John Swinburn

Yesterday afternoon, we protected ourselves from the blazing heat by sitting under the fan on the deck. Temperatures hovered around 87°F, but the covered deck and the breeze of the fan made the oppressive heat barely tolerable. Late in the day, when the light in the sky began to dim as the sun slipped toward the horizon, distant thunder interrupted the steamy solitude of the forest. As a gentle rain began to fall, the heat of the afternoon made the humid air grew even more dense. But, soon, cool breezes started rustling the leaves in the trees. The temperature dropped sharply. I think it had dropped as far as it would go when I checked the temperature again; 68°F. The sound of rain on the roof and in the leaves of the trees, coupled with the cool breeze, transformed the experience. Though the heat of the day at its peak was tolerable under the fan, when the air temperature dropped to the upper 60s, the comfort of sitting on the deck reached perfection. Visits by hummingbirds and woodpeckers and an assortment of other birds add magic to the experience of sitting outside when the weather reaches that point at which it could be no better. Any adjustment in temperature or wind speed or humidity or cloud cover could only diminish the circumstances.

Have no fear of perfection—you’ll never reach it.

~ Salvador Dali ~

Of course, adjustments invariably occur, so perfection passes. But my recollection of how I felt is what reminds me of what “ideal” means to me. Somewhere on this planet, there is a place where the weather consistently replicates my brief encounter with Nature yesterday. Somewhere, the temperature is always just right, the breeze is never too strong or too weak, filtered sunlight ensures visual clarity when looking at beautiful trees or brilliantly-colored birds or striking masses of clouds in the sky. But wherever that place is, the perfection is superficial; high prices, enraged residents, unfriendly neighbors, mosquitoes, snakes, scorpions, chiggers, hungry tigers, rampaging elephants, militias armed with high-powered rifles and low IQs, and a thousand other kinds of unpleasantness interfere with what could have been the ideal environment. So, we have to establish priorities. Our aims and objectives must combine the most appealing positives with the least offensive negatives; “tolerable” becomes the sought-after ideal. Yet many of us have few, if any, choices. Those unfortunates who have little control over their circumstances must learn to live with a deeply unpleasant imbalance: negatives that greatly outweigh the positives. Those of us who are lucky enough to have much greater control over our circumstances should exercise that power to the greatest extent possible; to do otherwise would be a travesty. We should examine all the positives and all the negatives, assigning priorities for both desirable and undesirable attributes of the lives we want to lead. Once the priorities have been firmly established, we should pursue them with dogged determination. But we should acknowledge, as well, that some of our priorities could well conflict with others; and with others’ likes and loathing. Wait. This is getting too complex. Perhaps it’s best to just “deal with the hand you’re dealt.” No, that discounts and discards the options available to us. Somewhere in the mass of wishes and dreams and things and people to avoid and concerns about how others feel and a thousand other influences on our lives, there is a constantly-transforming target that we seem to want to chase. The target—the environment we crave—changes with the same frequency as we take breaths. Desire is malleable, flexible. Ach. We cannot reach that place of perfection because the definition of perfection is fluid, like water in a river’s rapids. It moves within itself and slips through the fingers when one attempts to grasp it.

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I have an appointment with a financial advisor in Little Rock this morning. As much as I would like not to worry about money and what to do with it to preserve it so it lasts as long as I do, I must devote some attention to the process. Hence the visit in Little Rock. I had an advisor in the Village, but I was not impressed with her, nor with her company. I returned to an old standby, a company with which I’ve had a variety of relatively superficial dealings over the years. I hope the superficial dealings transform into deeper engagements; I want to feel confident that I can rely on the advise I receive. It’s a bit late to be coming around to this, given my advanced and advancing age. But maybe it’s better late than never. We shall see.

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I change my mind with incredible frequency. I suspect I have decided, with certainty, at least ten times in the last two days where I might want to live. Here. There. Over there. Close. Far. More distant. Nearer. Far, far, far away. In a small house. In a cavernous castle. In a cave. On a hillside in Chile. On the outskirts of a small town in Nebraska. On the Gulf Coast. In France…maybe Arles. In a small motor home. In a converted Greyhound bus. On a houseboat. On a thousand-acre farm. Finland. Reykjavik, Iceland. Tacoma. Bartlesville, Oklahoma. Schenectady, New York. Yellow Springs, Ohio. Santa Fe, New Mexico. Hawaii. Aix-en-Provence. The far northern reaches of Canada. None of my wishes and desires will matter if I am crushed by a meteor this morning. It’s all pointless daydreaming. I have better things to do. Probably.

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If I lived far from civilization, I think I would experiment with tattoos and complex jewelry. I would create long, colorful strings of beads—metal, wood, stone, plastic, etc.—and hang them from my left ear. The strings would be long enough to drape over my shoulders and wrap around my neck. Colorful, glistening beads. As for tattoos, I am not sure yet. Perhaps an extremely detailed, very colorful dragon wrapped around my torso and one arm and one leg. Or a monstrous scorpion on my left shoulder. Or, perhaps, a phrase taken from a book by John Steinbeck. Mi novia would want a say in my tattoo, I suspect. And maybe she would like to have input into my lengthy earring.  But why wait until I live far from civilization? Why not just do it? Here. Now. Hmmm.

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Time to shower and shave and prepare for my trip to Little Rock. Join me?

No “standard” exists for the size of urban residential lots. I thought one did, in fact, exist. And perhaps one did, at one time, but no longer. And I doubt the “standard” was geographically widespread. My assumption, based on the most common sizes I remember seeing on Zillow.com, is that the typical urban lot is a quarter of an acre, or 10,890 square feet. But an article comparing Jacksonville, Florida lot sizes with lot sizes in Austin, Texas, suggests otherwise. In Jacksonville, the decade for “large” lots was the 1970s, when the median lot size was more than 11,000 square feet. Recently, the median lot size there fell to 7,700 square feet, while the medium size of a home grew from 1,800 square feet in the 1970s to 2,300 square feet today. Austin’s real estate plat configurations changed in much the same ways during the same periods. Charlotte, North Carolina had an enormous median lot size back in the 1970s at 59,000 square feet; more recently, the size has shrunk to about 7,500 square feet. Even that big lot size is not really huge, at least in my opinion; it’s only a tad over 1.35 acres.

Given my thirst for space/distance between my neighbors and my home, 1.35 acres is on the very small side.  Multiply that number by 100—or 300—and the amount of space would be getting closer to…what?  Ideal? Adequate? I can live with what I have, of course. Roughly half an acre. But that half-acre is artificially enlarged by the fact that there are no houses close to me. I cannot count on that emptiness, though. I might buy up all the lots surrounding me, except for the fact that every unimproved lot would require payment of a monthly assessment, at present, of $46. “Ownership” is simply a code word that means “control” or “privacy.” And people must pay for control or privacy these days. Or submit to the vagaries of the world around us.

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I started this blog very, very late this morning. I’m ending it very, very early (considering how late I started it). Apparently, I have little to say this morning. I have plenty to think, but little to say about it. That’s often a wise approach to the day, though I too frequently disregard wisdom in favor of decompression.

I wonder how common it is for people to ask themselves whether they made any significant contributions to humankind during the course of their lives? The answer could ruin an otherwise perfectly acceptable life-long mood. But the ruinous nature of the response depends not only on what one did (or did not) accomplish, but on one’s desires or expectations about one’s “legacy.” If I have been under no illusion that my life “matters,” confirmation that it did not would be of no particular concern. But if I believe everyone has the obligation to make lasting contributions of one kind or another, failure to do so could be devastating. On the other hand, if I had created a successful vaccination against cancer, I might consider it a big deal, whether or not I believe everyone should leave a positive legacy. I have explored some of these questions before and have had conversations about the questions and some of the answers. Invariably, even in the absence of any tangible contributions to humankind, someone will have said something to the effect that, “You may never know how much of a positive influence you might have had on some people in your live…” That’s the “fix” for someone who feels like he is a failure because he has done nothing of consequence. Hmm. But, then, it might be true, yes? Anything is possible.

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Given the choice between: 1) detonating an explosion to bring down an old building and 2) creating an extremely intricate silver and gold wire sculpture, which would I choose? Those options are absurd; they make no sense. But sometimes we are faced with nonsensical options; do you prefer butter with your television viewing or do you hear the sound of raindrops hitting the big time? Incongruity frustrates us, but it can make us laugh. Or it can exacerbate our disappointments, turning moderate annoyance to white-hot rage. The effects of incompatible ideas running headlong into one another are difficult to accurately predict. People who understand those difficulties avoid betting the horses or sitting at the blackjack table. People who think all predictions must eventually come true tend to join Gamblers Anonymous when it’s too late—when everything worth losing has been lost.

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Let me look through the lens of a kaleidoscope and I will be lost almost instantly. Peering into that lens, I enter a chaotic world of brilliantly colored, rapidly changing geometric shapes and designs. Regardless what was on my mind the instant before my eyes land on that psychedelic mindscape, nothing but colors and shapes matter as soon as I plunge into that calamity of color. If ever I get news that a nuclear blast is about to annihilate planet Earth, staring into a kaleidoscope’s lens will be sufficiently distracting to me to keep me happy and curious until the end. Adults should not be so easily amused by kaleidoscopes, though I am not sure why I think that. I suspect it is for the same reason that adults have no business being awestruck by spectacular sunrises or sunsets. We’re just too mature for such childishness. Adults should be content to wallow in worry about taxes, healthcare, and the likelihood that all the world’s children will grow up to be chain-smoking welfare cheats.

At what point does childhood end and adulthood begin? Where is the razor-sharp line that separates unmitigated joy from shrugging acceptance? My immediate answer is that there is no such line and there never was…but then I realize there must be such a line, at least for some people. They are the people who seem to have made an abrupt transition from carefree child to über-responsible adult in the time it takes for a hummingbird’s heart to beat. I think something awful must trigger that instantaneous transformation. Something so overwhelmingly distressing or painful or depressing that all the light in the universe suddenly went dark and dull. Just…BAM! From cheerful giggles to mournful wails and endless sobs, in the blink of an eye.

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I do not remember how old I was when my oldest brother gave me a book full of images of M.C. Escher’s art. I think it must have been sometime around the time Escher died. Maurits Cornelis Escher died within weeks of my high school graduation. When I received the book is immaterial. I was  immediately taken with Escher’s unique way of looking at the world…and representing the world uniquely with his extraordinary graphic art. Escher blended imagination with reality and he mixed architecture with conjecture. His mind allowed him to see what others do not see. His hands (at the urging of his mind) presented what he saw in ways that allowed the rest of us a glimpse into his creativity. Escher’s art proved that the impossible is readily achievable; all it takes is the willing suspension of dead-certain practicality. I think I still have that thin, brown, hard-cover book. I hope I do. I feel a need to take a good look at how easily one can accomplish the impossible.

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Time moves far faster than a clock’s hands. That is very difficult to understand.

I found this thought-provoking:

If you would know a mystic, do not confine your search to monasteries and temples, but look also on the highways and byways, in towns, hamlets, and in the hustle and bustle of the great cosmopolitan centers of the world. When you find someone who is industrious, studious, compassionate, loved by friends, and neighbors, tolerant in religious views, and who can point out to you the magnificence and efficacy of God in the simplest of things, you have found a mystic. With these qualities, whether one is attired in sacerdotal robe or in the overalls of a mechanic, one is none the less a mystic.

~ Ralph M. Lewis, from The Sanctuary of Self ~

As I read this passage, it occurred to me that “God” in this context could range from the Christian or Jewish or Islamic version of a supernatural deity to—more in line with my thinking—the mere existence of the astounding complexity of every aspect of the cosmos and its contents. And, of course, many other interpretations could fit. God, then, could constitute one or more “beings” or some variation on recognition of the astonishing, awe-inspiring, incredibly complex puzzle that constitutes everything. But who or what God is does not really matter, does it? Yet why do I want to consider the possibility that “mystics” are among us. It depends on what constitutes a mystic. You or I could be one. All the people we admire could be mystics. And even those we loathe. Yes, it is possible to loathe someone who is “industrious, studious, compassionate, loved by friends, and neighbors, tolerant in religious views, and who can point out to you the magnificence and efficacy of God in the simplest of things.” But if we do, that loathing is not caused by an external reality; it is created in ourselves through fear or envy or some other human emotion, an emotion that feeds our ego and stokes the fires of hatred in our hearts.

I have not read The Sanctuary of Self; I was drawn only to a few meaningful passages I found in front of me. I do not know enough about the book to say precisely what it is about, beyond the apparently obvious. But the quotation and the title of the book both appeal to me in odd ways. That is, emotion is what attracts me to them; logic has no bearing on how I feel about them.

On one hand, I am thoroughly atheist, through and through. Though I admit the possibility, I am close to certain that “beings” such as those presented in the Bible or Quoran or Torah do not and did not exist. On the other, the amazing complexity of all existence is more than sufficient to inspire in me awe, wonder, worship…appreciation at the very highest level. The relationships between humans and between all other living creatures and the environment in which we exist summons, in me, reverence.

Conversations between mature adults, in which they explain their beliefs (or lack thereof) may be insightful—offering insights about one another—I doubt those conversations change attitudes, ideas, or positions. Beliefs about the nature of existence form early and coalesce into almost inalterable ideas by the time one exits one’s teens. At least my concepts of the universe and the cosmos and all “creation” had long since solidified by my early teens. My point, here, is this: at a certain point in life, probably very early on, one’s only sounding board about one’s belief’s is oneself. Others’ insights might be interesting, but they essentially are irrelevant to one’s own ideas and experiences. And that’s where “sanctuary of self” and “mystics” fit in. Sometimes, the only sanctuary available to us are ourselves. And we might find it is possible others may be mystics—but it is certain we can be and should be our own mystics. Especially for atheists and doubters, the only sanctuaries, sometimes, are ourselves.

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We recently visited with friends who are in the process of selling their house and moving on to their next adventures, the destination and content of which remains uncertain. During our conversation, Hawaii came up as an attractive option. The state’s politics, climate, natural beauty, diversity, and a host of other factors are clearly in its favor (for people of our political persuasion, anyway). The cost of living, not so much. That’s an obstacle that could be overcome if approached creatively. One of the couple is, like me, enamored of the concept of co-housing. If enough people—and the number might not have to be very big—got on board with the idea, they might collectively be able to amass enough money to create a “community.” Without breaking their respective banks, so to speak. The right plot of land, the right design, and the right people could make Hawaii a truly appealing destination. Maybe.

The appeal of Hawaii came to mind this morning as I read an AP article about the state’s laws regarding guns. A new law allows more people to carry concealed weapons, but simultaneously prohibit people from taking guns to a wide range of places, including beaches, hospitals, stadiums, bars that serve alcohol and movie theaters. If a private business allows firearms, it must post a sign to that effect. I do not know enough about the law to know whether I would support or oppose it; it depends on who can carry concealed weapons and why they are permitted. Whether I support or oppose it, though, is immaterial; it is what it is.

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Even in the laid-back environment of Hot Springs Village, even in the deep, dark woods, the world sometimes can seem intrusive and hostile. Those are times a person needs the world to empty out, leaving him safe and alone. Those are the times I feel strongest that I need to go away somewhere, by myself, and spend a day or a week thinking and writing. It doesn’t last long, the sense of urgency that I need to be away from all people. But while it does, that feeling tugs at me hard. As I think about my occasional hunger for solitude, I wonder what that craving for being alone means? The feeling that I need to find a safe retreat from the world is not new; it has come and gone, with about the same frequency, since I was in college. Maybe, in the deepest recesses of my mind, I think I will one day find an “answer” by reaching far, far inside myself during a time of total solitude. An answer to who I am, really, at the cellular level. That is an absurd idea, but in absurdity may be precisely the place where the answer rests.

Whosoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god.

~ Aristotle ~

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When I went in on Thursday to get a “loaner” hearing aid to see what it might do for me, it was unavailable because the supplier’s internet was down. The hearing aid had to have its software updated before use, which was impossible without internet access. So, I did not test the hearing aid. I am growing more skeptical by the minute of audiologists who sell hearing aids. I have decided to have my hearing tested by an ENT doctor, if possible. Ach! It’s the little things that can drive a person stark-raving mad. Having experienced many little things, I know this.

Today began with uplifting news for a change. I learned that the Edith Kanakaʻole Quarter is now in circulation, a continuation in the American Women Quarters^TM Program. Not only did I learn about the new quarter, I learned a little about “Aunty Edith” and the reason she is so admired in her native Hawaii and beyond.

I learned that Dev Shah won the 2023 Scripps National Spelling Bee (and its $50,000 prize), after competing in two of the events, previously. And I learned that Marie C. Bolden, a Black girl, won the first national spelling bee 115 years ago, in 1908.

News that the Senate passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling boosted my mood temporarily too. I like having a bit more confidence that I will continue receiving my Social Security payments and that my retirement funds probably will not lose massive amounts of their value in the aftermath of an economic bloodbath.

Though encountering uplifting news certainly is a good thing, discovering that the good news is tinged with disheartening information or realization is not surprising. In Aunty Edith’s case, the mere fact that a Hawaiian woman’s selection merits special attention verifies that bias, bigotry, racism, and a host of other unpleasant attributes require ongoing efforts to erase them.

The racist reactions to Marie Bolden’s 1908 spelling bee win amplified and shone a light on the brutal verbal attacks that being Black called forth—and continues to do so today. I know nothing about Dev Shah’s parents or grandparents, but I suspect Dev’s cultural ancestry is Indian or Pakistani. I have noticed many recent National Spelling Bees have been won by people whose names suggest (to me, at least) they are of Asian descent.  That observation suggests to me either that Asian parents tend to be more supportive of their childrens’ intellectual development or non-Asian parents are under-supportive. There could be many other reasons, of course, related not to support or intellect but to cultural differences…or other factors. I would like to know, with some confidence, what causes…wait, I seem to have great acumen at snatching negativity from the jaws of joy.

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Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.

~ Marcel Proust ~

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Finally, a deal to raise the debt ceiling. I will worry, even after Senate approval, until Biden signs the bill. And then I will grind my teeth as I think of the fact that the deal is yet another temporary “compromise” to temporarily solving a problem that should be eliminated. Philosophical differences must be confronted, acknowledged, and addressed if this Congress and those in the future are to effectively solve ANY problem. Compromise usually necessitates give and take on both sides of an issue. Everyone might have to swallow a bitter pill in order to reach a satisfactory resolution to problems that look very different, depending on one’s perspective.

The outrage at the debt ceiling compromise by those on the left and those on the right tells me the problems will not be solved until some grown-up leaders get involved at both ends of the political spectrum. Adults who hold strong positions that conflict with the positions of other adults realize they either must concede some of their ideals or risk dying in bloody battles. But lately I have seen evidence that too many people may be willing to die for meaningless ideals. “I will not accept apple pie for dessert. It’s either cherry pie or we fight to our deaths.” Moronicatude is a neologism I coined for such idiocy.

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The good news continues, though. When I look outside at my back deck and into the forest beyond, I feel a wave of satisfaction wash over me. The new deck furniture—two swivel rockers, a loveseat, and a coffee table—is comfortable. The newly washed and sealed wood of the deck looks well-used but is solid. The hanging ferns and wind chimes and various other decorations are pretty. The stained glass windows we hung from the end of the deck add something beautiful that words cannot describe. It’s a place where I feel good. I can sit there, sipping coffee or a soda or just water, and feel in touch with the universe around me. Sometime soon, I will buy another notebook computer to replace the one that threatens to crash and burn at any moment (and which I replaced with a desktop computer); then, I will be able to write my blog while outdoors, rather than inside, looking out a window. Mi novia has suggested I do that—more than once. Perhaps I should react more quickly to her ideas, inasmuch that many of them are quite good ones.  Oh, I should say this…looking out the window is not at all bad…but feeling the early morning air touch my skin and smelling the forest and hearing the birds sing fills me with appreciation.

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Yesterday afternoon, I attacked a sinus headache with acetaminophen and a nap. My timing was not good, in that I was asleep during a time when a friend might have come by to share cake and conversation. Today, I will preempt the sinus headache with an allergy tablet and large volumes of water. I hope yesterday’s wished-for event will take place today. This paragraph is, obviously, a message to my friend. 😉

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And there you go. It’s just ten minutes after 6 and I’ve finished my post for the day, I’ve emptied my coffee cup, and I’ve managed to maintain a reasonably positive outlook for the first two hours of the day. Life is good. And you are, too. Yes, you. And You. And so on.

The 2023 hurricane season begins today, June 1. The names awaiting assignment to potentially deadly storms for the season are: Arlene, Bret, Cindy, Don, Emily, Franklin, Gert, Harold, Idalia, Jose, Katia, Lee, Margot, Nigel, Ophelia, Philippe, Rina, Sean, Tammy, Vince and Whitney. I know of only three storms that bear my name, John. The first was a Pacific storm in 1994; the second, another Pacific storm, struck the  southern tip of Mexico’s Baja Peninsula on September 1, 20006, causing only minor damage. The third was yet another Pacific storm. It skirted Baja California, but did not make landfall. The storms do not “bear my name,” actually. They bear the same name assigned to me at birth. What, I wonder, does the 2023 hurricane season hold in store for the Pacific, Atlantic, and Gulf coasts? How many ships will be lashed by the fierce winds of tropical storms and  hurricanes between now and November 30? Who will write music and lyrics honoring the seafaring victims of this year’s storms, now that Gordon Lightfoot has died? I wonder whether any songs have been written in honor of people killed by the brutal onslaught of hurricane wind and water? Just curious, though the thought that people may have died—but no songs were written about them—makes me feel a bit melancholy.

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June is Pride month, too.  Until recently, I thought the United States had largely gotten beyond the bigotry associated with homophobia, etc. But the progress made in the recent past is under increasing pressure intended to reverse the advances. Bigots are coming out of the woodwork, emboldened by Ron DeSantis, Greg Abbott, and their ilk. For that reason, alone, those of us who are allies of the LGBTQ+ communities must be prepared to fight people who want to turn the clock back to times when gays, et al were forced to conceal their sexual orientations and other attributes viewed by bigots as “dangerous” or “immoral.” Will humanity ever evolve to a point at which bigotry dissolves into the hideousness of history, with no chance prejudice and intolerance will again rear its ugly head? I am afraid not.

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If not for the inconvenience of chaotic—and possibly distant—parking, I might have a good time attending an Arkansas Travelers baseball game. And I might enjoy going to Centerville Speedway some Friday night to watch racing…stock cars, modified stock cars, street racers, etc. I seriously doubt I would find either event truly riveting—at least not sufficiently joyful to warrant changing my attitude and giving me the urge to participate in spectator sports with any frequency or regularity. But I imagine this unanticipated interest will be short-lived.  Both events would, under normal conditions, be of absolutely no interest to me. But I suppose conditions these days are abnormal; certain elements of my personality are subject to momentary deviance.

That having been said, I sometimes long for a place to go, habitually and often, with people who—without becoming addicted—want a place where audience energy is palpable but not intolerably frenetic. After watching the event(s), I can imagine moving on to a welcoming, comfortable tavern where the group can have decent (but not snobbishly expensive) wine, good local draft beer, non-alcoholic drinks, and various types of bar food…burgers, pizza slices, fries, fried green olives, steak tartare, fried green tomatoes, jalapeños stuffed with shrimp and cheese, assorted mixed nuts, etc., etc. Food and drink tend to melt away social trepidation and misanthropy.

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There is a certain kind of joy in accomplishing something with one’s hands that cannot be replicated in any other way. Intellectual accomplishments usually cannot match the satisfaction of “building” something. Painting, sculpting, metal art, working with glass, model-building, jewelry making, and on and on get in a person’s blood; they become his salvation in a brutal, unforgiving world. But for someone like me, whose attention span seems to get shorter with every passing hour, even salvation is not enough to keep interest in the endeavor high. Writing, a poor cousin to creative handmaking, is my refuge. Yet as I type, hoping my “creative outlet” will keep me occupied, I remember this: I have forgotten how to write—I just process words through my fingers. Characters, words, sentences, and language at large simply spill from my hands’ tentacles onto a keyboard and subsequently onto a screen. Language, sentence structure, etc. by default. Ideas and concepts may (or may not) be buried beneath the sea of alphabetical characters.  But sculpting and welding and plasma cutting and painting and sewing and chiseling stone and making statues out of bronze and porcelain and clay are sure to increase the trickle of creativity to a powerful flow. At least for a minute.

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It is time for me to shower, shave, and get dressed. All in preparation for another visit to the audiologist to try out a hearing aid. I will not be persuaded to buy one today. I am certain of that. I have decided to have someone who does not sell the devices test my hearing. Not that I am a skeptic, of course…well, of course I am skeptical.

Perhaps this afternoon will present another opportunity to engage in conversation and otherwise enjoy the company of a friend. We shall see.

Wars of nations are fought to change maps. But wars of poverty are fought to map change.

~ Muhammad Ali ~

I remember a time when I found Muhammad Ali (formerly known as Cassius Clay) insufferably arrogant. And I still think the man was arrogant in many respects. But as proud and loud as he was, he was an extraordinary boxer, an excellent self-marketer, and—from time to time—an extraordinary philosopher. Actually, a number of wise, insightful quotations are attributed to him and I have no reason to believe otherwise. Despite the fact that involvement in boxing—a barbaric sport—is awfully dangerous and potentially fatal, I think he pursued it because it represented for him the most likely way forward toward the kind of success he sought.

Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.

~ Muhammad Ali ~

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“How would it look if I …” Though I criticize others who give more credence to optics than to reason, my hypocrisy is on full display when I do. I am just as guilty as anyone else when it comes to worry about what others might think. That fact, alone, embarrasses me. The fact that my worry about what what others might think might arise from “how it would look” is doubly disturbing. When I consider a person who is deliberately addressing optics, I think of a politician and the politician’s staff members as they consider how something might be received, rather than what that something might achieve. Putting myself in the same genus with them is quite shaming and hurtful. It makes the phrase “less than human” come to life.

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Two nights ago, we enjoyed a wonderful evening with our “wine group” friends, some of whom also are “church friends.” One of them hosted us at his house with ribs from his smoker; some of the best I have ever had. The others brought salads, beans, dessert, wine, and various other goodies. Our contribution was wine and stuffed celery. People assume the celery is stuffed with pimento cheese, but mine was different: cream cheese, sharp cheddar, lemon juice, cumin, chile powder, and a little Pace Picante Sauce.  The fact that there was so much else to eat may have been the reason so much was left over; but I think stuffed celery is now considered an appetizer from the 1970s or 1980s. I cannot help it; those were the years when I was coming into my own. “Coming into my own?” According to thefreedictionary.com, it means: “reach a new level of maturity, independence, or success.” But I digress!

Sitting among a group of good, friendly, reasonable, thinking people was such a good feeling. Everyone could be themselves, with no fear of offending anyone else. I may be the only one who actively considers such a concern: worrying that what I do or say may offend. The only people I would not worry about offending are people I actively dislike. Or loathe. Not, it’s not more digression; well, maybe a little. At any rate, I felt so fortunate to be among kindred spirits. Grateful to be protected by a refuge of progressive thought in a political (and even social) environment of deliberate, aggressive, unapologetic regression. And grateful for many other aspects of my life. Appreciative of the people who made life worth living in years gone by and those who do the same today.

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As we sat watching the latest episodes of Happy Valley last night, we heard a loud “boom.” I thought it sounded like a car crash, perhaps half a mile from us. Mi novia went online to learn what others nearby might have heard. Online, she read reports from all over Arkansas. Some people suggested it was a sonic boom, caused by a space capsule racing through the atmosphere as it plunged downward toward a water landing in the Gulf of Mexico. This morning, the only things I found about the sound were these:

• • • • A Facebook post made by a meteorologist,  who said it was the SpaceX capsule
      • A headline story online from The Manila Times, saying:
        • A private flight carrying two Saudi astronauts and other passengers returned to Earth on Tuesday night after a nine-day trip to the International Space Station. The SpaceX capsule carrying the four parachuted into the Gulf of Mexico, just off the Florida panhandle, 12 hours after undocking from the orbiting laboratory.

And so there you go. Our entertainment was interrupted by subtle evidence of a once-in-a-lifetime event that we did not learn much about until this morning (and not much so far this morning).

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Today is the very last time we can experience May 31, 2023. There will never be another one.  Six hours and thirteen minutes into this 24-hour span as I write this, less than three quarters of the day remain to be experienced. Never again will I be able to capture this moment. I’ve already squandered most of a quarter of the day. Only time—roughly eighteen hours of it—will tell whether I do the same to the rest or whether I put at least part of it to constructive, progressive, positive use.

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June, which begins in about seventeen hours and forty-five minutes, is a month flush with birthdays. Mi novia, my sister, a brother, and several friends celebrate their birthdays in the coming month. And I will celebrate the fact they have birthdays to celebrate. Although, for the first time I can remember, I wonder why we celebrate birthdays? Yes, I understand it is a milestone, but isn’t ten days after; a birthday also a milestone? I think so. And, anyway, why do we need milestones to warrant celebration? Why shouldn’t we celebrate the mere fact of all existence…every day??! We should! And I think we do, each of us in our unique ways. We may not even recognize that we are celebrating our existence in this universe and the universe’s existence in our fields of vision, speech, touch, smell, and hearing. Now, if only we would waken every day and express gratitude for (not to) everyone and everything. Time flies. We have only seventeen hours and thirty-three minutes left until June begins. I must prepare for it!

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The world in which I live would have been a completely different environment if evolution has gone in a slightly different direction a few millennia ago. What if, for example, the brains of sheep had evolved so that their intelligence (in human terms) was greater than humans? And, assuming that had happened, assume they developed the capabilities to work with the same tools humans use, just modified to conform to the anatomy of sheep. We might be sharing the Earth with a species that possesses capabilities that equal or exceed our own. They might drive their versions of “cars.” They could practice law and medicine. They could, through intense lobbying, get their most astute and persuasive members appointed to important governmental posts. Including, let’s say, executive positions in the Department of Agriculture and the State Department. Any mention of leg of lamb or lambchops would be considered hate speech. Sheep probably would run for elected office in key political districts, garnering ever greater political power with every office. Shepherds would be out of work; in an environment in which any human control over the genus Ovis is prohibited by law. These are absurd thoughts, indeed. Yet here they are, ideas emerging from a nearly seventy-year-old brain; a mind afflicted with all manner of innocuous deviance.

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My hands are riddled with claw and teeth marks. I blame the cat, but part of the problem has to do with my way of playing with—roughhousing with—the cat. She’s still a kitten, really, and still learning how to play without causing damage. I should be concerned, though, that my rough way of playing might be teaching her to be more aggressive, more willing to draw blood, and more willing to attack. So, watch it, John. She can take you out with just one swipe of her razor-sharp claws.

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Another day has begun. It has long been light outside. The air seems still and heavy, though I have yet to go outside. I think I shall, in a minute. A fresh cup of coffee and a deep breath of swamp-wet air is just what I need. Best of the day to ya!

Politicians are carriers of infectious psychiatric pathology. They harbor ideas and attitudes that cause stress in their constituents. It is informative to note that carriers need not suffer from the infection themselves; politicians, therefore, may not suffer the miseries they inflict on the electorate. If I had my way, they would. They would contract the diseases they carry. Gut-wrenching stress. Constant worry. Financial concerns. And much, much worse. If I could exert as much control over politicians as they exercise over the rest of us, politicians would dread me. With good reason. Alas, my power is limited to my ability to cast my vote. Unlike politicians, whose relatively small numbers give their votes considerably greater power than the ballots I cast, my power is massively diluted; my votes are weak and essentially powerless. But, by combining mine with the votes cast by like-minded people, my vote can take on more significance and far greater raw power. The trick, of course, is to find people who share my perspectives. And to secure the sanctity of our collective ballots. No mean fete when politicians manipulate votes the same way they manipulate voters. As much as I abhor violent insurrection, I sometimes find myself viewing insurrection through more favorable eyes. Hmmm.

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I watch the sky with suspicion. Do meteorologists have more control over the weather than they let on? Can they schedule rain, snow, rapid increases or decreases in temperature, and other meteorological events with precision? Watching television weather forecasters, one might be inclined to dismiss the idea as the product of an unhinged mind. But bumbling forecasts that are far off the mark are intentionally misleading in more ways than one. Meteorologists occasionally bungle their forecasts as a means of persuading audiences of the legitimacy of meteorology. If meteorologists were to reveal their true capabilities, the rest of us would label them magicians. The rest of us would be stunningly wrong. Meteorologists are not magicians; they are weather gods who possess the power to harness Nature. Watch them carefully. Their holy, supernatural powers are not limited to doing “good.” No, they not only provide gentle rains and soft winds that give crops needed nutrients and healing kinetic motion. They schedule tornadoes, hurricanes, ice storms, hail, fierce straight-line winds, floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and all manner of other catastrophic events. So, beware. Listen carefully to weather forecasters’ clues. Paying close attention may enable us to re-take the power long-ago snatched from us by Zeus. 😉

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Time is not “universal.” Even “galactic time” relies on moments that differ remarkably from “solar” or “lunar” time. Time, then, is contextual. It depends on its environment. A day on Earth is not the same as a day on Jupiter. And a day defined by the Milky Way galaxy is not the same as a day defined by the Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy. Yet we go about our lives under the mistaken assumption that time is universal. If we adopted time as dictated by movements within the Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy, we would age far slower. Or much faster. Or, perhaps, the physical manifestations of age would differ radically from the way they present themselves in our experience. We might get grey hair, crepe-paper skin, and a stooped walk before our first “birthday.” Would we continue to celebrate birthdays if time did not cooperate the way it does now? And how would we define “now,” given the huge variations between time as we experience it today and the way we might experience it under different conditions? “Today” would have a different feel to it, too, as would “yesterday” and “tomorrow.” While this string of ideas may have no obvious utility, I think they have value; if for no other reason than to stimulate parts of the brain that rarely have the opportunity to express themselves.

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I am not motivated to write this morning. The words I have placed on the screen thus far are just placeholders for words that might convey ideas of considerably more value. I am extremely tired. I will nap now and hope to awaken in time to do some modest amount of work around the house. But if not, the work might get done by others whose motives to do the work are governed by their desire for need for money. Off I go to sleep.

News about yesterday’s partial collapse of a six-story apartment building in Davenport, Iowa caused me to have concern about the people affected by the collapse and sparked memories of our road trip last September. As we drove along the Great River Road National Scenic Byway in Davenport, we were surprised to come upon a moored Viking River Cruises ship, disgorging passengers—for a tour of Davenport and environs, I suppose.  It feels a little odd for fond memories to collide with compassion and care; I suppose it’s natural, though. I liked what I saw of Davenport, a town of around 100,000. And, as we ventured north to Decorah, a smaller town that appealed to me even more, I found myself remembering how enamored I had been with Iowa and northern Illinois and Wisconsin when I lived for a few years in Chicago. The stops in small-town Iowa and, later, the drive through western and central Wisconsin, rekindled my deep appreciation for that part of the country. As we made our way from the mid-west to New York State, my love of road trips continued to intensify. I discovered that, if my immediate reaction to places along the way was any indication, I could happily settle—at least during spring, summer, and fall—in the north-central and north-eastern tier of states. The look and feel of that part of the country is somehow radically different from the south and southwest and west coast, though I would be hard-pressed to express just how the regions are so different…without going into excruciating detail that might initially seem irrelevant. I loved living in Chicago, though I cannot say I ever felt completely “at home” there. But I was happy to live in Chicago with my late wife and to spend weekends exploring the rural countryside west, north, and east of the city. I miss that time of my life. But I know “you can never go ‘home’ again,” even when you never felt that anywhere was truly ‘home.’

I sometimes find myself pitying people who never wandered more than a very short distance from their birthplace. But, then, I think those people may have a far better, deeper, and more accurate sense of “home” than I could ever hope to have. Hmmm.

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I woke, sometime before 4 this morning, to the sound of Phaedra meowing at the foot of the bed. She yowled as I went to pee and the noise continued as I went into the closet to throw on a t-shirt, shorts, and flip-flops. She followed me into the kitchen, the volume of her howling growing with every step. I tricked her into going into the laundry room, when I closed the door and left her complaining as I went back to the kitchen. I took my morning pills, checked my blood sugar, prepared the cat’s early breakfast, and made coffee. Soon after I left her with her bowl of food, she came looking for me in my study. I assume she had already finished eating. When I refused to devote my undivided attention to her, she left my office in a huff and deposited herself on the front entry mat, just outside my study door. And there she sleeps, even now; sated and angry and apparently ready for her postprandial nap. Before Phaedra, my morning preparations took far less time; back then, I slipped into the kitchen, quickly did my healthcare monitoring duties, and headed to my study. Ten minutes, tops. Nowadays, though, even when I trick the feline into staying out of my way by locking her in the laundry room while I prepare her food, what used to take ten minutes takes at least fifteen…more likely, close to twenty or twenty-five. Getting up by 4 is no longer quite as early as it once was because Phaedra demands my focus and distracts me from giving my undivided attention to my coveted morning routine. I willingly give in to Phaedra’s demands, though, despite feeling annoyed sometimes by her insistence that I give myself over to her whims.

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Later, after I have embraced the morning light (now appearing outside my window) and have otherwise grown accustomed to the start of the day, I will change into “work” clothes and go about finally doing some touch-up painting around the house, along with a few other long-delayed chores. “Work” clothes—shirts and pants and sneakers that will be undamaged if subjected to paint, dirt, sweat, and other forms of wardrobe punishment—put me at ease. I am always a little anxious while wearing clothes that could be ruined simply by accompanying me as I experience a normal day. I feel more at ease in clean “rags” than in freshly-pressed shirts, slacks, and polished shoes. That is not to say I do not enjoy getting “dressed up” from time to time. But that enjoyment is purposely kept to a minimum.

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To dwell in the here and now does not mean you never think about the past or responsibly plan for the future. The idea is simply not to allow yourself to get lost in regrets about the past or worries about the future. If you are firmly grounded in the present moment, the past can be an object of inquiry, the object of your mindfulness and concentration. You can attain many insights by looking into the past. But you are still grounded in the present moment.

~ Thich Nhat Hanh ~

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“...simply not to allow yourself to get lost…” That seems such a dismissive way of looking at how to avoid allowing regrets to commandeer one’s emotions. If it were “simple,” regrets would not be so damn difficult to overcome or set aside. Yet the advice given by Thich Nhat Hanh is probably solid. It is just not as easy as he made it sound. An impartial “object of inquiry” does not soften memories of the past, nor does it provide forgiveness for one’s acts or omissions. That is up to oneself to do on one’s own terms. A dispassionate, rather sterile personal assessment may give a person insights into himself, but it does not necessarily provide a “cure.” My skepticism notwithstanding, Thich Nhat Hanh’s advice deserves attention and observation and, whenever possible, adoption. If nothing else, it may suggest pathways that may be invisible without that mindful concentration.

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I have never been to Washington Island, Wisconsin. In fact, I am not sure I knew much—if anything—about the place until this morning. My brief exploration of the place has convinced me that I might enjoy having a look around, though. Once there (by way of car ferry), there appears to be quite a bit to explore, from lavender farms to restaurants to Stavkirke, described as “more than a beautifully designed and expertly crafted Norwegian church in the woods of Washington Island. It’s a tribute to a people, to a heritage, to a way of life that, though waning in the modern age, persists in small pockets all across rural America.” Well that sounds appealing. And there’s more. But one of the most appealing aspects of Washington Island is that it is home to only about 600 people. Yet those few hundred people must host hundreds and  hundreds of tourists to support restaurants, pubs, and more.

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Phaedra just succeeded in breaking my new and rather expensive stapler. She jumped on top of my two-drawer file cabinet, with the intent of jumping behind it. I grabbed her just in time, but she fought me and, in the process, knocked the stapler sitting atop the cabinet to the floor. A spring is now missing…possibly on the floor…but the likelihood of finding it is slim, thanks to its small size. Even if I find it, I will have no idea how to reattach it to the stapler to make the thing work. I am giving thought to how to skin, filet, and feed Phaedra to the local population of hawks, coyotes, foxes, and such. Grrr! With that, I am finished with today’s blog. Phaedra’s curiosity seems to have killed my interest in touch-up painting. Damn it!

Just as I was beginning to give more credence to the lessons I have been trying to learn this morning…

A cone of patchouli incense. A desire to feel the comforting embrace of universal peace. A seemingly endless supply of low-level anxiety. A sense of the presence of perpetual background noise, like radio static. This chaotic mix defines a tiny corner of my day—and a big slice of my time in this non-urban, non-rural community.

What is this place, after all? It is not a town. Despite its name, it is not a village. It certainly is not a city. I live in an unincorporated area where, in a futile attempt to keep the riff-raff out, porous gates stand guard. Gates offer irrefutable evidence that residents live in fear. But, then, locks on car doors and deadbolts at the entry to one’s home do the same thing. Locking the doors, latching the windows, and posting signs that say “this property is protected by a security system;” all these actions tell the story of where we are on the spectrum between fear and freedom. Freedom is a mythological state of being that few people have ever experienced. While we may not live in abject terror, our anxieties are on full display whenever we lock a door, check a back pockets for assurance the wallet is still there, or cling to a purse in preparation for tearing it out of the hands of a prospective purse-snatcher. We do not like to admit it, but we are, perpetually, afraid. We live in fear, albeit mostly a low-level fear.

The patchouli is not smothering the anxiety. Maybe it is keeping it to tolerable levels. Or, more likely, the incense is doing nothing; it can do nothing without my cooperation and active support. I cannot decide whether I am resisting or cooperating. I want to feel peace and freedom, but I do not want to mislead myself—or be misled—on the path to reach them. Suspicion is a byproduct of anxiety. Paranoia is a byproduct of a deeper level of fear. Further out, toward the end of the spectrum, insanity—with its potential for unpredictable (and potentially horrible) behavior—springs from fear on steroids: terror.

I consider these matters as if I were a detached observer. I look at them from the perspective of a distant witness, not as if I were in the midst of the confusion. Yet, even from a distance, I see myself—as clear as if I had the eyes of an eagle—right there in the middle of it. The mind’s eye has a range of vision, by the way: dull, dim, and fuzzy on one end and spectacularly bright and clear and precise on the other. In between, our vision (like our memory) is unreliable; it oscillates between clarity and confusion.

Peace. Universal peace. Those of us who can even conceive of it, much less actually believe it is achievable, live in a fantasy world. We are much more comfortable living in an imaginary place than in the real world. Our dreams frequently give imaginary substance to our desires. We might feel universal peace, but that sensation arises from our expectations about what universal peace might feel like—not from any real evidence of the sensations or emotions the experience might actually produce.

The bottom line: no matter how “grounded” a person might be, he or she lives in a dream world created by his/her perspectives. Having never been one others are apt to label as “grounded,” I have no legitimate credentials to make any claims about where—whether in a fantasy world or in the real world—a grounded person might live.

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Our new deck seating is operational and in use. I like it. I will like it even more when we secure an outdoor rug to put under it and some small end tables to place next to the two swivel rockers. In the interim, though, I will enjoy it “as is.” I may go out in a few minutes to sit and listen to, and watch, the birds. But, at 55°F, it’s still a touch cool for the way I am dressed (shorts, t-shirt, and flip-flops). What the hell. I’ll do it, anyway, at least for a minute or two. Just to say I did it. But, first, the blog insists on being put to bed.

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Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul – and sings the tunes without the words – and never stops at all.

~ Emily Dickinson ~

Though the “official” Memorial Day “holiday” is still two days away, I am thinking about it now. A post I wrote eight years ago still represents my thinking about Memorial Day:

Memorial Day is dedicated to the men and women who lost their lives in defense of the USA, it is not a celebratory welcoming of summer.

It doesn’t matter your politics, we owe a debt of gratitude to those people who did as they were asked. They may not have agreed with the politics of the wars they fought, but most did. Regardless, they followed orders and did their duty. Well over one million men and women have died while fighting, or supporting, wars in which the USA has been engaged. I offer my respect and admiration for them; I only hope their sacrifices lead, eventually, to peace and to an environment in which war is recognized as the ultimate insanity.

An experience eight years ago prompted me to write that little diatribe. I had read an article by a veteran who said he cringed when he heard people say “Happy Memorial Day!” “Happy” is not a word we should associate with the day, or the three-day-holiday linked with the day intended to recognize and mourn the ultimate sacrifices made by people “in uniform.” I think a specific day—or week or month or eternity—should be formally recognized as a moment during which people responsible for starting or prolonging wars are shamed for their roles in attempting to destroy civility and civilization.

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or in the holy name of liberty or democracy?

~ Mahatma Gandhi ~

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This morning, as I read about Ken Paxton’s potential impeachment as Texas’ attorney general, I wondered just how corrupt a person has to be to suffer the rancor of Texas’ Republican legislators. I have nothing but contempt for Ken Paxton, however I cannot bring myself to express admiration to the politicians leading the charge to impeach him. While they may not be as corrupt as Paxton, their political philosophies are brutal, dangerous, and should be rebuffed at every opportunity. “If only” the populace of Texas would rally ’round human decency, compassion, and democratic ideals, the cesspool that is the Texas legislature would be emptied and turned into an institution that actually serves the people of the state. But reality suggests the decay has not even reached its peak. Ach!

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Ten lighthouses are available from the General Services Administration. Several of them will be offered first, free of charge, to Federal, state, and local governments and non-profit entities. If they are taken, they will be offered at auction. I would love to own a lighthouse. Perhaps I should form a nonprofit, the sole objective of which would be to acquire and restore lighthouses—some of which would be intended for residential use. The prospect of buying, restoring, and living in a lighthouse has always been appealing to me. An incredibly powerful emotion draws me to those lights, like a moth to a flame. [WARNING: There are more clichés where that came from.]  Lighthouses have always represented a satisfyingly lonely isolation from the rest of the world. Living in one, while probably hard on my knees as I ascend and descend the stairs to the top, would make me feel like I am not just close to, but part of, the natural environment. Lighthouses belong to Nature just as much as—or more than—they belong to humans. They serve as the anthropomorphic intermediary between rough seas and rocky shorelines. Obviously, I have a romantic perspective on lighthouses. I realize, of course, they can be cold, dirty, spider-infested, money-consuming, and more; plus, they can be dangerous during severe weather. Nonetheless, lighthouses occupy space in some of my many, many fantasies.

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Niksen is a Dutch wellness trend that means “doing nothing.” I learned about niksen by reading a current article on BBC.com and an April 2019 article in the New York Times. Practicing niksen is said to relieve stress. Despite the fact that I am retired, modestly solvent, and generally unafraid for my safety, I feel considerably more stress than I would like. Perhaps I need more frequent and focused niksen as a safety-valve to relieve pressure and its attendant stresses. The Dutch are fortunate in that their government and their social structures facilitate the practice of niksen, in that the Dutch population largely has substantial free time, away from work. (So do I, but I haven’t practiced enough niksen thus far, I suppose.) Worth thinking about, methinks.

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I took a bit of a break from writing. During that break, my thoughts wandered into places I wish they would not go. My flippant mood transformed during my pause in blogging; melancholy took the place of glibness. Well, that’s life. My writing now ends.

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Nothing remains but to crouch among the prisoners or fall among the slain.

~ Isaiah 10:4 ~

The urge to be creative rises and falls in an unpredictable pattern. A relatively recent spike in that urge in me—rekindled by viewing several finished products on walls—honed in on stained glass. As I skimmed a craft catalogue—my growing current interest in intricate metal work (e.g., jewelry and abstract art)—burst into being. My years-long fling with mask-making remains—and it may erupt into a love affair at any moment—but I have been dissuaded to pursue it for various reasons. I still have my easel in my office, along with plenty of acrylics and oil paints and several canvases, so I may paint again. The life cycles of all these urges vary in erratic ways. My intentions to start or to return to a creative outlet may last a day or a month or a year. The embers of one may hide, buried in ash, for years. Eventually, they all reappear for a time before they slip back beneath the rocks from whence they came. Everything except writing. But writing is creative in a way and that satisfies the intellectual circuits of one’s brain, whereas creativity that yields a physical “product” answers the need to see and touch and possibly hold the tangible output of a person’s vision. Surprisingly, despite the fact that for years I have craved expressing the kind of creativity that produces physical articles, I have never latched on to one and kept at it. As I think about why I abandoned some of my creative pursuits (or stopped engaging in them for a very, very long time), I think the most significant reason is my dissatisfaction with the products I have created. I want to make clay masks, but I want the make good clay masks. I want to create abstract oil and acrylic pieces of two-dimensional art, but I want them to be good. I want to work with stained glass, but I want to immediately produce, physically, what my mind’s eye sees—something that would be good, if only I could translate into reality the fantasy inside my head. Any thinking person could immediately identify the problem here: getting good at anything requires practice. The Mona Lisa did not emerge, in finished form, from Leonardo da Vinci’s first brush with painting. (Author’s Note: That was meant to be something of a pun…but not much of one.) My lack of patience is legendary, at least in my mind. I try to hide my intractable impatience whenever I can, because it tends to annoy people around me. Of course, it may not be just your ordinary impatience; it could well be attention deficit disorder (ADD). Whatever it is, it is the primary stumbling block for me. I think. And despite the fact that I know it and that I wish I could conquer it, my interest in producing tolerably decent “artsy” products is insufficient to merit the effort. In other words, I want to be good, but my desire is not great enough to convince me to engage in the process of getting good. To use a favorite aphorism (one I have not used for far too long), “The game is not worth the candle.” In the original French: Le jeu n’en vaut pas la chandelle. It originated in the sixteenth century, as I am sure I must have written at some time in the past, to refer to an evening card game’s winnings that were so low they were not worth the wax burned in the candle providing light to the players.

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One unassembled chair arrived yesterday. Sometime soon, we hope, three additional chairs, a loveseat, and a low table will join what would now be the solo seating spot. We bought the set to serve as a comfortable and inviting seating area on our deck. The very heavy, circular wrought-iron and its four very heavy, wrought-iron chairs will take up residence at the opposite end of the deck from where they were, outside our bedroom. A few more decorative items to hang from the deck’s header, along with an attractive outdoor rug, will complete the setting. Or, if not complete, get close to it. Hummingbird feeders must be put up (late, I know), too, joining the birdseed feeders. The grill, smoker, and deck box must be properly situated, somewhere, as well. I’m sure it will work out fine. One way or the other, the deck will become an ever-more-inviting refuge. We will be awash in outdoor seating areas (if we include the area away from the house, where the forest floor is littered with a few strategically-placed and very thick slab flagstones). Now, if only I could keep at bay snakes, chiggers, and extremes of temperature, the place will be perfect. Even though I’ve committed to stay where we are, I cannot say with even the remotest certainty that I will remain even moderately as committed in a month or three months or a year. We shall see. I’ll keep searching for that place that will satisfy everything we have ever dreamed of. The moment I find it, my commitment will dissolve. I am not going to hold my breath waiting for that instant.

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Today promises to be a pleasant one, if our plans pan out. We expect a good friend to join us today for an extended period of leisure, conversation, and the kind of utter relaxation and comfort available only  in the presence of fast friends. I look at the calendar and see absolutely NO commitments…and the same tomorrow! And the only thing on Sunday is church (which, realistically, absorbs a considerable portion of the day, when one considers the frequent post-service conversation, lunch, and obligatory (for some) nap).  So, we have a few days of actual “vacation” from the day-to-day obligations that devour a person’s time the way a starving wolf consumes an unfortunately slow rabbit.

But we’re not talking rabbits and wolves, here. We’re talking close friends enjoying one another’s company. And that is a good thing.

A friend is someone who gives you total freedom to be yourself.

~ Jim Morrison ~

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Last night, we spent some time with other friends at the World Tour of Wines (or whatever it’s called), where we drank some pretty nice wines and ate some very nice food. The starter was fried pizza dough, dusted with shredded parmesan and basil and served with a homemade marinara sauce. An arugula salad with a wonderful bacon-infused tangy dressing was next. And a nice chicken breast with a white sauce, served over a few spears of asparagus. To top it off, cannoli stuffed with two different fillings. Of the six other people at our table, three are members of our church. The other three have known our church friends for many years, I believe. It is nice to be involved with a group of people like them—long-time close friends whose bonds go back much longer than we have known them.  Though we are not extremely close to the others, we feel extremely comfortable in their presence. They are people with whom we would happily enjoy socializing over food, wine, and conversation. Some days, I think there are many such people within my “sphere;” other times, I think the number is miniscule. It depends on my then-current definition of friends and where I find myself on a scale the ranges from “fiercely, furiously, dangerously loathing of” to “passionately, everlastingly, hopelessly in love with” on the other. I do not hang around with people on the “loathing” side of the scale, but I know of such people. The older I get, the quite modestly larger the numbers near the other end of the scale get. I’ve spend most of my life being something of a reclusive hermit who craves solitude but who is firmly attached to (i.e., in love with) a tiny number of people. The tiny number is what I refer to; it has grown…a little. Surprisingly (to me), the number increased significantly when I encountered Unitarian Universalists. Hmm. What could that mean?

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Yesterday, I came across a house for sale, online, that I found extremely appealing. It was built just last year, but from a design produced for Joseph Eichler’s company, which developed mid-century modern subdivisions in California between the late 1940 and mid 1960s. The design of the house, in Palm Desert, California, is beautiful. It screams “mid-century modern” for every peak and valley in its roof. But I cannot fathom why the builder/developer placed it on a lot that backs up to a large area of bland commercial establishments. Places like Red Lobster and Home Depot and so forth. I was a little put off by the price, too: I think it was $1.5 million, or thereabouts. But it has a pool, so I understand the price tag; the pool probably accounted for half the price. 😉

A little later, after I drooled over the Eichler-designed house, I came across another very nice house for sale, this one in New Caanan, Connecticut. The house, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and built in the mid 1960s, I think, is beyond beautiful. It, too, has a pool. But the opulence of the pool was nothing compared to the rest of the property. But it is an “old” house, so it probably needs more upkeep than a newer place. That notwithstanding, its $8 million price tag probably is fair, if a tad steep. After looking at pictures of the Wright house, glancing around my house made me feel sad and impoverished. Of course, I am not impoverished (though not rich by any stretch), just sad. I’ll get over it. I would like to have an architect design a house for me, incorporating my ideas and enhancing and improving them. And, then, I would want an exceptionally competent contractor to take care of construction, etc. I want it to be move-in ready when I see it. Actually, I’d like it to be fully-furnished in the finest furnishings. I would sell everything I own. An estate sale might be the way to go. Where, I wonder, would I have this house built? Not in Florida. Not in Texas. Not necessarily in the USA. Sighhhh.

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Mi novia want to name another cat; she suggests the name, Mandu. “Cat Manduuuuu,” she calls out, demonstrating the way a cat’s name can change a person’s behaviors and attitudes.

I need more coffee and something nutritional and tasty. Want. I most certainly do not need either of them. But I shall wander into the kitchen in an effort to satisfy my desire.

If I were to write what is on my mind this morning, the smoldering screed produced by my fingers on the keyboard would almost certainly erupt in a mighty explosion, spreading a fiery tornadic wind throughout the cosmos. Planets would be incinerated by the heat of my rage.  Distant stars, already white-hot on their own, would be incinerated by the intensity of my fury. Ashes a thousand light-years deep would bury the scorched remains of the ravaged universe.

That being said, maybe I should refrain from sharing what is on my mind. If I remain quiet, perhaps only the politicians and those who fervently support them, will burst into unquenchable flames. I think I should stay silent and hope the lot of them will demonstrate the real potential for spontaneous combustion.

No. Instead I should allow my anger to subside. I do not wish either the politicians, their supporters, or the universe that strangely allows them to walk the Earth, to burn. No, what I wish is for compassion, empathy, reason, and at least minimal levels of intelligence to return to the social and political realms.

I write this well after 10:30 p.m. on Tuesday night. Normally, I would be sleeping—or trying to sleep—by now. But I feel moderately wired at the moment; maybe even considerably wired. There’s no obvious reason for the fact that my nervous system seems to be pumping high-voltage electrical currents through my body. But my brain needs no reason for feeling like I’m clinging to a bolt of lightning as it races toward the ground at double the velocity of the Big Bang. My mind simply decides to ramp up, without limits. Something is keeping me awake, alert—skipping across rocks infused with nuclear energy. This energy gravitates toward explosive ideas, causing dismay and confusion among mid-level executives, high school cheerleaders, and professional hoboes living in boxcars outfitted with chic furnishings purloined from Ikea and Walmart.

Suddenly, at 1:00 a.m., I wake, discovering my computer screen filled with the letter “k.” My intended pause for reflection lasted considerably longer than I intended. The middle finger of my right hand apparently rested, quite heavily, on that letter. I scrolled down until I found the last “k” and I deleted all of them, all the way up to where I finished the sentence that ended with “Walmart.” And, now, I am going to bed. With a bit of good fortune, I will be able to sleep. Perhaps my brief attempt at blogging and my somewhat longer nap have zapped the unusually sharp spike in mental electricity.

+++

It is now morning. The cat, Phaedra, woke me.  Sitting atop mi novia, who was trying to finish sleeping, the feline meowed. She glared at me, her piercing stare no doubt intended to shame me into getting up to feed her. Though she claimed she was starving, I discovered considerable amounts of uneaten dry food in her bowl. She is spoiled. She wanted canned food. I chose a seafood pâté for her, as if the choice of canned food mattered. Any processed flesh from a creature that had once been a living being would have suited her just fine. Barbarian!

+++

We finished watching Rough Diamonds, a Belgian series from Netflix, last night. Netflix describes is thusly: When a prodigal son sends his family’s empire into crushing debt, his estranged brother returns to Antwerp’s diamond district to pick up the pieces. The description does not mention that the family is Jewish Ultra-Orthodox; the family’s religious beliefs and traditions matter to the story line and to the tensions between their thoughts and their actions. I finally found the series moderately engaging after episode four of eight. If I had been more energetic and mentally curious, I might have found something more riveting to watch before we finished the first episode. But I was, and continue to be, a tad lazy.

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My last remaining loop earring bit the dust two weeks ago or more, forcing me to wear a diamond (or diamond-lookalike) stud in its place. Finally, we went looking for another pair identical to the inoperable loop. We found a pair, just one, at Dillard’s. The last pair I bought, at the same store, cost $12. This one cost $16. I think the previous purchase was made about three or four years ago. The price increased by more than 33 percent in that short span of time. If a $25,000 car increased at the same rate over the same span of time, its price would have reached $33,250. I wonder whether that “what if” actually reflects reality? I do not have a solid grounding in economic theory, so I cannot quite grasp the reasons prices rise over time. If prices were stable, wages could be stable as well. But we do not want wages to be stable; we want them to grow at a rate faster than the prices of products we buy. Because we want to amass wealth. And we want more stuff. We would be delighted if prices dropped and wages rose, simultaneously. Except we do not really want “wages.” We want access to limitless cash. We hunger for massive wealth. We crave winning the PowerBall lottery. Yet people who win big seem, quite often, to go bankrupt and/or plunge into a bottomless pit of depression following their spectacular windfalls. Money is not the answer to all our problems. We know it. But we discard that knowledge with astonishing regularity, allowing greed to overtake and overpower our ability to be satisfied with what we have. This philosophical diversion arose from musings about an earring. I do not understand this man who inhabits my body; I sometimes think his brain is unhinged from the real world.

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Speaking of economics, when I took a couple of economics courses in college, I was introduced to the concept of opportunity costs. Opportunity costs represent the loss of potential gains from other opportunities when an alternative is chosen. For example, if I chose to stuff my money in a mattress rather than put it in an interest-bearing savings account, the opportunity cost would be the interest I failed to earn by choosing the mattress over the bank account. Opportunity costs are not limited to monetary considerations. Accepting a job in an urban environment in southern California instead of accepting one in a small village in the south of France presents an assortment of opportunity costs; as would be the case if the other offer had been accepted. Cost-benefit analyses, I think, involve considerations of opportunity costs, though I do not remember the two concepts running through my mind in parallel while studying them. I have forgotten so much of what I “learned” in years past. Saying I “learned” is misleading. I did not learn it; I was exposed to information I did not retain. But wait! If I forgot something, but it comes back when prompted by triggers of some sort (reading an article that sparks memories of opportunity costs, for example), I suppose I learned it; my knowledge was simply buried under the weight of time and interceding experiences. If I were more curious, I would research this issue to answer my questions about learning and memory and what constitutes the partial erasure (or burial) of memories. But I am not sufficiently curious. Or I am not sufficiently patient. Or something like that. It may be that my attention span is shorter than my pinky finger. That reminds me of the lyrics to You Can Call Me Al, by Paul Simon: “Why am I short of attention? Got a short little span of attention.” That recollection reminds me of another snippet of lyrics from the same song: “Why am I soft in the middle, now?” Hmm. Yes, why am I so damn soft in the middle, I wonder? Could it be my lifestyle?

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The idea of living in a commune of sorts appeals to me. I would want the commune to offer plenty of space between me and my communal partners, though—I need my privacy and my space. But being surrounded by people I like and admire and with whom I have important commonalities (and intriguing differences) would be quite nice. We could have meals together with some frequency…not every meal, though. And we would spend some time together most days, perhaps sitting in front of a roaring fire (or soaking in the communal pool) sipping wine and exchanging thoughts and ideas and dreams.

It could be a small commune. Perhaps ten people. Maybe even fewer. Or the commune could be larger, but smaller clusters of members would live in relatively close proximity to one another, yet more distant from others. I think the larger commune would have to be at least several hundred acres in size. Maybe even bigger. And members of the smaller clusters would each live in private homes that sit on an acre or more, surrounding a central, communal gathering place complete with kitchen, dining area, swimming pool, hot tubs, etc., etc.

What was I thinking earlier about greed and being satisfied with what we have, not forever longing for what we don’t? I must train myself to be satisfied, grateful, and content. Actually, I think I am all of the above, but I slip into occasional (frequent?) greed mode. I would like to eliminate that aspect of my personality; my desire for “things” I do not have. But other desires can be enervating; they can breathe life into a person and spark pleasant emotional experiences.

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Okay. It’s 7:30. I have better things to do than write about what’s on my mind. Don’t I?

A grey area. An imprecise piece of intellectual real estate where contradictory answers to the same question may be absolutely correct. Like the shoreline defined differently, depending on the tide, morality’s grey area follows the ebb and flow of philosophical righteousness. But grey areas may hide clear lines of what is perceived as right and wrong. I will try to explain my thinking.

For more than a decade in the early twentieth century, the official morals of the United States prohibited the making, sale, and transportation of alcohol. At the time, alcohol was, to some, unequivocally immoral. Simultaneously, moonshiners and their lawbreaking brethren deemed it perfectly legitimate. Today, another grey area enmeshes the abortion debate. When Roe vs. Wade was overturned by the conservative Supreme Court, the decision legitimized for opponents of abortion their moral position on the practice. But Roe vs. Wade did precisely the same thing for believers in a woman’s right to control her own body. The abortion debate, a long-simmering argument supported by infallible arguments on both sides, is a grey area of moral righteousness because the sharp black and white lines of moral versus immoral invariably merge into a grey field when viewed from different perspectives. Alcohol remains awash in that grey field, too, despite its legality; some people still see it as fundamentally as a vice, while others think of it as an enjoyable recreational beverage.

Marijuana is another grey area. Access to guns is another. Regulations governing the use of guns is another. Prostitution is another, though debate about its legitimacy or morality is limited in scope. There are dozens more. The solutions to sorting out grey areas? None that will be guaranteed to stick. The problem with grey areas is that they will exist just as long as political and social and philosophical spectra exist. Left wing. Right wing. Libertarian. Communist. Capitalist. Religious. Atheist. And on and on and on.

Last night, when mi novia and I were visiting with friends, the topic of political environments in various locations arose. We talked about places where the governing institutions are largely Democratic; we agreed such places are “friendlier” to people like us than is Arkansas, for instance. As I think about where one might find a solidly liberal, progressive majority, it occurs to me that progressive ideas (something I generally find appealing) float on a grey area that could just as easily host conservative mindsets. Arkansas, in fact, was in the past a reliably Democratic-voting state. But Democratic concepts mixed with Republican concepts over time, adding more black than white to the grey area. Depending on one’s perspectives, the clear line beneath that grey area is either this or that, but not neither. Or both.

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I was told yesterday that I have moderately severe hearing loss in both ears. The loss of hearing, according to the audiologist, would be especially noticeable with regard to certain higher-pitched sounds, like women’s and children’s voices. The idea of being deaf to noisy children is not half bad; but I want to know what women are saying about me, at least those who are within earshot. I will test a hearing aid in a week or so. I am not sure I have lost enough hearing to warrant using  a hearing aid…or, more importantly, to warrant the expense of a hearing aid. They are obscenely expensive. If I have to have hearing aids at some point, I do not want the Lamborghini-priced model, nor do I want the Mitsubishi Mirage version. I think I’d be more inclined to go with a mid-range Lexis. Or a Studebaker.

+++

It’s late. When I woke at 4:30, I was not ready to get up. But when I woke again and saw that it was almost 7, I cursed at my lazy self for having gone back to sleep when I should have arisen. My thoughts are not clear when I get too much sleep. Or too little. And sometimes when I get just the right amount.

The post-sermon conversation yesterday was thought-provoking. I listened, mostly, but I asked a question as well: where does guilt fit into ideas about mercy? And what about forgiveness? Is forgiveness a necessary component of mercy, or can mercy be bestowed without it? The discussion of mercy followed a sermon in which the minister delivered Portia’s soliloquy, from Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, which includes the following:

The quality of mercy is not strain’d.
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.

Listening to the sermon and to the post-sermon discussion, my thoughts swirled around the idea of guilt and how—or whether—one can bestow mercy upon oneself in partial relief for the guilt one carries. Not only can one do it, but whether one should—and whether forgiveness is deserved when it comes from within for actions or omissions of oneself.

These issues are not strictly religious questions. They are questions concerning life in general and the difficulties one encounters or creates along the way. One interesting point made during the course of the sermon and/or the conversation was this: mercy is not conditional. It does not depend on any form of quid pro quo. If that is the case, then the person upon whom mercy is bestowed does not necessarily have to feel guilt to earn mercy. Nor does the person showing mercy have to forgive the act or omission. Yet Shakespeare’s assertion, through Portia, suggests something else. Later in Portia’s speech, she says;

And earthly power doth then show likest God’s
When mercy seasons justice.

“When mercy seasons justice.” Mercy and justice are not born of the same mother. They come from different places and they serve different emotional masters.  Some of the lyrics of Michelle Shocked’s Quality of Mercy come to mind, too, alluding (I think) to justice:

Yes vengeance and revenge
Are just two words for pain
And the quality of mercy is not strained

Feelings of guilt for things said or unsaid or for actions taken or deeds not done seem distant from an intellectual appreciation for the concepts of mercy. But mercy hinges on wrongs, whether real or imagined, as does guilt. Forgiveness, too, is granted for wrongs. As I think about the two concepts, it seems to me they are one and the same, just given different names. But, then, mercy may be granted in lieu of punishment, whereas punishment may be meted out even in the face of forgiveness. In both cases, guilt is assumed. Or is it? I could think endlessly about those questions, arriving at different answers just as often.

One who feels guilt for his actions might hope for mercy or forgiveness from one who he has wronged, but in that person’s eternal absence, the only one who can grant either mercy or forgiveness is the guilty party. Showing oneself mercy or granting oneself forgiveness is self-serving. At what point—if ever—is that self-serving absolution justified? Another question whose answer could consume one’s entire lifetime of searching.

+++

I could shatter this morning if I bumped into a door casing. When I feel this brittle, I want either to crawl under the covers and sleep until I can sleep no more or drive for hours on a stretch of desolate highway until the highway sounds completely numb me. I want to do one of those things, but I will not. I never do. I just want to. Eventually, the brittleness subsides. I turn to taffy, instead, becoming malleable as I focus on keeping myself from wrapping around trees and lamp posts and sliding along the door casings as I look for ways out of the room. Odd, that…the way my mind pretends I become something I am not. Crazy is the word that comes to mind.

+++

I admire people who can sort things out for themselves—people whose analytical abilities are sufficiently well-developed that they do not need help overcoming emotional obstacles to their well-being. Those people seem to be equal in number to the rest of us, whose attempts to think things through lead only to tangled webs of impossibly complex confusion. The trick, I think, is to extract emotion from the process, leaving only dispassionate evaluation in its place. That trick is unavailable to me, and to many others like me, because our emotions are inextricably tied to every drop of blood flowing through our veins. We are the ones who cannot count from one to ten without feeling an emotional connection to each whole number and all the fractions carried within it. There are days I wish I could seal those goddamn numbers in a metal container and weld its lid tightly shut.

+++

Lacking the ability to sleep for hours and hours and hours or drive for a thousand miles on a restricted access highway, I will buck it up and have another cup of coffee. Then, I will try to confront the day as if it were a friend instead of an adversary. I will simply have faith the friend will not hit me over the head with a metal pipe and take everything. And off I go.

Cloudy, humid, still, and cool. Those adjectives describe the weather in Helen, Georgia this morning. The weather in this Bavarian-style mountain town is delightful this morning, if reports delivered from my desktop can be trusted. But the temperature where I am is a good seven degrees cooler at the moment. And the high for the day will not quite reach the high expected in Helen, but the peaks in both towns will be close. The biggest differences between the two places, though, will include their respective altitudes, their predominant architectural styles, and their personalities. The two towns, 650 miles apart, may as well be in different galaxies, though. They are in different time zones and they exist in different mind-sets. Good morning to the residents of and visitors to Helen, Georgia. One day I might visit Helen. Until then, I can only imagine an Alpine village, about 40 miles from Warne, North Carolina. That’s another place I have never visited. There are so many of them; places I have never seen or even thought about. Until recently. Given enough time, I might think of every place I could conceivably visit if I could travel for a thousand lifetimes. But who has that kind of time? As far as I know, I don’t. And neither do you. Nor does anyone else. But we can make the most of the time we have, can’t we? Not necessarily to travel—Thursday afternoon drinks and gummies can be just as relaxing or just as invigorating (or both). And daydreams, too, can take the place of actual experience. In fact, daydreams, reveries, fantasies, delusions, illusions and all their compadres can join together to provide joyous escapes from drudgery, reality, and other less-than-wonderful events. But I should reserve those things for another time. For this moment, I will contemplate where and who I am; and determine whether I want to be this person in this place. If not, I can escape into a new fantasy in the blink of an eye. And I can take you with me. And you. And you. And you and you. We can have the most spectacular time together! Privately, in some cases. Publicly in others. We shall see. At least I shall. The rest of you must make your own decisions. But we, in particular, must break out of our protective shells, casting off all the shards of the brittle case that surrounds us so we can plunge into new experiences. Or, if the mood strikes us, settle into older, more comfortable ones.

I am back in Hot Springs Village—though I have been here all morning—sitting in a chair lakeside. Not really. Only in my mind. I’m actually sitting at my desk, but in my mind’s eye I can see the mirror-like water, reflecting the sky and the houses along the shore and the birds skimming the water’s surface. And I can see the trees outside my window. And I can see the sky hidden behind the trees in the forest in front of me. How can I see the sky hidden behind the trees? I rely—heavily—on my imagination. When I write poetry, I rely on my imagination, too. And when I write my blog. And when I dredge through my memories and my dreams and my hopes and my desires. They’re all bound together at the intersection between what I think and what I experience. What I long for and what I remember. What I crave and what I need. We could have some fascinating conversations, you and I. Just letting our minds go. Giving free rein to our imaginations. Freeing our inhibitions from their constricting cages. Allowing ourselves to think the unthinkable. Permitting dangerous thoughts to explode into the atmosphere like compressed air released from a balloon at the instance its taut skin is punctured by a sharp needle.

When I am neither in Helen, Georgia or Hot Springs Village, Arkansas or a thousand other places, I may be in Corpus Christi, Texas or Madison, Wisconsin or Schenectady, New York or sitting inside an adobe cottage on the fringes of a limitless New Mexican desert. I ricochet between Neptune and San Francisco and I take the well-traveled road between Saturn’s rings and celestial clouds visible only through the Hubble telescope. I converse with Zeus and Mohammed and Hercules during my journeys, absorbing what I can of their wisdom and sharing what little I can of what little I know.

No one knows what caused the Big Bang, nor what happened before that unfathomable explosion. Some might suggest the Big Bang was eternity’s orgasm, but that kind of thinking leaves me blushing, embarrassed and afraid to show my face for fear of my private thoughts being made public for generations of stars to come. I think conversations about the Big Bang are simply admissions of a limitless lack of understanding of what, if anything, came “before.” For one thing, “before” is an impossibility in a reality in which “time” does not exist. The same is true of “after.” The only reality is “now.” And “now” is an impossibility, too, because by the time the word escapes one’s mouth, the moment is gone. That fact must make us wonder whether everything is an illusion. How can “now” exist if it cannot be captured and examined and probed for the secrets hidden beneath it? We must be figments of the imagination of something that exists only in our dreams—but our dreams and our very imaginations cannot exist if they are figments of something that cannot be until something else occurs…and that something else relies on the future, which cannot exist without a past. And, of course, the past cannot exist because…oh, my God, the conundrum gets deeper and more distant with every imaginary breath I take!

Kisses are the only reasonable answers. Only kisses can make the unknowable tolerable. Only kisses provide the salve we need to sooth the pain of not knowing. A tender embrace, followed by an eternal kiss, covers all the unanswerable questions with an impenetrable black cover that hides everything brittle and broken and troublesome. And when that black cover is pulled back, like a blanket, brilliant, bright, pristine space is all that remains. And that space invites us to plunge into it and explore all the realities and all the dimensions we never knew could be available to us. I suspect psilocybin in its purest form might offer a glimpse of those experiences, but only a sideways glance…nothing can mimic raw reality, with all its artificial ideas amassed at its beginnings and its ends.

Well, the morning continues to scratch at me, insisting that I emerge from my hallucinatory state (caused not by hallucinogens but entirely by free thought) and return to this sometimes dull reality. And here I am. Back to the place I never left. Here, where my invisibility was always clearly visible. At this place that could not have existed in its present form even a fraction of a second before…because nothing “is” as it “was” in an environment of constant, inescapable, absolutely radical change. The “same” is a concept without basis in reality. Change is the only constant, isn’t it? We should spend time in a tiny room, full of soft pillows and couches that conform to our shapes, sipping intoxicants and inhaling molecules that alter our minds. Reality, if there is such a thing, is so damn boring. Illusion may be far more appealing. But we’re all afraid of stepping outside the boundaries of what we consider proper. We’re not afraid of what we might think; we’re afraid of what others might think. We allow ourselves to be restrained, constrained, harnessed, tied down, lashed with thick wire rope to an anchor that cannot be moved the distance of the thickness of a hair. What, I wonder, might breaking free really be like? I doubt I’ll find out this morning.

+++

And now I will take a pair of clean socks out of the dryer. That act, following by sliding my feet into them, will permit me to put on a pair of shoes. And that will terminate this…this…this…thing.

We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.

~ Plato ~

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“La lutta continua. The struggle continues.”

So spoke Salman Rushdie Thursday evening when he accepted the PEN Centenary Courage Award. His presence marked Rushdie’s first public appearance since being stabbed last August—and blinded in one eye—during a talk at a literary festival at the Chautauqua Institution.

Other memorable words were spoken during the event when a letter from the imprisoned Iranian journalist and activist, Narges Mohammadi, was read aloud. Mohammadi, who was given the PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award, wrote this:

“Dear writers, thinkers, and sympathizers, I implore you to help the Iranian people free themselves from the grip of the Islamic Republic, or morally speaking, please help end the suffering of the Iranian people. Let us prove the magic of global unity against authorities besotted with power and greed.”

Writers with expansive audiences have the ability to communicate to vast numbers of people. Those who put their skills to progressive, constructive political or humanitarian use are not only impactful, they are brave. Their potential influence on the course of global events cannot be dismissed or over-sold. If their words and thoughts cause just a few people think, and then act, their talents can change the world.

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Always do what you are afraid to do.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

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Thunder. Lightning. Rain. Wind. Just another “weather event” common to central Arkansas and much of the rest of the southwest, south central, and southern United States. That was last night. And, to some extent, yesterday afternoon. Overnight, though, the weather seems to have become more tranquil. Here, at least. To the east of us, it is entirely possible that the heavens are assaulting everything on and above Earth’s surface. If I had looked at the current weather reports, I might know. But I haven’t. So I don’t.

+++

We had painters paint two very small hallways yesterday. One of the two will return today, we hope, to try again to perform the second part of yesterday’s engagement: staining some bare wood trim in several places throughout the house. He applied a small sample yesterday, but mi novia and I both agreed it was unacceptably different in color from the color we had asked for (and far darker). So, the guy will come back with samples today. We hope. Assuming he does, we hope the color will be acceptable. I am not sure I have the patience to have him try a third time.

Finally, after many, many, many years, the unreliability of hearty recommendations is sinking in. The fact that someone is a friend of a contractor, or a business associate of a contractor, does not offer any assurance that the someone’s recommendations can be trusted. Oh, the person might think his friend is the real deal, but confidence in a friend’s abilities sometimes is based on wishes or assumptions, rather than observations. Let that be a lesson…

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I have always liked the word, besotted. Its use tells me to user is at least moderately intelligent. A measure of acerbity, a bit of a caustic wit, and perhaps a tinge of arrogance accompany her intelligence. When she uses the word, I become curious about her. She is attractive. Until I discover she is deeply and irrationally conservative in every facet of her life and her thinking. Then, I label her a potential enemy.

What is an enemy, though? One of many online dictionaries offers as the definition of the word:

“Aa person who feels hatred for, fosters harmful designs against, or engages in antagonistic activities against another; an adversary or opponent.”

As I consider what the word means, it seems a bit harsh to label a person “enemy” simply because she leans far right. Yet I tend to do just that. I do not trust her. Her motives are, to my way of thinking, selfish and cold-blooded. She is hard and callous and unfeeling; at least she has no compassion for anyone but herself.

But, then, if I am in a rational mood, I catch myself. I privately express to myself how embarrassed I should be to cling to such narrow-minded and judgmental thoughts. We have enemies only to the extent to which we allow ourselves to have them.  This sort of thinking reminds me that adoration of the Bible and its extraordinary popularity probably can be attributed to the lessons contained in its collection of parables. Jesus probably was exalted as much for his human wisdom as for belief that he was holy. Ah, there’s that word.

As I wrote the preceding sentence, my thoughts immediately pivoted to Peter Mayer’s song, Holy Now. And, as I think of the lyrics of the song, I consider the meaning of the word, holy. I have come to embrace a semi-secular definition: “having a spiritually pure quality; entitled to worship or veneration as, or as if, sacred, like a holy relic.” Somehow, I veered away from besotted. And enemy. I feel pretty damn confident I have a mild to mildly severe case of ADHD or something similar to it. “Look, a butterfly! See its wings? I wonder what it would like to fly? What does a butterfly see when it flies around? I wish I could see through the eyes of a butterfly. How long does a butterfly fly? Does it fly until it dies in mid-flight? I wonder whether a butterfly’s relatives mourn its death? Or do butterflies not have emotions? If they don’t, would they be said to be without empathy? Or is there a butterfly version of alexithymics (that’s the big word describing a “neuropsychological phenomenon expressing important difficulties in identifying and describing the experienced emotions by oneself or others“)? Language is so complex! Without language, we would be unable to think. But people who cannot speak can think; yes, they can think because they have a language of some kind…maybe not the same language I use, but a symbolic language of some kind that enables them to communicate in some fashion. Enough of that!

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One of the pieces of advice often given to people who are nervous about public speaking is to imagine that the audience is nude. That, apparently, is intended to reduce one’s anxiety about speaking a the group. I think that might not work for me, because I am fairly certain my eyes would be drawn to specific people—or a specific person—sitting naked in front of me. My attention would be far too focused on her for me to think coherently about what I want to say to the group. Instead, I probably would stumble badly over my words and say something thoroughly inappropriate for the situation. Actually, it is not so much speaking to a large group that gets me nervous, it is speaking to certain individuals. I wonder whether I should imagine those people nude? My mind wanders with this idea; what if the person with whom I am nervous  (and so, imagine her nude) is just as nervous in my presence? What if she imagines me naked? Ach! I should have been working out! I should have focused more of my energies on losing weight and toning my muscles! How could I have let myself get so fleshy and flabby?! See? ADHD.

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Having just written the preceding paragraph, and assuming you read it, I know what you are thinking. You can deny it all you want, but I know. And, now, you know what’s on my mind when I seem reticent or reserved or otherwise unengaged during conversation with one person or a small group. 😉

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It’s Saturday morning, people. Your part of the world is awakening. Rise and shine. Take a deep breath and launch yourself into the day.

I may begin setting an alarm. I lost almost two precious hours of pre-dawn brooding reflection to shallow—but dream-laden—sleep. Again. This has happened too often of late. I may have to eschew medicinal gummies; while I cannot attribute all of my over-sleeping to that particular indulgence, there’s almost certainly a significant correlation. Now, at this late hour, all I can do is wonder what breakthrough idea did I fail to conceive, thanks to sleeping in? It’s impossible to know…such a shame.

+++

Very, very early this morning—perhaps 2 or 3—I woke to thoughts of a friend from church. It was more of a daydream or fantasy, I think. In my hazy thoughts, she and I were sitting at a table in a very dimly-lit jazz club. A pianist played softly in the background, but as low as he played, I still had trouble hearing my friend’s words. She told me she had bought into a co-housing community. I thought I heard her invite me to come see it, but I wasn’t sure that is what she said. For some reason, I was reticent to ask her to repeat or clarify her words. And during this fuzzy dream—if that is what it was—it occurred to my conscious self that I had intended to call her several days ago to arrange a get together between mi novia, my friend, her husband, and myself. So, there, as a result of thoughts in a state of semi-sleep, was my reminder: call her today.

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Parts of New Mexico and Arizona and other southwestern and western states have already begun to experience the effects of drought. Not the sort of drought that simply stresses agriculture, business, and residential communities.  The kind of drought that promises to make places uninhabitable. And, in some cases, not because water is unavailable but, instead, unsafe to drink. Several months ago, I read about a town in midst of west Texas oil fields where water was unsafe to drink. And I remember hearing about another town facing an uncertain future because of the lack of water. Twelve years ago, Spicewood Beach, Texas became the first Texas town to run out of water. Robert Lee, Texas followed not long thereafter. When water disappears from a community, so does the ability for humans to survive there without finding ways to replace that precious local resource with importing water…at great effort and expense.

I live in a place where annual rainfall totals are significant. But even here, changing climate threatens to transform lush, green forests to tinderboxes…when rainfall patterns shrink as a result of atmospheric changes. This possibility—this reality—is not a secret. It is not a fact hidden from the masses. It is and in-your-face truth. Yet the vast majority of us use water as if the supply of the clean, clear, life-giving liquid were limitless. In my growing periods of pessimism about the future of our planet—as a home to humans—I sometimes succumb to a frightful mind-set:

The environmental destruction of our planet is inevitable, so we are kidding ourselves if we think our feeble attempts at “conservation” matter. We might as well indulge ourselves as much as we like. Because…

Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die.

When I realize I have acquiesced to such skepticism, I try to bring myself up sharply. But more and more frequently, I cannot shake the pessimism or the self-indulgence. We may as well engage in orgies of drunken debauchery, I say to myself. And then I feel ashamed about my attitude. But that feeling of shame diminishes with each occurrence. I have no grandchildren to think about, though I should think about others’ grandchildren. And I do. But I also think humankind should simply stop reproducing, thereby preventing the sacrifice of future generations to the failures of their ancestors.

Either way, conserving water is just the polite thing to do.

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I am more than hungry. I am ravenous. I would chew the bark off trees…eat light bulbs and spark plugs…consider the possibility of engaging in cannibalism. The latter only with the previous consent of the specified entrée. The probable reason for my hunger is the fact that we did not have dinner last night. Instead, we each had an Atkins bar and some pecan halves. This morning, I am not in a state of mind suitable for making breakfast. Ideally, I could be teleported to an Asian fusion restaurant, where I could enjoy a bowl of pork congee, a bowl of miso soup, a piece of flash-grilled salmon (rare, please), and an unlimited supply of scallions, radishes, and grilled mushrooms. Oh, well. Teleportation has not yet become as common as I would like. It seems to happen only in science fiction and in my head.

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Mi novia and I may make a trip to my childhood stomping grounds before long—Corpus Christi. And/or San Marco, where my parents are buried. I learned that their graves are located in the Old Original section of the San Marcos City Cemetery, gravesites L-20-7 and L-20-8. I may have been there once after their headstones were placed, but that has been many, many, many years ago. I am not one to be sentimental about gravesites and headstones, but for some reason I would like to have a look at them. Back in Corpus, I would like to see my old house and my old schools. Based on some information I read just a few days ago, my old elementary and junior high schools are being replaced soon. I suspect the city of Corpus Christi is quite different from the last time I saw it, only a few years ago. As much as I am not a fan of the heat, humidity, and mosquitoes on the Texas coast, something about the area…at least the way it used to be…is deeply appealing to me. I would like to return to the area when the beaches were sparsely visited, there were no buildings on Padre Island, there were draw bridges from the mainland to the island…but I know, assuming Thomas Wolfe’s book title, You Can’t Go Home Again, is correct, that…you can’t.

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Enough, again. My mind is racing with a million thoughts. My fingers simply cannot keep up.

When the nighttime conspires with insomnia to erase comfort, the only refuge is an occasional, fitful moment of stolen sleep. During those brief periods of unconsciousness, dreams tend to interrupt relief, relentlessly pounding tranquility until it finally surrenders. Then, in place of the serenity that tries to accompany sleep, fear, anxiety, guilt, and regret take hold. When morning comes, with its unwelcome light, the fleeting moments of dream-infused sleep remain etched in the mind. The chaotic dreams—involving blurred images of sinister threats, gunfire, train rides, buildings ablaze, stolen cars, bloody rags, and painful memories—cling to the psyche. Those nightmarish recollections stifle all attempts to find a peaceful mental retreat. They insist on ruining efforts to achieve calmness. Even meditation fails in the face of what is only the imagination. Imagination can be as powerful as a sledgehammer and as sharp as a knife…as constricting as thick wire rope wrapped tightly around the soul.

Last night’s game of trivia (an event held to generate funds for the Friends of the Coronado Center Library) clarified, for me, the way my mind works. Or doesn’t. While I had no idea about the answers to some of the questions, I “almost knew” the answers to many others. On reflection, this morning, that “almost knew” sensation revealed the way my mind works. My memory is comparable to an out-of-focus camera. The impaired camera captures the same image that a precisely-focused camera does, but does not do the photographed subject justice. Another comparison may better describe my memory. My brain sometimes records facts like a tenth-generation photocopy; it retains only sufficient information to represent enough of the original to be recognizable, but not enough to be readable.

But that explanation may ignore the real reasons I could not answer so many questions; I just did know the answers. I should have paid closer attention to Greek and Roman mythology. I should have been more widely read. I should have listened more closely, read more thoroughly, thought more deeply. It was not that I did not want to know—it was that I was unwilling to invest the time or energy necessary to learn. Last night, my abysmal performance could be traced back to one of my attributes about which I have written more than once: I know very little about very much. I skim the surface of facts and ideas, rarely absorbing the knowledge hidden beneath the façade. I take in just enough to be familiar, but not enough to actually “know.” That habit allows me to present myself as if I were knowledgeable. But in reality, I am an imposter. A poseur. A pretender. A charlatan. It is not as if I am incapable of knowing. I clearly am intelligent enough to learn; I am just lazy—unwilling to invest the necessary effort to absorb and record facts and figures.

So, which is it? Does my mind simply make poor photocopies, record out-of-focus images—or am I supremely lazy? Or could it be both? Maybe neither. Perhaps I am just not adept at retaining trivial information. Why should I expect to know how many presidents died in office? Is it important for a well-rounded, educated person to recall the names and provinces of mythological gods? I do not know. I could go on for hours, justifying my ignorance, but it would be a pointless exercise. Something like these paragraphs I have written.

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Phaedra spent the night in our closet. We keep the door closed and do our best to keep her out of the closet when we open it, but we—I—did not succeed last night. It seemed odd that she did not jump up on the bed during the night, but we assumed she simply had a change of mood, not an uncommon occurrence. This morning, though, at 5:30, I heard her yowls in the distance. And when I opened the closet to retrieve my morning clothes, the volume of her plaintive cries increased several-fold. And she bounded out of the closet like an inmate freed from a lengthy stay in prison. I hope…fervently, deeply, earnestly…she did not pee during the night. On those rare occasions when she manages to get in the closet despite our efforts to keep her out, she tends to crawl into the far reaches of shelves and corners, hiding behind boxes or beneath folded clothes. Oh, I so enthusiastically hope she did not relieve herself during the night.

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This morning, I will conduct a meeting of church committee chairs. The experience, which I have had several times during the church year nearing its end, has taught me how little I enjoy church administration. I do not know what I was thinking when I accepted the role of vice president, which leads automatically to president. The request that I take on the responsibility no doubt stoked my ego; my egotism was the deciding factor, I suspect. My appreciation of and respect for the church and its congregation contributed significantly to my decision, but the tipping point probably was my own personal self-absorption. A lackadaisical, bureaucracy-loathing atheist leading a bureaucracy-dependent church is incongruous. It is entirely possible I will be invited to leave my post in short order, after my installation. On the one hand, that could be a welcome turn of events. On the other, it would be a severe and entirely unwelcome jolt to a congregation that has evolved quite nicely over the years, thanks to committed volunteers who have given freely of their time, talents, and energy. When I retired from a long and strange career in managing not-for-profit trade and professional associations, I told myself I would henceforth and forevermore avoid roles involving volunteers. Apparently, I lied to myself. So, my personal misgivings notwithstanding, I will attempt to overcome my natural inclinations and, instead, be at least an acceptable director for the year. And so it goes.

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The planned application of sealant to our just-power-washed deck probably will not go forward as expected today, thanks to the rain falling outside my windows. Though I have not heard from the guy who is doing it, my intuition tells me he will determine it is not a good idea to apply sealants to wet wood. If I had considerably more power over Nature, I would have scheduled sunshine all day today. My control over the weather, though, has never been particularly reliable.

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I did not feel like writing this morning. I still don’t. But I did it anyway. It’s an addiction. A sickness. An injurious habit that sometimes forces me to engage in revelatory behaviors that are not always in my best interest. With that as my guide, I shall stop writing this post. Right now.

As I skimmed the Associated Press website this morning, I encountered a page with a section devoted to “shootings.”  For just a moment, I was stunned that an entire section of a website would be dedicated to a summary of the latest mass killings perpetrated by people exercising their Second Amendment rights. But my surprise did not last; it’s just the way things are these days. Our society has hardened into a dystopian hellscape in which random killings are tolerated—we seem to acknowledge that mass murder is simply the price we pay for freedom; for the “right of the people to keep and bear Arms.”

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Another news item that caught my attention was Berkshire Hathaway’s divestiture of its remaining shares in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSM). Warren Buffet, the force behind Berkshire Hathaway, explained that the sale was precipitated by Taiwan’s precarious position in geopolitical gamesmanship. TSM, Buffet says, is an extraordinarily well-managed company, but the fact that China increasingly is claiming “ownership” of the territory is concerning. Capitalism often takes its cues from political realities, just as politics frequently responds to the demands of capitalism. It is impossible to predict which force will be more powerful or more sinister at any given moment.

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Yesterday, mi novia and I took a drive up Fox Pass Cutoff, turning north on Peaceful Valley, finally making our way up to and along Stihl Road.  Evidence that the roadway recently had been expanded, along with other clues, suggested the somewhat remote area was being prepped for a new development. Mi novia asked some workmen we encountered whether the area was, indeed, a new development. Their responses suggested the area was, in fact, being readied for an estate-sized tract development. Additional follow-up with a Realtor whose signs we saw in places revealed more details. Five- to seven-acre lots are being offered for sale at prices ranging from must under $50K to just under $70K. I asked for and received the covenants governing the tracts. And I imagined building a modestly-sized but thoroughly modern house on one of those tracts, hidden among a thick forest of hardwoods and pine. This morning, as I consider how much time it would take to buy some of the acreage, prepare it for building, build a new house, and sell the one we are in, reality set in. I am almost seventy years old. I wonder whether I really want to devote an entire year—or more—to a fantasy that might never evolve into the reality I would wish it to be? Time will tell. Time. What little may remain. But, God, I do have the ability to fantasize! I can dream big and bold and expansive! If only I had acted on some of my more grandiose dreams twenty or thirty or forty years ago… But I still have fantasies. Will I put them aside, too, for some future time when the moment is right? When is the time right to act on a dream?

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Weather forecasts change quickly. Yesterday morning, clear, dry skies were predicted for the next several day. Last night, the forecast changed: rain was expected today. This morning, the forecasts say today will be generally clear and dry, but tomorrow rain is in the forecast. Life mimics the weather. Or vice versa. Expectations are dashed. And then resurrected. And then crushed again. It’s all part of life in a universe fueled by chaos. Without chaos, the universe might be an endless void. As it is, the universe seems an outgrowth of endless chaos. What is beyond the edge of the universe? Does the universe have an edge…and end? If so, what lies beyond? It is impossible to comprehend either vision of this expansive…something…of which we are infinitesimally small component pieces. We can predict weather. But our predictions can be wrong. And we can predict the future. But we base our predictions on our knowledge of what has gone before—assuming the future will follow in some logical fashion, as if cause and effect will continue in the same way as “always.” We do not know. It is that simple. We do not know, because “it” is not knowable. Yet how can we “know” that?

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My dreams last night tease me with memories that lie just beneath the surface of accessible memory. I know I dreamed something exhilarating or emotional or otherwise quite powerful, but I have no idea what it was. Only that I awoke a little on edge, as if I had experienced something frightening or fascinating or enormously magnetic. I doubt I will remember anything of the dream(s). Their content will remain buried beneath my consciousness forever. Or until reality expresses the certainty that “forever” is an absurd impossibility in the dimension in which we exist.

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We are nearing the end of The Good Fight. I think we have only an episode or two left. With the exception of almost an entire season that deviated so far from reality that it seemed more like science fantasy than solid fiction, the series has been extraordinarily entertaining and intriguing. Christine Baranski and the rest of the cast has been fantastic. And the opening music and its accompanying wildly exciting extreme slow-motion explosions is almost enough to make me want to watch the series just to see and hear the opening credits.  What’s next? Time will tell.

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I desperately want privacy, isolation, seclusion. But I need human contact. The two desires always are at war with one another. I suspect the wish to be away from people is based on both my longing for serenity and my distaste for exposure to all the flaws of humanity and my loathing of the scabs that form on top of the wounds we inflict on one another. “If only we all could just get along…” Such an attitude…such a Pollyanna approach to life in general. If only, indeed. Before I try to control the rest of humanity, I should continue working to perfect controlling myself. I am only a tiny fraction of the way “there.”

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There’s conflict between wanting to be in a position to make every decision without interference and wanting to reach collective decisions that incorporate the wishes of those around me. That conflict has existed since the beginning of time. Assuming, of course, time had a beginning. Which seems both absurd and certain. Madness prevails…because without madness, there would be nothing.

Bonjour! Welcome to Tuesday…at least this specific Tuesday.

Experiencing different cultures expands the mind and opens the heart. Whether the cultures are as starkly different as rural South Texas and urban Beijing or as similar as Dallas and Little Rock, the cultural distinctions educate, inform, and change a person—if she is open to change. The shifts in mindset brought about by exposure to different ways of thinking or ways of looking at the world can lead to transformational insights. But unless one intentionally keeps chauvinistic attitudes in check—and unless he reins in in his parochialism—absorbing the lifestyles and ideas of unfamiliar places in the world can simply amplify a person’s ethnocentric zealotry.

I often wonder whether the difference between people who revel, versus those who recoil, at experiencing difference cultures are intrinsic to their nature. Or is insularity the result of subtle—or not so subtle—guidance during their development? In my case, I think the magnetic appeal of cultural differences was innate, but somewhat stifled, as a child. My interest was awakened during my youth, seeing and hearing and tasting the differences between the Anglo culture then prevalent in South Texas and the growing Mexican and Hispanic cultures that have since become predominant there. But my curiosity about and appreciation of cultural differences mushrooming during my years in Austin as a student at the University of Texas. The diversity of the student population was an important component of my growing interest in different cultures. The deeper exploration of culture to which I was exposed through sociology classes and the associated reading was even more crucial, I think. Sociology completed the initial phases of my transformation. Moving to semi-rural, small-town East Texas furthered the metamorphosis. The change in me continued when I moved to Houston, where I lived for eight years at the fringes of a cultural melting pot. Then, four years in Chicago and almost a year in and around White Plains, New York and Greenwich, Connecticut, helped solidify my appreciation for both subtle and in-your-face cultural differences.

While I think my eyes have been opened by exposure to different cultures, I suspect my oldest brother’s expansive world-view must be dramatically more advanced than mine. He has lived in India, Algeria, French-speaking Quebec, Ohio, the Bay area of California, Texas, Mexico…and on and on. And he is far more well-traveled than I. My world travels, mostly on business, exposed me to brief snippets of cultural surprises. His more extended experiences in various places around the world must have given him far greater insights than my short visits. Though living in different cultures is probably the most impactful way of enhancing one’s understanding and appreciation of different cultures, I think reading and watching non-fiction explorations of different cultures can be nearly as effective—providing, of course, one is open to challenges to one’s unsophisticated, small-minded mindset.

Despite my appreciation of different cultures, I am not blind to the faults and ugly flaws inherent in some of them. Often, I think, small-minded people judge as gullible (or easily misled) those who are more broad-minded. Moreover, they assume more open-minded are entirely uncritical of other cultures and are “taken-in” by them. That assumption, and more like it, tends to supplant insights about the positive aspects of different cultures. That’s my opinion. Almost everything I’ve written here is opinion; it should be taken with a grain of salt—which can either enhance the flavor or hide it entirely. 😉

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Today is Monday. The beginning of the “work week” for some. The continuation of a predictable set of rotating moments for others. And the commencement of an opportunity to begin life anew for still others. I choose—just for this moment—to look at this day as that incredible opportunity. A new life! A new way of thinking about the world! A new chance to correct mistakes or rethink my definition of what is “correct” and what is “wrong.” I hope this attitude lasts. The part of my life I’ve lived thus far is much longer than what is left to live; I suddenly feel an urgency to more acutely experience every second available to me. Time to light another cone of incense; lately, I have replaced patchouli with sangre de dragon, dragon’s blood. They both are quite nice; they help hone my appreciation for life in general, and my olfactory capabilities, in particular.

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Smile at someone who looks like they need it. Even if that someone is looking at you in the mirror.

I have written many times, over the years, about Ray Oldenburg’s concept of the Third Place., informal public gathering areas that offer comfort, camaraderie, and emotional safety.

The Brookings Institute says this about third Places:

Urban planners seeking to stabilize neighborhoods are focusing on the critical role that “third places” can play in strengthening our sense of community. Third places is a term coined by sociologist Ray Oldenburg and refers to places where people spend time between home (‘first’ place) and work (‘second’ place). They are locations where we exchange ideas, have a good time, and build relationships.

Once again, the idea of a third place is on my mind. An example of a welcoming, comfortable, and comforting third place is the fictional bar room in the old television comedy series, Cheers. In years past, my wannabe third places have ranged from libraries to a local Flying Saucer “beer emporium” to a former neighbor’s professionally-equipped wood shop. More recently, my Unitarian Universalist church has served, on and off, as a wannabe third place of sorts, but only on the rare occasions when it is open and alive with people and genuinely welcoming . I have never felt that any place has fully met my desires and expectations of a third place. It occurs to me, as I mull this over in my mind, that no one is assured of access to a third place—not that a person might be excluded from one, but that he might not find all the attributes of what would constitute a third place in any one location.

For me, a third place would be a place where I would feel absolutely comfortable to be myself, without worry that I might be judged as too serious or too silly or not sufficiently intelligent or intellectually arrogant or…on and on. And it would be available to me, if not around the clock, at least from morning until night. And the people there would be genuinely friendly and caring. And I would not have to pay for the privilege of being there. The bar room in Cheers is, I suppose, is the model for my imaginary third place. I have, over the years, thought about and talked about creating such a place, but I haven’t taken any action to bring it about. Except in my fiction, in my mind. My Fourth Estate Tavern, situated in a fictional financially depressed town in Arkansas, has all the trappings of a third place. I would love to replicate, in the real world, the Fourth Estate Tavern. It’s not just the place, by the way. It’s the people in the place, too, in symbiotic relationships with one another and with the place itself. The place has to be right, but without the right people, it cannot be a functioning third place. Similarly, all the right people might mingle in one place, but if it’s not the right place, it cannot be a functioning third place. Hmm.

Yesterday afternoon, my third place came into sharp focus for me. Mi novia and a close friend and I spend part of the afternoon in conversation, sitting in a comfortable setting, having a drink, and exploring whatever happened to be on our minds. The fact that we were in my house, not a public place, detracted from the concept of third place. And the fact that our gathering required intention (it did not organically flow from…just showing up) did not mirror my vision of a third place. But, still…it felt like a third place. It felt a little like my imaginary time, engaging in wide-ranging conversations with a diverse group of people, at the Fourth Estate Tavern.

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Today is Mother’s Day. Like several other holidays, I am not especially enamored of Mother’s Day. I am extremely grateful for the love and influence of mothers, but the expected formal appreciation emerging from the holiday strikes me as artificial and unnecessary. I suppose some people need to be reminded of the importance of mothers; I do not. And I suppose some children need to be reminded to express their appreciation to their (and all) mothers. I am forever grateful to my mother; no reminder needed. Like Valentine’s Day, I tend to steer clear of “celebrating” the day, in part because it has become so clearly commercial and so intrinsically hollow. Yet I always made it a point to send my mother cards or flowers or otherwise express my formal appreciation for her. Whether she expected it or not, I wanted to be sure my disdain for the practice of celebrating it did not conflict with my mother’s experience of the day. Maybe I simply did not have the courage of my convictions. I hope it wasn’t that. I may never know, without intense, long-term therapy and counseling. 🙂

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Certain painful emotions seem to linger forever. Maybe they can be overcome, though, with the help of a professional. Someone who can assist the sufferer by guiding a psychological scalpel to excise the mental malignancy that is bound to the person’s mind. That could be incredibly freeing. But a “psychiatric surgeon” sounds dangerous; if she cuts the wrong emotional tissue, everything could go horribly awry. More hmmm.

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I am staying home from church today, though I want to see and hear a friend read poetry…but the theme for the day echoes the day itself: Mother’s Day. Whether I watch the event online remains to be seen. I wonder whether I sometimes take myself too seriously. There is no question about it; no need to wonder.

While I skip church, I will relax and allow the day to unfold around me. And I will consider where, if anywhere, I belong. It’s those deep, mind-altering questions, that can make or break a third place.

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EDIT: I just listened to and watched part of the UUVC service. My friend Patty’s reading was extraordinary. I may look again at my attitudes about Mother’s Day.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is already in widespread use. In multiple automotive applications. In HVAC system thermostats. Virtual assistants, like the Amazon Echo. Global positioning system technologies. Computerized language translation systems. Email spam filters. Automated house floor maintenance devices. Facial recognition technology. Autocorrect computer applications. Real estate search engines (like those Zillow.com and Trulia.com and Realtor.com) and Chatbots. The list could go on and on. The value of AI is evident, despite the warnings about the existential dangers posed to humankind by the technology. Though I do not doubt the potential for AI to exercise far more control over human activities than humans intend, I am relatively confident humans will establish safety nets around its applications, limiting the potential for devastating harm. That confidence is what allows me to desire AI applications that will meet my needs/desires without undue fear. And one of the applications I would like to see would be a dramatically enhanced method of identifying and selecting places I might like to live.

Zillow.com and Trulia.com and Realtor.com once seemed, to me, almost magical in their abilities to quickly sort through available housing options. But as technologies have continued to become more and more sophisticated, those search capabilities no longer seem so spectacular. I want to be able to establish parameters that are not limited to searching for housing in specific locations. Rather than simply allowing me to set search criteria for number of bedrooms and bathrooms and various other attributes of housing options, I want AI to enable me to input an almost limitless set of search parameters across an enormously wide search area. So, for example, I want AI to help me find communities with specific attributes that appeal to me: like political leanings of residents, weather patterns, low levels of insect pests (like chiggers and ticks and mosquitoes), affordability (in the context of my personal financial wherewithal), geographical characteristics, etc., etc., etc.  Once I establish criteria, I want AI to return a list of places that match my needs, desires, and financial capabilities; then, I want to be able to continue to compare those places by incorporating additional search parameters.

AI might determine for me that my “ideal” place(s) are in areas I might never have considered on my own. Perhaps I might learn that communities in Nebraska or Michigan or the Lake District of England or English-speaking enclaves in the south of France are my “ideal” places. Or maybe I would learn that my desires are, in fact, simply fantasies and that there is nowhere I can find all my desired attributes and conditions. Either way, though, I would have an answer. The time I waste “wondering” about places and trying, without success, to learn deep, deep details about a potential home community, would be replaced by productive, valuable time I could devote to deciding for myself what AI cannot do for me.
It is entirely possible that such capabilities already exist, or will exist in the very near future. But I will not count on it. Instead, I will keep seeking answers the old fashioned way; using the drudgery of investigative analyses.

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The suicide arrives at the conclusion that what he is seeking does not exist; the seeker concludes that he has not yet looked in the right place.

~ Paul Watzlawick ~

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Seeking one’s own “ideal” circumstances tends to mute compassion in favor of selfishness. If I devote my time and energies to searching for something that will yield personal satisfaction, I am apt to let my compassion for others take on a lesser role in my identity. But if I sacrifice my search, opting instead to let my compassion guide my actions, I might at some point resent my failure to act in my own self-interests. That is the conundrum of looking for the perfect environment or the perfect set of circumstances. Sacrifice is built into the process because people sometimes have competing desires that, if attained, are mutually exclusive to one another. Sometimes, questions have no “right” answer; only multiple answers that are “less wrong” than some others.

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Guilt never disappears. It lingers for eternity. It sours successes and thwarts happiness. And when happiness succeeds in overcoming guilt, that very happiness later exacerbates the guilt, causing the happy, guilty person to be consumed with even more guilt for allowing himself the happiness he was after. Then, he realizes it was not the happiness he thought he wanted; it was simply the erasure of the excruciating feelings of guilt. Guilt feeds on itself, growing into a monster that devours happiness. Seeking comfort from gnawing feelings of guilt, a person discovers that consolation provides only a brief respite; the “cure” is akin to responding to a stovetop grease fire by dousing it with gasoline.

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This weather is a prelude to summer. Today is a gentle warning of things to come. Heat. Humidity. Chiggers aplenty. Gah!