply emptiness.  I can't explain what happened, other than to say - I can't say.

This is the reading for today, February 3rd, from the book A Year with Rilke by Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows.  


IT IS ALL ABOUT PRAISING

It is all about praising.
Created to praise, his heart
is a winepress destined to break,
that makes for us an eternal wine.

His voice never chokes with dust
when words for the sacred come through.
All becomes vineyard. All becomes grape,
ripening in the southland of his being.

Nothing, not even the rot
in royal tombs, or the shadow cast by a god,
gives the lie to his praising.
He is ever the messenger,
venturing far through the doors of the dead,
bearing a bowl of fresh-picked fruit.


Sonnets to Orpheus I, 7 


If you are interested in the story of Orpheus, you can find some information here:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orpheus



Feb. 2nd, 2010

great blue heron

Elders -

 This is an important statement on what we elders need to do.


http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/02/opinion/02brooks.html?ref=opinion


A nation cannot persist where the federal government spends $7.00 on the elderly for every $1.00 spent on children.

I have seen massive social changes in my lifetime.   It seems all have gained but our children.  

 It is time for we elders to step up to the plate and help figure out how to balance the needs of this nation, so that children enjoy and have access to the same opportunities  that we had.  We worked for equality, but this nation is not equal now when it comes to how we support the young as compared to the old.  Let's see what we can do to balance the gains of AARP.   We were one way and now we've gone another.   Let's reach a hand to the young.   


David Brooks says it well:

It may seem unrealistic — to expect a generation to organize around the cause of nonselfishness. But in the private sphere, you see it every day. Old people now have the time, the energy and, with the Internet, the tools to organize.

The elderly. They are our future.


simplicity - stones

Happy Groundhog Day!




Groundhog Day

Celebrate this unlikely oracle,
this ball of fat and fur,
whom we so mysteriously endow
with the power to predict spring.
Let's hear it for the improbable heroes who,
frightened at their own shadows,
nonetheless unwittingly work miracles.
Why shouldn't we believe
this peculiar rodent holds power
over sun and seasons in his stubby paw?
Who says that God is all grandeur and glory?

Unnoticed in the earth, worms
are busily, brainlessly, tilling the soil.
Field mice, all unthinking, have scattered
seeds that will take root and grow.
Grape hyacinths, against all reason,
have been holding up green shoots beneath the snow.
How do you think spring arrives?
There is nothing quieter, nothing
more secret, miraculous, mundane.
Do you want to play your part
in bringing it to birth? Nothing simpler.
Find a spot not too far from the ground
and wait.

~ Lynn Ungar ~

(Blessing the Bread)





Feb. 1st, 2010

candles

Flame -

 

Where I live, the winter months require I pay attention to the moon and the tides.  The entrance to the freeway can be underwater around the full moon high tide, so travel may require a bit of figuring and maneuvering and sometimes it means staying home.  I like that my leaving depends on the moon.

I am in reflective mode today, this first day of February. I notice the lengthening days within, and feel that tender new leaf response, even as the skies are gray.


Jack Gilbert has written that: 

We think the fire eats the wood. We are wrong. The wood reaches out to the flame.


Today, I am wood reaching out to flame, rock remembering that fire is one way I form, then, cooled, I rest.




snow and ashes

Listen -

 

The first duty of love is to listen.

Paul Tillich


I'm not sure I would call listening a duty but I do see the value of listening to others and ourselves.  Can we allow that space?
free ride

To Contemplate -



A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.

- Lao Tzu
eagle flying

Rice Field in Japan!

Planting different kinds of rice gives us these wonderful images.  Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_q_iOObid4&feature=related

Jan. 31st, 2010

breast strokes - me 3

Self-Portrait!

 

As many of you know, I love the work of Rilke.  

A few weeks ago, I went to a poetry reading where two men read the following poem of Rilke's and then, read their own Self-Portrait.  It was intriguing.  A friend of mine just did the same thing so I sat with it, feeling how rarely I look in the mirror, but years ago, I participated in a three month, life-changing experience called Eyes of the Beholder.  One piece of homework was to look in the mirror for five, ten, or fifteen minutes, just look and see the love and ancestry that is there.   Try it.  Write down what you see.  Fall in love with yourself.


Self-Portrait


The steadfastness of generations of nobility
shows in the curving lines that form the eyebrows.
And the blue eyes still show traces of childhood fears
and of humility here and there, not of a servant's,
yet of one who serves obediantly, and of a woman.
The mouth formed as a mouth, large and accurate,
not given to long phrases, but to express
persuasively what is right. The forehead without guile
and favoring the shadows of quiet downward gazing.

This, as a coherent whole, only casually observed;
never as yet tried in suffering or succeeding,
held together for an enduring fulfillment,
yet so as if for times to come, out of these scattered things,
something serious and lasting were being planned.


Rainer Maria Rilke

Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming




alan - spring flowers

One person -

 

Yesterday afternoon I went to Book Passage to hear Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows speak about their new book, A Year with Rilke, Daily Readings from the Best of Rainer Maria Rilke.  The book contains their translations of his work.  There, I saw Louise Yahnian, the third grade teacher of both my sons. She will be 75 on May 2nd, and is truly a guiding light.  I feel lighter just thinking of her and I see how much it matters how each of us in the world.  We truly do make a difference just by "showing up" with joy and excitement about what life brings and what we bring to it.

I was most struck yesterday by this reading for February 27th.  Rilke wrote the following in a letter to Countess Margot Sizzo-Noris-Crouy on January 23, 1924.  Of course, it was written in German, but this is their translation.   Joanna said it gave her comfort last week as she read it where her husband was placed a year ago in a Green cemetery in Mill Valley.


THE SECRET OF DEATH

The great secret of death, and perhaps its deepest connection with us, is this: that, in taking from us a being we have loved and venerated, death does not wound us without, at the same time, lifting us toward a more perfect understanding of this being and of ourselves.  

Rilke   

Jan. 29th, 2010

Utah Natural Bridges - a starry night sk

Space -

 

Epigram 43

- J.V. Cunningham


This Humanist whom no belief constrained
Grew so broad-minded he was scatter-brained.  

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