All in All, Don't Fear the Reaper

🌻 

Imagine that YOU are a wildflower with a tiny wildflower mind. YOUR idea of the grim reaper might well be a little girl with a penchant for picking flowers. I mean think about it... There YOU are, on the happiest, sunniest day of YOUR life, doing YOUR thing with YOUR dear flower friends, playing host to bees, swaying in the afternoon breeze, thinking about all the potential YOU have within YOU to reseed YOUR corner of the world, just abiding in YOUR prettiest, blossomiest moment in the meadow. Then wham! YOUR concept of life is shattered.

YOU hear the giggly sound of laughter approaching, and the determined, rhythmic footfalls rushing toward YOU. YOU are planted, helpless, and there is no place to run to. YOU are fully grown, shining forth in all YOUR flowery splendor. YOU are a ripe target come into view, and it's all about to change, because YOU are known. Suddenly a shadow passes over YOU. Then YOU see the tiny, soft yet dreaded hand, the instrument of YOUR demise, reaching for YOUR stem. Snap!

In an instant YOUR connection to the world YOU'VE known and held dear is severed. YOU are being transported above YOUR friends, who are left grieving over the loss of one of their own, yet secretly relieved at having escaped the greatest of wildflower horrors. YOUR attention begins to turn outward. The sun is still there, the bees, the breeze, and YOU see YOUR beauty frozen and reflected in a little girl's bright, discerning eyes. YOU are being worshiped with a smile because YOU have achieved the pinnacle of perfection in the eyes of love, which saw an aspect in YOU that YOU heretofore had not known.

Lifted ever higher, YOU see far beyond YOUR limited field, and realize the horizon is not a sudden edge dropping off into nothingness. YOU get an inkling that life is more than YOURSELF growing from seed, making seed, and returning again to YOUR native soil as seed. Life is more about being perfect for the purpose of nurturing seed everywhere, because life is love... YOUR beauty, YOUR fragrance, and YOUR heavenly energy enlivening the soul of a little girl, and thus everyone she knows and will know... YOUR every petal and leaf scattered over the ground, providing earthly nutriment for future flowers, whereby YOU inhabit new seed.

The reaper wasn't a hateful thief after all. The reaper was love helping you along. And death wasn't really death, but the transmigration of YOUR existence... YOUR essence released and being expressed in unfolding forms. 

Life is not about what YOU think YOU are. Rather, life is about what YOU really are. And that's all in all good, love reflected in love, being shared and passed along. There's nothing in love to fear, because YOU'RE just living on!

🌻 

✯

Rethinking Thanksgiving-No Turkey

 I recognize in myself sometimes a childish sub-thought that the Creator of the Universe and every molecule I see wants his due in the form of my gratitude to him.

I have wondered how to hold onto joy.  It slips away.  I don't say happiness because that's a lesser more weather-like state.  But the joy that warms and feeds the soul seem so fragile and prone to being forgotten.

I wonder if our Creator who must surely love us like no other, made us to be thankful for our own good.  Perhaps the state of mindful thankfulness would preserve that little heater in the soul of sturdy daily joy?  His love, our thankful awareness and joy.

Perhaps that is the way it is, and he wants to be with us even on the most mundane of days and has in fact sent his representative.

So today I set myself the task of being, taking the very long view, not falling into the habit of thought where I grieve and fret.  I set those things down and I go out to play.

Flipping My Rolodex...Sifting Through Legos

At the risk of sounding overly earnest today, I am reminded of Ernest Shackleton this morning who saved all his men alive from the frozen waste and time by not allowing them to repine.

re·pine

/rəˈpīn/

Learn to pronounce

verb

LITERARY

1. feel or express discontent; fret.

   "you mustn't let yourself repine"

 In truth, it was a hard night.  But this morning I set before me and you laughing and crying, and I choose laughing, as usual.

                                                                           😁

Psalm 32:11

Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart.

He gets a little mixed up on his theology, but its a good song anyhow.  Hope when he got there our sweet Lord forgave him and welcomed him  home.

lol, eh?

Why Do We Talk To The Animals, *besides just bossing them around*

 This is Henry, actually listening to me.

Like most people from a working farm background, I imagine, I was not raised chatting with animals.  

My father, when he was a young man at home, was really good with horses. You had to be able to communicate with them to do things like plow with them pulling the plow.  He and Old Lady, a very smart mare, were a good working team and in fact used to train other horses to work, between the two of them.

But we didn't see him or mom talking with cats or dogs at home when we were young.  I didn't either.  I certainly never yakked at a chicken. lol

Now'days, in the fullness of time, I perceive animals differently.  I sense them as part of a continuum of communication.  God talks to me with the physical creation and direct contact sometimes when I pay attention. heh.  I communicate with other people as do they with me.  And in truth, when I go through my day with the small house lions, I tell them what I am up to. I ask them how they are many times a day. When I need Willie to get out my way I tell him to "move it".  When I have to get up and there is a cat sitting on me I tell them I need them to let me move. Etc.

 

If I had a chicken I suppose I would talk to it also.

Is it a good thing, a bad thing, or just inevitable?

This Cake Cracks Me Up

 This cake don't carry no gamblers.  This cake is a broken-hearted melody.

It hasn't seen better days.  It has only seen one day and that one was rough.

Its broken.  But you can sure see that its a heart.

Lying there all full of hope and chocolatey determination,

it both persists and endures!

This one has some owies today and also must take off for Seattle after the morning ripens a bit more, to succor sick femme offspring.

PS, I don't propound all his words.  Just a good old song.

Of All The Surfer Girls, VENUS Was The Best

 I have kept this lady's photo in my working desktop collection of images for a few days now because she struck me as an archetype and possibly a good example.

If she was born on the wave, it was not yesterday.  This Venus is mature.  No ingenue.  Her hairdo of a little bun is almost school marmish.  The breasts are normal.  She may be a mother even.

So I say God bless her.  Long may she be borne upon the waves.  I'm not envious much at all. 😜

Venturing OUTside Today

 It seems that there are some really hungry seagulls down at Port Gardner Bay and  we happen to have a bag of cooked chicken that I believe no one but a seagull could love, and assorted old crackers and stuff.

Assorted fiddly stuff that has to be done in the flesh, also.

You go Joe.  All right man!

Back a little later!

A Question About Prayer

 As I set about praying for someone's trouble yesterday, it occurred to me to wonder if prayer while having unconfessed sin that I was well aware of, on my mind, would render such prayer in effect a curse.  Would I be laying more trouble on the person prayed for?

Or would it be merely ineffectual?  What was the image used in scripture, like the crashing of cymbals? 

Or, is this one of those things where if your own conscience condemns you, you better treat it as sin? 

Is prayer like a spell and its the words that are effective?  No, of course not.

I think my understanding is, that I will never be able to with awareness process all the sin in my life.  I am a creature of this fallen world. But, if I place myself under the headship of Jesus, as we call him in our language, and if I pray in his name, as if I were he, in some sense, then my prayer will be effective.  In spite of myself.

I also think part of the deal is to no be so taken up with myself, like the caterpillar and all its legs who got to thinking too much about how to walk.

What say you? 

The Golden Youth Called Lover, A Fairytale

Long ago, before our time, there lived a Maiden Alone.  She was Alone because the great plague had taken almost every soul she had ever known.  At the edge of the great ancient forest stood her little wooden house.  She lived on hen's eggs and garden stuff for that was all she could manage by herself.  She wore her Dead Mother's clothing, and worked with her Dead Father's garden tools.

At last, she grew old enough to think of being wed, and lamented in her heart for there were no young men about at all.  And she was Very Handsome indeed.  Her hair was Raven Black, her skin was fair like porcelain, and her eyes deep blue.

Forgetting the GREAT GOD, in her haste and sorrow, she set about a plan of her own devising.  On the next moonlit night she stood naked before her own door on the little path holding a red rose in one hand and a white rose in the other.  She called out, "Friend! (perhaps I miss this and she said Fiend) make me a man for my own!" After waiting a bit there, she put on her linen chemise again and went into bed and to sleep. Perhaps she added a small Blood Sacrifice, from a pricked finger.

The next morning she arose and went out her door.   A Small Person about as big as a six year old boy, dressed in black like a clerk sat crosslegged before her on the ground.  He had a strange tall pointed hat.  Beyond him, asleep on the sweet grass lay a Golden Youth of surpassing beauty.  Hair of fine full curly gold, most likely blue eyes, but he was sleeping.  Tall and shapely he was, dressed in a linen shirt and green corduroy breetches.

The Small Person spoke up and said "you may have this fine fellow for your own true love, but there is a dreadful Rule."  You must never name him a Human Name, or call him by such, or he will cease.  "You must call him only Lover."

Our Maiden felt that this was Easily Done, and hastily agreed to the deal.  There followed many years of happiness and love, for he was exceedingly pleasant in manner and speech and a Good Gardener.  But there were no Children because Lover was only a dream solidified.

After some time, she began to think of him as Henry, but only in her heart.  Then one day, needing his help catching a Hen or something, it was An Accident, she called out "HENRY!, I need you!"

It was over in a second. The Golden Youth was Nowhere to be Found.  Many moons and years passed and  she thought of her Foolish Bargain much.  She turned Her Heart to the GREAT GOD after much consideration, and became wise, if several years older.  In time a Tired Human Man who was also a survivor, found her and they lived a normal loving life, with five or six children.  I am not sure how many. But she kept a yellow Tom Cat, whom she named Lover, for some reason.

I don't know what it means either.  That's what came to me last night 

The Trip Of A Lifetime

I'm supposing that most of us have had a trip or vacation that was life changing.  Or more than one.  Mathmom probably gets the prize for actually living in exotic locations.

As an example, mine was the congregational pilgrimage to Israel that I was part of in 1988.  I  had never been out of the country before, except for Canada.  I was honestly a little afraid in my inner being, that it would turn out to be nothing much, a small disappointing country.  I wanted it to be mythic, mind blowing and grand.

Of all the trips, including travel to Europe and numerous road trips in the US, this was the important one.  I ended up saying that though Israel is small in landmass, its very very deep.  Its both the oldest tourist trap in the world, and the literal scenery of our most mythic thoughts.

What I was wondering is, would anyone like to tell a tale of the best trip ever?  Some experience of travel that is a treasure of memory?

I'm listening because I looove first hand reports of life on earth!!

PS, I don't have any photos from that trip because my camera was stolen in the plane on the ground in NYC.

A True Story Of The American West

The old man was dying.  That much was obvious.  Few days remained.  His breath was shallow as he lay propped in his recliner.  It was cancer of some kind.  

His work had been outdoors, farming on small acreage for many decades.

His face was covered in quarter-inch long gray whiskers, and it bothered him.  But none of the women tending him thought to deal with that problem, nor really, could they have.

***********************

Now it happened that my father, the old man's son-in-law was there that day also.  My father had never shaved another man's face in his whole life.  But seeing Grampa Ted's discomfort and perhaps shame, he gathered the tools of a shave and brought them out to the livingroom, soap, brush, razor, a wet towel.  I don't know, perhaps some aftershave.  You can bet that it would have been Old Spice.

Carefully, carefully, the job was done.  The face was clean and perhaps anointed with some Old Spice.  

My grandfather said to my father, "thank you for everything Rollo".

My father said to my grandfather, "that's all right Ted".

Things had not always been straight between them.  There was long history after all.  A simple exchange of grace by two men.  Clean and simple and final.

The old man with  his own mother.

The younger man when he was better looking than he ended up being.

Sunshower Saturday

☆★

...for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? 

-2 Corinthians 6:14-16

☆★

At this point, as the summer hell month of August drags on here in drought-stricken Texas, we'll pretty much take rain however we can get it. We'll take it in the daylight, or in the dark of night, or falling from skies both cloudy and bright! PBird informs us that the rain is coming, but then she's looking at it through Pacific NW eyes, so we shall see.

As we were reminded yesterday (hat tip Farnsworth), there is an old saying used to describe when it's raining while the sun is shining: "The devil is beating his wife again." That's the one we grew up hearing, but there are many variations in folklore around the world used to describe the sunshower phenomenon.

This seems an apt description, since the dual-natured devil is both light-bringer and prince of darkness, evil and worldly good, rolled into one. It also serves as a subtle reminder and lesson for us onlookers about the pointlessness of trying to combine and balance opposites. The results are always brief and lackluster and heaven is always just out of reach. 

This subject also raised the question: Who is the devil's wife? Well, in ancient Jewish folklore, Lilith is said to be the name of Lucifer's wife. There are a couple of references to her in the Scriptures.

☆★

The tziyyim (martens) shall also encounter iyyim (wild cats), and a sa’ir (wild goat) calls to its companion, and lilit (night creature) dwells there and finds for itself a mano’ach (place of rest). 

-Yeshayah 34:14 (Orthodox Jewish Bible)

For her house inclineth unto death, and her paths unto the dead. None that go unto her return again, neither take they hold of the paths of life. That thou mayest walk in the way of good men, and keep the paths of the righteous. For the upright shall dwell in the land, and the perfect shall remain in it. 

-Proverbs 2:18-21

☆★

It may sound soothing, but this is NOT the way!!

I want to know

Have you ever seen the rain

Comin' down on a sunny day?

✯

Rain Is Coming

 Exposition is a strange hobby for a woman of not very many words.  

In truth I must say my sayings run more to the poetic.  Also the goofy and sometimes a little prophetic lite.

Its feeling like a bit of a storm coming too in the old PNW.  The end of this year's summer and the slide into fall.

I am sorting thoughts about how to live with a single eye.  The language chosen for the concept still intrigues/baffles me. 

Its the practical working out of such a thing that is hard to pin down.  How to be in the world and functioning and not be of the world.

Perhaps it comes down to mercy.  Mercy given and mercy received.

Those are my thoughts this morning.  I have had no coffee yet. lol

This is the Rio Grande in 1945, before a storm.

Holon! It's All Good: Single Eye Edition

 ☆

☆☆☆

This was originally going to be a post about a Robert Louis Stevenson quote, but things have a way of mushrooming, so we'll try to keep it meow-sized, with a slight mix of Gospel and philosophy.

Feeling a bit discombobulated? It's OK, the struggle is real-unreal, because in a moment of temptation, 'materially cattywampus human' became our default setting ...seeing good and evil. The trick is to thoughtfully get into the mind machinery and return the setting to 'spiritually coherent man,' as we were originally shipped to earth ...seeing only good. Accomplishing that feat of mind over matter, with the help of God through Jesus Christ, opens the door to transcendence. (How's that, pbird?)

"Do seeds contain trees or do trees contain seeds? We could say both are true, because 'trees and seeds' is an example of a holon." Likewise, does man contain God, or does God contain man?

☆☆☆

The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light; but when thine eye is evil, thy body also is full of darkness. -Luke 11:34

And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. -1 John 4:16

☆☆☆

What is a Holon?

"A holon (Greek: ὅλον, from ὅλος, holos, 'whole' and -ον, -on, 'part') is something that is simultaneously a whole in and of itself, as well as a part of a larger whole. In other words, holons can be understood as the constituent part–wholes of a hierarchy.

The holon represents a way to overcome the dichotomy between parts and wholes, as well as a way to account for both the self-assertive and the integrative tendencies of organisms. The term was coined by Arthur Koestler in The Ghost in the Machine (1967). In Koestler's formulations, a holon is something that has integrity and identity while simultaneously being a part of a larger system; it is a subsystem of a greater system."

☆☆☆

☆

-LoneStar Neanderthal

Transcendence

 You can just tell that he's feeling it.  Its based on two Latin words.  Trans meaning "beyond", and scandare meaning  "to climb".

In our cases, as adherents to the faith of God's Messiah, it must mean to go beyond the meat world cares of life, while still taking care of business.

Perhaps poise is needed.  Basically, confidence and balance.

Transcend Dance?

                                                                                

  Job 11:6-7                                                                           

⁶ And show you the secrets of wisdom!
For sound wisdom ^[a]has two sides.
Know then that God ^[b]forgets part of your guilt.

⁷ “Can you discover the depths of God?
Can you discover the limits of the Almighty?

Its just the word that I was given.  I wasn't even sure what it meant.  Seems like there are both religious and philosophical thoughts on the matter.  For me it brings up Transcendental Meditation of course.  Which I think is an mental exercise meant to get you over your own consciousness?  In any case the word in not in the Bible literally at all.

And just for a giggle, one of those Craiyon images.

Cat Knows What's Right And What's Proper

 Felis Catus believes that you have finally figured out how to live.  Finally you are lying around in bed in a dream state.  Warm and silent. Many hours of the day.

If you watch him, you will learn it all.

FC greets the day elegantly stretching.  A visit to the box.  A desultory crunching at the food bowl, a stampede across the house and to bed.

His awareness is exquisite.  The slightest wiffy rustle and his eyes are open. Perhaps he senses action outside.  He will alert you.  If you watch.

He can't guard the yard, but he is a darn good secretary.  (keeper of secrets?)

He knows to beat it when the going gets weird.

Bye the bye, FC is mad for classic rock and roll.

A very good morning, this Tuesday on earth, to you all.

(waves hello to Olive)

Throwing My Hat Into The Room

I was thinking of writing about the making of a skeptic today.  But my slight case of youknowwhat has taken a turn for worse and my head is punkin full of pain, so some other day I will try to make sense.  My poor kid's case is worse too, so that weighs heavily.  

I'm sorry for what I did.  I hope that Roto can forgive me for being an idiot.

Here is a killer version of Hey Joe by Roy Buchanan.  Wow.

May the Lord bless this day for all of us.  

The Terrified Compliant VS The Cautiously Skeptical

 In thinking about the last nearly three years now, I could just as well called this postlette The True Believers VS The Last Bloodyminded Holdouts.

Was it the media that railroaded the public?  We saw scary films from China.  I am now somewhat ashamed to admit that I watched some of those televised performances by Fauci and Brix.  You could hardly put in a novel a more unlikely pair.

The flavor in the air seemed to make reference back to other older times when the country all got together to do something big and important.  Say like win the second WW.

Many of our friends and family were pressured into compliance. Some seem to have escaped damage, so far.  Some not. We are left with a really bad taste in our mouths, those of us who were stubborn enough to pull off resistance.

For in Him we live and move and have our being, as even some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also His offspring.'  Acts 17:28

May He continue to have mercy on the people of earth as we work our way through this greatest outrage.

I pray for a rebirth of wisdom and freedom among the people.

A Week's All Expense Paid Vacation In BOGUS Falls!

 There's A Little Cream For Any Need Ya Got! 💖

This is a bit like the good old Live Blogging, but in this case its a relatively easy case of the Wuhan Flu.  Many people have been way way sicker than I am.  Lucky for me I have an intact immune system.

Its a bit like being seriously stoned.  I am way deep in my head, but weak about moving around. I have body aches, but not too much more than usual, ahem.  There are some other issues, but fek em, I won't give them the pleasure of hearing their names pronounced out loud.

LoneStar is right.  It all depends on how you look at it!

As directed by MM I am talking those little magic pills which I don't understand the mechanism of, anyhow.  

They may be trying to kill us all off, but it may not be that easy!  So ha.  If Delta were here she would slap Prissy, but since I kind of am Prissy, I shall have to slap myself!

Here's to a Grand Day, right here and now on the event horizon.  

Much love.  Being full of the baloney I write is like being pregnant.  You can't sleep until the birth is done! lol

Two Kinds of Customers

 ☆

Dr. Boyce:  A man either lives life as it happens to him, meets it head-on, and licks it, or he turns his back on it and starts to wither away.

Captain Pike: Now you're beginning to talk like a doctor, bartender.

Dr. Boyce: Take your choice. We both get the same two kinds of customers. The living and the dying.

-Star Trek: The Cage (original pilot episode, 1965) 

☆☆☆

Which one are you? 

Romans 8:13

For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

☆☆☆

(Scare Easy, Mudcrutch)

...Yeah I had somebody once

And damn if I lost her

I've been running

Like a man possessed

I don't scare easy

Don't fall apart

When I'm under the gun

You can break my heart

And I ain't gonna run

I don't scare easy

For no one

-Tom Petty 

☆

-LoneStar Neanderthal

A Walk In The Valley

 

23rd

Look, even when I'm walking in the valley where death is,

I am not afraid.

For YOU walk beside me.

YOUR direction and YOUR counsel are my comfort.

Even when I am standing among enemies, YOU provide enough for me.

YOU take care to bless me.

Its almost too much.

I know that YOUR goodness and YOUR mercy will be with me all my life.

And at last I will live in YOUR house forever.

*

Please forgive my foolishness.  Its just the way the 23rd Psalm hit me last night.  BTW here is a short explanation of how we got the word "psalm".

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/psalm

It has to do with plucking strings as an accompaniment to a poem or song.

SHALOM indeed!

Love vs Sentimentality

"Love Minus Zero / No Limit"

 

My love she speaks like silence

Without ideals or violence

She doesn't have to say she's faithful

Yet she's true, like ice, like fire

 

People carry roses

And make promises by the hours

My love she laughs like the flowers

Valentines can't buy her

 

In the dime stores and bus stations

People talk of situations

Read books, repeat quotations

Draw conclusions on the wall

 

Some speak of the future

My love she speaks softly

She knows there's no success like failure

And that failure's no success at all

 

The cloak and dagger dangles

Madams light the candles

In ceremonies of the horsemen

Even a pawn must hold a grudge

 

Statues made of match-sticks

Crumble into one another

My love winks, she does not bother

She knows too much to argue or to judge

 

The bridge at midnight trembles

The country doctor rambles

Bankers' nieces seek perfection

Expecting all the gifts that wise men bring

 

The wind howls like a hammer

The night blows rainy

My love she's like some raven

At my window with a broken wing 

************************************************************

I've long held an antipathy to what I conceive to be sentimentality.  It struck me as a largely self-serving emotional gesture with no substance.  It seems to be only feelings.  

Before I dig myself in too deeply, I realize that feelings are there in love too.

Help me out here.  How to define love.  Obviously it wishes the best for the loved person.  Sometimes it costs.  Its sacrificial sometimes.  

I'm sure you commenters will have something useful to say.  Its always a treat to read what you say.