PROMISE OF SPRING

These buds are further along than the ones on that tree outside my window. So far mine are more of a promise that they will look like this in a couple of months or so. 

The tree in the courtyeard outside my window is looking preggy ragged. another good windstorm and most of those sade looking leaves will be gone; to be rounded up by the yeard service guy with the reall, really, loud gas powered leaf blower. 

As one season winds down the promise of another begins. the lefless branches show the  smallest promise of next spring's leaf and new branches buds. Very tiny, just a promise, but they are there. We're heading for the shortest days of the year, the darkest days. Especially if you live in states like Oregon or the New England states. After the dark days come the light days. If you live far enough north it doesn't really gt dark at night. 

I wonder who first realized that next spring's growth started in the waining days of Autumn. The Greeks compaged the Druids to their Natural Philosophers but the lives of the trees must have been discovered long before the Druids began codifying their knowledge. And who discovered that lighting smudge pots in an orchard helps to protect against frost damage.

We seem to have lost the awareness of the great cycle//spiral of time. Spring 's Maiden becomes Winter's Crone only to be reborn again in the Spring. The Oak King of Spring and Summer is succeeded by the Holly King of the days of harvest and Winter. And I do believe I will stop there. Have some reading to do before I reopen some of those mental file cabinets.

That's how my mind seems to work. I start out in one part of the puzzle aned other pieces make themselves known. Does make for some interesting, stream of consciousness entries though. 

FELL OFF THE PLANET. AGAIN

 I guess I did fall off the planet this time. I don't know. Time seems to pass differently these days. Turn around twice and a month or more has disapeared. Didn't help that I had another flare up that earned me almost three days in the high priced hotel down the road for another session with IV antibiotics. Turns out this was blessing in disguise. Finally realized that home health can only do so much, and to be honest that ain't much. So hi ho, hi ho it's off to out patient wound care three times a week. The hospital also has just opened a clinic specializing in lymph edema treatment. I've soon advanced cases and yours truly does not want to go there. 

Still reading Haikus.Does take some gettimg used to. But it's fun. And turn around and another afternoon has drifted away. 

I do get a kick out of Midge. She's getting used to the idea that Mom will be back. I'm not sure if it's I miss you or I'm glad you're back it's time for my snack and the box needs scooping. Ah well. I don't anyone else tol spoil. 

There's small flock of quail that visits every day. I can hear them calling early in the morning. And they really are a cross between beautifl and sort of silly with their beautiful markings and those two little reathers on the crowns of their heads. 

Sorry this ids more disjointed than usual. But then I'm more disjointed usual. 

POETIC REDISCOVERY

 Back in my university days I was fascinated with the style of Haiku poetry. Even tried my hand a time or two. I came up on a single leaf  that appeared to be frozen in the mid air over the bike path. It was hanging by a single thread of spider silk. It was a windless, cloudy Novenmber day. It was just hanging there. Wish I could remember because Haiku are very much of the moment and that moment was a lifetime ago.

Picked up a daily reader of one Haiku per day through the year. Glad I picked the kindle edition because this isn't just one poem a day. It's one poem per page. Oh well. Anyway I started reading and the next thing I knew I was rewriting the blessed thing. 

Book's haiku

Snowy woodland stream

Outer banks encased in ice

Center swift and mean

 

My haiku

Dark snowy branches

Hanging over icy stream

Between frozen banks

IMHO or not humble. The first one says too much. The traditional poems I’ve read imply more than they say. It’s cold enough for snow and ice. If the stream isn’t frozen it’s because it’s moving too fast. I just started the book, a haiku a day sort of meditation. Hate to say it, but these folks probably spend most of their time in the city.

My physical world may be smaller now but I have a lifetime of memories. Pacific beaches (this part of the country we go to the coast not the beach because you never know what you’ll find when you get there), the little valley where I grew up, mountains, waterfalls, the best.

I'M HOME

  Had a semi mind blowing moment of clariity this afternoon.  Obviously I knew this. In the front of my brain so to speak. I was reading, looked up and it hit me. It was a short reading that ended with Jesus offering to take the reader "home." That was the blast. We are home. You, me, the maple tree in the courtyard, the courtyard, that barn on the other side of the block across the street, the birds  diving through that maple, are made of star stuff created when stars went super nova and hydrogen mostly born when the universe was created. 

Currently there are questions about whether it was a Big Bang or an event astronomers haven't been able to describe yet. It's less than a century since scientists began to find evidence they believed aswered those questions we've been asking for generations. Where did everything come from" 

I've often wondered how we would look if we could see those around us glowing as the atomic level. I looked out the window and it hit me. What if we could see everything around us down to the smallest earthworm or sparrow glowing, sparkling and realize that there really is no difference. That as much as I miss the valley where I grew up, lived most of my life; I'm just in another room, I'm home. 

Absolutely beautiful image lifted from Spritual Ecology on Facebook. They also have a website. Be careful you could become lost in the eye gazing out inviting you to dive in. 

We are made from starstuff. The atoms that built the earth were cooked in the gases of an exploding supernova.

Just think about it. Before you were you, you were a star. What built you also built the tree across the street, the trout in the stream, the mountains half a world away, the moon, the rest of the planets and just maybe a star that's half way across the galaxy from us.

When the Irish poet Amergin made his boast; when he said he'd been a salmon, a stag, a wild boar he spoke more truth than he realized.

If you want to know what the building blocks of a star look like just g look in the mirror.

It also means that the homeless guy down the street has the universe in him too. That the undocumented immigrant in the the desert has the universe in them too. It also means that your crazy conspiracy spouting uncle is made of the same star stuff. Or whaever friend or relative that's no longer on that list of cards to be sent. What a world it would be if we looked at everyone and everything around us with the same wonder we give a full moon or the most beautiful waterfall we've ever seen.

WHERE I'M FROM

 Did this a few years ago. Along the line I discovered that Kaiser was actually spelled Kisor. All I can find out is that he was from Vermont. And got a message over ancestry from a lady who was familiar with his wife. Dexter Kisor was her relative's second husband and there was no information from her family about him. Total blank.  The Meyers line is solidly German. Arrived in the early seventeen hundreds from the Hanovarian lands brought into the Stuarts when Princess Elizabeth,daughter of Charles I. married the Elector of Palatine and that is a whole 'nother story as the saying goes. The daughter of James II either had no children or children who died well before adulthood. Exiled James II had a son, finally, but a snowball had a better chance of surviving in hell than a Catholic had of becoming king of England. 

Managed to trace a couple of lines to the late fourteen hundreds.Which means that they managed to survie the Protestant Reformation, the Peasant's Revolt, the Thirty Years War and various plagues and famines before emmigrating to the colonies and settled in Pennsylvania. 

There is information that William Penn sent Quaker followers into Germany to recruit Pietist Pretestants to settle in the new colony of Pennsylvania. Not Quakers but with similar beliefs. 

I’m a native Oregonian; a state that has the lowest per capita church attendance in the country. It doesn’t mean we aren’t religious or followers of the spirit. It does mean that we’re hard to pin down when it comes wearing a label. And to be honest all of us, including the remaining Native Americans came here from somewhere else. Some of us just happen to have more family members resting in pioneer cemeteries around the state than others. Me? I’ve got three generations and various cousins planted in a lovely cemetery on the north side of Chehalem mountain above the other side of Newburg. It's also one of the few pioneer cemetary that was planned large enough that it's still in use and well maintained. 

My genes are solidly northern European. Supposedly there’s a Cherokee in my dad’s family tree but I don’t have any proof so that’s a thread in my family tapestry that would be fun to claim but I can’t prove it. (shrug) There’s one German great grandfather; with a name like Kaiser I think I’m safe to assume he was German, not Dutch. The rest is Scots, Irish, English and Welsh. And heck, for all I know there could be a Roman or two in the family tapestry if I went back far enough. Hell, for all I know there was a British trader or two over the years who made it to Goddess knows where and left a calling card or two behind.

My dad’s family name comes out of Yorkshire in England and Vikings settled there in what became the Kingdom of York as well as Ireland so there some Scandinavian sea farers adding a thread to the tapestry. Near as I can discover the original Heaton ancestor was probably a Norman. A man at arms possibly who was in the service somebody and ended up in Yorkshire. For the next five hundred years or so. Have you ever wished you could invite your DNA over for tea, muffins and a good long sit down?

Anyway I originally did this back in my early J Land career. I got it from another writer who has since dropped off the radar. The original template was designed as a stream of consciousness exercise. And Russ was right. You do end up where you didn’t expect to. For the non-Nothwesterners out there; the Hanford reach includes a free flowing section of the Columbia river and the Hanford reactor complex. One of these days the leftover radioactive contamination will probably reach the river and we’ll all start glowing in the dark. Since I originally wrote this I learned that Hanford's reactors provided the Plutonium for those lovely so far never used nuclear weapons. 

As for the Umatilla arms depot? They used to store nerve gas there. That wasn’t so bad. The stuff doesn’t go anywhere unless you combine the two ingrediants and blow it up. So, some geniuses in the Reagan administration decided to make the stuff “war ready’ and installed rocket that would do just that. The government built a very nice, state of the art incinerator to deal with the little darlings. And they finally did. Then nerve gasses were brought in from other bases to be disposed of in Oregon. So, guess whose little sister lives smack, dab in the middle that little piece of God’s little acre? North of the arms depot and south oth the Hanford Reach. So far they aren’t glowing in the dark.

WHERE I'M FROM

I am from Douglas fir, hemlock, spruce and cedar.

I am from the Cascades, the Blues, the Siskiyous, and the Wallowas.

(Also turns out that these days I'm sitting on about a mile of lava spewed out from cracks in the land over about two million years. Some of the flows made it all the way to Pacific Coast.)

I am from clear cuts, choker cables, riggers and log trucks with one log loads.

I am from sandy beaches, basalt cliffs and mudflats.

I am from wild geese calling at sunrise, wrens in the thickets, and great blue herons on the other side of the river.

I am from the little creeks, the mighty Columbia and the Pacific breakers.

I am from tricycles, tetherballs, little sisters with skinned knees and a love for bugs.

I am from the ivy by the patio, the hydrangeas with dinner plate size clumps of blossoms and the garden in the back yard.

I am from a wringer washer, a concrete laundry sink and clothes full of the smell of sunshine.

I am from missionaries, Methodist hymnals, Quakers and fairy rings.

I am from winter gales, spring showers, sunny summer days and autumn fogs and winter frosts.

I am from a little valley in the Cascade foothills, the Hanford Reach, the Umatilla Arms depot, and the Columbia Gorge where condors may soar again.

I am from logging towns with no mills, harbors with no fish, and farms being swallowed by urban sprawl.

I am from shelves full of books, an old flute and feeling out of step on the march to wherever.

I am from feeling like I’m on the outside looking in.

I am from seeing what no one else sees to see.

I am from hearing what no one else seems to hear.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Russ you were right I did not expect to end up here. \

And if you’ve reached the final lines of the exercise this may be why you’ll find me out hugging the local oak trees these days.

THE UNIVERSE DOESN'T COME WITH A REWIND BUTTON

 To Vivek Ramaswamy who has stated that if he is elected he would ask Elon Musk to be in his administration because "he laid off three quarters of the Twitter work force." Ol' buddy, ol' pal just how long would you last if three fourths of the peons who make you life so comfortable decided not to show up for a a month or so. Ever get the feeling some of these wanna be politicians would put most of us in stasis and only wake us up to vote? Of course at that point they wouldn't neeD us anymore.

Caught a film titled Parkland this weekend. Movie is based on Four Weeks in November by Vincent Bugliosi. A minute by minute, hour by hour history of the murder of JFK. Parkland is the name of the hospital where Kennedy was taken after the shooting.

Which sent me back to a morning in eigth grade home room when Jack Carter, the vice principle, came in without a word, gave a note to Mrs Redmond. That's how the kids in a a logging town in the Cascade foothills of Oregon learned that the president was dead. For four days the country almost ground to a halt. There was literally nothing else on the tube. Sunday his assassin was murdered on live TV. 

Civil rights entered a new era, Politics entered a new era. Over the next five years Malcolm X, Martin Luther King and Bob Kennedy. Damn. Viet Nam heated up.Johnson had to choose between  guns and butter and chose guns. He didn't resig but he did choose to step aside. Took almost as much courage ias marching in that walk from the Capital to the church where the funeral mass was celebrated. Johnson told the secret service agants that "he didn't deserve to be president if he was afraid to go out where the American people could see him."

 Southern Democrats became Rebulicans. Watergate, innder cites on fire, riots on e campuses, Kent State. Nixon. Oh Lord, Tricky Dick. First president to resign from office for lying about the attempt to steal an election he was going to win anyway. 

Jump ahead to the Reagan years when the US chose to support tin pot dictators who were murdering their eir own people/ The excuse. The fight against communist subversion. And that hoary old accusation just won't go away even though the talking heads hurling the insult probably couldn't define communism if you asked them to.

Heck no generation has avoided the bad going on terrible times. But, it wasn't until the fifties and sixties that using police dogs on kids demonstrating for civil rights, jungle wars and murdered presidents, cvil rights leaders and senators were on on national television. Revolution, the decades leading up to the civil war, the civil war, bank failures, three presidentiala assassintaed, First world war, farmers losing their farms, the crash, depression, the dust bowl. another war. And. So. On. Heck reading this litany you'd find yourself believing that was all that was going on. There were a lot of good times. The country got through it and probably will again. 

One really big difference. Now the nut jobs that never got past the end of the bar or the low power local FM stations have a world wide audience. And the semi not crazy rest of us are still trying to catch up. 

Well this grew like Topsy. Sort of went all over the place. Got some some stuff I'd been thinking about for a long time off my chest. For what all that's worth. Sometimes I find myself believing that the day in Dallas was where step by step is how we ended up here looking backat all those forks in the road knowing that there are no do overs in this universe. Or crystal balls. 

RAISE ANOTHER GLASS

 This is the original companian piece to the last entry. Anyone else believe that we need more EMT'S, caregivers, cooks, truck drivers, and all the other folks that keep the country lurching along and few MBA'S  and so called financial planners. I love all those commercials touting this investment or that one and apparently assuming that nothing bad, like the great recession of 2008, is going to happen in their future. Without further ado, the first responders edition. 

I totally forgot about the police, fire fighters and EMT's when I wrote yesterday's post. I'm a fan of Blue Bloods and a first season episode pegged rookie Jamie Reagans's pay at under $47.000. Subtract the standard deduction and I guess Jamie isn't "pulling his weight." Even though like most other cops he's basically on call 24/7.

Big brother is a detective and their average salary is in the upper eighty grand neighborhood. Which is probably why the wife went back to work as an ER nurse. Still I'm betting their combined salaries don't put them in the $42,000 tax bracket. With two kids I guess they "aren't pulling their weight" either. Even though one of them is periodically risking his life and the other is trying to save the lives of ungrateful asshats like OldMan. 

I suspect that firefighters and EMT's probably pull down similar wages to run towards events that the rest of us run AWAY from. And remember that seventy one cops and over three hundred fire fighters died when the towers collapsed on 9/11. 

So Mr or Ms I pay eighty grand in taxes just what does it take for the folks who risk their necks to save your life and property to "pull their weight," If you're telling the truth about you taxes you are a sorry excuse for a human being. If you're putting out talking points to echo Romney's forty seven percent you are still a sorry excuse for a human being, 

RAISE A GLASS

 to all the unseen and often ignored folks who actually keep this country running. When the power goes out who to do you call? A financial planner or an electrician?  If your car breaks down who to you call? A tow truck or a financial planner? Who do you think is going to haul coal to that power plant or build the solar panels? Someone who knows how to drive or build it right or a certain billianaire who is running his company into the ground?

 Nicked this sho tfrom Lisa over at Coming to Terms. Link over in the sidebar. Seeing as how this is Labor Day Weekend. Love (not) this individial's claim that the taxpayer needs twelve thousand bucks for every member of the family. Even the baby who was just born. Without all those little folks mister I'm paying your way probably wouldn't be paying that eighty grand in taxes. 

Some folks can't seem to think past the ends` of their noses.

“If you don't pay at least $12,000 a year in Federal Taxes, you aren't even paying your own way! And less than $2,000 of that is for welfare. So if you have 2 children and a wife, you need to be paying $48,000 a year in Federal Taxes, just to be paying YOUR OWN WAY!

So for all you Party Of Stupid (POS) Whiners...You're welcome! I pay almost $80,000 a year, so I'm paying your way too! 

Unless you are in the 5%, you should stop whining, as it makes you look like an entitlement baby!”

Ran across this charming bit of philosophy on the net yesterday. Frankly I don't know if this person really pays $80.000 a year in taxes or if this is the opening salvo in this election cycles's version of Mitt Romney's “47 percent.” Anyway I decided to have a little fun. 

After spending some time with the IRS tax tables you'd have to be pulling down about sixty grand a year to owe about $12,000 in taxes. And then to have this sorry excuse for human being tell us that if you have a family you should be paying a hell of a lot more. How many average Joe's do you know who make close to two hundred thousand a year?

Anyway that got me thinking. In my scenario this person lives in a big city, say New York or Boston, has a nice apartment and their very own parking space.  Perhaps this is how a  couple of weeks might play out if the little folks who really keep the country going just don't show up.

You're getting ready for work, your housekeeper is due in today. She calls in sick, doesn't know when she'll be in. You usually stop at the local deli for breakfast. It's closed. The owner, the cook and the person who runs the register haven't shown up. Hungry, you head for the office. The doorman is missing. The guy/gal at the front desk is missing. You get to your office. No receptionist, no office assistant. Your computer is wonky. No techies available. The phone is ringing off the hook and you have to answer it yourself. Too bad.

Time to head home. The engine sounds a little rough so you swing by your favorite garage. Nobody there. Guess you'll have to take a cab tomorrow. You get home to your grubby apartment and fix dinner (I'm assuming this doofus is single) cupboards are starting to look a little scant. Better swing by the neighborhood bodega in the next couple of days,

The engine may be running rough but you still have to get to work. The streets are strangely quiet. No cabs, no buses and almost no subways. Nobody to drive them. Ignoring the chattering engine you discover that the situation at the office is the same as yesterday. Recalling the state of the larder you head out a little early via the bodega. It's closed. Not even the owner is in sight. Did you really think that guy or gal made that much money a year?

Your favorite place for dinner is closed. No cooks, bartenders, wait staff or bussers. They sure as hell don't make that kind of money. Hell, tipped staff often don't even make federal minimum wage. The engine may still be missing but tomorrow is Saturday; a good time to head for a real grocery store. Unfortunately the shelves are looking bare. There haven't been any grocery deliveries for three days and most of the stockers, checkers and deli staff appear to have also disappeared into the unknown.

You manage a loaf bread that's a little stale, some lunch meat that hasn't hit the expiration date, some wilted vegetables and some canned goods. To make life even more interesting your gas tank is below half full. The gas station is open but you can't get all you need because there haven't been any fuel deliveries for several days and the manager is trying to stretch supplies. Between explanations he/she is manning the cash register. Don't bother to go searching for another station. They're in the same straights.

You manage to get through the weekend. Comes Monday, oh did I mention it's July and there's a heatwave, and your neighborhood is beginning to smell a little “ripe.” The trash haulers are AWOL, too.

First of the week and no improvement. When you stagger into your apartment that evening the lights are flickering. Turns out your power comes from a coal fired plant and they haven't gotten any deliveries for more than a week. By midweek your apartment is a mess. You're being hit with rolling blackouts and “please don't use the AC” because we don't know when the coal is coming in. As the lights go out again you find yourself wondering if living near a nuclear power plant would be a good or a bad situation.

So Mr. or Ms. (I'm assuming it's a guy since the sign in was OldMan) I pay $80.000 in taxes you've just been brought to your knees because all the peons you dissed in your comment just disappeared a la A Day Without a Mexican. Without all those little people cleaning houses, manning the cash registers, stocking the shelves, waiting tables, delivering the food or gas and picking up the garbage your comfortable life grinds to a halt. It just might be a good idea to show a little respect now and then.

Think about it. 

FAMILY AND POLITICS

  You're probably getting tired of hearing the "I'm still here. Honestly." Some of the problems. Trying to find something to write about without mining earlier entries. My attention span isn't what it used to be. Something really winds me up I'm still up for it but it's harder to get wound up these days. The family tree and American History are still there. And may just be brimmimg with possibilities. I hope. 

Here we go again. There's another first gen, as in his parents immigrated from India, telling the rest of us how we got it all wrong. He admires the man who is running Twitter into the ground. He admires him for laying off most of his workforce. Including the employees who actually knew how the company worked.

Ever get the feeling that many of the technotcrats really don't like people very much? That they would be much happier if the bare minimum of their fellow humans were messging up their worlds? I mean it's messy out there. Silly people still believe their lives count for something. Machines are so much tidier. They have no expectations. They do what they're told, most of the time and the replacements are good to go out of the box. No need for clothing, housing, education, medical care for the best part of a couple of decades. This one is a bit disjointed; it started out as a FB entry and as usual the entry took over, seemed to start writing itself.

The Heatons are almost Johnny Come Lateies in the British settlement of the colonies. We touched dry land in 1682. The Robinson great grandmother's side of the the family arrived in the 1630's. That works out to ten or eleven generations on this side of the pond including yours truly (me).

Granted the German branch of the family tree didn't get here until the early 1700's. All but one branch here in what became the United (sort of) States arrived before the revolution. She came off the boat with her family in New York in 1850.

They all share at least one experience. They came by ship before ships had cabins or on sailing ships that carried immigrants only, especially from Ireland. You had to want to get here and were willing to risk your life to make the voyage.

I'm not including those who paid their passage by becoming indentured servants. In theory they received a few acres of land and the tools to attempt to start new lives as free men and women. Because to be honest I haven't found any in the family tree.

This entry is beginning to write itself. It's a risk I take when I start. I may not end up where I thought I was going. A last comment I keep running across candidated with JD law degrees who seem to have slept through their classes on constitutional law. If they took them on the first place.

MORNING

  

The California Scrub Jay in all it's glory. It's described as a song bird. Generous description since it seems to have exactly one call and after a couple of hours you are grabbing the headphones with your own personal ocean. I don't do operatic sopranos, Irish tenors or violins. My ears start begging for mercy and I start looking for the headphones. 

June sun well up. Whispy white clouds moving slowly towards the east. Haze on the horizon. Inversion or  smoke?  Can't be sure. Checked out the currrent fire map, nothing much in Oregon but there looks like three or four small ones in Idaho. With no wind to speak of the last couple of days the smoke sort of settles in and sticks around until another front moves in.

 A couple of squawking scrub jays accompanied about half of my early morning excercise. Jays don't chirp, twitter or cheep. They skreek. And it's a rusty skreek. A sort of fingernals on the blackboard skreek. 

With it getting light so early it's hopeless trying to get back to sleep, especially since the sun is coming through my window until at least six thirty this time of year. Might as well the first, longest, session out of the way.  

TREES AND STARS

Read in reverse order. Candles first, then the Universe, then Trees and Stars.

OoooooK. This shot is barly close to that mental image I had all those years ago. Trying to get my mind back to where it was. I definitely need to reread some of my old maerial along with basic geology and Heaven knows what all. And ok I'll hush up. For the day at least. 

When I first wrote the  Candle piece back in September of 2007 I tried to conjure up a mental candle or lamp because I knew I’d want to say it in times when I didn’t have a real candle handy. Well I asked for one and got a room full. Big ones, little ones, short ones, tall ones. All reflecting off each other. And this is where it got a little weird. Ok, really weird. Those “imaginary” candles tended to do crazy things, like zip out of the room when I thought about someone who needed a little extra “hey look out for ……” And go in the right direction I might add. One of our old J Land buddies was having some problems. And about the time I was thinking “I wish I could…” one of those little candles set out for Kansas.

Anyway, I got lazy for awhile and didn’t get back to it as often as I really should have. And at the same time I was working on the idea of a world tree. Well I went to my little candle room. Only it wasn’t a room anymore. It was night and the stars were shining. Glowing with brilliance I’ve never seen in this life. And then the Aurora just popped in. How did it do that, but come on in and join the party. Ok, just go with the flow here, obviously was not the one controlling the party that night. 

Anyway, as I read through the piece and let my candles light up, they weren’t bunched up in a room. They were in a line stretching away from me and going up, as if they were climbing up the side of a mountain. At the top of the mountain was a great tree, black against the stars. And the candles climbed up into the branches of the tree until it was filled, overfilled even, and it rivaled the stars.

Um, I still don't think I was responsible for all those lights. I just think I tapped into a whole lot of people doing the same thing, and that's how my mind interpreted it. And just think how it would look if the whole six plus billion people on this little ball lit a candle whether they had a real one to light or not. Heck for all I know they were. Keep them lit folks, we still need all the help we can get. In fact we need it more than ever.

THE UNIVERSE CAME CALLING

 And this one grew out of the earlier ones. 

The prayer that ended up in the entry in I Offer This started out as a more traditional litany. I wanted to use it at work, but I couldn't use a real candle so I decided to try to imagine one. I had a Christmas card that I had scanned in to use for my own cards. Just wanted one little ol' candle. I ended up with a whole room full. Without asking for them by the way.

OK I've got candles. Lots and lots of candles. Blazing candles. And this is where the universe got just a little bit wierd. This was back in the AOL Journals world when there was more interaction between bloggers. Anyway one of the guys who was following was having a hard time. If I remember it right I was commenting along the lines of "gee I wish I could help" when the universe did its thing. The candles popped up and one of those little beggers took off. A sort of US map was in the back ground and I swear that little flash of light headed in the right direction.Without any help from me. OK.

A few days a later a good friend was having some problems. And gee I'm sorry I'm down at the bottom of the valley and you are up north. Repeat performance. Only the candle headed north and it didn't go quite as far as the first one. The first one looked like it ended up around Kansas. The second one ended up just west of Portland.

I believe that's enough about the universe attempting to get my attention, at least for now. And frankly I've never really been sure about how I feel about this. Call me a Work in Progress.

CANDLES

 We kindle this flame in honor of the Creator of Creation. We are grateful for the plenty that blesses us. In a world where many walk hand in hand with hunger we have abundance. In a world where too many walk in fear we can speak as our hearts lead us and show our faith freely. In a world where too many are alone, even in a crowd, we are rich in family and friends.

 

We kindle this flame in honor of the earth and the star that warms it.

 

We kindle this flame in gratitude for the changing seasons, for the coolness of rain, for the shifting mists and warmth of sun.

 

We kindle this flame to ask healing for our battered world. May we learn to use only what we need and to respect what we use.

 

We kindle this flame in gratitude for theplants, animals, air and waters that sustain us. Their infinite variety is wondrous.

 

We kindle this flame in honor of all who share this little world with us.

 

We kindle this flame in gratitude for our fellow travelers. We kindle this flame in gratitude for birdsong, the glory of infinite colors of flowers and trees, for the seas, the rivers, the rolling hills and the soaring peaks.

 

 

We kindle this flame to honor the infinite variety of our brothers and sisters.

 

We kindle this flame to ask for healing for those who lash out in fear.

 

<BSTYLE="MSO-BIDI-FONT-WEIGHT: normal?>We kindle this flame to ask for healing for those who lash out in anger.

 

We kindle this flame to ask healing for those who lash out in ignorance.

 

We kindle this flame to ask for healing for those who are ill in body or spirit.

 

We kindle this flame to ask for healing for their caregivers, family and friends.

 

We kindle this flame in honor of the river of faith. Help us to remember that many streams enter the river of faith that sustains us. Help us to remember that this river has many wells to refresh our thirsty spirits.

 

 

We kindle this flame in honor of our family and friends.

 

We kindle this flame in gratitude for their love and support.

 

We kindle this flame to ask for healing for any sickness or injury. We kindle this flame to ask that they may find the love and support to live the lives they were meant to.

 

We kindle this flame in faith that we can return the love and support that has been so freely given to us.

 

I posted an earlier version of this last year. I haul it and re read it periodically. And something a little unexpected happened after I finished it. I like to re read it, but you don’t always have a lamp or a candle handy. So I tried imagining one. Well I got my candle all right. I got a whole room full of candles. Candle after candle after candle.

 

And this is where it starts to get, strange doesn’t really describe what I’ve had happen. I’m not sure I have the right words. Anyway, one of our fellow bloggers was going through a tough time and I was repeating the line asking for healing and suddenly I had a vision of one of those candles breaking away from the group and heading out. In the right direction.

 

Granted, what I saw may owe more than a little to the movie Fantasia. At least as a way for my brain to put this in a way I can understand. But, the thing is, I wasn’t thinking about road crew candles. That puppy took off on its own. It’s happened a few times since then. I can’t explain it and I’m not sure that it can be explained, in words at least.

THE LITTLE ENTRY THAT GREW

 This started out as just a few notes and it grew and grew. Then it took the bit in its teeth and headed for the tall timber

OK. I'm just spitballing here. I was raised Methodist. And never really felt like it fit. Wasn't especially comfortable in my own skin, if that makes any sense. Currrently identify as Quaker sort of. Imagine my surprise a few years ago when I discovered believers who identify as Quaker Pagans or even Quaker Cahtholics. 

I've spent time exploring pagan paths and some of the less well known Christian communities, especially the Celtic church. Fruitful. Especially the history of Western Catholicism and some of the Protestant offshoots including the Methodists. All of them proving over and over again the all too true the suspician  that once you have an organization most of the energy (and money) goes to protecting the organization and the hell with the souls you claim to be serving. 

I find myself truning more and more to the mystical side of the faith. Ahhhh, mysticiam aond contemplation. Google anything even resembling centering prayer, meditaiton, mysticism and you will find dozens of entrues warbubg you to keep out, the demons will get you. I suspect that what these commentatos are really afraid of is what the Catholic church calls private revelation.

 How you gonna keep 'em funding those private jets and jumbotrons if the believers realize that, within careful limits, they don't need you prancing up and down the stage yelling into your microphone probably won't answer their questions.. Or that claims of turning away hurricanes are so much hot air. That gays who love each other getting married won't or shouldn't affecct your marriage. That recognizing the rights and humanity of others does not decrease my rights or humanity unless I choose to let it. 

How are you gonna keep 'em following your rules when your former believers have discovered that you are pretty much full of hot air. That you may be asking them to believe that dinosaurs were on the ark with Noah or that the Grand Canyon probably wasn't created in the great flood or that the Cascades were built over millenia by volcanic eruptions. Or in the case of North east and South east Washington were largely created by flood basalts on the Columbia Plateau between fourteen and sixteen million years ago. 

My personal unfavorite is the so called Prosperity Gospel. Followers are encouraged to give generously, whether thay can afford it or not, and God will reward them with greater wealth and riches. All you have to do is believe. And if it doesn't happen it's your fault. Your faith wasn't strong enough. In the meantime your pastor may be living rent free in a multibedroom parsonage, may have purchased a private jet or even ANOTHER private jet. More than one televangelist has used the excuse that they have a lot of places to be and don't have time to wait in airports, or they don't like being recogized with fellow passengers pester them with questions. And so on.

Oops. I started out A and ended up in the briar patch. Again. Just don't be surprised if things get even weirder for awhile. Comments are welcome. Feel free to call me a blithering idiot. I won't be offended. I suspect I may be there already. Or offer suggestions. Who have you been reading and did it either help or offend? 

WAKE UP WORLD

   Well, awake at four (that's am folks). Did my morning routine, got my pain meds, tossed in an Aleeve for  good measure. (dear undear tablet just because your word list  doesn't include what I just typed doesn't  mean it doesn't exist) looked outside and decided I might as well start the exercise routine. Watched color come in as the sky turned from indigo to pearly white. There was a quail calling in the courtyard and a jay calling the tree as the leaves turned from dark gray to green to gold as the rose higher. The finches and chickadees are telling the that they are awake too. 

This time of year the sun shines right into my eyes for over an hour. Yes, I could put down the blind. But I would miss the world waking up. Two twenty minute stepper sets and a total of about twenty minutes getting used to the elliptical routine. If we weren't on daylight savings time the sky would be getting light at 3:15 not 4:15.  On that note I believe I will squeeze. In a short snooze before breakfast.      

DRY AS DUST

Is how I feel right now.

"It is customary to blame secular science and anti-religious philosophy for the eclipse of religion in modern society. It would be more honest to blame religion for its own defeats. Religion declined not because it was refuted, but because it became irrelevant, dull, oppressive, insipid. When faith is completely replaced by creed, worship by discipline, love by habit; when the crisis of today is ignored because of the splendor of the past; when faith becomes an heirloom rather than a living fountain; when religion speaks only in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassionits message becomes meaningless."

Rabbi Joshua A Heschel  The intro to God in Search of Man

Perhaps because most Christians aren't taught to look at the world that way. We're supposed to search for God, by the rules, as laid down by the powers that be, not the other way around. Perhaps that's why most denominations have trouble accepting mystics. We can't prove what we've seen or heard. And ususally we have trouble describing the experience in the first place. The words we have to work with just don't fit somehow.

The Catholic Church in the west calls that Personal Revlation. The guardians at the gate who attempt the enforce the rules frown on that. Oh, yes, do they frown on that.

NOT SURE WHERE I'M GOING

 

NOT SURE WHERE I"M HEADING

but I can't wait to get there. 

 I pulled this up from an old entry from 2011. It's odd. I was raised, sort of, Methodist. Working on the family tree I discovered several branches of Quakers. Exploring them I discovered their beliefs echoed mine. Quakers are, or were, mystics. Probably why there are so few of them after all these years and probably why the families were some form of Methodist by the time we hit Oregon. 

I have to admit there are damn few mystics in any branch of the tree. I may be jumpimg to conclusions but I believe that most mystics are born mystics who didn't run scared the first time the universe, or whatever is out there, tapped them on the shoulder and invited them to join the dance. It's scary and inviting and a whole list of words I don't even know. Yet. 

"f they ever take away our radio, suspend our newspaper, silence us, put to death all of us priests-bishop included, and you are left alone-a people without priests-then each of you will have to be God's microphone. Each of you will have to be a messenger, a prophet. The church will always live as long as one baptized person is left alive."

Oscar Romero, quoted in Messengers to the Kingdom by Jon Sobrino S.J.

I begin to understand by Romero scared the bejeesus out of some of the Vatican Curia in the three years he was archbishop of San Salvador. And I wonder how closely Morris West, author of the Clowns of God, followed the persecution of the church in Central America. Because he echoes that message in the novel. When the time comes, the little people, the lay people will have to carry on the work and the sacraments of the church whether they are ordained or not. Imagine how well that went over with old men who had spent their lives climbing the ladders of power.

This is probably true of most of the major denominations that seem more concerned with following the fules than caring for their people. So, in seventies I am basically starting from almost the beginning. I would apprecitae feed back if anyone cares to comment. You don't have to agree with me. In fact I was so surprised when I ran across Evangelical Quakers hired minister and all the trappings.

If this entry seems a little, or a lo,t mildly crazy that's pretty much where I am right now. Mildly crazy. 

BLESS ME IF I KNOW WHERE THIS IS GOING TO END UP

 No I haven't fallern off the face of the earth. Although it seems like it. Reading. A lot. Other things going on that are, well best left off. Curently working my war through one of Michener's giant novels, The Covenent. The story of South Africa up until the late seventies. And a couple of related non fictions to be mentioned later. When I work out how in the name of heaven I'm going to present them. Historical note. It's most interesesting how manydictatorships like the the Apartheid regime of South Africa had to change after the Soviet Union, as the Soviet Union, fell. The old "we may be assholes but at least we aren't Communists" excuse. 

Two of the main supporters of the Afrikkaner majorit government were Saint Ronnie and that iron lady Margaret Thatcher. Thatcher was replaced as Prime Minister in 1990 and congress passed legislation imposeing economic sanctions on South Africa in the mid eighties over a Reagan veto. He called it econimic warfare. Damn straight, sir. That it would just make the situation worse for Black south Africans. I suspect that most of the Black, disenfranchised, under a system of segregation that makes the US south look almost like a paradise the just might have said "what took you so long." Apartheid was pretty much dismantled by 1994. 

Does the country have problems? Yes. Are they working to solve those problems? Yes. 

I don't know when I discovered Alan Paton's novel Cry The Beloved Country. Probably the early seventies when I was taking Peoples of Africa for an Anthro major. The first paragraphs of the book are some of the most beautiful prose, at least for me. If you have a love of the land it may also be one of the saddest passages you'll ever read. 

A note some of the words. Ixopo is the name of a village. The x is pronounced with a ck sound. The veld is an open plain. The pronunciation is almost like fvelt. A kloof is a steep sided gully or small valley. The tithoya is a small bird like a plover and the name sounds like the birds’ call. Ingeli, Umzimkulu and Griqueland are pronounced pretty much as they are spelled.  The style in this novel is unlike anything I’ve ever read. It’s almost as if someone is writing down a spoken story. It probably breaks half the rules of conventional writing and that may be why I love it so much. The book is about people, the land, love, loss, forgiveness and acceptance.

So, here goes.

There is a lovely road that runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass-covered and rolling, and they are lovely beyond any singing of it. The road climbs seven miles into them, to Carisbrooke; and from there, if there is not mist, you can look down on one of the fairest valleys of Africa. About you there is grass and bracken and you may hear the forlorn crying of the tithoya, one of the birds of the veld. Below you is the valley of the Umzimkulu, on its journey from the Drakensberg to the sea: and beyond and behind the river, great hill after great hill; and beyond and behind them, the mountains of Ingeli and East Griqueland.

The grass is rich and matted, you cannot see the soil. It holds the rain and the mist, and they seep into the ground, feeding the streams in every kloof. It is well-tended, and not too many cattle feed upon it; not too many fires burn it, laying bare the soil. Stand unshod upon it, for the ground is holy, being even as it came from the Creator. Keep it, guard it, care for it, for it keeps men, guards men, cares for men. Destroy it and man is destroyed.

Where you stand the grass is rich and matted, you cannot see the soil. But the rich green hills break down. They fall to the valley below, and falling, change their nature. For they grow red and bare; they cannot hold the rain and mist, and the streams are dry in the kloofs. Too many cattle feed upon the grass, and too many fires have burned it. Stand shod upon it, for it is coarse and sharp, and the stones cut under the feet. It is not kept, or guarded, or cared for, it no longer keeps men, guards men, cares for men. The titihoya does not cry here any more.

The great red hills stand desolate, and the earth has torn away like flesh. The lighting flashes over them, the clouds pour down upon them, the dead streams come to life, full of the soil that is left, and the maize hardly reaches the height of a man. They are valleys of old men and old women, of mothers and children. The men are away; the young men and the girls are away. The soil cannot keep them any more.

So I'm not sure sure where this is going or how I'm going to get there. I'm assuming that most folks are not familiar with South Africa. It's a crazy quilt nation that well, just sort of happened. Unlike the British Colonies the Dutch didn't start out to colonise anyone or anything. The Dutch East Indiia Company was looking for profits in the spice trade and the little settlement on the tip of the Cape of Good Hope was meant to be a supply station and only a supply station

SPEECH CAN HAVE CONSEQUENCES

 

 The best explanation I've come across that points out that you can say what you carn well please. However the rest of us are free to disagree with what you say. Most of us will be resonably polite about it. But we will show you the door and slam it behind you. Rush Libaugh and his homies found this out a few years ago. And former richest man in the world looks to be findng that out the hard way. I wonder how many folks with Twitter accounts are like me. Never used it. And I'm not planning to sign up with anyone else. Well this headed off in another direction. Some of my entries are like that. 

I'M STILL HERE, SORT OF

 Yeah, it looks like I did sort of fall off the face of the earth. I've been reading, a lot. Working on the family treee. And discovering over and over that if you have relatives that were born in Northern Europe the rest of  us are probably all cousins of one kind or another. Just how often and with multiple who's. I swear almost all roads lead to Charlemagne. 

Watching the birds outside the window.Along with Fuzzball, AKA Midge, Henrietta Hairball, Pouncer (rally loves balls of paper.) So far this winter I've seen house finches, chickadees, mourning doves, sparrows, juncos, and one varried thrush who managed to hang on the the feeder. Just a little too big to do it the normal way. Thank heaven we haven't had anymore snow. We were getting eaten out of house and home for about a week and a half. 

Can't seem to get the old blazing outrage going these days. Perhaps because the faces have changed to the stories seem to be pretty much the same. Argh! I'm all over the place here.

Did run across this from a friend's posting from Yellowstone National Park, the Invasion of the Idiots.

Perhaps the bears will do better at reading the signs than the tourons.