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WALKING ON THIN ICE

MANNA STORMS FROM THE DIVINE

May 25, 2011 2 Comments

phone light

Dear Universe:

Here’s the quote you fed me this morn from my daily “Today’s Inspiration” newsletter:

“Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.” – Alexander Graham Bell

That said, I should probably make this morning’s letter brief, stop thinking about phones, phenomenology and philosophy, and focus on work. I do not wish to feel a lot of anxiety this morning. It used to be that my flaming thoughts, the flaming creative thoughts, were mostly a joy. Now I see them as:

1) manna storms from the divine
2) manic storms

I get a lot of good thoughts from these manna manic storms. But I feel physically ill. My stomach hurts. I worry about the appropriateness of what I express. Please, let me be appropriate. Is there such a thing as appropriateness, or does the concept stifle? I think sometimes that expression is very important in making the Universe a more humane place to live.

Oh, that I would obsess over art! But I do not feel I have time for art. I feel hurried. I feel that I must chug out a large portion of work and promise for cash flow and karma, respectively.

Dear Universe-God-It-Ess, I need focus. I need only some obsession. Obsession is like focus. But obsession is compelled focus, whereas focus without obsession seems a tad more healthy. Can’t I give myself over to the manna storms sometimes? Aren’t they part of my participation in divinity?

I need to compartmentalize and to be productive in many areas, don’t I? Is the conventional wisdom wise? Why do I feel the need to hurry? Do I need to hurry? I have a list of promises I’ve made. I made one more promise yesterday as well but I’ve got a year to start working on it.

I’m being buried under my own creative compost and good intent.

. .

I have been thinking about memes and dreams. Memes are the fruits of processes, the underlying history not always obvious. I have been thinking that memes are valuable evaluated on their own. But then the underlying history can help one evaluate the consequence of spreading the meme–the underlying history is encoded in some memes depending on the sophistication of the meme’s exploiters and recyclers. These memes are fruits wrapped in vines. On what lode load rests a meme?

I cannot throw everything out because of tainted history. Even the concept of taint is repugnant to me–it requires conformance to some kind of virgin ideal.

This is the huge problem in human reason right this moment, I think. The fear of slippery slopes. The inability to think through complex things in a sequential order, shuffle it, think through it again, shuffle it, etc. We’ve got to get smarter. We’ve got to stop playing to an assumed “lowest” common denominator. We’ve got to assume that most can rise to a threshold that’s going to get us through our severe biosphere problems.

There’s a ridge one can walk for easy ethics, I think. And then there’s utility in footholds on the sides of the ridge. This is called moderation. Walking the ridge is called fear. Dualism is fear. The two-party dichotomy is fear. Either/Or is fear.

The history of memes, how they’ve been used in the past… is the history enfolded in the meme’s fruit on a quantum level? Does it depend on the mindset of the person eating the fruit? Does it depend on the mindset of community? I think so.

“One has to develop a memory,” I told Smith.

“I just stole mine from the Five & Dime,” he answered.

One also has to develop a dream…

. .

Dear Universe, thank you for everything, especially the sky and the lawns and the trees and the woods and the raw uncut metaphorical swaths that are left, the metaphorical wilderness that I’ve not yet explored. I’m thinking particularly about country music as a context in which to understand Smith more, as a springboard for another context in which to understand his biography (one of the projects I’m working on now.)

Dear Universe, thank you for my health, my intelligence, my luck, my love.

. .

Dear God-It-Ess-Universe

May 24, 2011 No Comments

Dear God-It-Ess-Universe,

Of immediate concern in the vicinity is the flooding that’s happening in the U.S.

And of course, the tornadoes.

I am writing to let you know that I am concerned. I do not wish suffering for people. But of course I choose biosphere over people, if that choice has to be made in that way.

Perhaps extreme weather events are the only way we’re going to change, and perhaps people in the U.S. in particular need to be awakened to extreme weather events and their cause.

I think the best thing we can do is stop driving cars unless necessary, stop eating meat, unplug everything we can, and live within the rhythm of sun, moon and birdsong.

It’s reputed that meat, the desire for meat, is the cause of much suffering on this planet, both to our biosphere and to massive amounts of people and animals.

It takes so much more water, fertilizer, land space, vegetable matter to raise a pound of beef than, say, an equivalent amount, calorie-wise, of asparagus.

Forests are being clearcut in the Amazon to grow things to feed cows and to grow biofuel so that people can have luxurious lifestyles. The Amazon is the greatest area of lung on this planet. Please help us cease this clear-cutting by making wiser choices as ethical people and by creating better, more ethical opportunities for the people doing the clear-cutting as a vocation.

I am making incremental changes in my lifestyle to try to consume less, eat more locally, eat less meat, etc. Three weeks ago I bought four bags of magic beans. Two weeks ago I cooked two different things in the oven at the same time to save on energy consumption. The week before I learned how to make a healthy, inexpensive and tasty variant of hummus. This past week I’ve started to make my own bread.

I’m buying cage-free eggs from local farmers. The vendor at the West Side Market showed us pictures of the chickens. They are beautiful. They laze about in tall beautiful expanses of green grass. The egg yolks are bright, rich yellow, and I swear they taste extra fine.

I am soon getting half a share of produce from Geauga Family Farms. Pick up points are not limited to Geauga. There are points in Cuyahoga and Lake County as well.

I have doubled up duty on car rides. The two days I commute to work, I also do something special with Grandma. And I’m doubling and tripling up other car trips as well. I’ve started to consider only going to entertainment and poetry events in my local community as much as possible. My near goal is to commute with friends to get to events that are further out to minimize our impact on the environment and pocketbook. I aim to do everything I can do, within reason, yes, yet stretching my idea of reason to something that can effect change and help me live in a more joyful and reverent manner.

So what I’m asking you is to ease up on the floods and tornadoes, Universe. Have some faith in us and help us keep the faith by making immediate changes where we can perceive possibility for change.

Other prayers of note:

I pray for moderation, yet I pray to be possessed when I should be possessed.

I pray that I am ethical, calm, joyous, productive, and the same for Smith.

I pray that a certain family member starts writing a poem every day.

I pray that I finish my commitments so that I can feel more free to follow through on commitments to myself.

Thank you for the many, many blessings and miracles I receive daily from you-me-It-Universe.

Some private thoughts, hopes, thanks, prayers as well…

Love, Awomen and Amen,

Lady

LADY’S HUMMUS RECIPE

1# chickpeas, soaked overnight, rinsed, boiled in lightly salted water 1-2 hours until soft.
2 heads of garlic, roasted at 350 degree Fahrenheit 1/2 hour.
1/4 – 1/2 cup of your favorite vegetable oil (olive oil is a hoax perpetrated on the masses)
1/4 – 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Squeeze roasted garlic out of its skin and mash in large bowl with fork, then blender. Squeeze cooked chickpeas between fingers as much as possible and put in the bowl as well. Add the other ingredients. Mix as much as desired (I like little chickpea bits left in mine.)

LETTER TO THE UNIVERSE – May 23, 2011

May 23, 2011 1 Comment

My morning ritual: I get up, the cat wades between my legs as I sit on the toilet, I urinate, I feed her, I drink water, I make coffee, I do three minutes of Yoga, I check Facebook, and I write a morning letter to the Universe. This is my time in the morning. My time to be ideal, to think, to visualize, to ask the Universe for favors, to promise favors to the Universe, and to start the day off in a constructive way.

With the devastation of such a large mass of our pollinating bees over the past couple years, one of the most important things to address in a letter to the Universe–from this corner of the Universe, at least–is the health of the bees.

Saw some bees buzzing angrily around a telephone pole this week. Thought perhaps they are angry about cellphones (reputed to be a cause of bee death) and are attacking anything associated with phones. Or maybe they’re just angry about our infrastructure/priorities in general. I’d be, were I a bee.

Bees are such important insects. Pollinating insects have tremendous implications for the existence of animals who eat fruit, such as humans. They are critical BEEDS, crucial to ensuring a healthy ecosystem for so many other species.

I think visualization has a role in constructing a better reality. Here are some hastily drawn visualizations. I wish I could dedicate myself well to all causes:

A way things can work

A WAY THINGS CAN WORK:

Vision: One million more generations of great health for humans -> pollinating insects -> endless loop.

Another way things can work

ANOTHER WAY THINGS CAN WORK:

Goals: Happiness for Many & Happiness for the Individual.

Process: Think -> Prioritize -> Do -> Refine -> Endless Loop.

Visualization is important, and action is a way to follow through. I think I am not renewing my cellphone contract when it expires, and turning it off and just checking voicemail a couple times a day for now, and that I will return to a land line. The cell phone is too expensive, anyways. Am also thinking about returning to a wired network for our computers as I don’t know how all this wirelessness affects the insects or our health as well.

We’d do well to learn from bees. We can refine and humanize concepts of collaborative efforts. Collaboration does not need to be for tribe or nation over other tribe or nation. Collaboration can lend itself to a world civilization, a world society, a world organism that is not fighting itself, but finds itself on the mend.

Lady