amidst a week of goodbyes
including the planting
of Hopi Blue Corn
amidst the finest mist
of a gathering storm
of desert spring moisture
and my heart singing
with the sweet sadness
inspired by
the diverse and gentle affections
received upon departure
an unexpected visit
from an old and dear friend
a homemade greeting card
filled with reminders
the mind tosses up
unexpected images
to try and understand the present
my twenty-year high school reunion
was already nine years ago
when in reality
accurately perceived by my subjective experience
it really was only three or four years ago
six at most
wasn't it?
_______
themes like mortality occur often:
how can anyone avoid realizing
this blessed impermanence
permeating each day's
every action?
it stuns me with poignancy
for each moment
as every fellow traveler knows
is not to be missed
_______
I've had the good fortune
to be part of a couple productions
of summer theater under the stars
and so this moment is familiar:
set it up one more time
enjoy it all now that we've got it down
amidst a sudden rush to savor
this community of lovers and fools
the bonds and routines
which despite best efforts
have been taken all too for-granted
and wonder from where this silent tear arises
Monday, April 26, 2010
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
newport avenue
i took the pricey place
couldn't see stumbling past open bedroom doors with momma and pop and grandma trying to sleep through their miniature greyhounds barking at me at midnight
the prison cell of a rental was painful to have even imagined
and i was running out of time
it set up a great growth experience, riding the wave of my own jackally doubt and some weird new age shame that there wasn't some universal flow i should have been in perfect harmony with to find the perfectionist's dream home
all of which dissipated like morning fog after making the decision
leaving me suddenly recognizing people again
smiling at dog walkers
and gleefully
immersing myself without a wetsuit
in the 59 degree
pacific
_______________
it was good to make a decision
even if I won't be able to put up all the drifter friends I am making
they are the most interesting folks around here, and while they have a niche in OB beyond most places, the trend seems the same as anywhere
and since the just-don't-steal-the-tv-like-our-last-roommate 420 house didn't invite me to join them
i'm taking the conventional n/s
n/d behind-the-house studio
which is better since i'm around the kids so much these days anyway
_____________
but it sure is weird
then heading down to the street scene
amidst the bars and head shops
wondering which of my personas
is the main one and which
are subpersonalities needing to be kept under wraps
playing mando with street buskers
including a banjo playing sweetheart travelling through
reminding me i can still feel stuff no matter how unreal
after going out for ice cream with my straight laced bro-in-law and the kids
after agreeing to the pricey place
and watching it all co-occur
on the same
street
couldn't see stumbling past open bedroom doors with momma and pop and grandma trying to sleep through their miniature greyhounds barking at me at midnight
the prison cell of a rental was painful to have even imagined
and i was running out of time
it set up a great growth experience, riding the wave of my own jackally doubt and some weird new age shame that there wasn't some universal flow i should have been in perfect harmony with to find the perfectionist's dream home
all of which dissipated like morning fog after making the decision
leaving me suddenly recognizing people again
smiling at dog walkers
and gleefully
immersing myself without a wetsuit
in the 59 degree
pacific
_______________
it was good to make a decision
even if I won't be able to put up all the drifter friends I am making
they are the most interesting folks around here, and while they have a niche in OB beyond most places, the trend seems the same as anywhere
and since the just-don't-steal-the-tv-like-our-last-roommate 420 house didn't invite me to join them
i'm taking the conventional n/s
n/d behind-the-house studio
which is better since i'm around the kids so much these days anyway
_____________
but it sure is weird
then heading down to the street scene
amidst the bars and head shops
wondering which of my personas
is the main one and which
are subpersonalities needing to be kept under wraps
playing mando with street buskers
including a banjo playing sweetheart travelling through
reminding me i can still feel stuff no matter how unreal
after going out for ice cream with my straight laced bro-in-law and the kids
after agreeing to the pricey place
and watching it all co-occur
on the same
street
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
waves
amidst a couple rough first days of post-driving fatigue, along with internal pressure to make it all happen, especially finding a place immediately, i noticed a subtle fear or perhaps despair descending on me, especially in my relative sense of disconnection with the ocean and kids
it was the uh oh is this all a big mistake? moment, coming as my subconscious realized this was the last moment i could still turn around and undo this moving plan with minimal karma, a moment that i have in the past had difficulty with due to overwhelming additional factors of minimal and dwindling funds
this time i rode the wave, supported by receiving a couple friendly emails, a cup of yerba mate, and the remembrance to release into the hands of Benevolent Universe, with a prayer that it all serve the greatest good
and sitting on the perch i seem to have claimed, the left-most of four outdoor stools at the local cafe overlooking the beach and scene, a couple folks i'd met the night before with my mandolin strapped over my shoulder came by to discuss paradigm shifting and a shared perception of the need to empathize with cops, so that they have the option of joining the coming global picnic too
and looking at the water, i remembered eros, the whole point of this--the call to adventure, to embrace something new--and i realized what i had been missing about the water: the desire to go in, the stimulus of the potential for immersion, be it real or fantasy, which brings forth the horses to carry us to our places of responsiveness in the world
so with at least my legs in the 59 degree water, i felt the indescribable wonder of being amidst the swirling patterns of moving cold foamy wetness
and i say: life is for Beauty, sure the wonderful physical stimuli of youthful curves and vigor, yet which are but a glimpse into the true eros of this life, the ever-renewing word-defying dance-with-otherness, naturally available if we but manage the processes of our maturing with some grace and humility, along with some boldness and tenacity, so as to remember to love all of this
Life
it was the uh oh is this all a big mistake? moment, coming as my subconscious realized this was the last moment i could still turn around and undo this moving plan with minimal karma, a moment that i have in the past had difficulty with due to overwhelming additional factors of minimal and dwindling funds
this time i rode the wave, supported by receiving a couple friendly emails, a cup of yerba mate, and the remembrance to release into the hands of Benevolent Universe, with a prayer that it all serve the greatest good
and sitting on the perch i seem to have claimed, the left-most of four outdoor stools at the local cafe overlooking the beach and scene, a couple folks i'd met the night before with my mandolin strapped over my shoulder came by to discuss paradigm shifting and a shared perception of the need to empathize with cops, so that they have the option of joining the coming global picnic too
and looking at the water, i remembered eros, the whole point of this--the call to adventure, to embrace something new--and i realized what i had been missing about the water: the desire to go in, the stimulus of the potential for immersion, be it real or fantasy, which brings forth the horses to carry us to our places of responsiveness in the world
so with at least my legs in the 59 degree water, i felt the indescribable wonder of being amidst the swirling patterns of moving cold foamy wetness
and i say: life is for Beauty, sure the wonderful physical stimuli of youthful curves and vigor, yet which are but a glimpse into the true eros of this life, the ever-renewing word-defying dance-with-otherness, naturally available if we but manage the processes of our maturing with some grace and humility, along with some boldness and tenacity, so as to remember to love all of this
Life
Thursday, April 8, 2010
mostly about the kids
a part of me is watching
and wondering
is this really happening?
while i may go out dancing tonight
or just blog at length
and listen to the peatbog fairies
music a friend gave me
and was finally heard
what i really am doing
is moving
______
a little work on the car done
tithing the good ride fairies
new captain contacted
with at least three days a week
work offered
which means with call-ins I can get
4-5 days a week
my choice
how perfect is that?
hang out on the beach
and play more music
when the personal economy is good
pick up days when i need to
or just want the exercise
it's really what i was hoping for
in joining tjs a while back
relocate to cool places
and see what suits me best
the beach suits me
___________
wow
it's great to have savings
to venture into one's dreams with
too many rotted on the shelf
from some kind of poverty
and i tell you
the calling to nurture the kids
is huge
they are great kids
actually it would be more accurate to say
great people
who haven't so far
caught much of a break
in terms of finding adequate support
for their young lives
sad
and
i am going to make a difference
in their lives
_________
i realized today
again
what it means to be an uncle
it is a role that suits me
incredibly well
I can really drop all my jackals
around kids
they have had enough judgment
and harshness
to build all the character they need
i'm not sure they've ever had someone
move to their town
to come spend time with them
with the sole purpose
of offering the caring attention
they seek
to be happy, or at least happier
as they work on learning
the essential life skill
of loving themselves
and thus access an essential resourcefulness
as they journey
into the challenges
of their lives
____________
yeah there is pride in my voice
it's a celebration
of being in tune enough
to wake up immediately
upon realizing the opportunity
to contribute to others'
lives
and the mutual needs met
by offering young ones
the essential uncle-ing tasks
of mentorship into the world
learning to play ball
interacting with others respectfully
ordering tea at a cafe
fishing
guess i need to learn how to fish
now
____________
along with this
there is the calling
to be of tangible support as well
giving and contributing
economically to their dreams
even if it's a ten or a hundred
or a meal out here and there
they can get a sense maybe it's not
such a world of deprivation
it's like the two months
i will be hanging out with them
it can be seen as a short window
but for a family such as ours
a little is a lot
we are if nothing else
tenacious
_______
in other news
my hair which i think was buzzed
eight months or so ago
is already entering
ponytail territory
____________
i am jumpy
with a couple waves of near panic today
is this really happening?
i sure hope so
i'm packing half my stuff
tonight
and driving to san diego
tomorrow
and wondering
is this really happening?
while i may go out dancing tonight
or just blog at length
and listen to the peatbog fairies
music a friend gave me
and was finally heard
what i really am doing
is moving
______
a little work on the car done
tithing the good ride fairies
new captain contacted
with at least three days a week
work offered
which means with call-ins I can get
4-5 days a week
my choice
how perfect is that?
hang out on the beach
and play more music
when the personal economy is good
pick up days when i need to
or just want the exercise
it's really what i was hoping for
in joining tjs a while back
relocate to cool places
and see what suits me best
the beach suits me
___________
wow
it's great to have savings
to venture into one's dreams with
too many rotted on the shelf
from some kind of poverty
and i tell you
the calling to nurture the kids
is huge
they are great kids
actually it would be more accurate to say
great people
who haven't so far
caught much of a break
in terms of finding adequate support
for their young lives
sad
and
i am going to make a difference
in their lives
_________
i realized today
again
what it means to be an uncle
it is a role that suits me
incredibly well
I can really drop all my jackals
around kids
they have had enough judgment
and harshness
to build all the character they need
i'm not sure they've ever had someone
move to their town
to come spend time with them
with the sole purpose
of offering the caring attention
they seek
to be happy, or at least happier
as they work on learning
the essential life skill
of loving themselves
and thus access an essential resourcefulness
as they journey
into the challenges
of their lives
____________
yeah there is pride in my voice
it's a celebration
of being in tune enough
to wake up immediately
upon realizing the opportunity
to contribute to others'
lives
and the mutual needs met
by offering young ones
the essential uncle-ing tasks
of mentorship into the world
learning to play ball
interacting with others respectfully
ordering tea at a cafe
fishing
guess i need to learn how to fish
now
____________
along with this
there is the calling
to be of tangible support as well
giving and contributing
economically to their dreams
even if it's a ten or a hundred
or a meal out here and there
they can get a sense maybe it's not
such a world of deprivation
it's like the two months
i will be hanging out with them
it can be seen as a short window
but for a family such as ours
a little is a lot
we are if nothing else
tenacious
_______
in other news
my hair which i think was buzzed
eight months or so ago
is already entering
ponytail territory
____________
i am jumpy
with a couple waves of near panic today
is this really happening?
i sure hope so
i'm packing half my stuff
tonight
and driving to san diego
tomorrow
Saturday, April 3, 2010
warm night
wow first nice-enough-to-hang-outside
night of the season
and with a relatively late
seven a m start tomorrow
the luxury to savor it
air so still and pleasant and warmly cool
i decided to bike to edo for pizza
and so energized went for a run
through the hood
before going in to eat
then home uphill
with a belly full of pizza and beer
i so enjoyed the dark night of silver av
i continued on over to the u
seeing surprisingly few cars
a couple other bikes
a skateboarder
before finally heading home
to muse with cliff on the evening sky
vonnegut and vipassna
math and meteors
dogs with buddha
nature
night of the season
and with a relatively late
seven a m start tomorrow
the luxury to savor it
air so still and pleasant and warmly cool
i decided to bike to edo for pizza
and so energized went for a run
through the hood
before going in to eat
then home uphill
with a belly full of pizza and beer
i so enjoyed the dark night of silver av
i continued on over to the u
seeing surprisingly few cars
a couple other bikes
a skateboarder
before finally heading home
to muse with cliff on the evening sky
vonnegut and vipassna
math and meteors
dogs with buddha
nature
Friday, April 2, 2010
hocus pocus
I wanted to keep my job. This was my home. When the time came I wanted to retire here and then be buried here. That was before it was clear glaciers were headed south again, and that anybody buried here, including the gang by the stable, along with Musket Mountain itself, would eventually wind up in Pennsylvania or West Virginia.
--from Hocus Pocus, 2001
i think vonnegut had it about right
not only the idea that humans are simply vehicles designed by trafalmadoran superbeings in order to give germs a supreme breeding ground so as to become immune to the challenges of asteroid-induced space travel
but also in his style of writing a paragraph or two of some basic idea before moving onto another, with their distinction being signified by a line
__________________
it may be that he and i shared a basic tendency toward schizophrenia, in which the boundaries of this and that are not as obvious to us as to conventionally media-induced consciousness, nor the boundaries of now and then
although he died finally in his eighties from a bump on the head, while i just pretend to have lived
he said as much of himself: that without writing he would not have been functional
me, well: i have milk to stock
__________________
the greater likelihood is that i share with him a common anarchistic trajectory
one that follows a great enough and long enough disruption of normality that there becomes no further meaning in any conventional prescription for life
for him clearly the meat locker beneath the ground in dresden in which he was imprisoned and therefore ultimately saved from the carpet bombing of the city by his own troops
for me maybe it was that kindergarten class where i sat frozen without interacting for six months or maybe the kototama or the holocaust or too much pot as a teen
or something else like the immense failure at most everything i've tried to do and everyone i've tried to love
or the mental wards themselves
_____________________
but what i mean to express is how grateful i am that there are so few illusions left, and i am all the more capable of happiness as a result
i know pre-fab monogamy is a bland choice amidst those offered by a universe marked by zen and eros, whereas more fitting at least for me might be
an empathy-rich-platonic-polyamory-with-other-options-to-be-consciously-and mutually-determined-on-a-case-by-case-basis
i also know jobs and homes and friends, no matter how seemingly permanent, come and go
and that the glaciers, or some such thing, will soon swallow up the whole of it
____________________
and that is why
at the end of civilization
when it would be sheer stupidity to move from community-centered mountain safety into the dregs of urban petroleum-based living in a coastal state about to go bankrupt
i have decided nevertheless to spend the forseeable future
on the shore of a beach
connecting to something yet alive in this world
learning to surf these waves
--from Hocus Pocus, 2001
i think vonnegut had it about right
not only the idea that humans are simply vehicles designed by trafalmadoran superbeings in order to give germs a supreme breeding ground so as to become immune to the challenges of asteroid-induced space travel
but also in his style of writing a paragraph or two of some basic idea before moving onto another, with their distinction being signified by a line
__________________
it may be that he and i shared a basic tendency toward schizophrenia, in which the boundaries of this and that are not as obvious to us as to conventionally media-induced consciousness, nor the boundaries of now and then
although he died finally in his eighties from a bump on the head, while i just pretend to have lived
he said as much of himself: that without writing he would not have been functional
me, well: i have milk to stock
__________________
the greater likelihood is that i share with him a common anarchistic trajectory
one that follows a great enough and long enough disruption of normality that there becomes no further meaning in any conventional prescription for life
for him clearly the meat locker beneath the ground in dresden in which he was imprisoned and therefore ultimately saved from the carpet bombing of the city by his own troops
for me maybe it was that kindergarten class where i sat frozen without interacting for six months or maybe the kototama or the holocaust or too much pot as a teen
or something else like the immense failure at most everything i've tried to do and everyone i've tried to love
or the mental wards themselves
_____________________
but what i mean to express is how grateful i am that there are so few illusions left, and i am all the more capable of happiness as a result
i know pre-fab monogamy is a bland choice amidst those offered by a universe marked by zen and eros, whereas more fitting at least for me might be
an empathy-rich-platonic-polyamory-with-other-options-to-be-consciously-and mutually-determined-on-a-case-by-case-basis
i also know jobs and homes and friends, no matter how seemingly permanent, come and go
and that the glaciers, or some such thing, will soon swallow up the whole of it
____________________
and that is why
at the end of civilization
when it would be sheer stupidity to move from community-centered mountain safety into the dregs of urban petroleum-based living in a coastal state about to go bankrupt
i have decided nevertheless to spend the forseeable future
on the shore of a beach
connecting to something yet alive in this world
learning to surf these waves
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