Words

Are words important? I noted to a fellow bus rider today that, though we were at the end of a two hour journey that normally takes one, that we were, nevertheless, getting home. I had heard the complaints, grunts, curses from people claiming the metro people didn't care, the declarations that they didn't know what they were doing, the suggestions that the metro was always late. I told my fellow rider that it was sometimes difficult to not absorb some of the negativity around me, but that no matter the length of the trip, I do always get home. He nodded, seeming to be in agreement.

We then talked about recycled building materials for our houses.

Drama

When the wind howls, its mournful, wild, willful and dramatic at the same time. When it whistles in the eves, I hear music, sprites, play. It rattles my metal roof some nights, and recently, I've noticed that it's comforting, like the clock ticking down stairs, the sun rising in the morning. I like reminders that I am not alone, and that I am not lone. The poems written around me, in the sand, soil, shimmering water, leaves, wind, rain, snow, summer haze, are more real than the words I might use to conjure my own.

Wouldn't it be a good thing to keep balance, to stop pushing these so often gentle reminders of our coexistence to angrier and angrier expressions of stress? Snow is horizontal now, heavy, warm flakes falling fast, transforming again the already beautiful landscape, no inconvenience at all.

It's so easy

The same way a river flows, so to can love. A book I read many years ago is entitled, Don't Push the River (by Barry Stevens). I've forgotten how important that command is, and have been pushing the river now, for some time.

Writing this is how I organize realizations - it's how I know, what I do not need to 'know'.

Peace.
AF.

Drama

II

Shining sharp, bright, cold, the comfort of the moon, a constant cycle keeping me from being too much day to day, and reminding me how short the lifespan of such drama can be. I see her every 2 weeks, waxing, waning or hanging full 'above'. As my day started last Wednesday, the moon's was setting in this hemisphere. She accompanied me to work, giving me more than the day ahead, the people snoozing around me on the bus, and my own fatigue, to ponder.

I've been pondering happiness, and how simple the pleasure of looking at the moon is. I found that one of the countries/regions in Asia claiming to be the inspiration behind Shangri-la, has been moving toward's happiness as a primary goal in governance. Bhutan's ruler was a monarch until a few years ago, and peacefully and willingly converted the country to a democracy. They are known to be the happiest people on the planet, and their happiness was planned. As I think about this, I find it terribly difficult, being the concerned citizen I am, being unconcerned with my self, to avoid identifying reasons that one country can mindfully pursue happiness, while another cannot. Materialism naturally pops into my mind as a potential culprit, and materialism came about because of the choices and the abundance we found 350 years ago in the 'new world'. For whatever reason, our system of living, even the 'pursuit of happiness' have become a euphemism for pursuit of wealth, which results in more unhappiness.

The value placed on materials is artificial. I've been thinking for years now about diamonds, and how they are so valuable, not because they're rare, but because they are artificially controlled AND beautiful objects. Diamonds are a prime example of misplaced pursuit. One does not need a diamond, and yet not long ago, they were ubiquitous expressions of love and success.

Every time I hear a value ascribed to an object now, I think of whether that object is part of a commodified happiness, or is it a need that facilitates happiness.

Onward, into the next moon cycle, our own diamond constant in the sky.

Drama

The Book of the Living:




I

Crystal encasement, the dual beauty and hazard of ice, sheathing, magnifying, distorting, transporting everything to another place and time, a mummification of the beautiful bark and bud of our time. A look, perhaps a second look, out the door, window, and the landscape floods into me like the rush of fresh air taken when I've forgotten to breath. When I am open, it floods in, emotional and more real, perhaps, than the other drama, the conversations, the news, the tits and tats of moving through a day's routine, of schedules, of unmissables. And so, there are two dramas, the one defined in part by television, by necessity, by blind ambition, and there is this other one, the one that I must have presence enough to be absent enough to feel.

Today, in a conversation, I spoke of the heirlooms that define us (we're family), and voiced the question, 'what of them?' Even if I had children, what is that object that my grandmother's mother touched every day, what is the bear I had as a child, what is the portrait, but a look into eyes long dead, seeing a face with one half of one half of one half of one half of my mother in it, and yet I recognize my mother in her great grandmother, I recognize myself in that bear, feel home when touching that object my great grandmother touched every day. And so I live now and then at once.

For a while, I was vehemently anti-establishment, which meant effectively, that I thought I knew things I did not end up knowing. I thought it was someone else's fault. That 'it' was a fault at all, was wrong. But I was right too, because I was discovering passion and meaning in my life. I discovered, though may not have realized it, that I didn't have to have anything but what I have to be me. My teen dreams were brochures for a scheme, and I distinctly recall thinking that I wanted, or wanted to do many things that I don't feel a glimmer for anymore. We change, yes - but we also recognize. 'Our truths' are not others' truths. We recognize that we're alone in the world, and home is as great an adventure as Kathmandu, and for me, it is home, instinct. It is what I have, it is the answer, all the answers, and inside of it, I can do, be, swim and swarm and drink and love.

As I peered out into the cold shimmering icy wet morning, I realized that with all that seems missing to me, I yet have everything. What is to discover, but what is right there in front of me? I can dream of, and pursue magic elsewhere, in the mountains and mysterious mythologies, or I can have them in my own back yard in this prescient reality that is my life. I can ask questions, or I can live with questions. I can pursue depth, or I can enjoy it. I can marvel about water, or I can immerse myself in it, and feel it. Today, I could have disposed of everything, but I realized the amount of time it would have taken would have surmounted the gesture, yes, only a gesture. For every action, there is an equal and opposing action. This is true and is truly debatable. If we consider an action to be movement, then there might physically appear to have to be a counter-action. But stillness is action, and I wonder if the opposing force is a force at all, if it is also stillness.

Music was once a significant part of my life. Music spoke for me, the lyrics' clever and wonderful ways to say important things, like I love you. Music was again someone else's ideas adopted, adapted, co-opted by me, my publicity agent, a skill. And I've found new meaning in music now, only that which makes me move a little, not often a lot, that which tells me something about another, that I don't want, but that I like. I have now found that the music I enjoy most is the music that pulses along side my heart, that expresses despite the lyric, emotion, motion. Clever words and mystery no longer speak for me, my eyes speak for me, my heart speaks for me, and the music that beats with me, is me.