So, not to complain or anything (moi?) but at the last poetry reading by Ernesto Cardinal, in the ruins of an old convent with a view of the volcanoes and the lake, I had what seemed to be a great seat. That is until nearly everyone in the audience held up their ipads, their computers, their phones and silly old fashioned cameras. And they didn't just take a few thousand fotos, many recorded the whole thing. In the good old days, it was a bit of an inconvenience to have flash bulbs going off during a performance, but it is an altogether more irritating experience to have someone holding an ipad in front of your face and a thousand others doing the same.
But that isn't even my major worry. Aside from the appalling rudeness which we have to have become used to, it is the size of the things that presents new bigger issues. Remember the birthdays when the baby blows out the candles and a big loud "Damn, the camera didn't work ." causes the marvelous little moment to be repeated to the confusion of the birthday kid? Pretty rude, if you ask me. I remember class plays and other school performances where the dads with the video cameras obscured the action from half the audience or even interrupted performances. I remember the altar at the Cathedral de Santiago de Campostella where we had been asked to refrain from picture taking because it was a transformative spiritual experience for many and the priests saying the mass were whipping out their phones and taking pictures during communion. Shocker.
But the thing that has been going today is the seemingly idiotic compulsive taking pictures of everything all the time and the fodder that provides for people to have a new compulsive behavior and to hoard in a new dimension. The food in Nicaragua is OK for a very poor country. Fruits and certain veggies are abundant. I have lately been in restaurants with groups of people when, in the middle of conversation, someone starts taking pictures of everyone's dinners. Why would anyone want a picture of my dinner? A bit of compulsive behavior? What the hell are these pictures for? Who will ever look at them? Why do you need a hundred when one will do? Why does the taking of the commemorative picture over-ride the experience of the event itself?
I grew up in the torturous time of having to watch Uncle So and So's slides of his trip to Europe or trip to Vegas when all the pictures were bad and boring. Now the pictures are much higher quality, but the boring factor is also higher. How many times has someone at a big table wanted to show everyone a picture on their phone and had to scroll through a thousand to find it, then everyone has to get up to take a look? Not cool.
It doesn't seem crazy when it is just one compulsive nut in the room, but watching many such people at the same time sort of brings it home. I suppose soon we will have to make regulations about this just like about texting while driving because we just can't seem to stop ourselves by ourselves.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
WHY CAN"T THE US LEARN FROM OTHERS?
So today Sonja and I were watching the snow storm in Armadillo, TX on the news. She lives in Nica now, but is from that foreign country inside US boarder - Texas. I said something like "I bet they don't have heated runways there like they do in places that get lot of snow all the time." She allowed as how even a few inches can really disrupt the whole area.
Then she talked about Sweden where she lived for a long time. In the cities in Sweden, no one has a water heater. The city burns its trash in gigantic incinerators. The heat from these burns heats the water for the city. The hot water pipes run under the roads with special bigger pipe areas at places like bus stops, then the hot water goes to homes and apartments. Imagine that! You get rid of trash, (your fuel) and you melt snow and clear roads, and you deliver free hot water to everyone.
Imagine that! What I am imagining is a place where the will of the population is to reduce energy use and solve persistent problems. I am imagining a society that can look outside of itself and see what works in other places and implement the solutions.
I like it that some countries have stuff like affordable, excellent, public transportation. I like it that some countries actually have taken the bull by the horns and everyone has low flush toilets, motions sensitive lights, windmills and solar stuff. We are still trying to figure out how to get rid of plastic bags. We could save ourselves a lot of expense and pain and suffering if we got behind ideas like not using so much energy and used our brains and that good old "can do" attitude that we were once famous for. If we can figure out how to do fracking, we certainly could figure out how to do without it.
Then she talked about Sweden where she lived for a long time. In the cities in Sweden, no one has a water heater. The city burns its trash in gigantic incinerators. The heat from these burns heats the water for the city. The hot water pipes run under the roads with special bigger pipe areas at places like bus stops, then the hot water goes to homes and apartments. Imagine that! You get rid of trash, (your fuel) and you melt snow and clear roads, and you deliver free hot water to everyone.
Imagine that! What I am imagining is a place where the will of the population is to reduce energy use and solve persistent problems. I am imagining a society that can look outside of itself and see what works in other places and implement the solutions.
I like it that some countries have stuff like affordable, excellent, public transportation. I like it that some countries actually have taken the bull by the horns and everyone has low flush toilets, motions sensitive lights, windmills and solar stuff. We are still trying to figure out how to get rid of plastic bags. We could save ourselves a lot of expense and pain and suffering if we got behind ideas like not using so much energy and used our brains and that good old "can do" attitude that we were once famous for. If we can figure out how to do fracking, we certainly could figure out how to do without it.
Monday, February 25, 2013
All things old gotta get new again...
I think that when I first met Lee Perron, I had just left my first sophomore year of college. I had gone to high school at the Dana Hall School in Wellesley, MA. Whereas for some people, boarding school was a great problem, for me it was stupendous fun. (Thanks to Susan Lodge, Kay McGee and others). I was very stimulated by the academics there. I had teachers and mentors who met and exceeded any hopes I had from them.
But huge changes were in the air. I had been infatuated by the bohemian life of dark coffee houses where good and horrible poetry was being read, where shit wine was served, where people looked full of angst and existential pain. By senior year I had the most sought after wardrobe in my dorm. I had black tights, saggy short wool skirts and over sized sweaters that I had gotten from my brother.
We had to apply to college and I applied to Connecticut College for Women. Mom had gone there and she had gone to Dana. When the acceptance call came during spring break, I told them that I wasn't interested. The picture that kept popping into my head was that it would be four more years of Dana Hall, just in another gorgeous setting. I had done Dana. I had loved my experience. I had managed not to be kicked out, which was necessary because I was a scholarship kid. (No second chances) I wanted different.
Well, after all the acceptance letters had gone out, options of different were somewhat limited. I ended up going to Hartford College for Women and living at home. God. But this progressive little college was just the right thing for me at that moment. (1962). The idea behind the school was to provide a top notch education at a very affordable cost. My father was involved in this in some way. So, the school had no faculty of its own, and the profs came from several local colleges; Smith, Mt. Holyoke, Trinity, and maybe Yale (I can't remember). I met really brilliant women and teachers. I met guys. (remember that almost all the schools were single sex in those days).
I met Bobbin, one of the smartest people I have ever known and lots of fun. I had one advantage over Bobbin which was Dana Hall. I didn't have her smarts, but I had had a better secondary education. We vied for every honor in the school and we were neck and neck. I won. But that was just our personal friendship, the thing that was amazing was that every class we took was better than the next and it was one of those magic years when everything came together. I have heard that today a lot of freshman classes are kind of repeat stuff. We took World Religions which focused on great revolutions in thinking and social changes. We read Les Mis in french class. We studied art history. Everything flowed. We won tennis matches.
We went to Yale for weekend parties. We met the DKE house at Trinity College. The DKE house could have been the model for the movie Animal House. Right time, Right cast of characters, except for some unknown reason, it had collected the great writers of the school. It was a notorious party house, but everyone was in their spare time from social activities, writing, writing , writing.
There were two recent graduates who were the stuff of myth and legend when we hit the scene. They were the most brilliant, the most quirky, the most revered Lee Perron and Peter Fish. I have talked before about "more' Peter Fish. I was nervous when I met Lee the first time. What if I came across as stupid? What if I didn't understand his genius? What if he didn't like me?
What if, as it turned out, nothing like that mattered? It didn't because here was a man I could sit at the feet of an soak up poetry, ideas, as well as party hearty. Lee was larger tan life at that time. I mean he was then a huge guy. He ate and drank and smoked more than anyone I had ever known. He had (has) a mind that remembers and puts together ideas. More about Lee's ideas and humor at another time. Later when he was at Stamford he taught me Medieval poetry. He took (takes) me on nature walks that open my eyes to myriad beautiful things that I miss. He wrote poetry his whole life. He, made books, he created art. In my cosmology he is still among the walking Gods.
I am sharing a poem of his from a recently published book. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. You can see what I mean about nature, probing ideas, big thinking. Enjoy!
FALL ARRIVES
Fall arrives, time’s most favored season—
at last the heart, the mind loosens its fist
so that I no longer need to know who I am
I return to the hills and the great presences—
light, heat, clouds, the bull pines—
to recover for myself the purity of the falling world
to enfold it like a pearl in the mind’s silence
I read the calligraphy of the oaks against
the fading skies, the grass bending in the meadow,
the last robins— I’m a circle reaching
the first place for the first time
for in youth among fall leaves I refused
to acknowledge the ancient writing—
that the basket of summer empties, that
the hours of men are as wind-driven clouds—
and yet among fall leaves
I was overjoyed with the beauty of loss
now I stand on autumn’s wooded knoll
that my life too may vanish,
that night may fall into the earth’s arms
time is calling her trout
from their playgrounds in the sea
to river mouth, and redemption, and fury
it is by means of the long delay
that we come to the righteousness of passion.
Celtic Light
Poems 1985-2010
by Lee Perron
published by
Word Palace Press, San Luis Obispo, CA 93406
wordpalacepress.com
But huge changes were in the air. I had been infatuated by the bohemian life of dark coffee houses where good and horrible poetry was being read, where shit wine was served, where people looked full of angst and existential pain. By senior year I had the most sought after wardrobe in my dorm. I had black tights, saggy short wool skirts and over sized sweaters that I had gotten from my brother.
We had to apply to college and I applied to Connecticut College for Women. Mom had gone there and she had gone to Dana. When the acceptance call came during spring break, I told them that I wasn't interested. The picture that kept popping into my head was that it would be four more years of Dana Hall, just in another gorgeous setting. I had done Dana. I had loved my experience. I had managed not to be kicked out, which was necessary because I was a scholarship kid. (No second chances) I wanted different.
Well, after all the acceptance letters had gone out, options of different were somewhat limited. I ended up going to Hartford College for Women and living at home. God. But this progressive little college was just the right thing for me at that moment. (1962). The idea behind the school was to provide a top notch education at a very affordable cost. My father was involved in this in some way. So, the school had no faculty of its own, and the profs came from several local colleges; Smith, Mt. Holyoke, Trinity, and maybe Yale (I can't remember). I met really brilliant women and teachers. I met guys. (remember that almost all the schools were single sex in those days).
I met Bobbin, one of the smartest people I have ever known and lots of fun. I had one advantage over Bobbin which was Dana Hall. I didn't have her smarts, but I had had a better secondary education. We vied for every honor in the school and we were neck and neck. I won. But that was just our personal friendship, the thing that was amazing was that every class we took was better than the next and it was one of those magic years when everything came together. I have heard that today a lot of freshman classes are kind of repeat stuff. We took World Religions which focused on great revolutions in thinking and social changes. We read Les Mis in french class. We studied art history. Everything flowed. We won tennis matches.
We went to Yale for weekend parties. We met the DKE house at Trinity College. The DKE house could have been the model for the movie Animal House. Right time, Right cast of characters, except for some unknown reason, it had collected the great writers of the school. It was a notorious party house, but everyone was in their spare time from social activities, writing, writing , writing.
There were two recent graduates who were the stuff of myth and legend when we hit the scene. They were the most brilliant, the most quirky, the most revered Lee Perron and Peter Fish. I have talked before about "more' Peter Fish. I was nervous when I met Lee the first time. What if I came across as stupid? What if I didn't understand his genius? What if he didn't like me?
What if, as it turned out, nothing like that mattered? It didn't because here was a man I could sit at the feet of an soak up poetry, ideas, as well as party hearty. Lee was larger tan life at that time. I mean he was then a huge guy. He ate and drank and smoked more than anyone I had ever known. He had (has) a mind that remembers and puts together ideas. More about Lee's ideas and humor at another time. Later when he was at Stamford he taught me Medieval poetry. He took (takes) me on nature walks that open my eyes to myriad beautiful things that I miss. He wrote poetry his whole life. He, made books, he created art. In my cosmology he is still among the walking Gods.
I am sharing a poem of his from a recently published book. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. You can see what I mean about nature, probing ideas, big thinking. Enjoy!
FALL ARRIVES
Fall arrives, time’s most favored season—
at last the heart, the mind loosens its fist
so that I no longer need to know who I am
I return to the hills and the great presences—
light, heat, clouds, the bull pines—
to recover for myself the purity of the falling world
to enfold it like a pearl in the mind’s silence
I read the calligraphy of the oaks against
the fading skies, the grass bending in the meadow,
the last robins— I’m a circle reaching
the first place for the first time
for in youth among fall leaves I refused
to acknowledge the ancient writing—
that the basket of summer empties, that
the hours of men are as wind-driven clouds—
and yet among fall leaves
I was overjoyed with the beauty of loss
now I stand on autumn’s wooded knoll
that my life too may vanish,
that night may fall into the earth’s arms
time is calling her trout
from their playgrounds in the sea
to river mouth, and redemption, and fury
it is by means of the long delay
that we come to the righteousness of passion.
Celtic Light
Poems 1985-2010
by Lee Perron
published by
Word Palace Press, San Luis Obispo, CA 93406
wordpalacepress.com
Friday, February 22, 2013
Was the world created so man could reign?
In his wonderful book, A Thousand Mile Walk to the Gulf by Muir, John [Hardcover] (Google Affiliate Ad) John Muir was talking about arriving in Florida in the early 1900s. He was struck by the great abundance of food and vegetation and wild life of all sorts. The deer just about bumped into him, And the bear. And the alligators. He was also struck by malaria, apparently as was everyone down in those parts in those days. He got typhoid as he was sick with malaria. It slowed his hike for about 3 months.
He had lots of time to think. He mused:
"The world, we are told, was made especially for man - a presumption not supported by facts. A numerous class of men are painfully astonished whenever they find anything, living or dead, in all God's universe, which they can not eat or render in some way useful to themselves. They have precise dogmatic insight of the intentions of the Creator, and it is hardly possible to be guilty of irreverence in speaking of their God any more than of heathen idols. He is regarded as a civilized, law-abiding gentleman in favor either of a republican form of government or of a limited monarchy: believes in the literature and language of England; is a warm supporter of Sunday schools and missionary societies; and is as purely a manufactured article as any puppet of a half penny theater,
With such views of the Creator it is, of course, not surprising that erroneous views should be entertained of the creation. To such properly trimmed people, the sheep, for example, is an easy problem - food and clothing "for us", eating grass and daisies while by divine appointment for this predestined purpose, on perceiving the demand for wool that would be occasioned by the eating of the apple in the Garden of Eden.
In the same pleasant plan, whales are store houses of oil for us, to help out the stars in lighting our dark ways until the discovery of the Pennsylvania oil wells....Cotton is another plain case of clothing. Iron was made for hammers and ploughs, and lead for bullets; all intended for us. And so for other small handfuls of things.
But what if we should ask these profound expositors of God's intentions, How about those man-eating animals -- lions, tigers, alligators -- which smack their lips over raw man? Or about those myriads of noxious insects that destroy labor and drink his blood? Doubtless man was intended for food and drink for all those? Oh, no! Not at all! ...."
He goes on and concludes that he is "glad to leave these ecclesiastical fires and blunders, I joyfully return to the immortal truth and immortal beauty of nature."
I remember when my kids had gone to an Audubon Society summer camp and they came home singing wonderful camp songs and playing "Prey and Predator". "I'll be the cute little bunny rabbit and you be the mean old fox." "No! I'll be the smart snake and you be the little mouse going home to its mother." So, yes, they did fight and argue about who got to be whom.
This afternoon after listening to the great revolutionary poet Ernesto Cardinal read his poems in the ruins of an old convent decorated with pre-Columbian stone sculptures, I was talking with an older (sic) woman who is here in Nica in the Peace Corps. She happened to mention that Peace Corps volunteers can get kicked out of the Peace Corps if they visit Guatemala or Honduras while working here. Wow! The US backed monster who was President of Guatemala has now been accused of crimes against humanity..230,000 dead Mayans would qualify almost anyone. So far every time a witness is called, they have been assassinated. Peace Corps seems a little ironic. Same but different story in Honduras. Check it out.
It felt today that there is a little leap that has happened since the musings of John Muir. The leap is from the view that everything on the planet was created for the use of man except for those pesky mosquitoes which should be eliminated, to the modern version that replaces 'man' in general with the USA. If we can't exploit it for the glory of our lives, we should consider it evil and eliminate it.
One day old man karma is going to bite us.
He had lots of time to think. He mused:
"The world, we are told, was made especially for man - a presumption not supported by facts. A numerous class of men are painfully astonished whenever they find anything, living or dead, in all God's universe, which they can not eat or render in some way useful to themselves. They have precise dogmatic insight of the intentions of the Creator, and it is hardly possible to be guilty of irreverence in speaking of their God any more than of heathen idols. He is regarded as a civilized, law-abiding gentleman in favor either of a republican form of government or of a limited monarchy: believes in the literature and language of England; is a warm supporter of Sunday schools and missionary societies; and is as purely a manufactured article as any puppet of a half penny theater,
With such views of the Creator it is, of course, not surprising that erroneous views should be entertained of the creation. To such properly trimmed people, the sheep, for example, is an easy problem - food and clothing "for us", eating grass and daisies while by divine appointment for this predestined purpose, on perceiving the demand for wool that would be occasioned by the eating of the apple in the Garden of Eden.
In the same pleasant plan, whales are store houses of oil for us, to help out the stars in lighting our dark ways until the discovery of the Pennsylvania oil wells....Cotton is another plain case of clothing. Iron was made for hammers and ploughs, and lead for bullets; all intended for us. And so for other small handfuls of things.
But what if we should ask these profound expositors of God's intentions, How about those man-eating animals -- lions, tigers, alligators -- which smack their lips over raw man? Or about those myriads of noxious insects that destroy labor and drink his blood? Doubtless man was intended for food and drink for all those? Oh, no! Not at all! ...."
He goes on and concludes that he is "glad to leave these ecclesiastical fires and blunders, I joyfully return to the immortal truth and immortal beauty of nature."
I remember when my kids had gone to an Audubon Society summer camp and they came home singing wonderful camp songs and playing "Prey and Predator". "I'll be the cute little bunny rabbit and you be the mean old fox." "No! I'll be the smart snake and you be the little mouse going home to its mother." So, yes, they did fight and argue about who got to be whom.
This afternoon after listening to the great revolutionary poet Ernesto Cardinal read his poems in the ruins of an old convent decorated with pre-Columbian stone sculptures, I was talking with an older (sic) woman who is here in Nica in the Peace Corps. She happened to mention that Peace Corps volunteers can get kicked out of the Peace Corps if they visit Guatemala or Honduras while working here. Wow! The US backed monster who was President of Guatemala has now been accused of crimes against humanity..230,000 dead Mayans would qualify almost anyone. So far every time a witness is called, they have been assassinated. Peace Corps seems a little ironic. Same but different story in Honduras. Check it out.
It felt today that there is a little leap that has happened since the musings of John Muir. The leap is from the view that everything on the planet was created for the use of man except for those pesky mosquitoes which should be eliminated, to the modern version that replaces 'man' in general with the USA. If we can't exploit it for the glory of our lives, we should consider it evil and eliminate it.
One day old man karma is going to bite us.
Thursday, February 21, 2013
Is it time to brng out the sedition laws?
The hatred that is coming from the Tea Party, Fox News and the so called Christian far right seems to be so anti-government, so anti-Obama that it seems to me to be verging on sedition. When does free speech become trying to over throw a government? The spokespersons are upping the rhetoric. They don't seem to 'get' that they really lost the election, that the idea of a democracy is that whoever wins is the winner, that we are supposed to be the country founded on brotherly love, and that Jesus never ever called for murder as an answer to anything.
When I heard Glen Beck, sweating and screaming about his perception of immigration problems in Arizona and he shrieked into the camera that someone who loves Jesus has to do Jesus' will and kill the politicians who don't hate 'illegals', I almost got sick to my stomach. I did get sick when Gabrielle Giffords was shot soon after. Was that sedition?
I used to laugh at the Sarah Palins. Now, I am no longer laughing. Maybe partition is the only answer. Let's give them Texas. No, seriously, a mob has become whipped up and I have a feeling that it has become something different. I would like to see people who love their country work together to make it all better, make it all work, make it all worth the good name we once had. I also think that if TV personalities, ministers, and fickle politicians need to be held responsible for what they are creating. We know from history that class warfare doesn't solve much. It just makes a whole new bunch of problems.
Maybe you have to be a bit insane to even care. I think it is time to go back to a discussion of karma again. Everything we do for the good or for the dark side will have an effect on us. Everything has a cause and everything has an effect. Are we ready for the karma of our foreign policy? Heavy thought.
When I heard Glen Beck, sweating and screaming about his perception of immigration problems in Arizona and he shrieked into the camera that someone who loves Jesus has to do Jesus' will and kill the politicians who don't hate 'illegals', I almost got sick to my stomach. I did get sick when Gabrielle Giffords was shot soon after. Was that sedition?
I used to laugh at the Sarah Palins. Now, I am no longer laughing. Maybe partition is the only answer. Let's give them Texas. No, seriously, a mob has become whipped up and I have a feeling that it has become something different. I would like to see people who love their country work together to make it all better, make it all work, make it all worth the good name we once had. I also think that if TV personalities, ministers, and fickle politicians need to be held responsible for what they are creating. We know from history that class warfare doesn't solve much. It just makes a whole new bunch of problems.
Maybe you have to be a bit insane to even care. I think it is time to go back to a discussion of karma again. Everything we do for the good or for the dark side will have an effect on us. Everything has a cause and everything has an effect. Are we ready for the karma of our foreign policy? Heavy thought.
Wednesday, February 20, 2013
A Guatemalan woman was quoting May Sarton
Imagine a Yankee like me hearing a Guatemala woman quoting May Sarton on the streets of Granada, Nicaragua yesterday. Here I am falling in love again with the romantic rebellious poets of Central America, and then I hear a voice that is so like my own (only in poetry). It was certainly a cool experience. I can relate to the poems of the oppressed, to the poems of the angry, to the poems of the romantic, but I can really relate to the poems of a woman who lived in New Hampshire and Maine. Through poetry we can all be everyone. I suspect that is true for all art.
I know myself less and less as I age. I know less and less what I want from life and what I have to give to life. When I was 21, I knew just about everything. This state I find myself in is not about self doubt or a crisis of confidence. This is something about having a wider view of the illusions that we dwell in. Somehow the paradox of my life getting a bit smaller and my viewpoint getting larger is creating this new space that is my life.
I think I am less complicated than I used to be. I suspect that I am a pretty simple soul. I don't think I am hung up with guilt, although there are somethings I don't plan on repeating. I remember history, but I don't wish I were living in it. I am happy to get out of bed in the morning and mostly glad for what each day brings. I can sit still longer than I ever have, but I still struggle with a pretty big dose of impatience. Was there something about that in my last two New Years resolutions? I have some vague recollection about that. I look forward to seeing my kids and grand kids in San Francisco at Easter. I am eating life in smaller pieces now. At the same time I feel ready to big leap. I will be happy to see where I go next.
Here is a poem by May Sarton for you to enjoy. I hope.
Time, many years and places;
I have been dissolved and shaken,
Worn other people's faces,
Run madly, as if Time were there,
Terribly old, crying a warning,
'Hurry, you will be dead before-'
(What? Before you reach the morning?
Or the end of the poem is clear?
Or love safe in the walled city?)
Now to stand still, to be here,
Feel my own weight and density!
The black shadow on the paper
Is my hand; the shadow of a word
As thought shapes the shaper
Falls heavy on the page, is heard.
All fuses now, falls into place
From wish to action, word to silence,
My work, my love, my time, my face
Gathered into one intense
Gesture of growing like a plant.
As slowly as the ripening fruit
Fertile, detached, and always spent,
Falls but does not exhaust the root,
So all the poem is, can give,
Grows in me to become the song,
Made so and rooted by love.
Now there is time and Time is young.
O, in this single hour I live
All of myself and do not move.
I, the pursued, who madly ran,
Stand still, stand still, and stop the sun!
I know myself less and less as I age. I know less and less what I want from life and what I have to give to life. When I was 21, I knew just about everything. This state I find myself in is not about self doubt or a crisis of confidence. This is something about having a wider view of the illusions that we dwell in. Somehow the paradox of my life getting a bit smaller and my viewpoint getting larger is creating this new space that is my life.
I think I am less complicated than I used to be. I suspect that I am a pretty simple soul. I don't think I am hung up with guilt, although there are somethings I don't plan on repeating. I remember history, but I don't wish I were living in it. I am happy to get out of bed in the morning and mostly glad for what each day brings. I can sit still longer than I ever have, but I still struggle with a pretty big dose of impatience. Was there something about that in my last two New Years resolutions? I have some vague recollection about that. I look forward to seeing my kids and grand kids in San Francisco at Easter. I am eating life in smaller pieces now. At the same time I feel ready to big leap. I will be happy to see where I go next.
Here is a poem by May Sarton for you to enjoy. I hope.
Now I Become Myself
Now I become myself. It's takenTime, many years and places;
I have been dissolved and shaken,
Worn other people's faces,
Run madly, as if Time were there,
Terribly old, crying a warning,
'Hurry, you will be dead before-'
(What? Before you reach the morning?
Or the end of the poem is clear?
Or love safe in the walled city?)
Now to stand still, to be here,
Feel my own weight and density!
The black shadow on the paper
Is my hand; the shadow of a word
As thought shapes the shaper
Falls heavy on the page, is heard.
All fuses now, falls into place
From wish to action, word to silence,
My work, my love, my time, my face
Gathered into one intense
Gesture of growing like a plant.
As slowly as the ripening fruit
Fertile, detached, and always spent,
Falls but does not exhaust the root,
So all the poem is, can give,
Grows in me to become the song,
Made so and rooted by love.
Now there is time and Time is young.
O, in this single hour I live
All of myself and do not move.
I, the pursued, who madly ran,
Stand still, stand still, and stop the sun!
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
White Eagle
The material world is immaterial. I say this because of its impermanence. If you think about it, you have to end up with the old saw, "You can't take it with you." I am not saying that things don't have importance. I am for beauty, for art, for comfort, for ease of life. I have no ambition for us to be cavemen. But I am also very conservative in this point of view. I believe in conserving nature, conserving natural resources, conserving harmonious cultures, conserving peace of mind.
But anything taken to extreme is too weird for my brand of conservatism. In Ashland, Oregon, USA where I have been living, the town has a ghetto look in many neighborhoods. To me eyes, this is because everyone has built a big tall wood fence around their little piece of earth. The fences have many ostensible reasons; to keep the deer out, to keep the dog in, to give privacy, to block out the views of neighbors. To my eyes, it looks ghetto. The next step, I suppose is the gated town, looking much like a modern version of a medieval walled city. Keep the enemy at bay. Keep your goods to yourself. Keep out the plague.
Historically, it didn't work out very well. Now, with The Fence on the Rio Grande we are starting this on a national level. It still ends up looking ghetto to me and it still doesn't seem to offer much protection in the long run.
When you die it is very possible that your kids or some stranger cleaning out your house will say, "Throw that piece of crap in the dumpster." If we cared more for each other, there could never exist the inequalities that make everybody who doesn't have as much a you a threat to your peace of mind. It might call for fewer fences, alarm systems, jails, cops, less military spending. Where do we start?
I think we start by contemplating what White Eagle said, "Everything is Spirit, and Spirit is triumphant over matter." What can you take with you and what can you leave behind? Things that are imbued with spirit have a bit of eternity in them; a temple, a painting, a natural wonder, a sunset, a poem. The body goes to the trash heap, but the spirit is eternal. Let's work to make it worthy.
But anything taken to extreme is too weird for my brand of conservatism. In Ashland, Oregon, USA where I have been living, the town has a ghetto look in many neighborhoods. To me eyes, this is because everyone has built a big tall wood fence around their little piece of earth. The fences have many ostensible reasons; to keep the deer out, to keep the dog in, to give privacy, to block out the views of neighbors. To my eyes, it looks ghetto. The next step, I suppose is the gated town, looking much like a modern version of a medieval walled city. Keep the enemy at bay. Keep your goods to yourself. Keep out the plague.
Historically, it didn't work out very well. Now, with The Fence on the Rio Grande we are starting this on a national level. It still ends up looking ghetto to me and it still doesn't seem to offer much protection in the long run.
When you die it is very possible that your kids or some stranger cleaning out your house will say, "Throw that piece of crap in the dumpster." If we cared more for each other, there could never exist the inequalities that make everybody who doesn't have as much a you a threat to your peace of mind. It might call for fewer fences, alarm systems, jails, cops, less military spending. Where do we start?
I think we start by contemplating what White Eagle said, "Everything is Spirit, and Spirit is triumphant over matter." What can you take with you and what can you leave behind? Things that are imbued with spirit have a bit of eternity in them; a temple, a painting, a natural wonder, a sunset, a poem. The body goes to the trash heap, but the spirit is eternal. Let's work to make it worthy.
Sunday, February 17, 2013
House Committee on UnAmerican Activities is Back
And next will be the Salem Witch Trials, and why not the Inquisition? The way the Chuck Hagel confirmation hearings look to me reminds me of the McCarthy hearings in 1954. As I have told you before, the HUAC hearings were the first television I had seen in my life. I was 10 and I was visiting my grandparents who had one of those 6 inch TV screens in a gigantic piece of cabinetry. The hearings were the only thing on or at least at their house.
They were real Boston Irish living in Lawrence, MA a mill town on the Merrimack River. Nellie and Jack served lobsters at Thanksgiving because my grandfather proclaimed that no pilgrim in his right mind would eat wild turkey when the lobsters were so abundant. We had lobster races in their huge kitchen before the dinner was cooked.
Nellie was 'lace curtain' Irish. In those days that meant that she had a beautiful home with real china and silver and a grand piano. It really meant that they were putting on 'airs' because they weren't English and therefore were supposed to be less than. That kind of changed when Jack Kennedy became president. But this was in the days when the Irish were running Boston, but they couldn't join any of the establishment clubs. Rough and tumble outsiders. But they were all Democrats. All of them. And something about these hearings on un-American activities reminded them of the repression they remembered from Ireland.
And well it might. My grandfather had to be wondering whether eating lobsters on Thanksgiving was reportable as subversive and therefore he could be blacklisted. Being blacklisted had nothing to do with facts, but it never the less ruined many lives and livelihoods. It could happen to anyone.
Go to the web and watch a snippet of Army vs. Committee and look at the tactics. Then watch Chuck Hagel being interviewed about why it didn't think the Iraq war was a perfect idea! Then watch the terrible, but pointed SNL parody of the hearing. Good God! We are doing it again. It is the same technique that the Spanish Inquisition used. It is not about senators governing with the best interest of their constituents in mind. They are trying to fight the election. They are trying to fight the Civil War. They are fighting the Cold War. They are making the war country a country without a Secretary of Defense. I think the biggest crime of Hagel is that he is not ready to bomb Iran at the behest of Israel. The biggest crime of Obama is he is half black. That and the fact that occasionally he seems to be trying to serve up what the electorate wants. (health care)
I don't even know Chuck Hagel, but we never will with the kind of idiotic, hateful, scornful questions that are badgering him. The schizoid, angry, weird shit that comes from the mouth of Senator McCain wouldn't be tolerated by civilized people. What are they afraid of? Why can't we get a government that wants to govern rather than obstruct? Why aren't our representatives our servants? I think that was the idea our democracy. Yikes!
I am, once again, reminded of the conversation between Gandhi and Churchill when Churchill ask Gandhi what he thought of English civilization. Gandhi replied "I think it would be a good idea." I am not against a good debate by any means. I am not against a heated argument between our representatives, that is the idea, but badgering, innuendos, ugly lies are going to lead us nowhere good. What is going on here? The world is watching.
When I was elected to School Board in a small district in southern New Hampshire, at our first meeting we were told that we could say our peace in the meetings, debate again and again our side of any issue as representatives of our towns, but once the board made a decision we were to stand behind it publicly. It was a dignified way to proceed. The process was open so people knew where you stood, but the committee having voted, we then worked together to implement the policies that were chosen.
They were real Boston Irish living in Lawrence, MA a mill town on the Merrimack River. Nellie and Jack served lobsters at Thanksgiving because my grandfather proclaimed that no pilgrim in his right mind would eat wild turkey when the lobsters were so abundant. We had lobster races in their huge kitchen before the dinner was cooked.
Nellie was 'lace curtain' Irish. In those days that meant that she had a beautiful home with real china and silver and a grand piano. It really meant that they were putting on 'airs' because they weren't English and therefore were supposed to be less than. That kind of changed when Jack Kennedy became president. But this was in the days when the Irish were running Boston, but they couldn't join any of the establishment clubs. Rough and tumble outsiders. But they were all Democrats. All of them. And something about these hearings on un-American activities reminded them of the repression they remembered from Ireland.
And well it might. My grandfather had to be wondering whether eating lobsters on Thanksgiving was reportable as subversive and therefore he could be blacklisted. Being blacklisted had nothing to do with facts, but it never the less ruined many lives and livelihoods. It could happen to anyone.
Go to the web and watch a snippet of Army vs. Committee and look at the tactics. Then watch Chuck Hagel being interviewed about why it didn't think the Iraq war was a perfect idea! Then watch the terrible, but pointed SNL parody of the hearing. Good God! We are doing it again. It is the same technique that the Spanish Inquisition used. It is not about senators governing with the best interest of their constituents in mind. They are trying to fight the election. They are trying to fight the Civil War. They are fighting the Cold War. They are making the war country a country without a Secretary of Defense. I think the biggest crime of Hagel is that he is not ready to bomb Iran at the behest of Israel. The biggest crime of Obama is he is half black. That and the fact that occasionally he seems to be trying to serve up what the electorate wants. (health care)
I don't even know Chuck Hagel, but we never will with the kind of idiotic, hateful, scornful questions that are badgering him. The schizoid, angry, weird shit that comes from the mouth of Senator McCain wouldn't be tolerated by civilized people. What are they afraid of? Why can't we get a government that wants to govern rather than obstruct? Why aren't our representatives our servants? I think that was the idea our democracy. Yikes!
I am, once again, reminded of the conversation between Gandhi and Churchill when Churchill ask Gandhi what he thought of English civilization. Gandhi replied "I think it would be a good idea." I am not against a good debate by any means. I am not against a heated argument between our representatives, that is the idea, but badgering, innuendos, ugly lies are going to lead us nowhere good. What is going on here? The world is watching.
When I was elected to School Board in a small district in southern New Hampshire, at our first meeting we were told that we could say our peace in the meetings, debate again and again our side of any issue as representatives of our towns, but once the board made a decision we were to stand behind it publicly. It was a dignified way to proceed. The process was open so people knew where you stood, but the committee having voted, we then worked together to implement the policies that were chosen.
Friday, February 15, 2013
Nicaragua poetry festival dedicated to Ernesto Cardenal
Granada’s 9th annual International Poetry Festival, held Feb. 17-24, promises to be bigger and better than years past
January 30, 2013 They say that all Nicaraguans are poets or hijuepoetas. That dictum, which works better in Spanish than Spanglish, is never truer than in the month February, when Granada hosts its international poetry festival and even the most prosaic Nicaraguans start to speak in rhyme and iambic pentameter.
This year’s International Poetry Festival, now in its ninth year, will be dedicated to Nicaragua’s iconic revolutionary poet and priest Ernesto Cardenal, the country’s most revered and internationally celebrated living poet.
The poetry festival, an annual cultural event that has grown rapidly in scope and prestige over the past decade, is now considered one of the top events of its kind in the world, rivaled only by the International Poetry Festival of MedellÃn, Colombia.
“In
just eight years, the International Poetry Festival in Granada has
become an obligatory event for poets; the festival is now firmly
established on the cultural calendar of events in the Americas and is
second only to the poetry festival in MedellÃn, which has been going on
for more than 20 years,” says event organizer Fernando López.This year’s festival in homage to one of Granada’s most famous native sons, who last week turned 88, is expected to be an even greater celebration than years past, as Cardenal’s friends and admirers from around the world come to honor an extraordinary life of achievement. Cardenal, the 2012 recipient of the Queen Sofia Prize for Ibero-American Poetry and a former nominee for the Nobel Prize in Literature, is author of many famous poems, novels and works of poetry, including “Prayer for Marilyn Monroe,” “Epigrams”, and “Cosmic Canticle,” among others.
The former minister of culture during the Sandinistas’ revolutionary days in the 1980s, and now a leading critic of President Daniel Ortega, Cardenal is also an extremely accomplished sculptor and the founder of the primitivist art community in the Solentiname archipelago in Lake Cocibolca.
The revolutionary poet will be doing a poetry reading on Friday, at 4 p.m. at the San Francisco Convent.
Big international draw
The 2013 International Poetry Festival will draw a total of 123 poets—83 international poets from 58 countries and 40 Nicaraguan poets—who have been invited to participate in this year’s event, making it one of the biggest festivals yet. Among the long roster of internationally renowned poets participating in this year’s festival is U.S. feminist poet, author and social activist Margaret Randall, whose early involvement in the Sandinista Revolution prompted the U.S. government to revoke her citizenship in 1984. After a lengthy court battle, Randall’s citizenship was reinstated in 1989. The following year she was awarded the Lillian Hellman and Dashiell Hammett grant for writers victimized by political repression.Long-time Nicaphiles will recognize Randall’s name from her influential book on the Nicaraguan Revolution, titled “Sandino’s Daughters.”
This year’s poetry festive will also have a special celebrity guest: Bianca Jagger, the Nicaraguan born social and human rights advocate and former wife of Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger. Ms. Jagger, who resides in London, is founder of Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation and currently acts as the European Council’s Goodwill Ambassador, as well as sitting on the Executive Director’s Leadership Council of Amnesty International.
Organizers of the International Poetry Festival hope Bianca Jagger’s participation in the event will provide enough star power to generate some mainstream international attention for the poetry festival.
“Her presence will help make this festival more visible and that will open doors for us to find more funding for the festival in the years to come,” López told The Nicaragua Dispatch.
Event organizers will also seek to elevate the festival’s international status by nominating it for the 2013 Prince of Asturias Award, which is given each year in recognition of those who make significant contributions to peace and culture. The Granada poetry festival was nominated for the award last year and was given serious consideration as a shortlist finalist.
Going global after a decade
For the past nine years, Granada’s International Poetry Festival has been dedicated to a famous Nicaraguan poet, honoring the big names from Nicaragua’s “Vanguard Movement” (José Coronel Urtecho, Pablo Antonio Cuadra, JoaquÃn Pasos) and the “post-modern” movement (AzarÃas H. Pallais, Alfonso Cortés, and Salomón de la Selva ). Two years ago, the festival was dedicated to Claribel Alegria, who had the distinction of being the first female poet and the first living poet to be honored. The festivals of 2012 and 2013 were dedicated to honoring Nicaragua’s post-vanguard movement, known as “The Three Ernestos” for poets Ernesto MejÃa Sánchez , Carlos Ernesto MartÃnez Rivas and Ernesto Cardenal.Next year, the 10th installment of Granada’s International Poetry Festival will be dedicated to Nicaraguan National Hero Rubén DarÃo, known as the “The prince of Castilian letters” and “Father of Modernism.”
But after that, the festival is going to expand its accolades and start honoring international poets to reflect the globalization of the event.
“After we dedicate year 10 to DarÃo, we will start to dedicate subsequent festivals to other poets from Central America, and then expand from there,” López says. “This festival has already transcended the borders of Nicaragua.”
Those of you who remember me raving about this event a year ago are in for a re-run. I love this romantic Nicaraguan soul. The streets are filling up. The chairs and book stalls are going up. The loudspeakers are being stacked up. I am ready for some poetry. Send me your favorite poem. I'd love to read it.
Thursday, February 14, 2013
I am a Dinosaur in Nicaragua
This week the International Poetry Festival begins in Granada, Nica. This week, at least, I will encounter some of my people, some of the old dinosaurs from the idealistic years when we were in solidarity with those trying to overthrow a dictator from hell. Ernesto Cardinal and Giaconda Belli will be here, treated like the fine poets and writers they are. Treated by the living memory of what they sacrificed for the welfare of others.
But, I notice that they are a dying breed here now, as am I. The Norte Americanos who come here now are a very different species. The vast majority are evangelicals, who come to get converts, who come in competition with each other, who come with a huge political agenda, who often come to get their tithe from the poor , who come to educate, if you can call it that, who come to preach about Jesus wanting you to think positively about the concentration of wealth because the rich are just better Christians, getting what they deserve.
And then there are the ex-military men. I use that term in the bigger context of former mercenaries, former CIA, former spies, former Contras. (And God only knows which are still active). They congregate here as they do in Vietnam, Cambodia, Columbia and other places which they worked hard to destroy. They are here because they created a society where they brought their values of very cheap drugs, very cheap booze, the ability to buy underage girls and boys for next to nothing, the obvious subversive imports from the US military. They are all over here. They speak Texan or at least southern, by and large. They brag about their killings in the past when they get boozed up. They act like they own the place and they verbally trash this country while exploiting it for everything they can get.
And these two groups seem to live in harmony because of past convergences of thought such as fear of communism, love of power and money, thinking that those who are poor somehow deserve it. And I somehow feel that I am identified with them for what else could be the reason that I am here? There are no Birkenstock sandalista brigades here any more.
All this will be forgotten for a week during the International Poetry Festival. The elites and the downtrodden from countries all over the world, the romantics, the artists, and their fans will come together and celebrate the common themes that unite all humanity. I look forward to this very much.
But, I notice that they are a dying breed here now, as am I. The Norte Americanos who come here now are a very different species. The vast majority are evangelicals, who come to get converts, who come in competition with each other, who come with a huge political agenda, who often come to get their tithe from the poor , who come to educate, if you can call it that, who come to preach about Jesus wanting you to think positively about the concentration of wealth because the rich are just better Christians, getting what they deserve.
And then there are the ex-military men. I use that term in the bigger context of former mercenaries, former CIA, former spies, former Contras. (And God only knows which are still active). They congregate here as they do in Vietnam, Cambodia, Columbia and other places which they worked hard to destroy. They are here because they created a society where they brought their values of very cheap drugs, very cheap booze, the ability to buy underage girls and boys for next to nothing, the obvious subversive imports from the US military. They are all over here. They speak Texan or at least southern, by and large. They brag about their killings in the past when they get boozed up. They act like they own the place and they verbally trash this country while exploiting it for everything they can get.
And these two groups seem to live in harmony because of past convergences of thought such as fear of communism, love of power and money, thinking that those who are poor somehow deserve it. And I somehow feel that I am identified with them for what else could be the reason that I am here? There are no Birkenstock sandalista brigades here any more.
All this will be forgotten for a week during the International Poetry Festival. The elites and the downtrodden from countries all over the world, the romantics, the artists, and their fans will come together and celebrate the common themes that unite all humanity. I look forward to this very much.
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
I Need to Learn More about Princess Aurora
Well, all the following information doesn't really enlighten me. My lovely grand daughter has chosen to be Princess Aurora. I believe she became Princess Aurora when she was four. She is five now. She has dark hair (why chose the blond princess?) and I know is highly infatuated with the big dance at the end of Beauty and the Beast. I know this because I have had to be a fill in for the beast more than once. But, it is Aurora and no other character who has transformed her from a little girl with a big imagination to a sixteen year old princess.
I hadn't yet seen a movie or television when I was Isabella's age. I had heard some of the Grimm's fairy tales at around that age, but I was more about Hansel and Grettle and The Big Bad Wolf. The divine wisdom of fairly tales and the great Yungian depth of them hadn't yet been mixed with the Disney genius for turning imagination into money.
I wonder what Bella thinks when she meets other girls who think they are Princess Aurora and when they really don't look like the Disney image either. I am not going to break into Bella's enchantment and quiz her about being Princess Aurora, for that would be cruel. I am going to enjoy what I have learned from Wikipedia (below) and try to step into her magic circle as I do when we do the great dips and twirls with me as Beast.
One day when Bella was three and I was with her and feeling down, she took my hand and led me to the sunny patio. Then she ran around the house collecting things both real and imaginary. She came out to me with towels and juice boxes and sun glasses and set us up for a 'beach party'. "I know you love a beach party, Grandma." She played like a pro. "Don't forget to put on your sun lotion." "Do you want chips?" We had lots of fun watching the swimmers in the water, cooling off, going for a dip. She enchanted me.
So I am always happy to have Princess Aurora answer the phone when I call. I am happy to hear that Princess Aurora doesn't like certain things like salad. I put aside my snobby and political anti-Disney snarkiness and move into a child's orbit.
Information below.
Aurora (Disney)
Princess Aurora is a fictional character and the title character from Disney's 1959 animated film Sleeping Beauty.
The Disney version of the character was based on the French version of
the tale by Charles Perrault, written in 1634 in Histoires ou Contes du
Temps Passé. She is also known as Briar Rose which is the title of the German version by the Brothers Grimm.[2] Aurora was first voiced by Mary Costa in the 1959 film. Erin Torpey took over in the sequels and was later replaced by Jennifer Hale. Aurora is the third member of the Disney Princess line.
Characteristics
Aurora is 16 years old with long golden blonde hair, violet eyes,
rose red lips, and a fair complexion. Aurora is best described as sweet,
naive, playful, and refined. She doesn't like the fact that the fairies
won't let her meet anybody and often longs to meet new people and do
new things. Aurora is heartbroken when she learns she must never see the
handsome stranger again. But, as she is still naive about the world,
she returns to her parents' palace, since she still believes her "aunts"
know what's best for her.
Finally, Aurora wears her ball gown that the three fairies made her for the ball. Aurora's ball gown features a petal-style peplum and long triangular sleeves. Flora and Merryweather argue over the color being blue or pink, but Aurora's ball gown is finally pink as the storybook closes, so Flora wins. Aurora also wears pink slippers, a gold choker, and a gold tiara.
In Disney Princess Enchanted Tales: Follow Your Dreams, Aurora wears her pink signature ball gown, along with her usual slippers, necklace and tiara. At bedtime, she wears a powder blue nightgown with a matching headband, and uses the wand to briefly turn it into an elaborate gold dress with a matching necklace, earrings, and tiara.
Meanwhile the three good fairies are preparing for her birthday and to surprise her with the news that she is a princess. But when Briar Rose returns with the news of meeting a strange but enchanting man, the fairies must tell her she can never see him again. The three fairies tell her about the future that is set for her and that night they take her back to the castle. Aurora is saddened that she will never see the man from the forest and breaks into tears. The three fairies exit the room they secretly entered so as to let the princess have a few moments alone. Aurora suddenly sees a floating spark of light cast by Maleficent and, in a trance, follows the spark through the back of the fireplace and up a staircase to an abandonded empty room to a spinning wheel that was conjured up. All the three good fairies try to stop her, but Maleficent's spell is too strong and Aurora touches the spindle, pricking her finger. She is then put in a bed by the fairies where she can sleep peacefully within the highest tower. To prevent further hurt in the kingdom, the fairies put the whole kingdom to sleep. They discover from King Hubert that his son Prince Phillip was the man in the forest that Aurora had met and he's walking into a trap, and they help him confront Maleficent. After Prince Phillip fights and seemingly kills Maleficent, who transformed into a dragon, he moves upstairs to where Aurora slumbers and kisses her on her lips; she wakes up from the spell and smiles. They dance at the ball announcing her betrothal.
I hadn't yet seen a movie or television when I was Isabella's age. I had heard some of the Grimm's fairy tales at around that age, but I was more about Hansel and Grettle and The Big Bad Wolf. The divine wisdom of fairly tales and the great Yungian depth of them hadn't yet been mixed with the Disney genius for turning imagination into money.
I wonder what Bella thinks when she meets other girls who think they are Princess Aurora and when they really don't look like the Disney image either. I am not going to break into Bella's enchantment and quiz her about being Princess Aurora, for that would be cruel. I am going to enjoy what I have learned from Wikipedia (below) and try to step into her magic circle as I do when we do the great dips and twirls with me as Beast.
One day when Bella was three and I was with her and feeling down, she took my hand and led me to the sunny patio. Then she ran around the house collecting things both real and imaginary. She came out to me with towels and juice boxes and sun glasses and set us up for a 'beach party'. "I know you love a beach party, Grandma." She played like a pro. "Don't forget to put on your sun lotion." "Do you want chips?" We had lots of fun watching the swimmers in the water, cooling off, going for a dip. She enchanted me.
So I am always happy to have Princess Aurora answer the phone when I call. I am happy to hear that Princess Aurora doesn't like certain things like salad. I put aside my snobby and political anti-Disney snarkiness and move into a child's orbit.
Information below.
Aurora (Disney)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Princess Aurora | |
|---|---|
 Aurora in her ball gown. |
|
| First appearance | Sleeping Beauty (1959) |
| Last appearance | Maleficent (2014) |
| Information | |
| Aliases | Briar Rose |
| Species | Human |
| Gender | Female |
| Occupation | Princess |
| Title | Sleeping Beauty |
| Family | Father: King Stefan Mother: Queen Leah |
| Spouse(s) | Prince Phillip |
| Nationality | English[1] |
Costumes
As Briar Rose, Aurora wears a simple outfit consisting of a grey skirt, a black bodice, and a cream-colored blouse. She also wears a purple shawl and a black headband. Later, she wears a hooded blue cloak.Finally, Aurora wears her ball gown that the three fairies made her for the ball. Aurora's ball gown features a petal-style peplum and long triangular sleeves. Flora and Merryweather argue over the color being blue or pink, but Aurora's ball gown is finally pink as the storybook closes, so Flora wins. Aurora also wears pink slippers, a gold choker, and a gold tiara.
In Disney Princess Enchanted Tales: Follow Your Dreams, Aurora wears her pink signature ball gown, along with her usual slippers, necklace and tiara. At bedtime, she wears a powder blue nightgown with a matching headband, and uses the wand to briefly turn it into an elaborate gold dress with a matching necklace, earrings, and tiara.
Appearances
Sleeping Beauty
Main article: Sleeping Beauty (1959 film)
Princess Aurora was born from King Stefan and his wife, Queen Leah.
At her christening, she was given gifts by two of the three fairies
that showed up. Following this, the evil fairy named Maleficent showed
up, angry at not being invited, and put a curse on Aurora stating that
at the age of sixteen, she would prick her finger on the spindle from
the spinning wheel and die. Luckily the third good fairy, named
Merryweather, had not presented a gift yet and is able to change the
curse to sleep instead of death which only True Love's Kiss could break.
Concerned, the three good fairies take Aurora to a secluded cottage in
the forest and change her name to Briar Rose. When Aurora grows to be a
teenager, she is dancing and singing in the forest when she meets a
handsome man who happened to hear her singing. Briar Rose does not
realize he is Prince Phillip who is betrothed to her, and they agree to
meet again that evening.Meanwhile the three good fairies are preparing for her birthday and to surprise her with the news that she is a princess. But when Briar Rose returns with the news of meeting a strange but enchanting man, the fairies must tell her she can never see him again. The three fairies tell her about the future that is set for her and that night they take her back to the castle. Aurora is saddened that she will never see the man from the forest and breaks into tears. The three fairies exit the room they secretly entered so as to let the princess have a few moments alone. Aurora suddenly sees a floating spark of light cast by Maleficent and, in a trance, follows the spark through the back of the fireplace and up a staircase to an abandonded empty room to a spinning wheel that was conjured up. All the three good fairies try to stop her, but Maleficent's spell is too strong and Aurora touches the spindle, pricking her finger. She is then put in a bed by the fairies where she can sleep peacefully within the highest tower. To prevent further hurt in the kingdom, the fairies put the whole kingdom to sleep. They discover from King Hubert that his son Prince Phillip was the man in the forest that Aurora had met and he's walking into a trap, and they help him confront Maleficent. After Prince Phillip fights and seemingly kills Maleficent, who transformed into a dragon, he moves upstairs to where Aurora slumbers and kisses her on her lips; she wakes up from the spell and smiles. They dance at the ball announcing her betrothal.
Disney Princess Enchanted Tales: Follow Your Dreams
Main article: Disney Princess Enchanted Tales: Follow Your Dreams
In the beginning of the movie, Princess Aurora introduces herself.
This is very important, since little can be known about Aurora's
personality from Sleeping Beauty. After she asks a question, she
guides the viewer to the scene where she is told by her father, King
Stefan and her mother, Leah, that being a princess is so easy. Then
after both her parents and Prince Phillip leave, she has some duties to
do when as a princess. During the "Keys To The Kingdom" musical number,
she orders her servants to cook food, plant tulips, lilies, and orange
trees, cut topiary, and paint the trellis pink. She has been taken to
the table in a chair where she can wait for her guests to come for the
party. Later on, the clumsy Duke helps her sign the forms and reviews
what she has found. There is a speech sheet with a golden medal on it King Hubert has forgotten to take. She instantly sends it to the three good fairies
and is told by Merryweather that she has to use her wand for magic.
When she uses it to make the giant chickens, green pigs, and brown cows
appear, one of the brown cows chases the Duke. She then manages to sell
cows to the farmer who meets her and the other peasants who wait for too
long. After Prince Phillip, King Hubert, her parents and the Good
fairies return, they all attend a banquet together and she talks about
how she enjoyed her own duties. After the movie Aurora thanks the viewer
for watching her story and gives a goodbye wave and she is shown as the
main protagonist.
Monday, February 11, 2013
I Stand Corrected!
A reader wrote to me concerning my sloppy information calling us the richest country in the world. I looked it up and according to several sources, we are the 8th richest country in the world. The statistics I read didn't include stuff about natural resources, but did mention that the current winner, Qatar, has a great divide between the people who are enormously wealthy and the workers who most certainly are not. And (surprise!) the workers aren't happy about it.
I regret being sloppy and will try not to be. But I still think that we could do something about the decreasing middle class if we would think a little bit about a "chicken in every pot." Are we starting to look like the days before the fall of Rome or the days before the French Revolution? More and more so, I think. And I can't see how bullying the world and subverting governments and arming ourselves and the whole planet are making things better.
It is obvious to anyone who thinks that we are in a state of decline. Are we going to be like the addict who has to hit rock bottom or death before he have his spiritual awakening? I hope not. The risks are enormous. But the addiction to power and greed and a sense of superiority seems to have many of us in its grip.
From what I have read, Canadian children get a good public education....all over the country. That would be a good place to start in the USA. What is it that we talk about equal opportunity and equality and start kids out with such unequal, haphazard, failing education in our poor sectors that a child knows from his first day of school that he is screwed? How can we hope to be a world leader when we allow this? And don't give me the old line about there not being enough money. It takes will power much more than money. Throwing money at problems very often doesn't solve anything.
Americans used to be famous for their 'can do' attitudes. Have we lost that? Why don't we start a few wars in our country? We could have war on poverty, a war on obesity, a war on preventable diseases, a war on ignorance, a war on depression, a war on abuse, a war on bad food, a war on homelessness, a war on pollution. There are so many ways we could use our righteousness and energy behind something we could export with pride.
I need to take my hand out from the government, my $530 a month, of social security benefit, and find a way to give back because I have my own social security; my friends and family and education and health and literacy and great looks. These things I can count on. But many of us didn't come from solid middle class backgrounds. Many more every day, sadly. What can they count on?
I regret being sloppy and will try not to be. But I still think that we could do something about the decreasing middle class if we would think a little bit about a "chicken in every pot." Are we starting to look like the days before the fall of Rome or the days before the French Revolution? More and more so, I think. And I can't see how bullying the world and subverting governments and arming ourselves and the whole planet are making things better.
It is obvious to anyone who thinks that we are in a state of decline. Are we going to be like the addict who has to hit rock bottom or death before he have his spiritual awakening? I hope not. The risks are enormous. But the addiction to power and greed and a sense of superiority seems to have many of us in its grip.
From what I have read, Canadian children get a good public education....all over the country. That would be a good place to start in the USA. What is it that we talk about equal opportunity and equality and start kids out with such unequal, haphazard, failing education in our poor sectors that a child knows from his first day of school that he is screwed? How can we hope to be a world leader when we allow this? And don't give me the old line about there not being enough money. It takes will power much more than money. Throwing money at problems very often doesn't solve anything.
Americans used to be famous for their 'can do' attitudes. Have we lost that? Why don't we start a few wars in our country? We could have war on poverty, a war on obesity, a war on preventable diseases, a war on ignorance, a war on depression, a war on abuse, a war on bad food, a war on homelessness, a war on pollution. There are so many ways we could use our righteousness and energy behind something we could export with pride.
I need to take my hand out from the government, my $530 a month, of social security benefit, and find a way to give back because I have my own social security; my friends and family and education and health and literacy and great looks. These things I can count on. But many of us didn't come from solid middle class backgrounds. Many more every day, sadly. What can they count on?
Sunday, February 10, 2013
How Can We Be Proud of Our Military When They Lose Every War?
Yesterday I was thinking of the great expense and emphasis we put on having the greatest military killing machine on the planet. Today I am wondering what value we get for our money. I think that since WW11 we have lost badly every military intervention we have attempted.
It is hard to even remember them all, let alone the justifications for them. Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Iran, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Egypt, Columbia, And so on. Now we are moving our magic into Nigeria, Congo, every African nation where there is trouble.
I think we are basically really bad at the colonization sport. When Spain and England were conquering the world, They did a bang up job. Their colonies lasted hundreds of years. We don't have the what it takes to catch a really big fish in this game. I think it is in part because we can not be honest about our intentions. We use lame excuses like stopping the spread of communism or spreading democracy.
The democracy argument is especially lame because democracy is messy and, son of a bitch, we can't quite control it the way we want to. Those idiots in other countries might remember how we supported their awful dictators and then supported their overthrow and then tried and failed to punish, terrorize the population into putting whomever we back into a democratically elected process.
And how has this worked? Some poor country with not a pot to piss in suddenly becomes the most threatening enemy imaginable. Like El Salvador, like Nicaragua, like Vietnam. We go in acting like the population which is still trying to rid itself of our dictators will rise up like Cuba did behind Fidel and Che and think of us as saviors. Somehow these dumb ignorant, don't understand that we are the good guys, local yokels don't buy what we are selling. Is is perhaps because we don't either? Are we suddenly interested in African nations because we need certain minerals for computer parts? Why are we always going to war with little helpless nations?
And back to my big question: why don't they want to be saved by us? Why can't our military do its job well enough that we can rule the world in peace and take care of other populations in the same enlightened loving manner that we set in our own country? Why do we keep throwing more money at a failed military? Why don't we try first to be honest about what is behind our policy and see if our shaky democracy can support it? I think we don't even believe ourselves anymore.
It is hard to even remember them all, let alone the justifications for them. Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Iran, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Egypt, Columbia, And so on. Now we are moving our magic into Nigeria, Congo, every African nation where there is trouble.
I think we are basically really bad at the colonization sport. When Spain and England were conquering the world, They did a bang up job. Their colonies lasted hundreds of years. We don't have the what it takes to catch a really big fish in this game. I think it is in part because we can not be honest about our intentions. We use lame excuses like stopping the spread of communism or spreading democracy.
The democracy argument is especially lame because democracy is messy and, son of a bitch, we can't quite control it the way we want to. Those idiots in other countries might remember how we supported their awful dictators and then supported their overthrow and then tried and failed to punish, terrorize the population into putting whomever we back into a democratically elected process.
And how has this worked? Some poor country with not a pot to piss in suddenly becomes the most threatening enemy imaginable. Like El Salvador, like Nicaragua, like Vietnam. We go in acting like the population which is still trying to rid itself of our dictators will rise up like Cuba did behind Fidel and Che and think of us as saviors. Somehow these dumb ignorant, don't understand that we are the good guys, local yokels don't buy what we are selling. Is is perhaps because we don't either? Are we suddenly interested in African nations because we need certain minerals for computer parts? Why are we always going to war with little helpless nations?
And back to my big question: why don't they want to be saved by us? Why can't our military do its job well enough that we can rule the world in peace and take care of other populations in the same enlightened loving manner that we set in our own country? Why do we keep throwing more money at a failed military? Why don't we try first to be honest about what is behind our policy and see if our shaky democracy can support it? I think we don't even believe ourselves anymore.
Saturday, February 9, 2013
I can't believe we are even having these discussions!!!
We are having discussions about whether it is all right to assassinate Americans in the USA, about abortion, about whether Obama was born in the USA, about who it is OK to kill with drones in countries we are not at war with, about how proud we are of Obama for killing Bin Laden. We spend more money on our military than all the other countries in the world put together. We ARE the killing country. We have proportionately more people in jail than any other country. We kill school kids, we kill cops, we kill any one anywhere whom we deign a terrorist or a son of or a cousin of or a next door neighbor of a terrorist.
Many of our citizens think we are a Christian nation. Why aren't we unsatisfied in our Christianity to be killers? No where is Christ ever reported to have said, "Go now and kill anyone who might be the enemy of the day." Nelson Mandala was on Ronald Reagan's list of worst terrorists on the planet. Oops. I would venture to guess who most of the world thinks of as the biggest bully and most bewildering nation on the planet. We do not practice what we preach.
Half of our country still thinks we were bombed on 9/11. Bombed? Half of the country thinks capitalism and democracy are the same thing. Some of our country thinks we are the only democracy in the world. Some of our people can't read and write. Many of our children go to bed hungry. Homeless kids sleeping in cars in the winter struggle to go to school. If it weren't for how hurtful this is, it would be have to be looked at as a joke. You couldn't invent something like this in a novel and get anyone to read it. Too far out.
We are so rich and yet we have failing schools all over the country. We have failing health care everywhere. We have a failing criminal justice system. We have a CIA that kills and tortures people and starts unrest in other countries that leads to thousands of people dying. We have the biggest baddest killing machines ever imagined all over the planet and in our own homes. Think about it when you listen to the unholy, ungodly things we are discussing as if we are talking about buying a new car. "And whom do you think we should kill this week?"
Who are we? I'd love to hear from some of my readers in other countries. How do we look from outside? Do we ever consider doing unto others as we would have them do unto us? How many countries have we ravaged in the past 50 years? A lot. How can sane people be having the discussions that we are? We know we can kill anyone anywhere anytime because we do it.
Many of our citizens think we are a Christian nation. Why aren't we unsatisfied in our Christianity to be killers? No where is Christ ever reported to have said, "Go now and kill anyone who might be the enemy of the day." Nelson Mandala was on Ronald Reagan's list of worst terrorists on the planet. Oops. I would venture to guess who most of the world thinks of as the biggest bully and most bewildering nation on the planet. We do not practice what we preach.
Half of our country still thinks we were bombed on 9/11. Bombed? Half of the country thinks capitalism and democracy are the same thing. Some of our country thinks we are the only democracy in the world. Some of our people can't read and write. Many of our children go to bed hungry. Homeless kids sleeping in cars in the winter struggle to go to school. If it weren't for how hurtful this is, it would be have to be looked at as a joke. You couldn't invent something like this in a novel and get anyone to read it. Too far out.
We are so rich and yet we have failing schools all over the country. We have failing health care everywhere. We have a failing criminal justice system. We have a CIA that kills and tortures people and starts unrest in other countries that leads to thousands of people dying. We have the biggest baddest killing machines ever imagined all over the planet and in our own homes. Think about it when you listen to the unholy, ungodly things we are discussing as if we are talking about buying a new car. "And whom do you think we should kill this week?"
Who are we? I'd love to hear from some of my readers in other countries. How do we look from outside? Do we ever consider doing unto others as we would have them do unto us? How many countries have we ravaged in the past 50 years? A lot. How can sane people be having the discussions that we are? We know we can kill anyone anywhere anytime because we do it.
Friday, February 8, 2013
I Only Get Around to Praising the Lord When Things Are Really Bad
I think it is kind of a desperation bargaining move. If I can think of enough good stuff for which to be grateful, then the current unpleasantness will surely go away. I suspect that that is how my devious mind works. Sometimes I wonder if this is a kind of built in part of our make up. I remember when I was quite young having a conversation with God. In my conversation, I promised that if my mother didn't find out what I had done, I would become a nun.
Now for a little Catholic girl in the fifties, making this promise was no small matter. Even then I dreaded having to shave my hair off and wear that black 'habit'. As soon as I made my promise, I was terrified that my mother wouldn't find out. So, in order to avoid God's everlasting wrath, I fessed up. That is pretty twisted, but that was how my mind worked then. I remember the moment clearly. I was standing by the stone wall near the cellar door next to the clothesline and a Rose of Sharon bush. I almost never used that as a bargaining tool again.
I have thought of becoming a nun again. Sometimes I have this fantasy, day dream, about this almost empty convent outside of Antigua, Guatemala. The gardens were gorgeous, colorful peasant women were growing the veggies, the chapel was lovely. The priest only got there once a week. My romantic picture had me praying peacefully in a garden all day. The magenta bougainvilleas rippled in the breeze. You see my picture. I get this escape fantasy when the burdens of life overwhelm me.
The nuns I have known in my adult life worked in the devastated villages of El Salvador and were often the life line for the whole village. They worked from dawn to dusk and then often all night. That was another kind of romantic fantasy for me.
But back in my mundane life, I do find I am sometimes not so very different from that little girl next to the rock wall. I get all up with the gratitude lists when I am feeling the worst. Maybe I'll get a break if I say 'thank you' enough. Maybe I'll get a second piece of pie if I smile enough. Maybe I'll not have to do the work of creating inner piece if I can think of all the good things in my life. And sometimes, just sometimes, a little magic really does happen and I do start to feel better.
Now for a little Catholic girl in the fifties, making this promise was no small matter. Even then I dreaded having to shave my hair off and wear that black 'habit'. As soon as I made my promise, I was terrified that my mother wouldn't find out. So, in order to avoid God's everlasting wrath, I fessed up. That is pretty twisted, but that was how my mind worked then. I remember the moment clearly. I was standing by the stone wall near the cellar door next to the clothesline and a Rose of Sharon bush. I almost never used that as a bargaining tool again.
I have thought of becoming a nun again. Sometimes I have this fantasy, day dream, about this almost empty convent outside of Antigua, Guatemala. The gardens were gorgeous, colorful peasant women were growing the veggies, the chapel was lovely. The priest only got there once a week. My romantic picture had me praying peacefully in a garden all day. The magenta bougainvilleas rippled in the breeze. You see my picture. I get this escape fantasy when the burdens of life overwhelm me.
The nuns I have known in my adult life worked in the devastated villages of El Salvador and were often the life line for the whole village. They worked from dawn to dusk and then often all night. That was another kind of romantic fantasy for me.
But back in my mundane life, I do find I am sometimes not so very different from that little girl next to the rock wall. I get all up with the gratitude lists when I am feeling the worst. Maybe I'll get a break if I say 'thank you' enough. Maybe I'll get a second piece of pie if I smile enough. Maybe I'll not have to do the work of creating inner piece if I can think of all the good things in my life. And sometimes, just sometimes, a little magic really does happen and I do start to feel better.
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
I used to be scornful of facts, now I have a new attitude.
The experience of living in a guest house where the overwhelming majority of guests who come through are from Texas, has been an eye opener for me. Some of these people have 'education', some have made great money in their lifetimes, several were in the so called Peace Corps previously. All are still fighting the Civil War, the Alamo, the last US Presidential Election...all at the same time, all the time. I am talking about all of them (except Tucker, the Texan who doesn't stay here.)
I walk out when the 'discussions' commence. The guys end up having a blast yelling the same side stuff at each other. Fox news in miniature. Facts are utterly irrelevant. The first thing that happens is the "birther" thing. The great constitutional wisdom comes out. The constitution doesn't allow foreign born people to be President. He is a phony. It is a plot to get all our money. We need to arm ourselves more. How many guns can two arms hold at a time? I had never met a real life 'birther!" I thought they were a late night comedy construction. I really did.
One guy asked me if I could stand to listen to the lies on any of the major Networks. I said," No, I listen to Democracy Now! and Al Jazeera. He said he didn't know Al, but Democracy Now! sounds about right. He would shit his pants if he could ever listen to it. The thing is that that they are not prejudiced, they declare this to a man, but the niggers and wetbacks need to be taught a lesson. They are taking over the world. We need smaller government, but many more people on the borders to keep out the intruders. We need to wipe Iran, Syria, and so on, off the face of the earth because they bombed (!) the US on 9/11. Facts are not the thing. Birth control freely given is communist, abortion is a sin, in every instance. What's a poor woman to do? But it doesn't really matter because if you're a Christian, you will not only be saved, but you know who else will be saved when the end times come. Nifty package. You know all this stuff, but I tell you thaat it is shocking to hear it from real people's mouths.
It is no longer nuts blathering on Fox or preachers on the hustle for power. It is real people. I can understand how messed up the old time Republicans must be about the GOP. It doesn't resemble anything I grew up thinking of as conservative. George Bush 11 was the perfect transition guy for this transformation of the GOP. He had the blue blood background (Andover, Yale, and so on-- summers in Maine, Connecticut Yankee grandparents and then the Texas thing and the evangelical transformation.
People talk about Texas leaving the Union, I think it is a done deal.
I walk out when the 'discussions' commence. The guys end up having a blast yelling the same side stuff at each other. Fox news in miniature. Facts are utterly irrelevant. The first thing that happens is the "birther" thing. The great constitutional wisdom comes out. The constitution doesn't allow foreign born people to be President. He is a phony. It is a plot to get all our money. We need to arm ourselves more. How many guns can two arms hold at a time? I had never met a real life 'birther!" I thought they were a late night comedy construction. I really did.
One guy asked me if I could stand to listen to the lies on any of the major Networks. I said," No, I listen to Democracy Now! and Al Jazeera. He said he didn't know Al, but Democracy Now! sounds about right. He would shit his pants if he could ever listen to it. The thing is that that they are not prejudiced, they declare this to a man, but the niggers and wetbacks need to be taught a lesson. They are taking over the world. We need smaller government, but many more people on the borders to keep out the intruders. We need to wipe Iran, Syria, and so on, off the face of the earth because they bombed (!) the US on 9/11. Facts are not the thing. Birth control freely given is communist, abortion is a sin, in every instance. What's a poor woman to do? But it doesn't really matter because if you're a Christian, you will not only be saved, but you know who else will be saved when the end times come. Nifty package. You know all this stuff, but I tell you thaat it is shocking to hear it from real people's mouths.
It is no longer nuts blathering on Fox or preachers on the hustle for power. It is real people. I can understand how messed up the old time Republicans must be about the GOP. It doesn't resemble anything I grew up thinking of as conservative. George Bush 11 was the perfect transition guy for this transformation of the GOP. He had the blue blood background (Andover, Yale, and so on-- summers in Maine, Connecticut Yankee grandparents and then the Texas thing and the evangelical transformation.
People talk about Texas leaving the Union, I think it is a done deal.
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
Dear Abbey
Dear Abbey,
I was sick and now I am better but the gastritis can come back very easily even without the parasites because it was bad and things are still easily aggravated. So, the best advice I can get is not to eat so much hot sauce (hate that one!) and stay away from STRESS!
Now, Dear Abbey, stress is a stalker. I have to hide out and not read the news and not talk to discordant people and not look at the bills, and all that there stuff or the stalker finds me. It even found me at the pool today when some high strung New Yorker lady had been feeding a feral cat (dumb move) and then went to the bathroom. While she was in the bathroom, the cat jumped on her table and knocked over and broke the plate with her lunch on it. The woman screamed at the poor waitress that it was the hotel's fault for letting the cat in and they owed her a new lunch and what kind of a place was it? Now, the thing is that we all thought she was really stupid to feed the cat. The pool and the hotel are all part of the big wide world here. There is no gate the hotel would let the cat in... everything is wide open. It is the tropics, for god's sake.
This was not a personal stressor, but kind of lurking stress, dancing around my tranquility. A more personal stress can enter my orbit via a distressing phone call, a series of bummer thoughts. There are myriad entry points. You may have experienced some. I get one every month when ATT gets my phone bill wrong and threatens to cut me off. I had set up a five month suspended service thing (you even have to pay them to have no service) and this year they can't seem to remember from month to month. It is not easy to get things fixed up with that company in the best of times, but it is really hard from a Nica phone. Stress.
It is a major stress to get phone calls with bad news or distressing situations that I can't help. Abbey, you know all this. So my question is, should I, for the benefit of my stomach, take up some serious smoking of marijuana? I mean, I can work things out sometimes by prayer and meditation or 'reasoning' with friends, but maybe if I was already nicely stoned, the first impulse of the stress wouldn't hit my stomach and cause the initial damage. Maybe, if I smoked enough, I could get to the perfect place of "whatever" and end up being a much healthier person. What do you suggest?
I thank you in advance fro your help. I have read that marijuana is not a gateway drug and I really need to be vigilant about my good health.
I was sick and now I am better but the gastritis can come back very easily even without the parasites because it was bad and things are still easily aggravated. So, the best advice I can get is not to eat so much hot sauce (hate that one!) and stay away from STRESS!
Now, Dear Abbey, stress is a stalker. I have to hide out and not read the news and not talk to discordant people and not look at the bills, and all that there stuff or the stalker finds me. It even found me at the pool today when some high strung New Yorker lady had been feeding a feral cat (dumb move) and then went to the bathroom. While she was in the bathroom, the cat jumped on her table and knocked over and broke the plate with her lunch on it. The woman screamed at the poor waitress that it was the hotel's fault for letting the cat in and they owed her a new lunch and what kind of a place was it? Now, the thing is that we all thought she was really stupid to feed the cat. The pool and the hotel are all part of the big wide world here. There is no gate the hotel would let the cat in... everything is wide open. It is the tropics, for god's sake.
This was not a personal stressor, but kind of lurking stress, dancing around my tranquility. A more personal stress can enter my orbit via a distressing phone call, a series of bummer thoughts. There are myriad entry points. You may have experienced some. I get one every month when ATT gets my phone bill wrong and threatens to cut me off. I had set up a five month suspended service thing (you even have to pay them to have no service) and this year they can't seem to remember from month to month. It is not easy to get things fixed up with that company in the best of times, but it is really hard from a Nica phone. Stress.
It is a major stress to get phone calls with bad news or distressing situations that I can't help. Abbey, you know all this. So my question is, should I, for the benefit of my stomach, take up some serious smoking of marijuana? I mean, I can work things out sometimes by prayer and meditation or 'reasoning' with friends, but maybe if I was already nicely stoned, the first impulse of the stress wouldn't hit my stomach and cause the initial damage. Maybe, if I smoked enough, I could get to the perfect place of "whatever" and end up being a much healthier person. What do you suggest?
I thank you in advance fro your help. I have read that marijuana is not a gateway drug and I really need to be vigilant about my good health.
Monday, February 4, 2013
Rosa Parks,an inspiring activist
Why do we have this thing that we do when we soften and sweeten people like Rosa Parks and Dr. King and Gandhi. They were steel, not Wonder Bread. She was not a sweet little old lady who happened to be too tired to give her seat to a white man on a bus one day. She was a woman who knew that the status quo had to change, that segregation was wrong, that she was of equal value as a human being to any white man.
Today she would have been 100 years old, so in the mid-fifties, she was in her mid-forties. She was an activist. Her father was an activist. It was no accident that she was the spark that ignited the Montgomery Bus Boycott. There were many fortuitous events that helped the movement. One great thing that happened was that a young minister arrived in town and he turned out to be a great speaker and an inspired leader: Dr. King. The other great surprise was that the people supported the boycott the day of her arraignment and then voted to continue it. Read about it! It is one of the most courageous and trans formative moments in the history of the USA in my lifetime.
The great movers and shakers of history should not be watered down in our telling of their stories. They knew they were right and they were willing to stake their lives on what they knew was right. Dr. King and Gandhi lost their lives and became martyrs. Whom do we remember with reverence year after year? We will forget the names of the redneck racist cops who beat them up. Many will not even remember who ran the countries when these troubles occurred, but the people who spoke truth to power went down in history. Who do we want to be?
I get very angry when I see injustice. The Dalai Lama says that anger can be of real value if it is a motivating force to make the world a better place. Of late, I have been in a bit of a coma. I want to do some good works in the world. If I look at my personal story, my next cause will probably find me, not the other way around. I am getting my fighting Irish ready for action.
Today she would have been 100 years old, so in the mid-fifties, she was in her mid-forties. She was an activist. Her father was an activist. It was no accident that she was the spark that ignited the Montgomery Bus Boycott. There were many fortuitous events that helped the movement. One great thing that happened was that a young minister arrived in town and he turned out to be a great speaker and an inspired leader: Dr. King. The other great surprise was that the people supported the boycott the day of her arraignment and then voted to continue it. Read about it! It is one of the most courageous and trans formative moments in the history of the USA in my lifetime.
The great movers and shakers of history should not be watered down in our telling of their stories. They knew they were right and they were willing to stake their lives on what they knew was right. Dr. King and Gandhi lost their lives and became martyrs. Whom do we remember with reverence year after year? We will forget the names of the redneck racist cops who beat them up. Many will not even remember who ran the countries when these troubles occurred, but the people who spoke truth to power went down in history. Who do we want to be?
I get very angry when I see injustice. The Dalai Lama says that anger can be of real value if it is a motivating force to make the world a better place. Of late, I have been in a bit of a coma. I want to do some good works in the world. If I look at my personal story, my next cause will probably find me, not the other way around. I am getting my fighting Irish ready for action.
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Everyone Has a Million Stories
For me, that is what makes it all so interesting. I love stories, fiction or 'true'. Our stories become truer as we relate them. Yesterday, our new fried George had a grueling day. George is in his mid-eighties. He was here in Nica with the Peace Corps when he was seventy. He came back for a visit last week and is staying with us. His grueling day was caused by his best friend loosing her shit on him.
It is my observation that a lot of gringos loose their bearings here if they stay too long or don't have a grounding influence in their lives. Especially women. Especially women who decide to help others and then feel used. This can be a crushing experience. Especially women who use up their 'nut' helping others and then find themselves alone when their health or their money runs out. Al this seems to be happening to George's friend.
Perhaps this happens more than I know in our country. I do know that it doesn't happen in Nicaraguan for Nicaraguans. There are no 'homes' here for elderly or sick. The family and God are the two highest priorities. Practically every front door has a granny sitting in the breeze, living out her days. It is hard to have an old sick person around all the time, but here it is the right thing to do and it gets done. Knowing this will be passed on when your turn comes is the best insurance anyone can have.
Last night, George was pretty devastated by the actions and condition of his old friend. She got very mad at him and then left him angry. Our conversation worried the subject for a while. Then George started to tell a few stories from his past, the good stories. I liked that. He was lamenting a bit how we are missing neighborliness in these days, but he was also working to bring back our faith in good.
He left home in Dallas right before he was sixteen to go to work in a processing plant. This was during the depression and work and food were hard to come by. He was the oldest of three boys who heard one day that they were hiring in Waco for a construction job. The boys got up at four AM and hitch hiked all day only to be rejected at the job site for their youth and inexperience. They had no choice but to turn around and hitch home.
There was little traffic because there were few people who could afford gas. Finally a man with a hay truck picked them up and had them bury themselves in the hay to keep warm. Sadly he wasn't going very far. He gave them a ride to the tiny Texas town where he lived and left them off near a diner. Between the three of them, they had $.25. The diner was about to close but there was still a customer , a farmer, sitting in the corner. The boys went to the counter and read the posted menu. There was stew and bread for twenty-five cents. The one kid ordered one. When the otherrs were asked what they wanted, they said they weren't hungry. (They only hadn't eaten or drunk for 28 hours at that point).
The owner said "One stew, one bread, coming up." He went to the kitchen and brought out the big pot of stew that was left from the day and a loaf of bread. He put out three bowls and said "This is my $.25 special. The boys ate the whole loaf of bread and cleaned out the pot. Then the farmer came by the counter and asked them where they were sleeping. They said they were going to hitch and sleep by the road. The farmer said no one would be driving so later, but a freight train came by and went into a siding every night to let a passenger train go by. He gave them each a gallon of water and drove them to the train siding and they got to Dallas by early morning.
Good story , George. He said it was like that everywhere during the Great Depression and even more so during WW11. People had each others backs. I love that picture, and I loved the warm glow we all felt as we went to bed.
It is my observation that a lot of gringos loose their bearings here if they stay too long or don't have a grounding influence in their lives. Especially women. Especially women who decide to help others and then feel used. This can be a crushing experience. Especially women who use up their 'nut' helping others and then find themselves alone when their health or their money runs out. Al this seems to be happening to George's friend.
Perhaps this happens more than I know in our country. I do know that it doesn't happen in Nicaraguan for Nicaraguans. There are no 'homes' here for elderly or sick. The family and God are the two highest priorities. Practically every front door has a granny sitting in the breeze, living out her days. It is hard to have an old sick person around all the time, but here it is the right thing to do and it gets done. Knowing this will be passed on when your turn comes is the best insurance anyone can have.
Last night, George was pretty devastated by the actions and condition of his old friend. She got very mad at him and then left him angry. Our conversation worried the subject for a while. Then George started to tell a few stories from his past, the good stories. I liked that. He was lamenting a bit how we are missing neighborliness in these days, but he was also working to bring back our faith in good.
He left home in Dallas right before he was sixteen to go to work in a processing plant. This was during the depression and work and food were hard to come by. He was the oldest of three boys who heard one day that they were hiring in Waco for a construction job. The boys got up at four AM and hitch hiked all day only to be rejected at the job site for their youth and inexperience. They had no choice but to turn around and hitch home.
There was little traffic because there were few people who could afford gas. Finally a man with a hay truck picked them up and had them bury themselves in the hay to keep warm. Sadly he wasn't going very far. He gave them a ride to the tiny Texas town where he lived and left them off near a diner. Between the three of them, they had $.25. The diner was about to close but there was still a customer , a farmer, sitting in the corner. The boys went to the counter and read the posted menu. There was stew and bread for twenty-five cents. The one kid ordered one. When the otherrs were asked what they wanted, they said they weren't hungry. (They only hadn't eaten or drunk for 28 hours at that point).
The owner said "One stew, one bread, coming up." He went to the kitchen and brought out the big pot of stew that was left from the day and a loaf of bread. He put out three bowls and said "This is my $.25 special. The boys ate the whole loaf of bread and cleaned out the pot. Then the farmer came by the counter and asked them where they were sleeping. They said they were going to hitch and sleep by the road. The farmer said no one would be driving so later, but a freight train came by and went into a siding every night to let a passenger train go by. He gave them each a gallon of water and drove them to the train siding and they got to Dallas by early morning.
Good story , George. He said it was like that everywhere during the Great Depression and even more so during WW11. People had each others backs. I love that picture, and I loved the warm glow we all felt as we went to bed.
Friday, February 1, 2013
Yearning for the Good Old Days
I could go on and on about what is missing in our lives today. I could go on and one about what has been enriching our lives today. I am pretty ambiguous about some of the things that make our lives easier. The fact that we now have the convenience of being our own travel agent. Mmm. Because I am impatient and because I am not that handy with computers, sometimes I yearn for the days when I just called my friendly (obsequious) travel agent and within a few hours she called back with exactly what I wanted and the tickets arrived the next day. Huge help. But on the other side of that, I had to carry the tickets around for months if we took a long trip, knowing that if I lost them or they were stolen, all was lost. Good side, bad side.
But one of the deals I miss the most in our adventures in Central America is using private planes. In the good old days, 30 years ago, I could go to a private plane airport in whatever country I was in and get us a plane ride within minutes to where ever we wanted to go. If I had my kids with me, it always ended up costing $100. Sometimes an hour and a half flight would save us days of overland agony; bad food, worse hotel rooms, and general discomfort. Sometimes we had to awaken the pilot. Sometimes we had to figure out whether he was sober enough to fly, sometimes I had to spend a little extra when I thought the gas tank looked too low to take off.
It was always fun and easy. If I was alone I could usually hitch hike a ride on a private plane (in the USA). People who fly a lot alone often like company. So last year in Costa Rica, I called up the private airport and asked for an estimate to fly from San Jose to the east coast of CR. The price quoted was staggering. Everything is expensive in Costa Rica, but this was off the charts. Last summer I went to the private plane airport in Ashland, Oregon and queried them about flights to SF, CA. The prices were not staggering, but the difference I experienced was that everything was so corporate that there was little room for flexibility. You couldn't even get into the room to schmooze the owners and pilots. (Of course, Oregon is famous to me for being righteous about rules. I have been yelled at by passing motorists for walking outside of the cross walk lines.) So, perhaps in another state, I could still hitch a ride from a small plane pilot.
I like hitch hiking in general. In college towns when I was young, students didn't arrive their freshman year with their new Saab convertible, they arrived with their thumb ready to go. I don't think it is a good idea these days. (Are their more perverts these days? We know more people carry guns around.) All around bad idea.
A current good place to hitch is sail boats. More lonely people in need of helping hands. Any Yacht club in Central America is good hunting ground to find a sailboat hitch to a far away port. There are two main dangers to this from my perspective. Firstly, you might find yourself with the world's most boring person who might also be a boat Hitler. (What happens to men when they own a boat? It often isn't pretty.) And secondly, if you are a woman I think you need to hitch with a friend. A big strong handsome friend, preferably - for obvious reasons.
How did I get here today? I was talking to an older man this morning, George from Houston, who got to know Central America back when he would fly his Cessna from Houston to where ever he could get to on two tanks of gas ($30) each. It got me to thinking about the good old days and the good old ways.
But one of the deals I miss the most in our adventures in Central America is using private planes. In the good old days, 30 years ago, I could go to a private plane airport in whatever country I was in and get us a plane ride within minutes to where ever we wanted to go. If I had my kids with me, it always ended up costing $100. Sometimes an hour and a half flight would save us days of overland agony; bad food, worse hotel rooms, and general discomfort. Sometimes we had to awaken the pilot. Sometimes we had to figure out whether he was sober enough to fly, sometimes I had to spend a little extra when I thought the gas tank looked too low to take off.
It was always fun and easy. If I was alone I could usually hitch hike a ride on a private plane (in the USA). People who fly a lot alone often like company. So last year in Costa Rica, I called up the private airport and asked for an estimate to fly from San Jose to the east coast of CR. The price quoted was staggering. Everything is expensive in Costa Rica, but this was off the charts. Last summer I went to the private plane airport in Ashland, Oregon and queried them about flights to SF, CA. The prices were not staggering, but the difference I experienced was that everything was so corporate that there was little room for flexibility. You couldn't even get into the room to schmooze the owners and pilots. (Of course, Oregon is famous to me for being righteous about rules. I have been yelled at by passing motorists for walking outside of the cross walk lines.) So, perhaps in another state, I could still hitch a ride from a small plane pilot.
I like hitch hiking in general. In college towns when I was young, students didn't arrive their freshman year with their new Saab convertible, they arrived with their thumb ready to go. I don't think it is a good idea these days. (Are their more perverts these days? We know more people carry guns around.) All around bad idea.
A current good place to hitch is sail boats. More lonely people in need of helping hands. Any Yacht club in Central America is good hunting ground to find a sailboat hitch to a far away port. There are two main dangers to this from my perspective. Firstly, you might find yourself with the world's most boring person who might also be a boat Hitler. (What happens to men when they own a boat? It often isn't pretty.) And secondly, if you are a woman I think you need to hitch with a friend. A big strong handsome friend, preferably - for obvious reasons.
How did I get here today? I was talking to an older man this morning, George from Houston, who got to know Central America back when he would fly his Cessna from Houston to where ever he could get to on two tanks of gas ($30) each. It got me to thinking about the good old days and the good old ways.
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