Stardust

I am just a modest little

blogger

who, when I began this modest little

blog,

thought I could say something

that would impact someone.

I've since come to realize

that my little blog is just a blip 

on the larger screen,

like a distant star

in a distant galaxy,

in a landscape of babble.

I'm always a little shocked 

and amazed

when someone responds to a post I've written.

It's sort of like a voice from the other side of the universe.

And for those of you who are reading this:

It's nice to know you.

*

I ramble on

about whatever, and my words spin out

into the ether, sort of like that wonderful

to that film Contact,  that I think

Carl Sagan helped produce.

Remember that?

I kind of imagine the internet that way,

this scramble of voices

of impulses

of history,

emanating from our earth,

embracing the earth,

producing lasting traces

of we,

our history.

Cosmos left a big impact on me,

when it first came out.

It was one of those media events,

like the first time we landed on the moon,

that asked me

and everyone else,

to see our planet

from elsewhere,

to put our planet in its true perspective.

This is a fairly awesome thing to do,

in the truest sense of the word

awesome.

I've been recently made aware of another film,

that places us back into that space perspective,

and asks us to look at earth

from space

and consider our responsibilities.

It's called Continuum, and from what I can see,

its makers are/were looking for funding to 

suport it at Kickstarter.

I think it's worth it.

Here's a trailer for it:

I'm getting used to the fact

I'm a blip on the internet screen,

and we

as a race, perhaps,

are getting more used to the fact

that we are but a blip

in the universe,

yet when you're 

an inhabitant of the blip,

well, it's worth taking the time to take care of it.

Indeed, 

as I've said before,

that particular issue overshadows

all else.

without milk on 'em

yeah

Cheerios

wikipedia

without milk on 'em

they're better than

Fritos

cookforestcook

Please, quote me on this, if you agree!

Feelin' Groovy

One thing that many people don't know about

Buffalo, New York,

which is where I live,

is that 

on any given morning

I can walk out my front door 

and smell

the smell

of Cheerios baking.

That's right,

Buffalo smells like Cheerios.

borninBuffalo

And it's not an unappealing smell at all.

In fact, after I moved to this city,

about nine years ago,

it was one of the things that really enamored me

to this much misunderstood town.

It's true,

when driving into this city,

one of the first things encountered

is the monstrous, haunting carcasses of former industry,

in the form of grain elevators.

Grain elevators are one of the inventions that 

Buffalo, at its peak, gave to the world,

which may not seem all that big of a deal until

I find myself someplace like Barcelona, Spain,

where I was a few weeks ago,

and, on looking out at the busy harbor,

and what do I see but

a couple grain elevators:

This does make my chest swell

with a modicum of pride,

but it's a difficult one to explain,

so I generally opt not to.

But I felt it necessary to explain the grain elevator

phenomenon

in the context of the subject of

Cheerios in Buffalo,

because

as one travels along the industrial waterfront,

past rows and rows of empty grain elevators,

one inevitably encounters this:

The General Mills factory, one of the working industries

and proud employers in this town.

In this next photo, from Buffalo Rising,

you can even see the Cheerio smoke

rising out and wafting over the city.

And that's a much better scent than your typical industrial smells, I'd say.

Now, you may be wondering, why have I decided,

after so many weeks and months of silence

to write about the fact that

Buffalo smells like Cheerios?

Well, it is a notable thing,

and I did indeed smell Cheerios

just the other day.

But I also was made aware of this commercial,

and the fact that it's making some people upset:

Yes, it elecited so many nasty, petty racist comments that

YouTube had to disable comments on it.

And that upsets me quite a bit,

because I think it's a very sweet,

brave

advertisement.

And furthermore, 

it makes me so proud

to live in a city

that smells like Cheerios.

wrappedinfoil 

Coming out from a long cold winter. . . .

Wow,

I'm in the Spring

of 2013. 

We made it to the other side.

I will admit, I've been way too busy

to even find words.

I'm deluged in the words of others.

The words of young people,

some of whom

are strangers in the land of written words.

Still,

I could write for hours about what my students say.

I heard a great idea today:

A student named Anthony presented an argumentative paper to me,

and his thesis was that we have to train everyone to be able to recognize

the signs of depression. 

And I said:

Everyone?  How can we do that?

And he said:

Change the education system.

He went on to say:

We worry about physical health,

and we have to take classes about that,

but why not mental and emotional health?

He proposed changes to curricula, beginning at the lowest grades,

in which we teach young people about their emotions.

We can teach them, he said, about the fact that they'll

be sad and happy and frustrated and angry

all in the same day,

and that's normal.

We can teach them ways to manage

their emotional states.

(Like yoga and meditation, I would add.  He didn't say that.)

And we can make it mandatory, Anthony said, throughout their education.

Because our emotional needs change, you know?

Yeah, I know, I said.

Anthony also thought we should teach, in this class,

morality and ethics,

separate from any religion.

So the young know that's it feels best

when they do the right thing.

As Anthony left my office, I thanked him.

And I felt exceedingly 

happy.

Because I think Anthony has a fabulous idea,

that could change the world,

and if Anthony,

and the thousands of young psychology majors in the world

all feel the same way about this,

well, 

we may be going in the right direction,

after all.

mantra

                                           

Every day                                                    

        

                                                           is

Another day

                                                            to

practice

                             being happy.

To be it

                                                          despite

the hurt;

                                                          to smile

through the fog

                                                           to love

through the apathy

                                                          until

You can do it

                                                           everyday

                                 without a hitch.

                                    Today is

                                  another day to

                                    practice

                                  being happy.

                                  being happy.

                                  being happy.

                                  being happy.

                                  being happy.

Love Poem For Today

(from: senior hiker )

My grandmother always said

the honeymoon's over

when you fart in bed,

and then the test of true love starts,

a love that sometimes ignores the heart

and demands a patience greater than

that of the wisest fisherman.

Well,

 you and I are growing old

and seek a fairy tale more real

where companionship is the moral

and star-struck ever-afters, vile,

and bed a place to sleep,

to caress,

to talk and cry

and

to die.

I'll lie by your side,

my gentle prince

and forgive fragrant emissions.

They mark a life

well lived, and full

of wisdom and

forgiveness.

Of pain and disappointment too,

and respect for every hour,

and the worship

of the sacred

in a budding flower.

This love I welcome:

well worn,

flawed,

but always new,

and pray I give the same

to you.

(photo by me)

True Communion

( from: Food52 )

There are words we pass

To pass the time

And words of civility,

And words, like coins,

That fill that rhyme,

And too many of acrimony.

These words we spend

Without a thought,

Disregarding the ceremony

That occurs each time

We pass a word,

Like bread,

From mouth to mouth.

There is a wordspring,

Deep inside, where

Language lingers,

Brooding,

Aching to bond the hearts and minds

Of each sad, solitary human.

So we must treat the sharing of words,

As it should be, as

Communion,

Because in sharing words,

Like bread,

We find immortal union.

(From: Chopra )

Phone Home with E.T.

You can't change the world,

but you can change yourself.

This man is brilliant.

Meditate with me:

OK Go "All is Not Lost"

I lost track of this band for a little while.

They're worth paying attention to.

This is a year old, but the sentiment is, 

well,

timeless:

bushels

via texasbasket

. . . and Jesus said, lest you be dead

don't hide your light under

bushels.

That bushel, friend, is the skin

you're in:

the woven textured artifice

often

mistaken

for who we are meant to be.

The light, dear friend, grows dim each time 

you deny its luminosity.

It guides yourself

to your

Self,

It is the christ within.

As long as you resign your Self to pine

away in the vehicle given

for living and doing on

the earth,

you are destined to

die,

and live and

die,

and live and 

die

again and again.

via artnet

the work of Artist Shoichiro Matsuoka, found at createyourcosmos

Meditate.

Dive in.

Have no fear,

when you let your light shine,

the body, too, 

will follow,

magnificently

Also with gratitude to createyourcosmos - a fabulous blog! and the artists Daniel Franke and Cedric Kiefer 

return to the garden

(all photos by Makropoulos)

At the moment when the infamous residents

of the original Garden Eden

ate the apple, something happened:

the human brain began so quickly to grow, so

much so it began to rival

God's

.

And not knowing this new power they so quickly had in hand,

they panicked.

If they had not panicked so

A + E may have discovered,
far too early,
 the distinctive 

pleasure of mind, the intense

satisfaction one can gain

from imagining worlds.

Ultimately, they, both woman and man,

might have gotten lost

in their own individual revery.

Like two fools in front of a TV,

they would have climbed inside themselves

-- godlike, indeed, one and only --

and that would have been the end

of the human race,

before it even began.

But that was not the plan.

God had intended all along for woman

and man

to make manifest the many dimensions of Him/

Her/

(Whatever pronoun we must deploy

to speak of God.)

But if so early in the game

the human players got distracted,

it would be the end.

Amen.

So God, in Her infinite wisdom,

put an end to that:

He decided that humans, 

more than any other species,

would have the distinct ability

to take intense pleasure in the act

of coupling, and presto!

it worked. 

Man and wife produced

legions, and with that too came

                         jealousy

                         pride

                         leachory

                               treachory

                             and 

                         falsehood =

all the products of minds misused

and bodies abused, in the 

lusty quest for self stimulation.

But meanwhile we have reproduced

indeed, and invented History

(written by the few, not always the wise;

the wise, in solitude, advanced technology).

And here we are now 

at the crest of infinity.

In our spare time,

we have created a facsimile 

of God=Expansive Mind,

but in our limitations

and morbid manipulations

we cannot see

that God is with us

and in us

right now.

O man, listen to birdsong.

O woman, cease your labors.

The earth pulses with life;

we are her masters.

It is our responsibility to care for her

as it is our appointed duty.

In the word huma, hu represents spirit, and the word mah in Arabic means water.

In English the word "human" explains two facts which are characteristic of humanity:

hu means God and man means mind, which comes from the Sanskrit mana, mind being the ordinary person.

The two words united represent the idea of the God-conscious person; in other words, hu, God, is in all things and being, but it is man by whom He is known.  "Human" therefore may be said to mean God-conscious, God realized, or God-man.    from: The Music of Life, by Hazrat Inayat Khan

Rainbows in the Trash

And as the sweet cicadas call,

in this, only early July,

I wonder if the world will

ever be the same again.

The bees have burrowed in the soil,

and herbs have gone to seed;

will August bring an early fall?

Will autumn quickly recede?

Then I found these rainbows in the trash

and captured them for you.

Do not despair, it's only hiding

the earth, we know, will renew--

It's just waiting for you

too,

to renew.

The Shimmering Self

So hard to believe my material self
                                           is the very least of me,
not meant to accompany me
                                           into eternity.

Over the centuries, I've grown so very
                                                      very
                                             intimate
with my curves and lines,
with my cracks and groans,
with my nails and toes,
with my hair, and every
crevice of me.
So very hard to believe my physical
                                           disposability.

( with gratitude to The Happiness Rx )

And yet, when breathing deep,
I find my shimmering self exceeds
my mortal limits, is only impeded
by my body's desires, but smiles
              compassionately at my body's
needs for snacking on the fruits of the earth --
                air and sea, wine and bread,
                you and me
                together --
gentle pastimes of the time
we spend clasped in this earth's embrace.

But if one sincerely meditates
one finds the lines of our bodies
only hold us close; we seek to fly,
and we can fly
infinitely.

(photo by Makropoulos)

Why
is it that we fear our dying?
It is because the body
which is a somatic entity
loves the vibrancy
                   the spirit endows it with.


The body is, essentially,
a parasite that sucks the life
off the spiritual source
that created it.
No sin in that, we live mutually,
striving to see clearly
                         the duality
               of each and all.

~ ~ ~

Now what the hell
             you may implore
does this have to do
               with the cost of oil,
               the unending wars,
               the embittered child,
               the Tony awards,
               with Barack Obama,
               or with Mitt or George?
               With the rising debt
               with the setting empire
               with Madonna's tit
               or the unpredictable weather?

With all the awful news today
Why is it that this is all
                I can say?


Because it is all I can say.

It's hard to believe,
yet it may be time
to believe
that our materials selves
are the very least of we
not meant to accompany
us
into eternity.

nature

(Huffington Post: "Human Induced Ocean Warming" )

The Elf in Self

stonecarver

~ ~ ~

The self, transformed

becomes an elf,

on its way to being

stone.

~ ~ ~

fanpop

The elf in the self is a 

solitary soul,

sly and suspicious 

of snakes;

when met on the road,

she is playful and kind and certain

society's rules are a guise.

The elf self wants only to be self

unencumbered

by rules and opinions

of others.

And then, we'll agree

that the loss of the "e"

leaves

life's consonants

that must be whispered,

not hissed or aspirated

but rolled on the lips

and tongue

felt by the body

like a kiss.

Self as a word,

deconstructed,

brings us solely to now,

wholly to how

we can give to each other --

by discovering the elf,

and removing the vowels

we are left with the body

the shape of the utterance,

the impulse to say,

the impulse to stay.

sdakotabirds

The Art of the Exhale

I just started reading Pema Chödrön's book When Things Fall Apart,

and I have been trying to practice her meditation technique of 

making the outbreath, the exhale, the object of meditation:

". . . -the elusive, fluid, everchanging out-breath, ungraspable and yet

continuously arising.  When you breathe in, it's like a pause

or a gap.

There is nothing particular to do except wait for the next out-breath." (19)

annawojtczak

~ ~

Last Tuesday, I returned to the States after my second trip abroad

this year.  It was a relief to be home,

and to return to Normalcy, though, quite frankly,

I fear Normalcy 

-- "Normalcy" is that strange state we all slip into

when we are surrounded by the familiar,

where we take things for granted,

take each other for granted,

walk down the street where we live and don't look at the beauty,

etc. etc. etc. . . . 

but I did not come home to Normalcy, really; I came home to a phone message

from an old friend telling me my former husband was dying.

In actual fact, he died that night,

and for 24 hours or so I was barraged by phone calls from people

who associated me with him, everyone wanting to be

the person who told me he had passed on.

Of all the calls I received, the one that moved me most was from my old friend A.,

who happened to be there in the hospital when my ex breathed his last.

A. called me within 30 minutes of the death, and he was indeed the first to tell me.

Truly, I was deeply moved that he shared that moment with me:

I could hear the awe and horror still in A.'s voice as he described the scene:

my former mate had cancer, you see, and it was in his lungs,

in his whole body, A. finally admitted,

(I actually had had contact with my ex- over the past months,

and knew he was quite ill, though he would't tell me

exactly how ill)

and he had a breathing tube,

and A. explained the sound of the breath

even with the tube,

and I recalled the times I've stood by one near death,

and all I could really focus on 

was breath.

The inhale, yes,

the agonizing intake,

but more poignantly,

the exhale --

that moment of release

and relief

that anyone at hand knew could be the last,

and I was happy to hear

that the final breath was a gentle one,

a peaceful one 

orchestrated by Mahler, played by one of his friends. 

You see, exhales are the most important part of the breath because

it is what we give out to the world.

Yes, we need the inhale for our individual lives,

we draw in the air to maintain our measly machines,

but it is the exhale that we give to the rest of our

living, breathing creation.

(inhabitat)

Perhaps this is why people are so interested in final words:

Did he say anything about me?

(No, I didn't wonder that, not at all; but people do.)

Did he say anything absolutely insightful?

Did she say anything at all?

The final word is the wish we give to the larger assembly.

So it is best if it is one of love, or at least one of peace or compassion,

or understanding.  

Our world is so full of evil expirations

and intentions, and it seems to me our final words

have the power to allay them.

huffingtonpost (interesting story - The Scream is being auctioned off!)

~ ~ ~

Indeed, every exhalation is a powerful thing,

like a wish, or a spell, we unconsciously bring 

to those around us.  My mother

was a great sigher, exuding her personal agonies on her children

with every melodramatic sigh.

I think we were all impacted by this,

raised as we were in this aura of personal despair.

Exhalations of fear, too, only fill others with apprehension.

I can see that in my poor cats: when I get upset,

they are upset, too, just as

when I am in love, they too are in love.

Air, you see, is the most insubstantial substance

we consume 

in the material world,

and, whether we like it or not,

it gets recycled.

Now that we understand recycling a little more,

those of us who care actually clean what we discard

before we put it out to be reused.

Why not the same with breath?

Meditating on the outbreath

makes me very conscious of this dynamic.

I know it's hard to make every outbreath meaningful --

after all, we take so many every hour --

but being conscious on some level of the challenge

can slowly bring a change

to every breath we take,

and give back to the world in which we live

and die.