This NYT article about 'Vipassana Romance' has gotten a lot of attention in the Buddhist blogosphere this week.
I've read other articles about 'falling in love' during meditation retreats. There's often some accompanying reader comment about how group meditation 'makes our hearts open to possibilities in the eternal now' and blah and blah.
No one ever seems to notice that this isn't romance — it's just infatuation.
"His wrist peeped out of the sleeve, endearingly bony and frail." I mean, really — Jesus Christ.
Speaking of whom, Southern Baptists do the same thing. They'll quote I Corinthians 13 while banging each other in the back of the choir bus, and reassure themselves it's a profound spiritual experience they're having.
I guess what bugs me most about this is people who get involved with allegedly spiritual pursuits, when actually they're just looking for hookups.
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
The iPhone-controlled helicopter
I mentioned my iPhone-controlled helicopter in the previous post. Fascinating gadget. It really does fly, and it streams low-res video back to your iPhone as it flies.
It was entertaining for about an hour, but then what?
It was entertaining for about an hour, but then what?
Tea
During an afternoon of bored wandering at the mall, I was lured into a gourmet tea store by a very pleasant and knowledgeable sales person who was offering free samples at the door. I walked out with about $600 worth of tea pots, tea cups, tea accessories and, of course, tea.
The store has about 200 types of loose-leaf teas, and most look more like potpourri than typical grocery store tea.
Well, the cups and tea pots are great for show, but I ended up ordering an electric water heater from Amazon that's a lot more practical. It keeps a small amount of water tea-steeping hot 24/7, so it's always there when you want it.
And I'm now drinking about four cups of organic low-caffeine or caffeine-free tea a day at home.
I buy a lot of stuff that looks interesting at first glance but turns out to not have much practical use — my iPhone-controlled helicopter, for instance. But the tea and the electric heater look like they'll permanently change my daily routine.
The store has about 200 types of loose-leaf teas, and most look more like potpourri than typical grocery store tea.
Well, the cups and tea pots are great for show, but I ended up ordering an electric water heater from Amazon that's a lot more practical. It keeps a small amount of water tea-steeping hot 24/7, so it's always there when you want it.
And I'm now drinking about four cups of organic low-caffeine or caffeine-free tea a day at home.
I buy a lot of stuff that looks interesting at first glance but turns out to not have much practical use — my iPhone-controlled helicopter, for instance. But the tea and the electric heater look like they'll permanently change my daily routine.
Books
Well, I got bogged down in The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. It was too easy to imagine myself being in the midst of the Merry Pranksters, and not liking it one damn bit. Tom Wolfe's graphic description of the first leg of their New York trip, traveling across the hot, humid south in the old bus, almost made me physically nauseated. (The same thing happened with Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.) I could imagine sitting in that hot, cramped old bus barreling on with a speed freak at the wheel, and wanting desperately to be someplace a lot more sane. If I'd been a sixties acid head, I would certainly have been more of a Mill Brook acid head and less of a 'on the bus' acid head.
I have had some other books recommended to me, one by the Jungian analyst Robert Johnson and one by Rollo May. I'll report back when I've read them.
I have had some other books recommended to me, one by the Jungian analyst Robert Johnson and one by Rollo May. I'll report back when I've read them.
Saii
We had dinner the other night at a place in the northwest part of the city called Saii. I had eaten there once before, years ago, but it's the kind of place that, for whatever reason, doesn't stick in my memory.
But it's an interesting place. It's one of those very dark, modern Asian fusion/sushi places. I don't know of any other place quite like it here. It reminds you of one of those bars Bill Murray and Scarlett Johanssen visited in Lost in Translation. You feel like you could be somewhere three thousand miles from the Bible belt.
The only drawback is that at the end of the evening, after you've been surrounded by bottom-lit bead curtains, dimly-illuminated statues and soft 'buddha lounge' jazz, you walk out the front door and bam! you're back in a strip mall on North May Avenue.
But it's an interesting place. It's one of those very dark, modern Asian fusion/sushi places. I don't know of any other place quite like it here. It reminds you of one of those bars Bill Murray and Scarlett Johanssen visited in Lost in Translation. You feel like you could be somewhere three thousand miles from the Bible belt.
The only drawback is that at the end of the evening, after you've been surrounded by bottom-lit bead curtains, dimly-illuminated statues and soft 'buddha lounge' jazz, you walk out the front door and bam! you're back in a strip mall on North May Avenue.
Tuesday, November 09, 2010
Out on the town
I went to an art opening last night, and from there went to VZD's, where I ran into a couple of old friends. Had a pretty good time all the way 'round, had a little too much to drink, but was still home by 9:30.
And when I got home, I was exhausted. I wasn't physically tired, but mentally, emotionally and perhaps psychically, I was drained. I found myself thinking I could have stayed home and read a book and would have had just as pleasant an evening.
And when I got home, I was exhausted. I wasn't physically tired, but mentally, emotionally and perhaps psychically, I was drained. I found myself thinking I could have stayed home and read a book and would have had just as pleasant an evening.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Green autumn
Blogblah! raises the question, via Twitter, of whether the grass in our city has ever been this green this late in the year. I don't know the answer to that. I do remember that on Christmas Day 1979, the afternoon high here was 71.
I went out to a restaurant on the lake last night with Flibbertigibbet and spent a couple of hours there watching the sun set. It got a bit chilly after sunset.
I thought the East Wharf development was a good idea as originally proposed and was very disappointed with the final product — especially the addition of the office building. I thought the whole thing was overdone. But sitting out there last night, I decided that what's needed now is more development — houseboats, for example. I think there are good reasons why houseboats aren't allowed out there. But it would be cool to sit by the lake at night and watch the boats rocking gently at their moorings on a pier or two.
And pretty cool to live there!
I went out to a restaurant on the lake last night with Flibbertigibbet and spent a couple of hours there watching the sun set. It got a bit chilly after sunset.
I thought the East Wharf development was a good idea as originally proposed and was very disappointed with the final product — especially the addition of the office building. I thought the whole thing was overdone. But sitting out there last night, I decided that what's needed now is more development — houseboats, for example. I think there are good reasons why houseboats aren't allowed out there. But it would be cool to sit by the lake at night and watch the boats rocking gently at their moorings on a pier or two.
And pretty cool to live there!
Sunday, October 24, 2010
A Dead Cat
One of the neighborhood cats was killed by a car this evening. It was a black shorthair that lived on the next block over. I saw him almost every day on the way to the Red Cup. In fact, I saw him this afternoon, galloping across the street. I don't know most of my neighbors, but I feel like I know their cats.
I'm a little upset by it.
I'm a little upset by it.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Depression
...chapter 107 or whatever.
Finally broke out of it a couple of weeks ago, after spending the whole summer holed up in the house. But now it's coming back, and I can feel it coming on like a cold.
I'm sleeping a little bit later every day. I'm more acutely aware of past failures and current shortcomings. I'm feeling alone again, but wanting to disengage from people nonetheless.
Finally broke out of it a couple of weeks ago, after spending the whole summer holed up in the house. But now it's coming back, and I can feel it coming on like a cold.
I'm sleeping a little bit later every day. I'm more acutely aware of past failures and current shortcomings. I'm feeling alone again, but wanting to disengage from people nonetheless.
Friday, October 22, 2010
More reading.
After finishing "The Harvard Psychedelic Club", I decided to bookend that with "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test", which I had somehow managed to avoid reading all these years. (I am not nearly as well-read as some people think I am.)
Did you know Ken Kesey wrote "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest" when he was 24 years old?
Did you know Ken Kesey wrote "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest" when he was 24 years old?
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Still No Teacher
I watched a somewhat unsettling YouTube video the other day pertaining to Zen. In the tape, a young self-styled 'punk' Zen master 'debates' a sock puppet who represents an older, well-established (and apparently quite commercialized) Zen master. The video is followed by dozens of heated comments by supporters of both masters.
Maybe you've seen it. I'm not going into all the details, nor am I going to link to it. I have no desire to spread the antagonism.
I only want to say that this is the kind of thing that reinforces my continuing desire to have no teacher at all.
One of the great disillusions I suffered as a fundamentalist Christian 40-odd years ago was the discovery that many (or most) of the people I looked to as spiritual leaders were not much more than actors. They would have been just as comfortable being siding salesmen, and probably every bit as sincere.
I read about some of the stuff that goes on in Buddhist temples and organizations, and I suspect the same truth applies there.
One of the things I like about the lecturer and philosopher Alan Watts is that he frequently prefaced his presentations with the admonition that he was not a guru and not seeking followers.
"I am not advocating zen buddhism," he once told an audience. "I am not trying to convert anyone to it. I have nothing to sell. I’m an entertainer. That is to say, in the same sense, that when you go to a concert and you listen to someone play Mozart, he has nothing to sell except the sound of the music. He doesn’t want to convert you to anything. He doesn’t want you to join an organization in favor of Mozart’s music as opposed to, say, Beethoven’s."
I am near the conclusion that anyone who wants to set himself up as a leader or authority over other people – even in a democracy like ours – ought to be automatically disqualified from doing it. The very act of seeking the position suggests the person is too much of a narcissist, egomaniac or control freak to be any good at it.
Maybe you've seen it. I'm not going into all the details, nor am I going to link to it. I have no desire to spread the antagonism.
I only want to say that this is the kind of thing that reinforces my continuing desire to have no teacher at all.
One of the great disillusions I suffered as a fundamentalist Christian 40-odd years ago was the discovery that many (or most) of the people I looked to as spiritual leaders were not much more than actors. They would have been just as comfortable being siding salesmen, and probably every bit as sincere.
I read about some of the stuff that goes on in Buddhist temples and organizations, and I suspect the same truth applies there.
One of the things I like about the lecturer and philosopher Alan Watts is that he frequently prefaced his presentations with the admonition that he was not a guru and not seeking followers.
"I am not advocating zen buddhism," he once told an audience. "I am not trying to convert anyone to it. I have nothing to sell. I’m an entertainer. That is to say, in the same sense, that when you go to a concert and you listen to someone play Mozart, he has nothing to sell except the sound of the music. He doesn’t want to convert you to anything. He doesn’t want you to join an organization in favor of Mozart’s music as opposed to, say, Beethoven’s."
I am near the conclusion that anyone who wants to set himself up as a leader or authority over other people – even in a democracy like ours – ought to be automatically disqualified from doing it. The very act of seeking the position suggests the person is too much of a narcissist, egomaniac or control freak to be any good at it.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Saturday Update
I guess I'm about ten days back into my normal schedule. I'm up early and usually off to the Red Cup to visit.
I tried drinking coffee again. You may recall I gave up caffeine a few years ago to calm my stomach. I tried limiting myself to one cup in the morning, but I was soon back to stomach cramps and EAS by late afternoon. So it's tap water for me from now on.
After the Red Cup, I generally go somewhere for breakfast. My appetite has unfortunately returned to normal. After breakfast, I often go for a walk.
Then I head back home, and may eat lunch around 1.
I spend a lot of time visiting and hanging out with my friends Diane and Kathryn. And I occasionally make it to Wednesday or Friday group dinner.
I have to say there are some advantages to being depressed.I find that when I'm depressed, I'm less prone to amusing myself by going for shopping for stuff I don't actually need. (And at this stage, 'don't actually need' encompasses pretty much everything. I could get by with never shopping again, except for groceries.)
This probably seems counter-intuitive, but I feel less lonely when I'm depressed. During my depression, I'm content to just stay in bed and sleep all day. It's when the depression has lifted, and I'm in the mood for a road trip or a movie, that I'm most likely to wish I had some sort of significant other with which to share the experience.
Another thing that's counter-intuitive: I'm less likely to drink when I'm depressed.
I'm continuing to immerse myself in the recorded lectures of Alan Watts.
I tried drinking coffee again. You may recall I gave up caffeine a few years ago to calm my stomach. I tried limiting myself to one cup in the morning, but I was soon back to stomach cramps and EAS by late afternoon. So it's tap water for me from now on.
After the Red Cup, I generally go somewhere for breakfast. My appetite has unfortunately returned to normal. After breakfast, I often go for a walk.
Then I head back home, and may eat lunch around 1.
I spend a lot of time visiting and hanging out with my friends Diane and Kathryn. And I occasionally make it to Wednesday or Friday group dinner.
I have to say there are some advantages to being depressed.I find that when I'm depressed, I'm less prone to amusing myself by going for shopping for stuff I don't actually need. (And at this stage, 'don't actually need' encompasses pretty much everything. I could get by with never shopping again, except for groceries.)
This probably seems counter-intuitive, but I feel less lonely when I'm depressed. During my depression, I'm content to just stay in bed and sleep all day. It's when the depression has lifted, and I'm in the mood for a road trip or a movie, that I'm most likely to wish I had some sort of significant other with which to share the experience.
Another thing that's counter-intuitive: I'm less likely to drink when I'm depressed.
I'm continuing to immerse myself in the recorded lectures of Alan Watts.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Random Notes
Ordered a book called "The Harvard Psychedelic Club" last week after hearing its author interviewed on public radio's "New Dimensions" last Sunday. The book is a popular history of the psychedelic drug experiments performed by Harvard professors Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert in the early sixties, and what happened to them and their associates after that. It was a fascinating book; I read it in one sitting.
It also led to some other books I am now working my way through. I'll write more on those later.
I'm also listening to a new (to me) collection of Alan Watts lectures released as "You're It: On Hiding, Seeking and Being Found" on the Sounds True label. I don't understand the impact Watts' recorded lectures have on me. I don't have a word to describe it. I would recommend his lectures to anyone suffering stress or anxiety. It's not just the subject matter, which is, of course, what first interested me. Watts could be reading the phone directory aloud and I would still get a sense of ease and relaxation from listening.
Watts, incidentally, was peripherally involved at the outset of the Leary/Alpert experiments at Harvard, at least according to the book. That must have been an interesting time in which to have lived. I was 10 years old when Leary and Alpert left Harvard.
My sleep cycle is now back to normal. I'm going to bed between nine and ten pm, sleeping fitfully, as I have for years. I wake up between 6:30 and 7:30 am. Some days I'll have a midday nap.
I started drinking coffee again recently, but that will have to stop. I didn't drink coffee until I was in my twenties, and I've always taken it black. I first stopped about four years ago. Coffee still screws up my stomach, I've found, so I'm going to swear off again.
It also led to some other books I am now working my way through. I'll write more on those later.
I'm also listening to a new (to me) collection of Alan Watts lectures released as "You're It: On Hiding, Seeking and Being Found" on the Sounds True label. I don't understand the impact Watts' recorded lectures have on me. I don't have a word to describe it. I would recommend his lectures to anyone suffering stress or anxiety. It's not just the subject matter, which is, of course, what first interested me. Watts could be reading the phone directory aloud and I would still get a sense of ease and relaxation from listening.
Watts, incidentally, was peripherally involved at the outset of the Leary/Alpert experiments at Harvard, at least according to the book. That must have been an interesting time in which to have lived. I was 10 years old when Leary and Alpert left Harvard.
My sleep cycle is now back to normal. I'm going to bed between nine and ten pm, sleeping fitfully, as I have for years. I wake up between 6:30 and 7:30 am. Some days I'll have a midday nap.
I started drinking coffee again recently, but that will have to stop. I didn't drink coffee until I was in my twenties, and I've always taken it black. I first stopped about four years ago. Coffee still screws up my stomach, I've found, so I'm going to swear off again.
Saturday, October 09, 2010
Sunday, October 03, 2010
Judge not
A friend told me the other day that I was the most judgemental person she knew.
That may be an exaggeration. But it's true I've often been an overly critical person. I've really struggled with it over the past ten years or so, with only middling results. I did pretty well with it for awhile, but lately I've been worse about it.
That may be an exaggeration. But it's true I've often been an overly critical person. I've really struggled with it over the past ten years or so, with only middling results. I did pretty well with it for awhile, but lately I've been worse about it.
Saturday, October 02, 2010
October is here
...thank God. Just saw a flock of ducks heading east, for whatever reason.
I seem to have my sleep cycle back to normal. I still wake up at night, but I just roll over and go back to sleep. I don't end up at IHOP or Beverly's.
I've gone walking three days in a row, now that the heat is no longer stifling.
I'm eating breakfast and lunch, but still skipping dinner.
I seem to have my sleep cycle back to normal. I still wake up at night, but I just roll over and go back to sleep. I don't end up at IHOP or Beverly's.
I've gone walking three days in a row, now that the heat is no longer stifling.
I'm eating breakfast and lunch, but still skipping dinner.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Still adrift
Sleep an hour, up two hours. Sleep three hours, up five hours. Sleep two hours, up three hours. Repeat.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Early Sunday morning. It is Sunday, isn't it?
Not that I care.
I'm sitting in the Classen Blvd IHOP at 2:05 AM. The place is packed. I wonder if it's like this every night or if this is a weekend phenomenon. Either way, the place is a lot busier than Beverly's usually is.
Needless to say, my sleep cycle is still upside down. But over the past few days, I've started to not care. My daily life is about the same if I'm awake during the day or awake during the night.
I've ordered a breakfast T-bone and scrambled eggs. That's about a million calories, but it's probably the only thing I'll eat today. I'm down to eating once a day.
I realized I'm tired of food. Tired of looking at it, tired of smelling it, tired of eating it. I've eaten every kind of food I care to try; I seek no new culinary experience. Now it's just some biomass to shove in my maw to keep my meatbag producing shit, piss, sweat, pus, puke, dandruff, etc.
Damn, this is a big steak.
I'm sitting in the Classen Blvd IHOP at 2:05 AM. The place is packed. I wonder if it's like this every night or if this is a weekend phenomenon. Either way, the place is a lot busier than Beverly's usually is.
Needless to say, my sleep cycle is still upside down. But over the past few days, I've started to not care. My daily life is about the same if I'm awake during the day or awake during the night.
I've ordered a breakfast T-bone and scrambled eggs. That's about a million calories, but it's probably the only thing I'll eat today. I'm down to eating once a day.
I realized I'm tired of food. Tired of looking at it, tired of smelling it, tired of eating it. I've eaten every kind of food I care to try; I seek no new culinary experience. Now it's just some biomass to shove in my maw to keep my meatbag producing shit, piss, sweat, pus, puke, dandruff, etc.
Damn, this is a big steak.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Man, there are a lot of posts here about sleeping
...and this is another one. I'm not sleeping as much as I was before I quit taking the allergy medicine, and when I'm awake, I'm more like my normal self. But I'm still sleeping strange hours. I went to bed at 9:30ish Sunday night after a fairly normal day. I felt sleepy, and I thought I'd fall asleep right away. But as soon as I got settled into bed, I was wide awake. I had brought Bailey in, and she was restless, too.
I finally got up about 3 AM and went to Beverly's and ate. Then I came home, and finally got to sleep about 5 Monday mornng. I slept soundly until 11:30 AM. I got up and went to lunch with a friend. Sleepy again, I came home and dozed lightly until about 2 in the afternoon.
I went to bed at 10 PM, slept about ninety minutes, then woke up again.
And here I am. I guess Tuesday will be more of the same.
I finally got up about 3 AM and went to Beverly's and ate. Then I came home, and finally got to sleep about 5 Monday mornng. I slept soundly until 11:30 AM. I got up and went to lunch with a friend. Sleepy again, I came home and dozed lightly until about 2 in the afternoon.
I went to bed at 10 PM, slept about ninety minutes, then woke up again.
And here I am. I guess Tuesday will be more of the same.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Guess it was the allergy medicine
I skipped my evening dose of Zyrtec last night and felt like a new person today.
Zyrtec is the best thing I've ever taken for allergies. Typically in September, I'm sneezing and coughing all day, every day. Some days, my eyes are swollen almost shut. Zyrtec gave me more relief from the symptoms than anything I've ever used. I've gone through my allergy season this September with almost no symptoms at all.
The down side is that I've been sleeping sometimes 20 hours a day, and when I've been awake, it's been like looking at the world through two inches of glass. I suppose that could be just coincidence, but today was the first 'normal' day I've had in weeks – months, maybe.
The question now is whether I'll have a return of allergy symptoms. If I do, I guess I'll go back to taking Zyrtec on a limited basis. But I'm pretty sure I won't be taking it every day again.
It feels good to be back in what passes for reality.
Zyrtec is the best thing I've ever taken for allergies. Typically in September, I'm sneezing and coughing all day, every day. Some days, my eyes are swollen almost shut. Zyrtec gave me more relief from the symptoms than anything I've ever used. I've gone through my allergy season this September with almost no symptoms at all.
The down side is that I've been sleeping sometimes 20 hours a day, and when I've been awake, it's been like looking at the world through two inches of glass. I suppose that could be just coincidence, but today was the first 'normal' day I've had in weeks – months, maybe.
The question now is whether I'll have a return of allergy symptoms. If I do, I guess I'll go back to taking Zyrtec on a limited basis. But I'm pretty sure I won't be taking it every day again.
It feels good to be back in what passes for reality.
Friday, September 17, 2010
Yawn
Went back to sleep about 4:30 am. Woke up about 9:30, looked around the Very Dark Room, and decided to go back to sleep. Slept soundly until noon. Woke up, looked around the Very Dark Room, and decided to go back to sleep. Woke up about 4, got out of bed about 6, went to dinner with DianeC, and now I'm back in bed, trying to stay awake long enough to finish this.
I'm wondering now if my allergy medicine is contributing to this.
I'm wondering now if my allergy medicine is contributing to this.
More on sleeping
Staying awake is still the biggest struggle of my day. I'm getting up at a fairly normal hour now, but I'm often groggy and a bit disoriented. I stay up through lunch, then go home and go back to sleep. I usually sleep very soundly until 2 pm to 3 pm, then get up again. Thursday, I went back to bed at about 10 pm, and woke up again right at midnight. It's early Friday morning as I write this.
I wrote a few months ago about my One Productive Task goal, in which I would simply try to do one prductive task each day. I haven't kept that up for weeks now. On the other hand, since I'm asleep all the time, I don't have much opportunity to mess the place up.
I wrote a few months ago about my One Productive Task goal, in which I would simply try to do one prductive task each day. I haven't kept that up for weeks now. On the other hand, since I'm asleep all the time, I don't have much opportunity to mess the place up.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Awake
Well, on Sunday I got up at 3 pm and ate something, then went back to bed and didn't get up again until 7 pm. That's when I was actually 'up'.
Today, though, I was up at 10:30 am — pretty good for me — and actually spent most of the day awake and doing stuff. That's a step forward.
Today, though, I was up at 10:30 am — pretty good for me — and actually spent most of the day awake and doing stuff. That's a step forward.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
About That Quote
dzaster asks why I posted that quote about priorities and options. I think it sums up a lesson which I learned too late in life to do me much good, but which might be beneficial to others.
It's easy to overcommit. Well, for some of us, anyway. Easy to overcommit in a new romantic relationship, easy to overcommit to a job or an employer. Easy to overcommit in a variety of ways.
When an employer talks about welcoming you to the "Fahrquahr Humate Corporation family," that's usually bullshit. It's not a family, it's a business. They would like for you to think it's a family, and make your job a priority. But unless you can make humate fly out of your ass, you are probably just an option to them. There's an imbalance in the relationship, which will become more clear if there's a sudden glut in the humate market.
I don't think I need to go into the issues of a romantic relationship. Let's just say it happens, sometimes because one partner encourages the other to overcommit, and sometimes because one partner is just prone to overcommitting.
The bottom line is, make sure your relationships are balanced.
It's easy to overcommit. Well, for some of us, anyway. Easy to overcommit in a new romantic relationship, easy to overcommit to a job or an employer. Easy to overcommit in a variety of ways.
When an employer talks about welcoming you to the "Fahrquahr Humate Corporation family," that's usually bullshit. It's not a family, it's a business. They would like for you to think it's a family, and make your job a priority. But unless you can make humate fly out of your ass, you are probably just an option to them. There's an imbalance in the relationship, which will become more clear if there's a sudden glut in the humate market.
I don't think I need to go into the issues of a romantic relationship. Let's just say it happens, sometimes because one partner encourages the other to overcommit, and sometimes because one partner is just prone to overcommitting.
The bottom line is, make sure your relationships are balanced.
A Pleasant Walk
I'm feeling a lot better tonight than I have for most of the summer.
I ate a late lunch with a friend at an Italian restaurant downtown. This restaurant is only about five minutes from my house, but I tend to think of it as outside my 'bubble.' I haven't eaten there in four years or more.
After we ate, I took my friend on a walking tour of downtown. She was planning to see an event in the Kerr Auditorium later in the evening, but she didn't know where it was, so I walked her over there. I suspect most people don't even know we have a Kerr Auditorium; it's part of the old Kerr-McGee complex now owned by Sandridge Energy. I don't think I've been in it since the eighties.
We spent about thirty minutes walking around downtown, and afterward, I felt as close to normal as I've felt in weeks. I guess I really needed to spend some time outdoors.
I ate a late lunch with a friend at an Italian restaurant downtown. This restaurant is only about five minutes from my house, but I tend to think of it as outside my 'bubble.' I haven't eaten there in four years or more.
After we ate, I took my friend on a walking tour of downtown. She was planning to see an event in the Kerr Auditorium later in the evening, but she didn't know where it was, so I walked her over there. I suspect most people don't even know we have a Kerr Auditorium; it's part of the old Kerr-McGee complex now owned by Sandridge Energy. I don't think I've been in it since the eighties.
We spent about thirty minutes walking around downtown, and afterward, I felt as close to normal as I've felt in weeks. I guess I really needed to spend some time outdoors.
Somebody's words of wisdom
"Never allow someone to be your priority while you're just their option."
— origin unknown
Thursday, September 09, 2010
Another day
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
— Yeats, or Gerry Rafferty, or somebody
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
— Yeats, or Gerry Rafferty, or somebody
Wednesday, September 08, 2010
Sleep/no sleep
I went to bed about 11 last night, which I thought was a reasonable hour. I was awake again by about 2:30 this morning. I don't know what time I got back to sleep — sometime after 3:29 am, obviously.
I woke up again about 6:45 am. I thought it was too early to get up, so I went back to sleep, thinking I'd be awake again in an hour. Instead, I woke up about noon, too groggy to even think. I went back to sleep, and awakened again at 3:45 pm, feeling rested for the first time.
Now, it's 8:45 pm, and I feel like I could go back to sleep right now.
Needless to say, I'm failing in my effort to get back on a regular sleep cycle. I wonder if this could be caused by something other than depression.
I woke up again about 6:45 am. I thought it was too early to get up, so I went back to sleep, thinking I'd be awake again in an hour. Instead, I woke up about noon, too groggy to even think. I went back to sleep, and awakened again at 3:45 pm, feeling rested for the first time.
Now, it's 8:45 pm, and I feel like I could go back to sleep right now.
Needless to say, I'm failing in my effort to get back on a regular sleep cycle. I wonder if this could be caused by something other than depression.
Ring of Fire
Ring of fire forms around a new supernova
"A 6-trillion-mile-wide ring of gas encircles a supernova in the Large Magellanic Cloud, Supernova 1987A, and the explosions from the supernova are lighting it up like a candle, creating what will become a glowing ring."
Six trillion miles. Another example of how the scale of cosmic events is simply beyond comprehension. And relatively speaking, this is just a tiny thing.
Monday, September 06, 2010
Sleep
The most pressing issue for me right now is getting my internal clock back on a normal schedule — getting up at 7 am, maybe, and going to bed at 10:30 pm. I think my depression is being made worse by my bad sleep habits.
I made myself go to bed at 10:30 last night, and actually fell asleep rather quickly. But I woke up around 2, and didn't get to sleep again until about 5. I woke up again at 7:30, and made myself get up. Drove to the Red Cup, but it was closed for Labor Day, so I went on to Jimmy's Egg and had breakfast.
I felt sleepy by the time I got home, so I decided to lie down for an hour or so. Instead, I slept soundly until almost 1 pm.
And now it's about 11 pm, and I'm about to try again to force myself to go to sleep. I don't know what it's going to take to get my sleeping back to normal.
I made myself go to bed at 10:30 last night, and actually fell asleep rather quickly. But I woke up around 2, and didn't get to sleep again until about 5. I woke up again at 7:30, and made myself get up. Drove to the Red Cup, but it was closed for Labor Day, so I went on to Jimmy's Egg and had breakfast.
I felt sleepy by the time I got home, so I decided to lie down for an hour or so. Instead, I slept soundly until almost 1 pm.
And now it's about 11 pm, and I'm about to try again to force myself to go to sleep. I don't know what it's going to take to get my sleeping back to normal.
Sunday, September 05, 2010
Calmer today than yesterday
I've been reading dzaster's advice in response to yesterday's early morning most, "Another Cheery Saturday". I don't think I'm giving away too much personal information by saying that dzaster moved from Oklahoma to another sunbelt state a few months ago, and has found the change significantly improved her sense of well-being.
I've considered the same thing, but I won't do it. I have too strong a financial incentive to remain here. And, while I have some sense of the kind of place where I'd like to live, I don't know if such a place actually exists.
Back in the early seventies, when I was a fundamentalist Christian, we were urged to separate ourselves, at least emotionally and philosophically, from the world. Of course, it was mostly bullshit; the church fathers doing the urging were no more separated from the world than any average consumer. It was salutary for everyone else, they insisted, but they were all so spiritually mature they no longer needed to deny themselves. Now we have this so-called 'prosperity gospel', and its New Age equivalent The Secret, and it's actually considered spiritual to wallow in material wealth and consumerism.
Meanwhile, I've drifted closer and closer to being detached from the world. I didn't do it on purpose. I wasn't pulled in this direction by the need for spiritual growth so much as I was pushed in this direction by boredom and frustration. When I was a Bible thumper, I struggled with this — unlike my pastors and Sunday school teachers, I took it seriously. But now it seems to have happened on its own, gradually over the years, with no prodding from the outside. I just looked at one thing after another, and said to myself, "Well, this is crap," and eliminated it from my life. This is my take on planet earth in general. Where would I move that would change this? I'd still be on this same speck of dust surrounded by people stirring up shit for no good reason.
I still have more material possessions than any human being needs. I get pleasure from music I've accumulated, but I think I could do without the rest of it now.
But being where I am doesn't make me feel more spiritual. I don't feel closer to God. I just feel farther away from crazy.
I've considered the same thing, but I won't do it. I have too strong a financial incentive to remain here. And, while I have some sense of the kind of place where I'd like to live, I don't know if such a place actually exists.
Back in the early seventies, when I was a fundamentalist Christian, we were urged to separate ourselves, at least emotionally and philosophically, from the world. Of course, it was mostly bullshit; the church fathers doing the urging were no more separated from the world than any average consumer. It was salutary for everyone else, they insisted, but they were all so spiritually mature they no longer needed to deny themselves. Now we have this so-called 'prosperity gospel', and its New Age equivalent The Secret, and it's actually considered spiritual to wallow in material wealth and consumerism.
Meanwhile, I've drifted closer and closer to being detached from the world. I didn't do it on purpose. I wasn't pulled in this direction by the need for spiritual growth so much as I was pushed in this direction by boredom and frustration. When I was a Bible thumper, I struggled with this — unlike my pastors and Sunday school teachers, I took it seriously. But now it seems to have happened on its own, gradually over the years, with no prodding from the outside. I just looked at one thing after another, and said to myself, "Well, this is crap," and eliminated it from my life. This is my take on planet earth in general. Where would I move that would change this? I'd still be on this same speck of dust surrounded by people stirring up shit for no good reason.
I still have more material possessions than any human being needs. I get pleasure from music I've accumulated, but I think I could do without the rest of it now.
But being where I am doesn't make me feel more spiritual. I don't feel closer to God. I just feel farther away from crazy.
Saturday, September 04, 2010
Another Cheery Saturday
I have at least three friends who are suffering depression severe enough to disrupt their lives. One has moments of sadness, and sees herself becoming less organized and motivated. Two others are afflicted with panic and anxiety attacks that disrupt sleep. One of them talks of occasionally being suicidal.
I wonder what the hell is the matter with all of us.
I have had the panic and anxiety attacks, but it's been 25 years ago, and the direct result of working for an absolutely insane company. I've had the suicidal tendencies, but that's been about 12 years ago. At the moment, I don't feel sad, I don't feel anxious or panicked, and I don't feel suicidal. But I feel zero enthusiasm for anything. I just absolutely do not give a shit.
Human beings are, for the most part, greedy, self-serving idiots. And it's the greediest, the most self-serving, and the most idiotic who end up running things. Did you watch that clip of Arizona's Governor Brewer trying to make an opening statement in a debate? Just tell us what you think, Governor. Blank stare for ten seconds. And then something like, "We're proud of what we've did." The Sarah Palin School of Communications. And she's leading by 19 points.
We are doomed, doomed, fucking doomed. We're cretins. But we're also just a bunch of microbes screwing things up on one little speck of dirt in one little galaxy. About the only pleasure I get out of life these days is knowing that the universe is so immense that we'll never be able to pave the whole thing and put strip malls on it. We won't be able to pollute all of it or spill oil all over it. We'll never get to kill the people on other planets who are different colors than us or who don't believe in the same all-powerful invisible beings we do.
And then there's this: Mass Extinction Threat: Earth on Verge of Huge Reset Button?
But if we're publishing news stories with sentences like...
...then we deserve to die.
Shit.
I wish I felt better.
I wonder what the hell is the matter with all of us.
I have had the panic and anxiety attacks, but it's been 25 years ago, and the direct result of working for an absolutely insane company. I've had the suicidal tendencies, but that's been about 12 years ago. At the moment, I don't feel sad, I don't feel anxious or panicked, and I don't feel suicidal. But I feel zero enthusiasm for anything. I just absolutely do not give a shit.
Human beings are, for the most part, greedy, self-serving idiots. And it's the greediest, the most self-serving, and the most idiotic who end up running things. Did you watch that clip of Arizona's Governor Brewer trying to make an opening statement in a debate? Just tell us what you think, Governor. Blank stare for ten seconds. And then something like, "We're proud of what we've did." The Sarah Palin School of Communications. And she's leading by 19 points.
We are doomed, doomed, fucking doomed. We're cretins. But we're also just a bunch of microbes screwing things up on one little speck of dirt in one little galaxy. About the only pleasure I get out of life these days is knowing that the universe is so immense that we'll never be able to pave the whole thing and put strip malls on it. We won't be able to pollute all of it or spill oil all over it. We'll never get to kill the people on other planets who are different colors than us or who don't believe in the same all-powerful invisible beings we do.
And then there's this: Mass Extinction Threat: Earth on Verge of Huge Reset Button?
But if we're publishing news stories with sentences like...
"Looking back in time, the diversity of large taxonomic groups (which include lots of species), such as snails or corals, mostly hovered around a certain equilibrium point that represented a diversity limit of species' numbers."
...then we deserve to die.
Shit.
I wish I felt better.
Wednesday, September 01, 2010
Autopilot
Went to bed at 8:30 last night. Woke up at 11:30. Met up with Blogblah! at Beverly's from midnight to 2 am, drinking decaf and talking about life. Then, back home and back to bed. Up at ten-ish. Breakfast at the Egg on May. Then back in bed. Slept until three-ish. Got up, joined a couple of friends at Will's, then we went to Diego's for dinner. Came home, rolled trash cans out to the curb. Now back in bed.
My life has been on some sort of autopilot for about three months now.
My life has been on some sort of autopilot for about three months now.
Monday, August 30, 2010
More shooting
A police officer trying to take in a drunk driver was shot and wounded by the driver's wife and sons last night. This happened about six blocks from where I saw the shots fired last Tuesday. Probably coincidence.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
A Little Neighborhood Diversion
Somebody shot at me tonight. Or at least in my general direction.
I was traveling west on a neighborhood street, stopped at a light, waiting to turn north onto a major artery. A car came from the north, had the light, and turned east — toward me.
Then, three shots — BAM, BAM, BAM. I saw the muzzle flash from the third one, coming from the back seat. The car kept on going.
It took a couple of seconds to soak in. I looked around — there were no other cars on the street, nor pedestrians.
Something to break the tedium, I guess.
I was traveling west on a neighborhood street, stopped at a light, waiting to turn north onto a major artery. A car came from the north, had the light, and turned east — toward me.
Then, three shots — BAM, BAM, BAM. I saw the muzzle flash from the third one, coming from the back seat. The car kept on going.
It took a couple of seconds to soak in. I looked around — there were no other cars on the street, nor pedestrians.
Something to break the tedium, I guess.
Two years without even a doodle
It occurred to me over the weekend that I have not done any art — not even random doodling in a notepad — in more than two years. The only exception to that has been two half-hearted attempts at starting paintings last fall.
I have never been productive as an artist. I was at my most prolific in high school and college, but I tapered off after that. I had a burst of output when I was doing it for a living for a few years, but after that, nothing.
This mildly disturbs me. But I'm not so bothered by it that I want to jump up and run to the easel.
I have never been productive as an artist. I was at my most prolific in high school and college, but I tapered off after that. I had a burst of output when I was doing it for a living for a few years, but after that, nothing.
This mildly disturbs me. But I'm not so bothered by it that I want to jump up and run to the easel.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Momentarily You
“Matter flows from place to place, and momentarily comes together to be you. Some people find that thought disturbing. I find the reality thrilling.”
— Richard Dawkins
I don't find it thrilling or disturbing. I find it to be... well, this.
Saturday, August 21, 2010
The Front Porch
The front porch looks terrible. I have more stuff piled on the porch than some people have in their houses. Almost all of it is stuff that needs to be given away or tossed. Most of it is under a brown tarp that's almost the same color as the house, so it's not too visible from the street.
It's too hot to go out there and mess with it, though.
It's too hot to go out there and mess with it, though.
Thursday, August 19, 2010
See ya around, Kos.
After weeks or months of threatening to cut myself off from political blogs, I finally did it this week. 72 hours of not looking at my usual list of left/progressive blogs, and the difference in my attitude is noticeable — at least to me. I don't feel like I'm missing anything, and I'm not making myself angry about the stuff I would be reading.
Frankly, I don't give a damn about what outrageous thing Michele Bachmann or Glenn Beck or Sarah Palin said today. Those folks' stock in trade is asinine statements. The real news would be if they shut up for awhile. Too much of liberal blogging now consists of simply reacting with outrage to some inane remark made by right-wing professional blatherers. Reporting that Palin said something stupid is like reporting "Bozo the Clown's nose was red again today."
Ignorance really is bliss, at least in this context.
I need to update my blog list on the right. Some of those blogs haven't been updated in months. And there are others I've begun reading.
Frankly, I don't give a damn about what outrageous thing Michele Bachmann or Glenn Beck or Sarah Palin said today. Those folks' stock in trade is asinine statements. The real news would be if they shut up for awhile. Too much of liberal blogging now consists of simply reacting with outrage to some inane remark made by right-wing professional blatherers. Reporting that Palin said something stupid is like reporting "Bozo the Clown's nose was red again today."
Ignorance really is bliss, at least in this context.
I need to update my blog list on the right. Some of those blogs haven't been updated in months. And there are others I've begun reading.
Later and later
I ate dinner at 1:30 a.m. yesterday. Or, more accurately, I ate yesterday's dinner at 1:30 this morning. I'm sleeping later and later, and getting up later and later.
I received a curious email from a friend yesterday. I can only paraphrase it, because I don't have it in front of me. The gist of it was that she didn't think I could go much longer without some sort of challenge, and that everyone seemed to see this but me.
I don't have a craving for any challenges. My challege is to go through every day without any crazy shit happening to me, and without causing any crazy shit myself. I think that's challenge enough.
I received a curious email from a friend yesterday. I can only paraphrase it, because I don't have it in front of me. The gist of it was that she didn't think I could go much longer without some sort of challenge, and that everyone seemed to see this but me.
I don't have a craving for any challenges. My challege is to go through every day without any crazy shit happening to me, and without causing any crazy shit myself. I think that's challenge enough.
Rorschach
"What was once called the objective world is a sort of Rorschach ink blot, into which each culture, each system of science and religion, each type of personality, reads a meaning only remotely derived from the shape and color of the blot itself."
— Lewis Mumford, "Orientation to Life," The Conduct of Life
Poli-blog blackout
Decided I needed a break from political blog surfing. I've gone 48 hours without reading Kos, FDL, C&L, HuffPo or anything else political. I feel better already.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Human Understanding
"The human understanding is like a false mirror, which, receiving rays irregularly, distorts and discolors the nature of things by mingling its own nature with it."
— Francis Bacon
Illusion and Reality
"Illusions commend themselves to us because they save us pain and allow us to enjoy pleasure instead. We must therefore accept it without complaint when they sometimes collide with a bit of reality against which they are dashed to pieces."
— Sigmund Freud
Actually, Not All That Ethereal
I should quit calling the Willowy, Ethereal Buddhist 'ethereal'. Because, actually, she's not. I just projected that onto her because I wanted her to be ethereal. I wanted to think she spends all her free time chanting mantras and lighting incense and wandering through fields of wildflowers or whatever, and not going to movies like "Iron Man".
But actually, I guess, she just does ordinary stuff. I say, 'I guess' because I don't know what the reality is. I have to face the fact that I didn't know her that well. I just knew the person I created in my mind and pretended was her.
But actually, I guess, she just does ordinary stuff. I say, 'I guess' because I don't know what the reality is. I have to face the fact that I didn't know her that well. I just knew the person I created in my mind and pretended was her.
Sunday, August 15, 2010
I'm Just Putting the Question Out There
If you Google the expression 'anger turned inward', you'll get about 53,000 hits. Almost all of them will be about depression.
I've always lived under the assumption that my depression is biologically-driven. My father had it and so did my grandfather. But now I'm wondering if it isn't partly 'anger turned inward'.
As a kindasorta buddhist, I guess I shouldn't get angry. But I know I do. I'm angry about the state our country is in. Do I direct that inward? I certainly don't blame myself for it. But I don't express that anger outwardly very much, either.
If I got down to the core of that anger, I think I would find it's because I indentify with working class people who have gotten screwed by the realignment of our economy over the past forty years. And the reason I identify with them is because I resent the way I was treated as a worker, and I have some deep-seated anger about that.
Granted, my situation now is modestly comfortable, but that's just dumb luck. It's not because of anything I did. If I look at what I have to show for the work I did, it's not much. So is my depression due in part to unresolved anger about that? I don't know; I'm just putting the question out there.
Another question: am I angry with myself over my shortcomings and failures, whether real or perceived? Again, I don't know; I'm just putting the question out there. Most men my age have a wife, or maybe a second wife, and a family. Maybe there's a house in the suburbs, and an SUV and backyard cookouts. Me? I've been married once, and I do my own my home, again more due to good fortune than any achievement on my part. But I have no family, and I'm pretty much relationship-proof.
I tell myself I'm okay with that, but am I really? Or am I just suppressing, or inwardly directing, anger over not being able to have these things?
I don't know. I'm just putting the question out there.
I've always lived under the assumption that my depression is biologically-driven. My father had it and so did my grandfather. But now I'm wondering if it isn't partly 'anger turned inward'.
As a kindasorta buddhist, I guess I shouldn't get angry. But I know I do. I'm angry about the state our country is in. Do I direct that inward? I certainly don't blame myself for it. But I don't express that anger outwardly very much, either.
If I got down to the core of that anger, I think I would find it's because I indentify with working class people who have gotten screwed by the realignment of our economy over the past forty years. And the reason I identify with them is because I resent the way I was treated as a worker, and I have some deep-seated anger about that.
Granted, my situation now is modestly comfortable, but that's just dumb luck. It's not because of anything I did. If I look at what I have to show for the work I did, it's not much. So is my depression due in part to unresolved anger about that? I don't know; I'm just putting the question out there.
Another question: am I angry with myself over my shortcomings and failures, whether real or perceived? Again, I don't know; I'm just putting the question out there. Most men my age have a wife, or maybe a second wife, and a family. Maybe there's a house in the suburbs, and an SUV and backyard cookouts. Me? I've been married once, and I do my own my home, again more due to good fortune than any achievement on my part. But I have no family, and I'm pretty much relationship-proof.
I tell myself I'm okay with that, but am I really? Or am I just suppressing, or inwardly directing, anger over not being able to have these things?
I don't know. I'm just putting the question out there.
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Random Summer Notes 2
My appetite has been off. This is not necessarily a bad thing, since I am also getting almost no exercise. I assume the heat is largely responsible. I can't tell that this has caused any weight loss, but at least I'm not gaining.
I'm keeping a friend's dog for a month. We're at about the halfway mark on that. I think Bailey, my basset hound, benefits from having a co-dog.
I bought a couple of documentaries from iTunes and watched them on my iPad: "Gonzo", about journalist Hunter S. Thompson, and "Born Into This", about poet Charles Bukowski. I wasn't sure how I would like watching films on the iPad, but it's not bad at all. It's sort of like holding a movie in your hands as if it were a book. I wouldn't want to watch "Lawrence of Arabia" this way, but for documentaries, it seems fine.
The aloha shirts are finally gone. Now I can work on getting the rest of the crap off the porch.
I'm keeping a friend's dog for a month. We're at about the halfway mark on that. I think Bailey, my basset hound, benefits from having a co-dog.
I bought a couple of documentaries from iTunes and watched them on my iPad: "Gonzo", about journalist Hunter S. Thompson, and "Born Into This", about poet Charles Bukowski. I wasn't sure how I would like watching films on the iPad, but it's not bad at all. It's sort of like holding a movie in your hands as if it were a book. I wouldn't want to watch "Lawrence of Arabia" this way, but for documentaries, it seems fine.
The aloha shirts are finally gone. Now I can work on getting the rest of the crap off the porch.
Random summer notes
For about 60 days now, I've been spending most of my time holed up in the Very Dark Room. That's the master bedroom of my house, where I've covered the windows enough that at high noon, the room is about as dimly lit as the inside of a movie theater.
I still eat frequently with the Wednesday/Friday dinner group, but I'm not there all the time. I'm a rare sight at the coffee shop. I never eat at home now, but most of my meals are taken alone, usually at some neighborhood sandwich shop or café. I don't like high-end 'dining concept' places. Sometimes I'll dine with a friend, but most of the time I'm alone. Sometimes, frankly, I tire of the companionship of even my best friends, and I'm sure they sometimes tire of mine.
If you saw "I Heart Huckabee's", you'll remember how the marketing executive Brad Stand (played by Jude Law) constantly repeats a story about his encounter with Shania Twain. I have that in mind constantly when I find myself telling a story to friends, because I guarantee you, any story I tell is one I've told before. I ran out of new material years ago.
The heat continues to be oppressive, and part of the reason I'm staying holed up. My car thermometer registered 123 degrees in a parking lot today. The official high was only about 102, with a heat index of 104, but it gets a lot hotter out on a vast expanse of concrete.
I ran into the willowy ethereal Buddhist a few weeks ago, and we ended up having coffee together one afternoon. It was our first sitdown together in a year and a half.
A couple of weeks later, she called and invited me to a movie that evening. We went to see an old film at the art museum. On the way home, she mentioned she had seen and enjoyed "Iron Man". That's about the last movie on earth I would have expected her to sit through. Which goes to show that yet again, I didn't know a woman as well as I thought I did, and made assumptions based on my own preferences rather than looking at reality. Too bad I didn't learn that lesson thirty or forty years ago, when it might have mattered.
The willowy ethereal Buddhist being who she is, I might hear from her again next week, or it might be another year and a half.
More random notes to come.
I still eat frequently with the Wednesday/Friday dinner group, but I'm not there all the time. I'm a rare sight at the coffee shop. I never eat at home now, but most of my meals are taken alone, usually at some neighborhood sandwich shop or café. I don't like high-end 'dining concept' places. Sometimes I'll dine with a friend, but most of the time I'm alone. Sometimes, frankly, I tire of the companionship of even my best friends, and I'm sure they sometimes tire of mine.
If you saw "I Heart Huckabee's", you'll remember how the marketing executive Brad Stand (played by Jude Law) constantly repeats a story about his encounter with Shania Twain. I have that in mind constantly when I find myself telling a story to friends, because I guarantee you, any story I tell is one I've told before. I ran out of new material years ago.
The heat continues to be oppressive, and part of the reason I'm staying holed up. My car thermometer registered 123 degrees in a parking lot today. The official high was only about 102, with a heat index of 104, but it gets a lot hotter out on a vast expanse of concrete.
I ran into the willowy ethereal Buddhist a few weeks ago, and we ended up having coffee together one afternoon. It was our first sitdown together in a year and a half.
A couple of weeks later, she called and invited me to a movie that evening. We went to see an old film at the art museum. On the way home, she mentioned she had seen and enjoyed "Iron Man". That's about the last movie on earth I would have expected her to sit through. Which goes to show that yet again, I didn't know a woman as well as I thought I did, and made assumptions based on my own preferences rather than looking at reality. Too bad I didn't learn that lesson thirty or forty years ago, when it might have mattered.
The willowy ethereal Buddhist being who she is, I might hear from her again next week, or it might be another year and a half.
More random notes to come.
Nightmare
Another of those nightmares that jolted me awake, gasping for air with my heart racing.
I have a recurring nightmare in which there's some kind of aircraft crash, and I'm on the ground trying to dodge flying debris. In the dream I just had, I'm driving a van that is absolutely loaded with stuff, balky and top heavy, and a huge helicopter is trying to take off right in front of me.
The copter is out of control, and I'm backing the van full speed across the parking lot, trying to stay from it. But it keeps coming straight at me. When I swerve, it swerves.
Finally it climbs straight up, flips over, and comes crashing down upside down on the roof of a building. I'm still backing up full speed so if a rotor blade or some other part comes flying off, it won't hit me. But I know I'm still too close.
That's when I woke up.
I have a recurring nightmare in which there's some kind of aircraft crash, and I'm on the ground trying to dodge flying debris. In the dream I just had, I'm driving a van that is absolutely loaded with stuff, balky and top heavy, and a huge helicopter is trying to take off right in front of me.
The copter is out of control, and I'm backing the van full speed across the parking lot, trying to stay from it. But it keeps coming straight at me. When I swerve, it swerves.
Finally it climbs straight up, flips over, and comes crashing down upside down on the roof of a building. I'm still backing up full speed so if a rotor blade or some other part comes flying off, it won't hit me. But I know I'm still too close.
That's when I woke up.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Aloha, Shirts
I went through my rack of aloha shirts and other silk sport shirts and pulled out 30 of them, of which I will now rid myself. A couple of them still have tags, having never been worn.
They're all in a pile in a chair on the front porch. I'm trying to get some of my Facebook friends to come take them, but if no one does, I guess they'll go to Goodwill.
That only puts a dent in my shirt accumulation.
I can't imagine why anyone would need as many shirts as I have.
(I first wrote about my unfortunate aloha shirt predeliction here.)
They're all in a pile in a chair on the front porch. I'm trying to get some of my Facebook friends to come take them, but if no one does, I guess they'll go to Goodwill.
That only puts a dent in my shirt accumulation.
I can't imagine why anyone would need as many shirts as I have.
(I first wrote about my unfortunate aloha shirt predeliction here.)
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Nothing to say, but here I am anyway
Sometimes I decide to post something. Then, staring at the blank Blogger text entry window, I think to myself, 'What's the point?' and post nothing at all.
This just happened to me. I woke up, as I often do, suddenly possessed of a desire to say something, only to realize I have nothing to say. Or that I could say something, but it would just be blather. I guess almost all of it is blather.
You and I may both be better off if I say nothing.
This just happened to me. I woke up, as I often do, suddenly possessed of a desire to say something, only to realize I have nothing to say. Or that I could say something, but it would just be blather. I guess almost all of it is blather.
You and I may both be better off if I say nothing.
KC
During the ten years my ex and I were married, we acquired seven cats and two dogs. I left them all with her. We parted 12 years ago, and over those years, the pets grew old and died, one by one.
The last of them, a cat named KC, died Monday. She was about 19.
My ex has three cats and a dog she acquired after our divorce. Two of the cats came from me, and are descendants of Lark.
But KC, as the oldest of the pets, was special to her. KC had a long, comfortable life, but it makes me sad that she's gone.
The last of them, a cat named KC, died Monday. She was about 19.
My ex has three cats and a dog she acquired after our divorce. Two of the cats came from me, and are descendants of Lark.
But KC, as the oldest of the pets, was special to her. KC had a long, comfortable life, but it makes me sad that she's gone.
Monday, August 09, 2010
I live now
"With the past, I have nothing to do; nor with the future. I live now."
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
Saturday, August 07, 2010
Collapsing Empire
I rarely post political or current events stuff. I hope you'll read this salon.com post by Glenn Greenwald, called "What collapsing empire looks like."
Somtime back during the Nixon administration, the Powers That Be ran the ship of state into an iceberg. What's been happening since then, even during the terms of Democratic presidents, is the luxury class passengers making for the lifeboats while the rest of us are stranded on the lower decks. Now, they're yelling at us to throw down the ship's china and silverware before the gunwale slips below the waves.
"Does anyone doubt that once a society ceases to be able to afford schools, public transit, paved roads, libraries and street lights -- or once it chooses not to be able to afford those things in pursuit of imperial priorities and the maintenance of a vast Surveillance and National Security State -- that a very serious problem has arisen, that things have gone seriously awry, that imperial collapse, by definition, is an imminent inevitability?"
Somtime back during the Nixon administration, the Powers That Be ran the ship of state into an iceberg. What's been happening since then, even during the terms of Democratic presidents, is the luxury class passengers making for the lifeboats while the rest of us are stranded on the lower decks. Now, they're yelling at us to throw down the ship's china and silverware before the gunwale slips below the waves.
Thursday, August 05, 2010
Another Blog Post I Like
From Buddhist in Nebraska:
"I have no hope. No hope for heaven, no fear of hell. No hope for a better rebirth and no fear of worse. I know I will die. I seek no reward nor escape from any punishment. This life is all I have. And though I tell myself I could be wrong (what if I’m wrong?) I never seem to find enough faith or reason in such belief to spur action. Nor do I think I should."
Itchy bumps
I pulled weeds in the yard yesterday and now my hands are broken out in itchy bumps. I'm using some generic brand of Benadryl lotion on them, and it's helped a lot. I guess I'm allergic to one of the weeds I handled. Next time, maybe I'll remember to wear gloves.
A Blog I Found
I found a blog I think I like called The Scurrilous Monk.
Here's a post from 2007 entitled "Do Not Seek an Easy Practice"
Personally, I just have the practice I have. I guess I could have kept on working rather than retiring, but other than that, I didn't seek this out. On the other hand, I've certainly avoided more strenuous practice.
And I certainly wouldn't compare myself to the Dalai Lama or Thich Nhat Hanh. I'm not even sure I'm actually a Buddhist, strictly speaking. Do not use me as a role model or example. If something I've written during the past four and a half years had some use to you, that's great. But there are plenty of people out there in a better position to give advice than I am.
Anyway, it seems like an interesting blog. I'll probably add it to my permanent links at right.
Here's a post from 2007 entitled "Do Not Seek an Easy Practice"
"We seem to think there is a shortcut...that all we need do is to think the right thoughts, see the right things or even feel the right things......and poof.....so if we read enough books by Thich Nat Hanh or the Dalai Lama then we can be just like them. But Thich Nat Hanh's practice was tempered in a real war zone with grenades and bullets, and the Dalai Lama was driven from his country that he was responsible for and watched those friends under his protection tortured and killed."
Personally, I just have the practice I have. I guess I could have kept on working rather than retiring, but other than that, I didn't seek this out. On the other hand, I've certainly avoided more strenuous practice.
And I certainly wouldn't compare myself to the Dalai Lama or Thich Nhat Hanh. I'm not even sure I'm actually a Buddhist, strictly speaking. Do not use me as a role model or example. If something I've written during the past four and a half years had some use to you, that's great. But there are plenty of people out there in a better position to give advice than I am.
Anyway, it seems like an interesting blog. I'll probably add it to my permanent links at right.
Wednesday, August 04, 2010
Cats
Another Buddhist cat fancier
I am down to two cats. Gastón, who is the great-great-great-something grandson of Lark, who first appeared at my house in 2002 (I think), and Rollo, originally called Roland, whom I got from the shelter about a year and a half ago.
Gastón's sister Frannie vanished several months ago. His mother, Evil Kitty, aka Eek, hasn't been seen since spring, but she's semi-feral and often disappears for months at a time. The cat Ms. HRP and I called Grey hasn't been around since winter. But he spends long stretches of time at a house across the street. I hope he's there now.
There have been a lot of other cats wander through over the years, most of them only barely tame. At one time I counted thirteen of them.
Having two is better. And Rollo and Gastón are both completely tame, mostly indoor cats, and have all their shots. I hope they'll be around a long time.
I am down to two cats. Gastón, who is the great-great-great-something grandson of Lark, who first appeared at my house in 2002 (I think), and Rollo, originally called Roland, whom I got from the shelter about a year and a half ago.
Gastón's sister Frannie vanished several months ago. His mother, Evil Kitty, aka Eek, hasn't been seen since spring, but she's semi-feral and often disappears for months at a time. The cat Ms. HRP and I called Grey hasn't been around since winter. But he spends long stretches of time at a house across the street. I hope he's there now.
There have been a lot of other cats wander through over the years, most of them only barely tame. At one time I counted thirteen of them.
Having two is better. And Rollo and Gastón are both completely tame, mostly indoor cats, and have all their shots. I hope they'll be around a long time.
I forgot to mention the grass
Last fall, we planted a lot of shade grass in the back yard. By spring, I had a thick green carpet across the yard. Then the elm tree grew leaves, and we had several days of heavy rain. Now, the grass is all dead and even the weeds wom't grow. It's just bare dirt everywhere.
The back yard
I like to go back and look at previous months' blog postings. In August, 2009, I wrote only two posts for the whole month, so this post puts me ahead for August, 2010. In August, 2009,
I posted photos of my new gate and the still-unfinished garage. In August, 2008, I was almost through with the backyard landscaping project, and I posted photos of that.
As I've mentioned before, I can't post pictures here with the iPad, so no photos today. But I'll describe the back yard as it looks now for you. First of all, many of the plants have gotten so big they're now kind of crowded together. Others, meanwhile, have died, so there are some blank spots around. The dwarf blue palmetto I planted in 2008 is now suddenly growing extremely fast, and looks like it will be bigger than I ever thought it would be. I'm wondering if there's a way to divide and spread this plant.
The crape myrtles also need to be pruned back, but I'm not sure whether I should do this now or wait until fall.
A lot of grass — what we used to call 'johnson grass' — has come up in the cracks bewteen the patio flagstones. I've spent some time pulling it up, but it's been extremely hot outside, and my back has not been amenable to the effort. So, there's still a lot out there.
The back yard looks pretty cluttered, especially compared to how neat and orderly it looked two years ago.
I posted photos of my new gate and the still-unfinished garage. In August, 2008, I was almost through with the backyard landscaping project, and I posted photos of that.
As I've mentioned before, I can't post pictures here with the iPad, so no photos today. But I'll describe the back yard as it looks now for you. First of all, many of the plants have gotten so big they're now kind of crowded together. Others, meanwhile, have died, so there are some blank spots around. The dwarf blue palmetto I planted in 2008 is now suddenly growing extremely fast, and looks like it will be bigger than I ever thought it would be. I'm wondering if there's a way to divide and spread this plant.
The crape myrtles also need to be pruned back, but I'm not sure whether I should do this now or wait until fall.
A lot of grass — what we used to call 'johnson grass' — has come up in the cracks bewteen the patio flagstones. I've spent some time pulling it up, but it's been extremely hot outside, and my back has not been amenable to the effort. So, there's still a lot out there.
The back yard looks pretty cluttered, especially compared to how neat and orderly it looked two years ago.
Tuesday, August 03, 2010
Compulsive activity
"Western laziness consists of cramming our lives with compulsive activity, so that there is no time at all to confront the real issues."
— Sogyal Rinpoche
Of course, this is what I've been saying all along.
Sunday, August 01, 2010
Beginning year four
Today marks the beginning of my fourth year of retirement. It's gone about the way I expected, with a couple of notable exceptions.
I have spent much more money than I intended to. Most of it was spent on improving the house, so I have the hope of getting a lot of it back if I need to. But there's no way I could sell this house for what I've put into it.
I've gained more weight. I expected to lose weight, being removed from the temptation to snack at my desk. But as it turns out, I'm not much more physically active now than I was when I was at a workstation all day.
My television career is so distant it seems almost like it never happened. But my final job, working in a municipal government office, seems like it ended just a year or so ago.
I'm still depressed all the time, or at least not viewing life through the same rose-colored glasses most other people seem to have. But I enjoy my time alone. I have more of that now than I've ever had in my life, and it seems to suit me.
I have spent much more money than I intended to. Most of it was spent on improving the house, so I have the hope of getting a lot of it back if I need to. But there's no way I could sell this house for what I've put into it.
I've gained more weight. I expected to lose weight, being removed from the temptation to snack at my desk. But as it turns out, I'm not much more physically active now than I was when I was at a workstation all day.
My television career is so distant it seems almost like it never happened. But my final job, working in a municipal government office, seems like it ended just a year or so ago.
I'm still depressed all the time, or at least not viewing life through the same rose-colored glasses most other people seem to have. But I enjoy my time alone. I have more of that now than I've ever had in my life, and it seems to suit me.
Thursday, July 29, 2010
2001st post
Actually, it's not just the Internet. It's everything. I feel like someone in a theater watching a really mediocre play, and it's only politeness that keeps me from getting up and walking out.
Too much Internet
One of my Facebook friends (actually more of an acquaintance) has decided to give it up. I certainly respect her decision. I've found some useful information on Facebook, and I've been able to reconnect with a lot of long-lost friends, classmates and coworkers. But Facebook can also be a huge timesink. Time isn't a big problem for me at this stage of my life, but I can see where other, busier people would find Facebook an annoying habit that intrudes on their other activities.
My personal problem with Facebook isn't the time I spend with it, but the general pointlessness of what I read, and, frankly, what I post. I've picked up some gems of wisdom, but they've been few and far between. I quit visiting my regular coffee shop in part because I found myself trapped between two or three simultaneous conversations about things that didn't interest me. Facebook produces a similar effect: a lot of what strikes me as conversational noise.
Actually, the whole Internet is starting to wear me down. As you know if you've been reading this blog awhile, I don't own a TV. I can't stand the barrage of commercials, nor the hyperkinetic animations and visuals that seem to be always running, even popping up over programming. I hate the hours of 'information' programming in which the same two dozen pundits and spokespeople yell over each other.
That's television, but the Internet is starting to be the same way. I'm tired of visiting web sites where there are three animated advertisements running at the same time — and they're all for the same thing. I'm tired of the increasingly shrill political bloggers whose alarmist headlines lead to nothing more than a snarky critique of something some other shrill blogger wrote — which may be nothing more than a slam of a third blogger. I'm tired of 'news' about celebrities I've never heard of.
I make my daily round of my regular websites, which include The Huffington Post, Firedoglake, Crooks and Liars, Eschatonblog, Hullaballoo, io9, Slashfilm, Gawker and macsurfer, and after I'm done I just feel like I've littered my mind with the intellectual equivalent of fast food wrappers and cigarette butts. And then there's reddit and Twitter, which dump even more irrelevant junk data between my ears. Why do I keep reading this stuff?! I think it's because I have nothing else to do.
But just as I struggle with clutter in my house, I also have to struggle with clutter in my brain. I've got to find a substitute for this intellectual junk food.
And there's my 2,000th post.
My personal problem with Facebook isn't the time I spend with it, but the general pointlessness of what I read, and, frankly, what I post. I've picked up some gems of wisdom, but they've been few and far between. I quit visiting my regular coffee shop in part because I found myself trapped between two or three simultaneous conversations about things that didn't interest me. Facebook produces a similar effect: a lot of what strikes me as conversational noise.
Actually, the whole Internet is starting to wear me down. As you know if you've been reading this blog awhile, I don't own a TV. I can't stand the barrage of commercials, nor the hyperkinetic animations and visuals that seem to be always running, even popping up over programming. I hate the hours of 'information' programming in which the same two dozen pundits and spokespeople yell over each other.
That's television, but the Internet is starting to be the same way. I'm tired of visiting web sites where there are three animated advertisements running at the same time — and they're all for the same thing. I'm tired of the increasingly shrill political bloggers whose alarmist headlines lead to nothing more than a snarky critique of something some other shrill blogger wrote — which may be nothing more than a slam of a third blogger. I'm tired of 'news' about celebrities I've never heard of.
I make my daily round of my regular websites, which include The Huffington Post, Firedoglake, Crooks and Liars, Eschatonblog, Hullaballoo, io9, Slashfilm, Gawker and macsurfer, and after I'm done I just feel like I've littered my mind with the intellectual equivalent of fast food wrappers and cigarette butts. And then there's reddit and Twitter, which dump even more irrelevant junk data between my ears. Why do I keep reading this stuff?! I think it's because I have nothing else to do.
But just as I struggle with clutter in my house, I also have to struggle with clutter in my brain. I've got to find a substitute for this intellectual junk food.
And there's my 2,000th post.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
2000
The next post here, whatever it turns out to be, will be my 2,000th post. So, happy fucking 2,000th post to me.
Well, I voted.
But I can't remember an election where I had less enthusiasm for dragging my fat lazy ass to the polling place. I voted for George McGovern when I was 18, and I haven't missed a general or primary election yet - except for 2000, when I had moved to Texas and hadn't been there long enough to qualify.
But this year, it just seemed like a tiresome chore. This state is run by a coalition of creationists, militia enthusiasts, softcore white supremacists and billionaire pro sports hobbyists. Anything that doesn't appeal to at least one of those interest groups isn't going to go anywhere.
The Democratic nominee for U S Senate is, according to someone who knows him, a crazy old coot who lives in a trailer in Midwest City, has bad breath and lives on Chips Ahoy! cookies. Hell, I could have beaten him just relying on residual name recognition from TV days. I wouldn't win the general election, but at least I would have my footnote in Oklahoma history.
But this year, it just seemed like a tiresome chore. This state is run by a coalition of creationists, militia enthusiasts, softcore white supremacists and billionaire pro sports hobbyists. Anything that doesn't appeal to at least one of those interest groups isn't going to go anywhere.
The Democratic nominee for U S Senate is, according to someone who knows him, a crazy old coot who lives in a trailer in Midwest City, has bad breath and lives on Chips Ahoy! cookies. Hell, I could have beaten him just relying on residual name recognition from TV days. I wouldn't win the general election, but at least I would have my footnote in Oklahoma history.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Primary Day
Today is political primary day in my state. I will vote, but I have no enthusiasm for it.
Monday, July 26, 2010
Missing a friend
A friend dropped out of my life a few months ago. At the time, I was relieved. We had gotten to the point where we were together almost every day, and we had come to rely on each other for support in ways that were not healthy for either of us.
She was doing tons of stuff for me that I should have been doing for myself, and I was helping her out financially to an extent that was actually beyond my ability. She once said she would like to be my personal assistant. If I were a multimillionaire, I would have been happy to hire her in that position. As it was, I had come to rely on her to sort of keep me energized, so I wouldn't just sit in bed in a dark room all day like I'm doing right now.
Anyway, she moved on, and I have no idea what she's doing now. The parting was a little acrimonious, and I'm sorry it turned out that way.
These things are all temporary. People come and go. Nothing is permanent, and none of it has meaning.
Even so, I find my samsaric self sometimes misses her.
She was doing tons of stuff for me that I should have been doing for myself, and I was helping her out financially to an extent that was actually beyond my ability. She once said she would like to be my personal assistant. If I were a multimillionaire, I would have been happy to hire her in that position. As it was, I had come to rely on her to sort of keep me energized, so I wouldn't just sit in bed in a dark room all day like I'm doing right now.
Anyway, she moved on, and I have no idea what she's doing now. The parting was a little acrimonious, and I'm sorry it turned out that way.
These things are all temporary. People come and go. Nothing is permanent, and none of it has meaning.
Even so, I find my samsaric self sometimes misses her.
Sunday, July 25, 2010
There is no Santa Claus
After having fairly normal and productive days (well, productive by my standard) Friday and Saturday, I fell back into summertime slothfulness today. I didn't get out of bed until 2:30 pm. I took a shower, then went to an Italian place for lunch. Later, in the early evening, NurseK and I went to a Irish pub kind of place for dinner.
Somewhere in the day, I made it by Target to pick up some Q-Tips and a couple of T-shirts. But I spent most of the day in bed.
I was never a person of ambitious, far-reaching goals, but I've come to realize that even the miniscule goals I had for myself were pretty much pointless.
So, some days I don't feel like getting out of bed, nor do I see any reason why I should.
A couple of years ago, I wrote a post about people who are just sitting around, waiting to die.
That phrase was used by a woman I knew who was herself busy every minute of every day. She was a surgeon who, in addition to her medical career, raced cars, rode and maintained a decrepit old motorcycle, raised three pigs and some dogs and cats, and, in what time she had left over, skated in the roller derby. Seriously. I know that sounds like a character in a TV show, but there she was.
I don't begrudge anyone their hobbies and extracurricular activities. But this stuff is, to my mind, staying busy to stay busy. It's keeping ourselves occupied so we don't have to recognize the fundamental non-existence of all the stuff floating around in our heads – illusions which we have chosen to treat as reality.
It's liberating to realize all this stuff is just illusion. But in a way, it's also disappointing. It's like when I learned there wasn't really a Santa Claus. I wouldn't want to have spent my whole life believing there was a Santa Claus when there wasn't, but it was still sort of a letdown to find it out.
Somewhere in the day, I made it by Target to pick up some Q-Tips and a couple of T-shirts. But I spent most of the day in bed.
I was never a person of ambitious, far-reaching goals, but I've come to realize that even the miniscule goals I had for myself were pretty much pointless.
So, some days I don't feel like getting out of bed, nor do I see any reason why I should.
A couple of years ago, I wrote a post about people who are just sitting around, waiting to die.
That phrase was used by a woman I knew who was herself busy every minute of every day. She was a surgeon who, in addition to her medical career, raced cars, rode and maintained a decrepit old motorcycle, raised three pigs and some dogs and cats, and, in what time she had left over, skated in the roller derby. Seriously. I know that sounds like a character in a TV show, but there she was.
I don't begrudge anyone their hobbies and extracurricular activities. But this stuff is, to my mind, staying busy to stay busy. It's keeping ourselves occupied so we don't have to recognize the fundamental non-existence of all the stuff floating around in our heads – illusions which we have chosen to treat as reality.
It's liberating to realize all this stuff is just illusion. But in a way, it's also disappointing. It's like when I learned there wasn't really a Santa Claus. I wouldn't want to have spent my whole life believing there was a Santa Claus when there wasn't, but it was still sort of a letdown to find it out.
Monday, July 19, 2010
Monday
The heat, the light, the colors, the glare, the sounds, the textures — even the smells. Everything out there is too much for me right now. Here in the Very Dark Room, it is quiet, cool, calm, and of course, dark. I'll just stay here for now. I don't even want to leave to eat.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
119 Degrees
Unfortunately, there's no way to put photos on this blog from an iPad. If there were, I'd show you the picture I took of my car's outdoor thermometer yesterday. It was registering 119 degrees in the middle of a big restaurant parking lot. Here's a link to it on Facebook, if you're really interested.
The official high has yet to reach 100. But the humidity has been so high this summer that heat indexes of 102-105 degrees have been daily occurences.
I am doing what I did last summer, which is to retreat to the Very Dark Room, lights usually off, and sitting or lying in the dark most of the day. I'm sleeping a lot. I'm also reading "The Zen Teachings of Bodhidharma", a collection of writings traditionally attributed to the monk who brought Zen to China. Red Pine is the translator.
Like many of the earliest Zen/Chan writings, it's much more straightforward than the stuff that came a thousand or fifteen hundred years later.
The official high has yet to reach 100. But the humidity has been so high this summer that heat indexes of 102-105 degrees have been daily occurences.
I am doing what I did last summer, which is to retreat to the Very Dark Room, lights usually off, and sitting or lying in the dark most of the day. I'm sleeping a lot. I'm also reading "The Zen Teachings of Bodhidharma", a collection of writings traditionally attributed to the monk who brought Zen to China. Red Pine is the translator.
Like many of the earliest Zen/Chan writings, it's much more straightforward than the stuff that came a thousand or fifteen hundred years later.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Too much Facebook
Two acquaintances of mine are sort of 'acting out' their romantic breakup on Facebook. It feels unpleasant to witness.
They're being very adult and low-key about it, but even so, I feel uncomfortable reading about it. I don't know either of these people well enough for this to be any of my business.
I'm starting to be over Facebook. I feel as if I'm in too many other people's lives, and too many other people are in mine.
There's not going to be any Facebook in my mountainside hut.
They're being very adult and low-key about it, but even so, I feel uncomfortable reading about it. I don't know either of these people well enough for this to be any of my business.
I'm starting to be over Facebook. I feel as if I'm in too many other people's lives, and too many other people are in mine.
There's not going to be any Facebook in my mountainside hut.
Thursday, July 08, 2010
Back in High School...
...I knew this kind of willowy, gauzy, ethereal hippie chick. This was in 1969-70. Her name was Frances Green, but she was known to her friends as Frannie the Green. (This was 1969, remember.)
I lost track of her after high school. We both moved away from that town. About a year later, I got a letter from her. She wasn't sure I was the right mcarp, but she sent the letter on a hunch. I had no idea how she found me. I don't know why I didn't reply, but I didn't.
But I wondered over the years what had become of her. Starting about 2005, I began scouring the Internet looking for information on her. I posted queries about her on websites where I thought she might have visited.
One of them finally produced results. I got an email tonight telling me Frannie died of cancer two years ago.
I should have answered that letter.
I lost track of her after high school. We both moved away from that town. About a year later, I got a letter from her. She wasn't sure I was the right mcarp, but she sent the letter on a hunch. I had no idea how she found me. I don't know why I didn't reply, but I didn't.
But I wondered over the years what had become of her. Starting about 2005, I began scouring the Internet looking for information on her. I posted queries about her on websites where I thought she might have visited.
One of them finally produced results. I got an email tonight telling me Frannie died of cancer two years ago.
I should have answered that letter.
Wednesday, July 07, 2010
Back Projection Reality
Some days – and this was one of them – I feel a strange disconnect from my surroundings. I don't think 'alienated' is the right word, but I don't have a better one.
You know how, in old movies, if a couple of people were traveling in a car, they'd have them in a mocked-up car on a stage and project a movie of a street behind them to make it look as if they were driving down the street? That's how it feels to me.
I can't say I like it or that I don't like it. I simply observe it.
Bulldog Blackie and the Case
of the Mysterious Enigma.
Or something.
You know how, in old movies, if a couple of people were traveling in a car, they'd have them in a mocked-up car on a stage and project a movie of a street behind them to make it look as if they were driving down the street? That's how it feels to me.
I can't say I like it or that I don't like it. I simply observe it.
Sunday, July 04, 2010
Hubble pics
This is why I don't give a damn.
The Hubble pictures underscored for me the unimaginable vastness of the universe, and how small and frankly irrelevant our planet and all our human schemes and plans are in the grand scope of things.
The Hubble pictures don't leave me the least bit motivated to care about the things most people think are important.
But if the engineers, opticians and other experts who built and launched the Hubble had my attitude, the thing would never have been made, and I would never have seen these pictures.
I don't know what to make of that. It doesn't change my point of view.
Thursday, July 01, 2010
Bagworms
Apropos of nothing else, the bagworms are crazy this year. I have a juniper tree about six feet tall in the front yard that had at least a thousand of them. I tried spraying them, to no avail. Now, I'm picking them off by hand, one by one. I've pulled off more than 600 over the past three days, and it looks like I'm at about the halfway point. I hope I got to them in time to save the tree.
Non-attachment redux
A friend offered this item from zenhabits.com about non-attachment.
Letting Go of Attachment, From A to Zen | zenhabits.com
Back in 2006 I wrote a post about non-attachment. I'll post the relevant quote here:
I wrote that more than four years ago. At the time, I thought I was making great progress in removing attachments. And yet it's been only in the past ten days or so that I've been able to scratch the white-out off my rather basic and obvious attachment to stacks and stacks of old books. I've kept some around for twenty-five years or more, even though I rarely read them more than once.
I stayed attached to them because they made me feel erudite and intelligent, and it was important to me to be able to view myself that way. Part of the reason I'm able to let go of the books now is because I previously started divesting of the attachment to feeling erudite and intelligent.
Letting go of that doesn't mean I now view myself as poorly-educated and stupid. It means that I am in the process of outgrowing any opinion or judgment one way or the other.
(By the way, this also doesn't mean I'm going to turn anti-intellectual and start believing in Palinism, fundamentalism, creationism, UFOs, New Age and the like. Magical thinking is also an attachment. I still believe what I believe; I'm just not hanging my personal identity on it.)
In the meantime, there's still a lot of crap in this house.
Letting Go of Attachment, From A to Zen | zenhabits.com
Back in 2006 I wrote a post about non-attachment. I'll post the relevant quote here:
"I went through my list of attachments. This is harder than it sounds, because the stuff you detach from most readily is the stuff to which you're not really attached at all. Babyshit-flavor ice cream, for example. Totally non-attached to that. FOX News... non-attached. 'American Idol'... non-attached. Dan Brown novels... non-attached.
So what's the problem? The stuff to which we are really attached. I mean, we're so attached we won't even admit to ourselves we're attached, so when we're pondering the stuff to which we're attached, this is under the blobs of white-out we've painted there so we won't see it."
I wrote that more than four years ago. At the time, I thought I was making great progress in removing attachments. And yet it's been only in the past ten days or so that I've been able to scratch the white-out off my rather basic and obvious attachment to stacks and stacks of old books. I've kept some around for twenty-five years or more, even though I rarely read them more than once.
I stayed attached to them because they made me feel erudite and intelligent, and it was important to me to be able to view myself that way. Part of the reason I'm able to let go of the books now is because I previously started divesting of the attachment to feeling erudite and intelligent.
Letting go of that doesn't mean I now view myself as poorly-educated and stupid. It means that I am in the process of outgrowing any opinion or judgment one way or the other.
(By the way, this also doesn't mean I'm going to turn anti-intellectual and start believing in Palinism, fundamentalism, creationism, UFOs, New Age and the like. Magical thinking is also an attachment. I still believe what I believe; I'm just not hanging my personal identity on it.)
In the meantime, there's still a lot of crap in this house.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Lo, More of This Random Crap
I took a stack of about 30 books to Half Price Books today. That comprises maybe 20 percent of the books I want to get rid of.
I've always hung on to books, rationalizing that books represent knowledge and wisdom. And frankly, you won't find a lot of junk books on my shelves. Among the things I took in today were Schlesinger's two-volume history of the New Deal and DeTocqueville's 'Democracy in America' — books that I had read once, then left unopened on my bookshelves for 20 years.
Maybe now someone else will read them.
Even after I've pared my library down to where I want it, I'll have dozens of books around the house.
I also gave away a bookshelf today.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
My kitchen
The Miracle Worker came over again today and brought a friend. Together, they restored my kitchen to sanity. In fact, it looks amazing. It looks like a normal person lives here.
There are some things missing. When I say missing, I mean I just don't know where they put them — they're here somewhere. The can of WD40 that was on top of the microwave, for example. And the laundry that was in the dish drying rack. And the package of auger bits that was on top of the laundry. I'm sure I'll track all that stuff down.
And now that the kitchen is finally clean, I plan to keep it that way by never setting foot in it again.
There are some things missing. When I say missing, I mean I just don't know where they put them — they're here somewhere. The can of WD40 that was on top of the microwave, for example. And the laundry that was in the dish drying rack. And the package of auger bits that was on top of the laundry. I'm sure I'll track all that stuff down.
And now that the kitchen is finally clean, I plan to keep it that way by never setting foot in it again.
Friday, June 25, 2010
Nag Champa
When you've had as many cats living in your house over the years as I have, Nag Champa is your friend. Maybe your best friend. I'm down to only two cats now, but I still have plenty of incense.
(Now that I've said it's my best friend, I'll find a status update on Facebook: "Nag Champa is in a relationship." And I'll have to switch to patchouli.)
(Now that I've said it's my best friend, I'll find a status update on Facebook: "Nag Champa is in a relationship." And I'll have to switch to patchouli.)
Who would you see?
Another Facebook friend posted this as her status update: "Who would you see if you saw yourself walking your way?"
On the one hand, this is a question that directs your attention back toward yourself. From a Buddhist perspective, that's probably a pointless exercise. On the other hand, many of us wonder what kind of immediate impression we make on other people. This question prompts us to step outside ourselves and imagine how we appear to others.
In trying to answer this question, I decided I probably wouldn't even notice myself walking my way. I'm a pretty generic-looking guy; except for my height, I blend into a crowd pretty well. (My size is one reason my previously-documented Hawaiian shirt fixation is ill-advised. They make me look like a billboard for a florist. Neutral, solid colors are my friends.) I kind of shuffle when I walk, and I'm generally slow-moving.
On the one hand, this is a question that directs your attention back toward yourself. From a Buddhist perspective, that's probably a pointless exercise. On the other hand, many of us wonder what kind of immediate impression we make on other people. This question prompts us to step outside ourselves and imagine how we appear to others.
In trying to answer this question, I decided I probably wouldn't even notice myself walking my way. I'm a pretty generic-looking guy; except for my height, I blend into a crowd pretty well. (My size is one reason my previously-documented Hawaiian shirt fixation is ill-advised. They make me look like a billboard for a florist. Neutral, solid colors are my friends.) I kind of shuffle when I walk, and I'm generally slow-moving.
"__________ is in a relationship."
One of my friends has updated her Facebook status to "in a relationship." While I'm happy for her, I assume this means she won't have as much free time to hang out with her regular friends.
When a friend gets into a relationship, it's sort of like they're moving away to another city.
When a friend gets into a relationship, it's sort of like they're moving away to another city.
Monday, June 21, 2010
More on the random crap
Why do we keep all this random crap? I'll open a drawer and see some dumbass thing that's been around here a million years: "Ah. There's the shoelace organizer I bought in 1987."
And then what? Well, it proves that event happened. I didn't just imagine I bought a shoelace organizer in 1987, because, well, look — here the thing is. I bought it, and this proves I existed in 1987, and I wasn't created by aliens just 15 minutes ago and implanted with a bunch of false memories.
But what if I didn't exist in 1987? What if I don't exist right now? What difference does it make? What fucking difference does it make?
And then what? Well, it proves that event happened. I didn't just imagine I bought a shoelace organizer in 1987, because, well, look — here the thing is. I bought it, and this proves I existed in 1987, and I wasn't created by aliens just 15 minutes ago and implanted with a bunch of false memories.
But what if I didn't exist in 1987? What if I don't exist right now? What difference does it make? What fucking difference does it make?
Return of the Miracle Worker
Four years ago this month, I had the miracle worker come to my house and set things right. I called her the miracle worker then because it seemed to me to be miraculous that she could get done in a day what would have taken me months to accomplish.
There were a few changes this time, however. The most significant was that I had realized, as mentioned previously, that I could not get the house livable by simply throwing out trash and rearranging and organizing what was left. There was simply too much stuff. So even non-trash items had to go.
I made an agreement with her that I would let her throw away things, and I would not challenge her decisions or bring things back in after she had thrown them out.
As for the rest of it, I have no idea what she threw out. The bags went in the trash can without me looking at them.
This represents a change in my view of my personal possessions. I finally realized there isn't a single thing in this house that I 'have' to have. It's all optional.
I realized that I had come to view many of my possessions as components of my identity. I have since learned that a lot of hoarders/clutterers view their identity and individuality through their possessions.
I finally decided that my 'identity' is as disposable as anything else in this house. It doesn't mean a thing to say, "I'm me," and therefore I don't need a bunch of stuff around here to daily prove to myself that it's true. "Me" is just another pointless possession – one that isn't even tangible, like Casper the Friendly Ghost is. 'Me' is just a concept – a thing floating around in what I still think of, for purposes of convenience, as 'my' mind. As is 'I'.
(I could awkwardly recast all these sentences to get rid of the personal pronouns, and they would be more accurate from a Buddhist perspective. But they'd be unreadable, so I'll do what ever other Buddhist does and continue the conceit for the sake of convenience.)
In addition to all the stuff that Kat the Miracle Worker got rid of, I have given away a goodly amount of other stuff. Last year, Ms. HRP helped me get rid of bag after bag of clothes. That included a plastic tub full of more than 200 pair of socks that I had boxed up back in 1999.
Having gotten rid of all those clothes, I was able in recent weeks to give away a chest of drawers that had been parked in the middle of the dining room for about a year. I gave away a coffee table I bought twelve years ago and had not used in ten years. I gave away a bunch of bed linens, never opened, and got rid of the cabinet I had bought to hold them. This weekend, Tall Ed came by and took about a dozen history and current events books that had been on my shelves.
And after all that, the house is still packed with stuff. A lot more needs to go.
Lo, this random crap:
the miracle worker
holds a telephone
made from a Batman-logoed
tennis shoe.
There were a few changes this time, however. The most significant was that I had realized, as mentioned previously, that I could not get the house livable by simply throwing out trash and rearranging and organizing what was left. There was simply too much stuff. So even non-trash items had to go.
I made an agreement with her that I would let her throw away things, and I would not challenge her decisions or bring things back in after she had thrown them out.
The friendliest ghost I know.
As for the rest of it, I have no idea what she threw out. The bags went in the trash can without me looking at them.
This represents a change in my view of my personal possessions. I finally realized there isn't a single thing in this house that I 'have' to have. It's all optional.
I realized that I had come to view many of my possessions as components of my identity. I have since learned that a lot of hoarders/clutterers view their identity and individuality through their possessions.
I finally decided that my 'identity' is as disposable as anything else in this house. It doesn't mean a thing to say, "I'm me," and therefore I don't need a bunch of stuff around here to daily prove to myself that it's true. "Me" is just another pointless possession – one that isn't even tangible, like Casper the Friendly Ghost is. 'Me' is just a concept – a thing floating around in what I still think of, for purposes of convenience, as 'my' mind. As is 'I'.
(I could awkwardly recast all these sentences to get rid of the personal pronouns, and they would be more accurate from a Buddhist perspective. But they'd be unreadable, so I'll do what ever other Buddhist does and continue the conceit for the sake of convenience.)
In addition to all the stuff that Kat the Miracle Worker got rid of, I have given away a goodly amount of other stuff. Last year, Ms. HRP helped me get rid of bag after bag of clothes. That included a plastic tub full of more than 200 pair of socks that I had boxed up back in 1999.
Having gotten rid of all those clothes, I was able in recent weeks to give away a chest of drawers that had been parked in the middle of the dining room for about a year. I gave away a coffee table I bought twelve years ago and had not used in ten years. I gave away a bunch of bed linens, never opened, and got rid of the cabinet I had bought to hold them. This weekend, Tall Ed came by and took about a dozen history and current events books that had been on my shelves.
And after all that, the house is still packed with stuff. A lot more needs to go.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
I bought a book
If you read the WaPo article to which I linked a few days ago, you may recall the mention of a book called Buried In Treasures by Tolin, Frost and Steketee. I bought it the other day and have been browsing through it. I started out reading it closely, but quickly discovered most of the information was stuff I had read in other books or had figured out on my own. After that, I just thumbed through it looking for interesting tidbits.
I come back to my basic decluttering rules:
When you see something interesting in a store or online, you have to program yourself to see that object as something that is going to screw up your life. Possessions are the enemy. They hate you. They want to crush your spirit and snuff out your soul.
The most valuable possession of all is your own peace of mind.
I come back to my basic decluttering rules:
- Stuff has to leave the house and not come back.
- Other new stuff cannot come in.
When you see something interesting in a store or online, you have to program yourself to see that object as something that is going to screw up your life. Possessions are the enemy. They hate you. They want to crush your spirit and snuff out your soul.
The most valuable possession of all is your own peace of mind.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Lo, This Random Crap
So, I'm doing my One Productive Task for the day, which is going through cardboard boxes in the dining room to see if there's anything in them I need to keep.I found this copy of IBM's OS/2. I think this is the 1993 release. I never installed it.
The house is full of this kind of stuff.
The gulf blowout
I don't write much about current events, but the gulf oil blowout has been on my mind a lot. I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about it.
This will end up being a typical USA deal. By which I mean ten years from now, the gulf will be dead, along with the Caribbean and a large part of the Atlantic. Beaches along the gulf coast will be abandoned. Hurricanes will have carried oil inland, and coastal cities will slowly dwindle in size. Cities from Mobile to Tampa will look like Detroit and New Orleans. There will be occasional news dispatches promising progress soon, and we will have heard the promises so many times by then we won't have the emotional energy left to be outraged by the obvious lies.
It's the environmental equivalent of Afghanistan or Vietnam.
BP will get taxpayer bailouts, change its name, and walk away unscathed.
Part of what disgusts and depresses me about this is knowing that if some manmade disaster happens where I live, the result will be the same. Swarms of personnel will swoop in to make sure no pictures are taken of it. The government will send the perpetrators sternly-worded letters. Michael Bloomberg will urge us to protect our royal CEO class.
And the rest of us will just be fucked.
I'm not getting out of bed today.
This will end up being a typical USA deal. By which I mean ten years from now, the gulf will be dead, along with the Caribbean and a large part of the Atlantic. Beaches along the gulf coast will be abandoned. Hurricanes will have carried oil inland, and coastal cities will slowly dwindle in size. Cities from Mobile to Tampa will look like Detroit and New Orleans. There will be occasional news dispatches promising progress soon, and we will have heard the promises so many times by then we won't have the emotional energy left to be outraged by the obvious lies.
It's the environmental equivalent of Afghanistan or Vietnam.
BP will get taxpayer bailouts, change its name, and walk away unscathed.
Part of what disgusts and depresses me about this is knowing that if some manmade disaster happens where I live, the result will be the same. Swarms of personnel will swoop in to make sure no pictures are taken of it. The government will send the perpetrators sternly-worded letters. Michael Bloomberg will urge us to protect our royal CEO class.
And the rest of us will just be fucked.
I'm not getting out of bed today.
I threw away a TV
Eight years ago, a friend gave me a 21-inch TV. It was broken when he gave it to me — I guess he thought I might figure out how to fix it. I didn't. So the thing sat around here for eight years, taking up space.
Today I finally just dropped the thing in a trash can. A tight fit, but I got it in there. This is the kind of crap that has filled my house. God knows why I didn't throw it away in 2002.
Today I finally just dropped the thing in a trash can. A tight fit, but I got it in there. This is the kind of crap that has filled my house. God knows why I didn't throw it away in 2002.
Saturday, June 12, 2010
One Productive Task
I don't think I've mentioned this before... my new cleanup strategy is what I call the One Productive Task method. I try to do One Productive Task, i.e., some bit of household cleanup, every day. I may do more, but at the minimum, I try to do one.
Today, for example, I threw out a couple of old pillows the dog had slept on, along with a few bits of other debris that had been in the living room and dining room.
It's not much, but it's something, and if I keep doing that every day, I'll have the house shipshape by 2018 or thereabouts.
Washington Post reporter Michael S. Rosenwald has written a story about his own struggle with clutter and hoarding.
I would dispute the use of the word 'slob' in the headline. I doubt that Rosenwald shows up at the Post for work every day in dirty clothes or a three-day growth of beard. But, like me, he has a hard time dealing with the accumulation of material possessions.
And it's not status symbols or rich people's toys that are the problem. I don't own a big screen TV or a home theater system, for example. What I have is a bunch of junk, much of which I have described previously. That includes my huge box of 'wall wart' transformers for various electronic doodads long ago burnt out or broken; dozens of CD-ROMs, many of them blank, that have gotten scratched or cracked from being left out of their cases; old books I'll never read again, and so on.
Rosenwald's story is accompanied by a slide show of photos – a few of them apparently staged – showing the clutter in his home and his car. His car is actually worse than mine, but there have been times when mine was worse than his.
But one picture especially caught my attention. It's a picture of his hands emerging from a pile of books, magazines, newspapers and whatnot. And in the upper left hand corner is a roll of toilet paper. What is a roll of toilet paper doing in his home office or den or wherever this is? The same thing they're doing in my den, dining room, kitchen, and bedroom, I suppose. I need to blow my nose, or wipe up a spill, and I grab a roll of TP out of the bathroom because it's the handiest thing. And then the roll just stays wherever I used it.
It dawned on me that I don't spend more than five minutes a day making this house a mess. And if I could spend, say, seven minutes a day cleaning it up, eventually I ought to get caught up. Hence the One Productive Task. It takes about seven minutes. And I have seen a little progress, but only a little. It's like spending seven minutes shoveling sand out of the Sahara Desert.
Back in 2006, I recruited someone to come in and declutter, and she got more done in a day than I would have gotten done in a couple of months.
I've asked her to come back in a few days, and I hope she'll help me get further ahead in this process.
Addendum: A couple of friends suggested I watch "Hoarders" on A&E. I don't have a TV, so I checked the A&E web site, where full episodes are available for viewing. I was so turned off by the 'dum dum DUMMMM!' music and the grainy "se7en"-style graphics that I didn't watch the show. It's a houseful of crap, not the Zodiac killer.
Today, for example, I threw out a couple of old pillows the dog had slept on, along with a few bits of other debris that had been in the living room and dining room.
It's not much, but it's something, and if I keep doing that every day, I'll have the house shipshape by 2018 or thereabouts.
Washington Post reporter Michael S. Rosenwald has written a story about his own struggle with clutter and hoarding.
The Mess He Made: A Life-long Slob Decides It's Time to Get Organized
I would dispute the use of the word 'slob' in the headline. I doubt that Rosenwald shows up at the Post for work every day in dirty clothes or a three-day growth of beard. But, like me, he has a hard time dealing with the accumulation of material possessions.
And it's not status symbols or rich people's toys that are the problem. I don't own a big screen TV or a home theater system, for example. What I have is a bunch of junk, much of which I have described previously. That includes my huge box of 'wall wart' transformers for various electronic doodads long ago burnt out or broken; dozens of CD-ROMs, many of them blank, that have gotten scratched or cracked from being left out of their cases; old books I'll never read again, and so on.
Rosenwald's story is accompanied by a slide show of photos – a few of them apparently staged – showing the clutter in his home and his car. His car is actually worse than mine, but there have been times when mine was worse than his.
But one picture especially caught my attention. It's a picture of his hands emerging from a pile of books, magazines, newspapers and whatnot. And in the upper left hand corner is a roll of toilet paper. What is a roll of toilet paper doing in his home office or den or wherever this is? The same thing they're doing in my den, dining room, kitchen, and bedroom, I suppose. I need to blow my nose, or wipe up a spill, and I grab a roll of TP out of the bathroom because it's the handiest thing. And then the roll just stays wherever I used it.
It dawned on me that I don't spend more than five minutes a day making this house a mess. And if I could spend, say, seven minutes a day cleaning it up, eventually I ought to get caught up. Hence the One Productive Task. It takes about seven minutes. And I have seen a little progress, but only a little. It's like spending seven minutes shoveling sand out of the Sahara Desert.
Back in 2006, I recruited someone to come in and declutter, and she got more done in a day than I would have gotten done in a couple of months.
I've asked her to come back in a few days, and I hope she'll help me get further ahead in this process.
Addendum: A couple of friends suggested I watch "Hoarders" on A&E. I don't have a TV, so I checked the A&E web site, where full episodes are available for viewing. I was so turned off by the 'dum dum DUMMMM!' music and the grainy "se7en"-style graphics that I didn't watch the show. It's a houseful of crap, not the Zodiac killer.
Friday, June 11, 2010
Freak me out, why don't you?
I have a few female friends and acquaintances with whom I often have lunch or dinner. These are not women I'm dating, but friends I enjoy sharing time with. Nevertheless, a friend suggested a few days ago that I ought to 'get together' with one of them.
I could feel the muscles in my chest and diaphragm tense up as soon as he said it. He might as well have suggested a recreational trip to the dentist, or getting a job.
It's not that I'm not attracted to women. But at this stage in my life, that attraction seems to exist somewhere outside of me, like a cloud of fog surrounding my head. It's not pleasant.
I have friends who enjoy their infatuations, even when the interest is not mutual. "Oh," they tell me, "it makes me feel alive."
I don't call that feeling alive. I call that feeling crazy.
I feel more alive sitting in the back yard, watching the birds and petting the dog. But beyond that, I'm kind of over the whole 'alive/not alive' thing.
I'm not that much different than the big rock out in my back yard. And after I die, I won't be any different at all. So I'm not going to get all cranked up about the 'alive' thing. That will resolve itself soon enough.
I could feel the muscles in my chest and diaphragm tense up as soon as he said it. He might as well have suggested a recreational trip to the dentist, or getting a job.
It's not that I'm not attracted to women. But at this stage in my life, that attraction seems to exist somewhere outside of me, like a cloud of fog surrounding my head. It's not pleasant.
I have friends who enjoy their infatuations, even when the interest is not mutual. "Oh," they tell me, "it makes me feel alive."
I don't call that feeling alive. I call that feeling crazy.
I feel more alive sitting in the back yard, watching the birds and petting the dog. But beyond that, I'm kind of over the whole 'alive/not alive' thing.
I'm not that much different than the big rock out in my back yard. And after I die, I won't be any different at all. So I'm not going to get all cranked up about the 'alive' thing. That will resolve itself soon enough.
Sunday, June 06, 2010
Transmission of Mind
I want to mention a book I read recently. It's called Transmission of Mind, and contains the teachings of Huang Po, a Chinese Chan master of the ninth century CE. It was written by one of his students shortly after his death in 857.
Transmission of Mind predates the 'one hand clapping' era of Zen, and proves Zen can be taught without riddles, brain teasers and intellectual snipe hunts. John Blofeld's translation of this work can be found on Amazon, and I assume elsewhere as well.
Transmission of Mind predates the 'one hand clapping' era of Zen, and proves Zen can be taught without riddles, brain teasers and intellectual snipe hunts. John Blofeld's translation of this work can be found on Amazon, and I assume elsewhere as well.
Saturday, June 05, 2010
Another material possession
I bought an iPad today. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing. I spend a lot of time away from the computer these days, but I frequently want to blog or surf or check Facebook or Twitter. I won't carry this around town with me; it's strictly for use around the house and the back yard.
The learning curve doesn't appear steep. It works more like an iPhone, of course, than a Mac. But there are differences, and it will take a while to get used to them.
The learning curve doesn't appear steep. It works more like an iPhone, of course, than a Mac. But there are differences, and it will take a while to get used to them.
Thursday, June 03, 2010
Like a Brick Wall
I got a comment on Facebook a few weeks ago suggesting that talking to me was like 'talking to a brick wall.' And I guess that's true much of the time. Other people have commented that I don't participate well in group conversations.
I just don't have a lot to say. The dropoff in frequency of posts here reflects that.
I think that, if anything, I talk too much. Sometimes, at the end of the day, as I look back over what the day has been like, I find myself asking, 'Why did I say that? That was unnecessary.' Or snarky. Or unfair. Or demeaning.
I spent about seven hours Memorial Day hanging out with the former Flibbertigibbet. There were long stretches of time (or at least they seemed long) where neither of us said anything. That is as it should be. I like not feeling compelled to fill every second of airtime with noise, like I'm a Top 40 radio station or something.
Silence really is golden.
I just don't have a lot to say. The dropoff in frequency of posts here reflects that.
I think that, if anything, I talk too much. Sometimes, at the end of the day, as I look back over what the day has been like, I find myself asking, 'Why did I say that? That was unnecessary.' Or snarky. Or unfair. Or demeaning.
I spent about seven hours Memorial Day hanging out with the former Flibbertigibbet. There were long stretches of time (or at least they seemed long) where neither of us said anything. That is as it should be. I like not feeling compelled to fill every second of airtime with noise, like I'm a Top 40 radio station or something.
Silence really is golden.
Tuesday, June 01, 2010
Networked Blogs
There's a new widget on the right side of the screen called Networked Blogs. This is the doodad that somehow interfaces this blog to Facebook. Or something. So if you click on the button that says "Follow This Blog," something happens. I'm not sure what.
Update
Just some random stuff: First of all, I lost the artwork for the blog banner. It's got to be on my computer somewhere, but I can't find it. So, I've tossed up what may be a temporary replacement – or it may be permanent, depending on whether I get around to finding the old one or making a more elaborate new one.
I have tried to link this blog to my Facebook account through a FB app whose setup is a bit difficult for me to follow. Maybe it works. Maybe it doesn't. I guess if you see this from Facebook, it's working.
I have tried to link this blog to my Facebook account through a FB app whose setup is a bit difficult for me to follow. Maybe it works. Maybe it doesn't. I guess if you see this from Facebook, it's working.
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