Two Death Scenes, Both Tulalip

🥀 

You know, one of the unusual things about modern first world life is how infrequently we witness human death.  I was able to visit my mother's parents shortly before and my own parents shortly before their passings also.  But the only times I was an actual witness were with people out on the Reservation.

The first case I will mention was my friend Winny, an Assiniboine from northern Montana. How she ended up in Tulalip would be a long story. Her tribe were about the same people as the Sioux, but usually lived over the border into Canada.

She wrote grants for various local Indian Tribes to submit to the BIA.  When I first knew her she was 56 years old, but retired from government work.

There were about a dozen of us local women who met up at her house for a variety of reasons.  Sometimes just to sit and talk, sometimes to do a bit of Bible study, or work on some project or other.  She and I used to like to go do our grocery shopping in the small local city at 2 and 3 AM.  Then we would stop and get coffee and pie at Shari's.

We were a varied group.  Most of us were much younger than Winny.  She served horrible, weak, supermaket coffee and whatever she had in the way of snacks, just like we were her kids.  We just went along with it.  She smoked, and so did I and a couple of the others.  It was a continuing stop and start bull session, and tea party and place to cry, if needed.  There were at least 20 children represented by all the moms.  Some of us were really square and some were not.  We all did fine.   I was the only fire department member in the group.

Eventually, Winny got sick.  It was discovered that she had Pancreatic Cancer.  So we all did what we could to support her.  She was divorced, so no help there and her one child lived in Oregon and was busy.  

It didn't take long.  I remember helping her on and off the toilet.  We made raw juice for her, but it was really too late for that.  I drove her to the doctor.  I helped with her stupid little dog named Please.  She lost her hair.  She sat looking like death in her chair until death showed up.

One night I got a call from one of the other girls who said I better get up there if I wanted to see her off.  So I zoom up the hill to be with her.

Death was quiet.  First she was breathing.  Then she just wasn't.  She was just really gone. No drama at all.

 Her death was surely hastened by the morphine that the hospice people were giving her to try to stay ahead of her pain.  I was angry in a sort of helpless way about that.  They actually did kill her.

Then there were things to do, the things women have always done.  We removed the dog from her lap.  The dog was very confused.  Her son was called and informed.  Someone called the funeral home.  They showed up and took her into their vehicle.  So then there were a few more things to do, we needed to get rid of some stuff in the room.  None of this is anything but earthy, and then Ceceilia and I went to pick an outfit for her burial, in her bedroom.  Now, Winny wore pants exclusively in her later years, but she had skirts and dresses.  So, just as a final joke, Ceil and I picked a skirt outfit for her and everything including underwear.  I remarked that this bra looked comfy, and we had to laugh hysterically for a minute.  Comfort was moot.

There was a funeral.  There was the disbursement of her home and goods.  She left a bit of cash for each of us who had helped her in her last days.

She was raised as a Catholic, but became a Baptist by the time I knew her.

She was my closest Indian friend.

★🌟★

My other story was at an aid call.  An elderly white man was evidently dying.  He had been a sports writer for a magazine or something like that.  He was, in a small way, a known person.

His wife called us because she wasn't sure if he could be helped or if he was dying.  She just needed somebody to come and say what it was I guess.

I remember that the boys did some resuscitation attempts on him, mostly for her sake.  No go.  He was leaving the building.  Last time I saw him his eyes were still focusing but that was all.  No breath.

I stepped outside with his wife.  She asked me if he was gone now and I said "almost".  It seemed to be a process that took a few minutes.

I wasn't present for the wrap-up of his life. of course.  Not my job as an EMT.

👶

(As an EMT, btw, my one regret was that the midwife beat me to the house where a baby was coming!  I wanted to catch one!  Oh well.)

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If anyone wants to play, I'm game.  😉

I Hope King David Doesn’t Mind

A Take on the 23 Psalm:

Adonai walks before me.  I have no other needs.

He makes my bed in soft grass beside a quiet stream, as if I am a lamb.

He fulfills my soul and shows me the way to walk to represent his Name.

Look.  Though I walk in the valley of mortality, I am not afraid.

Adonai, your rule is upon me and comforts me.

You sustain me in spite of this world, which hates me.

You show the people that I am blessed with abundance.

You put your covering on my head.

Your virtue you put within me and I will live in You eternally.

A Peace On Marshy Land In Idaho

 I saw a Bigfoot with a pickax in his hands,

pacing out a pond on marshy land,

marking out the spokes of a sacred wheel!

👣👣👣

In the middle land, the marshy land, the naked people and the hair people meet to make a peace.  A peace must be made every turning of a year.  A peace must be kept this way.

A crosswise pond is dug and the water comes into it.  A shining cross of water is made.  Many offerings of peace are made upon the water.  Food, flesh and plant, is given for a peace between naked men and hair men.  These are ephemeral gifts.  They are given in trade also.  Hair men are hunters only.  Naked men tend corn and squash and bean.

Lasting gifts are made of stone.  Power is in the stone.  Corn in stone.  Deer in stone.  Ducks, eagles, and the great buffalo.  This is a great work and must be done in harmony on the land.  It will take many days.  There must be quiet between them.

A peace is made.  The hair men will not hunt the naked.  A gift of blood and stone has made it.  The hair men will give flesh to the naked men.  The naked men will give corn, squash and bean for a peace between them.  

Women are not given.  There is no mingling of the tribes of naked men and hair men.  Children must be one or the other.  Mingling will break the peace.

It is a sacred wheel of peace.  It must be made at every turning.  If it is not made the peace will be broken.

Has the peace been broken?

On The Murmuration Of Souls

 

The Incredible Science Behind Starling Murmurations: Where and Why They Form

https://www.treehugger.com/the-incredible-science-behind-starling-murmurations-4863751

As I was minding my own business recently, I happened upon one of those videos of Starlings doing their group maneuvers in the sky.  I got one of those little kicks in the ear you get, an idea.  I thought "mankind" and "Bingo".

I felt that I could see the operation of group thought in action.  I thought "surely the people are grass", Is. 40:7.  Nothing as alike as a bunch of grass blades!  They all do it together too, whatever it is.

It's easy to be scornful, to think "I am no Starling!", my thoughts are my own and I fly as I like.

But really, are we not at the mercy of the ephemeral messaging of our era?  Cheap media, hearsay, reading and even real scholarship fill our heads.  How can we help but be flying in the flock as it goes here and then there as the spirit of our times dictates?

Our own minds are made of this stuff, more or less, depending, unless there is some other way to be.

💓📖💓

There is a mysterious escape from this grip on the mind.  We know what it is, of course.  To be filled and motivated by the Holy Spirit is to be independent.  Relationship with God Almighty is the most individual thing out there.  For the Almighty is into the individual and the specific and the unique!  Just thinking about DNA should demonstrate that.  Not even identical twins are exactly alike.

I don't know if I am quite getting there, but it seems like it's zeit geist or Holy Ghost, you know.  

Do NOT Listen To The Song

Remember, I warned you.  Just don't. 

A Brief History of Gummy Bears

In 1920, Hans Riegel of Bonn, Germany, became frustrated with his dead-end job as a confectionary worker and started his own sweets company, making hard, colorless candies using a copper kettle and marble slab in his kitchen. His bicycle-riding wife was the sole delivery person. The name of his new business was a combination of the first two letters of his own first and last names and hometown: Hans Riegel of Bonn=Haribo.

The hard candies sold fairly well at local street fairs, but not as well as Riegel had hoped. Then, after a couple of years, Riegel hit upon what would prove to be a genius idea: He produced a line of soft, gelatin-based, fruit-flavored treats in the shape of dancing bears (then a popular diversion at festivals in Europe). But while Riegel is often credited as the inventor of gummy candy, he actually just improved upon an already successful, centuries-old, formula.

🍬🍬🍬

“Gummy candies descend from Turkish delight and even Japanese rice candy,” says candy historian Beth Kimmerle, author of Candy: A Sweet History. “But both of those are typically made with rice or corn starch versus gelatin.”

https://www.bonappetit.com/entertaining-style/pop-culture/article/history-gummy-bears

🐻🐻🧸🐻🐻

Gummi, German for rubber.  Often rendered as "gummy" in English.  Beloved chewy, fruity flavored candies.  All brands are fine with me, all flavors.  If you do a little research you can find gummis you  never heard of.  I love the worms.  I love the sour ones.  I love all the weird gummi candies made in all the shapes here in America.  

We have gotten them in a shop in Seaside OR shaped like giant fried eggs, pigs, frogs, various fruit shapes, bananas und so weiter.

Daughter and I have been considering if it were possible to make some savory flavored ones ourselves.  Open to suggestions.  Of course tomato, maybe something garlicky?  Not sure.  Olive?  

I will tell on my brother, a little tale.  When he was in school in German class he and his friends decided to insult the teacher by calling her a "gummi aber".  Foolishly, they were using the word aber wrong.  It does mean but, but it does not mean butt.  

It is to laugh.

I Sh*t You Not - A Visit With My Brother

Now the main thing to remember at this point is this guy lived out in Stick Indian, Sasquatch territory for several years and married into the tribe, so he knew the gossip I didn't know about all that. Plus he is a collector of stories.

I managed to distract him or rather get him focused enough to get a couple of stories out of him about all of that.  I believe him mostly.  I'd say he is a 90% reliable witness.  At least about that material.

There is a dirt road out there called Maple that he was told not to go up, but of course he didn't think it was actually a problem, so he went for a hike up Maple. He says if you see a skull and crossed bones you have to go there. I can understand that. 

When he came to, he was in some tribal guy's house wrapped in a blanket by a large fire with a huge lump on his head.  This Indian had gone looking for him and found him out cold in the rain.

There were places out there that even young strong men would just not go.

The girl he married out there grew up on the Res and remembered being left alone with younger siblings while her parents went to shop or whatever.  She remembers things of some sort climbing on the roof of the house and frightening herself and the little kids.

There were the drifts of mist that the Indian guys said were their ancestors coming to look at them.

***

  Same guy, both photos.  He was just 69 years old. He had it all. He could play the saxophone well.  He was a powerful runner.  He was intelligent and interested in language and art.  He was quite good looking when young.  He had the character flaw of being too lazy or selfish or whatever to do what other men had to do.  He did not want to work and he liked to get high.  He became this way at about 16. Also, my parents spoiled him.  He was the boy.

Yeah, we were laughing and rolling our eyes at him a bit. He is a natural story teller and I could not begin to do justice to all the Truth And Veracity he was laying down. I think some of it happened.  Many narrow escapes.  Strength triumphing over danger and possible death. Commercial fishing stories.  Car stories. He knew everyone in the scene.  I did not.  I was busy.

It was funny, but with a bitter gloss.  I kept this guy alive when he was a little kid, a school aged boy and even when he was a little older. I look at him and remember a little boy in the woods singing big epic boy songs and knocking down little rotten trees and manly stuff like that.  I remember what a cry-baby he was when he lost his pocket knife and I had to find it for him. He had little dusty boy hands.  He was as sweet as a kid could manage to be. 

So I hugged him and God blessed him today. What else can ya do? 

My God, look at the nose on him.

Why Not? Just an epic song to go with it.

PS

He also mentioned glimpsing the "other side" at one point in his strange career.  An opening with like feathers or something around it, and people talking.  This is about all I remember of mine.

 

Sweet Things

I'm thinking of all the sweet things we have.  There are so many blessings.  We have life, incredible!  We have so much to thank G*d for!

I don't have much to say today, but my heart is very full.

I pray that each of you and those you love have an epic holiday today.  And if its a bit quiet at your house, rest in the love sent your way.  Remember the good times from before and those you have loved forever.

If you would like to share a sweet thing, I would love it.  Real stories are just the best things and I feel so privileged to read them.  As you wish.

I also want to register my gratitude to the Almighty for the breath of life, the mind that perceives him, the ability to work and do...

So- Happy Thanksgiving my friends.  You are precious to me.

🍁💗🍂

 

Just My Imagination Running Away With Me

I have been thinking on the proper use of imagination.  This verse, down there, sounds as if imagination, period, is a bad thing, to be controlled rigidly. But imagination is how our minds work!  We think a thing and then we say it or do it.  First is the thought, then the thing.

I think actually the imagination is a powerful two edged blade, like the tongue.  It can be used to create and to defile.  For what is prayer except a picture in the mind of the righteous thing to be desired, in accordance with God's intentions?  It's not easy for me to explain what I mean, but I'm working on it.  Seems to me that it can be a creative force in concert with God bringing something into being.  They always say that you and God are a majority.  Hard to beat that.

OTOH, if one listens to the dark voice in the mind, has the radio tuned to the devil's channel, harbors and pets the evil inclinations of the heart, grows them and nutures them..well then, that is the type of imaginations that the verse is referencing.  It also can call into being an evil event.  The test is love.  Is your mental picture a working out of love, or is it selfish or haughty.  I am lecturing myself here.

That's what evil spells were, evil imaginations held onto and wished into being.  Things in this creation seem random, but they are not.  We just don't see all the pieces in motion. But, yeah, evil spells work.

My little example of taking dominion over the physical world is funny but it was important at the time. It's very clear cut, so a good example.  Long ago, we lived in a tiny cabin under the great huge Douglas Firs, as you know.  There was no way possible to keep all the big woodland spiders out of that place.  They just came in the places where there should have been insulation in the walls.

Well, they did bite the children.  So, I decided to just tell the spiders that I would not smash them or harm them, but that they may not bite the children.  I was able to make this real in my mind for some reason.  The result was that though we still saw a few spiders around, they did not bite the children after that day.

🕷🕷🕷

2 Corinthians 10:5
King James Version
5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;

Maybe I am being Captain Obvious, but I like to think about these things to see if they work.

A Lot Has Fallen Away or How I Plan To Celebrate This Holiday

One of the main things that has fallen away is the mindless urge to comport to what I have imagined are the expectations of others, who, in fact, are probably not really that concerned with me or mine.  This may sound self-centered. But it's not.  It's just freeing.  Freedom is godly, eh?

I don't come from a background that really enjoyed holidays.  I am not sure why.  Perhaps it was because my parents were so young, working so hard to not go under, and were far from their homes, so that there was no greater family to encourage and cement traditons such as celebrations.  It was always tense at home during holiday times.  Mom would be trying to do the holiday stuff and dad would be grumpy and disapproving.  Not much fun, in my estimation.  (Voices whisper "if it's not fun, why do it?").

The mindless pressure should be examined and judged I think.  Mindlessness is never good.

I see the beauty of traditional decorations, but.  I think I get the draw of the big family feast, pulling the tribe together, right before facing winter.  So traditional. So comforting.

It's too big of a job in this messy little house.  There won't be anyone but we three, the Bird, the girl and p.  I think I will try to locate a nice Chinese restaurant.  Just go and be relaxed and thankful and festive in our own way.  It will be a new way this year.  We always did the whole shebang before.  But, if it's not fun, why do it? 

You turkeys are so so safe from me this year!

                                                              ✡✡✡

Monday! Recipe Day?

One thing I actually do like to cook, is soup.  I really like soup and could live on it.  I like to have soup for breakfast.  A nice bowl of warmed up leftover soup!

Last night I need to make something with boned, skinless chicken thighs because I had bought a huge tray of the stuff and had to parcel it out for the freezer and use some of it.

I had been thinking of potatoe/cream type soups.  So this is what I did.

I sliced up in quarter inch slices my last two slices of that very good hot sweet bacon.  Started that frying in my big enameled pot.

I cubed up four of the thighs into about one inch pieces and threw those in to cook and brown up some.

Then I chopped a medium sized red onion and tossed that in.  Letting it all carmelize a bit.  

Since it was chicken, and not fish, I used a bunch of Slap yo Mama cajun seasoning, some extra black pepper and what the heck, some Mexican style bouillion powder with the tomato in it.  Maybe a teaspoon of that.

Peeled and cubed six rather small russet potatoes.  Added enough water to cover all that stuff in the pan with the potatoes.  Once the spuds were about done I put in a can of sweet corn.  OK, made sure it was all done.  Checked for salt.

Last thing I do with chowder type soups is put in half&half cream to taste.  I like it pretty white and creamy.  Let it all get nice and hot.  It made a lot.  I had to adopt some of it out to GS and his SO.

That's it. I also like to make bread but that's a whole other story!  Would take more typing too!

💖💖💖

 So, I was wondering if you guys would like to share a recipe or method to make something you like to make?  I am all ears, er, eyes!

Seriously, I love Pho' to distraction, but its too much trouble to make at home correctly.  Head on out to your local Vietnamese cafe'!  It's the only way. But don't mess up.  There could be a Vietnamese Pho' nazi!

                                                  MEOW!
I must add Korean tofu soup with all the pickles, and rice!  It's been too long.  Gotta go!!

It comes to table in a smoking hot stone bowl.  Pretty neat.

I Find It Really Exciting That I DON'T Have Any Idea!

 For when I might have the idea that I should already know what Heaven, or the Hereafter shall be like.

9 But as it is written:

“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,
Nor have entered into the heart of man
The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”

Also:

Isaiah 64:4 (KJV) For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him.

✰🔯✰

These thoughts were forshadowed for me a bit when I was preparing for my big trip to Israel so many years ago now.  My fear was that I would find this place, above all other places, to be shabby and disappointing.  I was afraid to find it was just another tourist trap.  And there was that aspect.  What could I reasonably have expected?  It's been a tourist trap/destination for hundreds and hundreds of years.

But instead, it was wonderful and real and epic in ways that I could not have truly forecast.

I believe that it's possible to think of Eternity like that, to fear it. We see these silly images of haloed figures on clouds with harps.  Right.

We might fear that "voices echo, this is what salvation must be like after a while..".

Those verses up there at the top say to me that I have no idea.  So stop worrying about it.  The child in the womb has no idea.  We have no idea.  We do have our instructions though and formulating a picture of Heaven is not in the order.

It makes me really happy that it will be such that my little head just can't imagine it.  That sounds really really encouraging!

💓

Oh, the graphic up there is my rather hysterical handwriting to myself, when I figured out what I wanted to touch on tonight.  lol. I can actually read it!

He that is unrighteous, let him do unrighteousness still: and he that is filthy, let him be made filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him do righteousness still: and he that is holy, let him be made holy still.
Blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may have the right to come to the tree of life, and may enter in by the gates into the city.
-Rev. 22:11; 14

Niceties Of Expression, Or How Do You Know

How we read expressions on another's face is something that I puzzle about.  I think we mostly get it right.  Why is that? Is it learned?  Is it innate?

Is it something woowoo?  How do you know if someone is lying to you?  Are you helpless when it comes to a sociopath or someone like that who has deranged psychic signals?  That's a transmitter disfunction.  Oh, its probably also a receiver malfunction too, or maybe they don't even possess any receiver qualities.

I think someone who has Aspberger Syndrome might be said to have a receiver disorder.  They are probably not getting the same signals that the more average of us are getting from others.  It sounds awkward.

What does love look like exactly? Does anyone know?

In the meantime, here is Suzy, being somewhat disturbed by a showing of Shetland's last season, last episode.  It had some really gaggy scenes.  I can see why she is slightly put out.

Well, it turns out that you can't edit Youtube shorts.  Ah well.  Now I know.  I only used Youtube for the sake of editing.

Is Luck Even A Real Thing?

I don't think I believe in luck, as such.  What a belief in luck really is, is a belief in randomness without reason. Isn't it?  I think it takes a great deal of faith to believe in the actually random.  A random universe would be massively irrational and even more dangerous than it is now.  I don't even like to think about it.  I am not sure life could exist in such a universe, or even if there could be a universe in a random state.  

I believe that there is the appearance of randomness.  This is because only God could know all the moving parts.  So when Tom Petty sings You Got Lucky, it's really a case of You Were Blessed.  

I landed right back in sermon land!  

I ratted around through a lot of definitions of blessing.  In general it looks like a blessing is a gift.  I wanted to see if there was an element of it being an unearned favor from God, or even just another person.  There is that aspect for sure because blessings from God arise out of his love which is mostly unearned.  Right?

So, why the heck do so many lives have so much pain?  Where are their blessings?  These are deep deep weeds, but we have to remember our doings and the doings of all who went before us have had real results.  Some of them are awful results.  We inherit the troubles of our ancestors and add our own.  In spite of all this, God does bless us as much as we will let him.  Other people do bless us also, and we can practice blessing them.

I guess I wanted to say that if we receive a blessing of some kind, small or large, our joy is more complete if we say "I was blessed", not "what luck!"  Because if you are blessed there is a giver who loves you and that is a very nice thing to remember.

It's still a really good song and I sort of ignored what is was about, which was a rather clever way of stating that the girl in the song is really receiving a great blessing of real love, and she better appreciate it!!!  lol!

The old English word is bletsung.  I bet there is a ghost word buried in there.  Sung might mean song..so a blessing being a kind of song.  But that's for another day.  Its getting late!

Simple words.  Just some things I was thinking about.             Shalom, as always.

And just for fun:

Presence vs Presents

           Isn't it a bit like a kind of a negotiated peace?

Neithan, that rash fellow, brought up the question of what women really want.

Of course, there are a couple of arenas of interest.  He was dealing with the national/political.  Yeah, lots of us want a functioning national system.  Fair laws, justice, safety and free enterprise.

Of course, being myself, as I can't help being, I will stray into the personal.  Being a Boomer, I came of age at the end of what we like to think of as the normal world.  Therefore my beliefs and behavior would probably be considered traditonal.  The window dressing in my life was not very traditional, but the stones of the house are.

I don't think women are as swayed by physical appearance as men are.  You guys.... It sure doesn't hurt if a man is a babe or all lovely and hunky.  But, there needs to be more.  He needs to be what I call Respectable.  I mean a bit of a handful in a good way.  Not a pushover.  That could mean a dangerous man who is in submission to God and full of mercy.  It could mean that he is really good at something.  Something to look up to and admire.  He needs to be subtantial in some way.  A traditional woman is looking for that.  I mean, if she's an adult and knows what's what.  That sounds like dependable, which is a good word, but it sounds boring.  

This is pure opinion.  Mine. Now for the essential bit.

Women, in my understanding, want to be valued.  We don't want to be the boss.  That's a perversion.  It's anti-erotic.  We want to be important TO, not just important.  We want to be wanted.  To be desired.  

So, not gifts, presents, but presence.  We want you to be there in all senses of the word, wise, strong, respectable.  Please, so no sensitive new age men.  I bet I could beat one of them arm wrestling anyhow.

Get this, I am now looking for a song about love.  Can you imagine such a thing?  I amuse myself.

Part of being traditional, in my book, is not being very sentimental.  I wonder if that is even true?

The Trouble With Being A Selkie

 Or in my case, an otter, is that every darn day I have to pass myself off as human.

There is the walking upright.  So tiring.  I have a spine like a Slinky.

I have to speak in their convoluted language.  Whatever.  Whistles and chuckles were always good enough when I lived in the salt water.  Like I should.  You know?

Of course it's a load of otter spraint to call meself a selkie, but you get the shapeshifty idea.

Does everybody know what a selkie is?

The Selkie-folk

http://www.orkneyjar.com/folklore/selkiefolk/

"Selkie is simply the Orcadian dialect word for "seal".

So, selkies are a very common sight across Orkney. Heads bobbing above the waves, they are often seen by the shore, watching inquisitively with uncannily human eyes.

To the onshore observer it is not hard to see how the legends surrounding the selkie-folk — the seal people — sprang into life.

Orkney has many tales concerning this shape-shifting race.

Unlike the Finfolk, who retained their malicious tendencies throughout the years, the selkie-folk have come to be regarded as gentle creatures, with the ability to transform from seals into beautiful, lithe humans. This, however, is a far cry from the original folklore — a topic dealt with further here.

In the surviving folklore, there is no agreement as to how often the selkie-folk were able to carry out the transformation. Some tales say it was once a year, usually Midsummer's Eve, while others state it could be “every ninth night” or “every seventh stream”.

Regardless of how often they were able to transform, the folklore tells us that once in human form, the selkie-folk would dance on lonely stretches of moonlit shore, or bask in the sun on outlying skerries."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It seems like there ought to be a separate name for we otters.  Though, in fact, I have never met another otter in the fur.

I just like to dwell on some of my happiest hours.  I would swim, day or night, rain or storm, in the bay, sometimes with the big raindrops falling all around me and the water fowl bobbing nearby.  The mysterious finny folk beneath my toes, always present.  Also, I had to be aware of the tribal nets, subtle traps stretched across and through the water.

The water was cold.  Around 42 degrees.  No matter.  One gets used to it.

My signal to return to the littoral was the calling of my human children.  Time to return to the skin of mankind, to be a mother on dry land.

But the wild salt water and the low grey sky stay with me always.

It's pretty much all the same up north here!

There is also plenty of time for our Wednesday game!

As You Wish!

So What Is Trauma Bonding Anyhow?

Old Alan there yesterday got me thinking about trauma bonding.  Then there was the purple dinosaur cartoon. Sorry about that.  

If you look it up online you will get this:

https://www.choosingtherapy.com/trauma-bonding/

What Is a Trauma Bond?

"A trauma bond is a close attachment formed between a perpetrator of abuse and the person they perpetrate against. The dramatic ups and downs of the relationship can result in a powerfully unhealthy bond. In order to survive, trauma survivors develop a keen awareness of everything their perpetrator does, says, and wants."

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It seems to me that the bond resulting from trauma like that, is a kind of obverse or infernal version of the acquiescence to discipline.

I am not sure that the therapeutic types believe there is any such thing as righteous discipine.  We do, though.

How can you tell if what you are experiencing is discipline or abuse?  Um, who is the active party?  That's one clue.

What is the end result?  Is it that good fruit we hear about, or is it that skulking dependence on the good opinion of some person or other power that has control over one?  I think by this time in our lives that we have probably experienced both.

The most common version of this, or the biggest one, going on now, is the terror caused from seeing or reading the news every day.  One knows they do that to one on purpose.  One is meant to be afraid and dependent.  

Also, if all this stuff shoved at us, per Watt, isn't our real lives, what are our real lives?  Is it our native experience, as lived privately?

How can I sense what is real and what is not?

             FATHER, help us find our real lives and true freedom!

Who Are We To Believe?

            Predictive Programming, or, The Cart Before The Horse 

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The Psychology of Extraorinary Beliefs

https://u.osu.edu/vanzandt/2018/04/18/predictive-programming/

Predictive Programming
April 18, 2018 at 12:04pm by van-zandt.2
by Dahria Beaver
Predictive Programming is theory that the government or other higher-ups are using fictional movies or books as a mass mind control tool to make the population more accepting of planned future events. This was first described and proposed by researcher Alan Watt who defines Predictive programming as “Predictive programming is a subtle form of psychological conditioning provided by the media to acquaint the public with planned societal changes to be implemented by our leaders. If and when these changes are put through, the public will already be familiarized with them and will accept them as natural progressions, thus lessening possible public resistance and commotion.” (Wood) Then it was popularized by Alex Jones and David Icke. The most notable cases of predictive programing are the examples found in the Simpsons, The Dark Night Rises, The Hunger Games, and the oldest being from Futility. Information can be found on blog posts and many conspiracy theorists have either made videos on it or have spoken on the subject.

People who believe in this theory are mostly conspiracy theorists who think there will be a totalitarian government takeover, or on the more mild side, theorists who believe tragic events are an inside job or completely fake. David Icke proposed that the Sandy Hook shooting was predicted in the Dark Night Rises because Sandy Hook is shown on the map in one of the scenes. (Wood) While I was looking for more information on the motives behind the government participating in predictive programming I found that most commonly people believe the government creates a problem so the population will look to the government for a solution. However, because the government planned for the crisis the government will offer a solution that has been planned long before the crisis ever happened. Alan Watt, along with many others, believe a desired outcome is created through the power of suggestion in media. (Wood) This theory is still very popular today because any huge event can be seemingly traced back to cartoon or movie that was fortunate enough to predict it.

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I have not watched it yet.  However, I will, and it's on topic.

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Why You Should Worry About Predictive Programming

The Ugly Truth About Predictive Programming

https://medium.com/reciprocall/why-you-should-worry-about-predictive-programming-6d1867a19e7

Predictive programming = increases the public’s acceptance of planned future events

Predictive programming is the practice of government and other higher authorities that use feature films and books to increase public acceptance of planned future events.

A popular conspiracy is the idea of using government “predictive programming” to manipulate citizens and enable them to predict what they want to do in the future.

Sometimes the intended purpose of predictive programming is not to plan for some major social change, such as the establishment of a totalitarian government, but to control the impact of a particular event.

But the main aspect of predictive programming, namely mental preparation or mental programming, has been achieved through movies and TV shows that use futuristic devices to manipulate audiences. [Sources: 7, 9]

Much more at the link.

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Well, there is a taste of it.  Most "reputable" sources discredit the possibility of this being a thing.  People who think this way are labled conspiracy nuts.

However, considering the events of just the last three years or so, and the last few elections, what are we to think, really?

We have been watching a tv series made after a William Gibson story called Peripherals.  Much in this yarn could been seen that way, for sure.  Or, maybe time works both directions?

I have no amusing song or clever artwork to go with this.  Perhaps an AI illustration would be appropriate? The prompt was "predictive programming nightmare".

James 4:13-16 ESV

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.

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"Good Boys Don't Bite"

 I was just explaining to Willie the other day, after I was petting him and he got all catly and bit me, that good boys don't bite.

He explained to me that I have it all wrong.  He avers that he is neither good nor bad.  He is a cat.  His behavior is ineffable and always correct, for he understands his own beingness.

He eschews this sort of tomfoolery.  That's human nonsense.  He is a beast of another color.  

Man must struggle with should and should not, but surely this angel was sent with a message? What can I say, that love is not without pain?  It is what it is?  Some things are unknowable? Some things are just not about me, possibly?

Being the crown of creation separates us forever from our beastly cousins?

That Jordan Peterson is correct, that a good man is a dangerous man, who stays his hand, unless he needs to be dangerous?

I should leave it be.  Men are men and cats are cats.  (I mean of course, mankind including we femmes.)  And sometimes good boys do bite!

There really isn't any other song for this.