I often discuss taking the high road in these matters. That is no easy task. A personal analogy would be my desire to hike trails that traverse hills and mountains, and then to have my knees fail me. This is so personally frustrating. It’s as though I can not reach the heights that I seek. And, yes, it makes me angry.
Category: Spiritual
Send Waves of Peace Today
Peace, like an ocean, rolls on in all space.
The View From a Field-Anchored Bench
Acres of brown and late summer-weary grasses that were born green in the spring, bend to a cool breeze spawned from the sea below and the sky above. It’s like sitting in the center of a terrarium of earth, sea, and sky.
Respect Remains Forever
I tossed and turned so much last night, that the cat grumbled a harumph and hopped off the bed. I joined him on the living room sofa… Read more “Respect Remains Forever”
Light, Peace, and Miracles
It’s a habit that makes me smile most every morning. I smile even while the morning news blares the daily tales of liars, destruction, mayhem and disruption.… Read more “Light, Peace, and Miracles”
The Circle of Life, the Planet, the Solar System, and Beyond
All this magnificence everywhere, yet we find ways to desecrate the poor, the under privileged and less fortunate. Is this how human projectile shards shatter the inner sanctum of their circumferential beginning and seek to destroy as they develop?
Awakening a California Girl’s Spirit
The woodsy air born from the thousands of years old coast redwoods filled my lungs on a Sunday morning 45 years ago. My California girl’s spirit awakened. I took the first steps along a new path as nature whispered her song into my ears. Harmonic resonance beneath the aged ones, those sentries of the primeval forest, comforted and healed my wounds of the day.
Though a pup in my personal timeline, I did “Seek ye counsel of the aged, for their eyes have looked on the faces of the years and their ears have hearkened to the voices of Life. Even if their counsel is displeasing to you pay heed to them.” (Kahlil Gibran, The Words of the Master.)
Like now, troubles headlined world news. Fear fueled paranoia. A cyclical change rolled through society. Discourse bred defiance. So I took to the trails beneath the aged trees—some with the wisdom of 2000 years at their roots—sought counsel and listened.
They didn’t speak a word. They simply stood there and inched further into the sky and added rings to their girth. What did I expect? Would instant wisdom rain down upon me? Clearly, that did not occur. But I left understanding that that moment in time was fleeting and temporary. I left understanding that even though we humans cut and harvested the bulk of this forest’s family, other humans heard the family of sempervirens preservation plea—for the sempervirens’ moment in time is not temporary, unless we make it so.
When time came to leave the redwood forests, I hugged those tall trees in body and spirit. Life brought me births, deaths, conflicts, books, quests, love, sadness and joy. The redwoods faded into my foggy memory.
Recently, age and wear took its toll on my ability to walk. Three separate injuries that first occurred after I left the redwood forests converged into an ugly knee that took me down—not unlike a chain saw to the wood. This down time wasn’t at a complete loss. I choose not to be destined to becoming a beautiful deck or frame for another’s house. So I took the time to grow— I queried and listened to matter outside of my comfort zone. My discovery included a black and white world with divisive and barbed walls. Common kindness, empathy and compassion, I learned, are, according to this sect of thinking, a sign of weakness. Power to the sword. Power to acquisition. Power to me! These thoughts did not seem akin to the wisdom of the ages.
It was as if a mythological goblin slipped out from beneath a muddy rock and tricked once kindhearted people into a dark underworld.
This made me rethink and question my core.
Meanwhile, a relatively simple surgery repaired my knee followed by weeks of physical therapy. I had no idea how far my body had slipped away from well-being. Each day, post-surgery, I learned the proper way to walk, and realigned the ligaments and muscles that literally twisted my knee from forward to sideways. Then one day, I walked for over three miles with no pain. A life-metaphor was in the works. “Strengthen your core,” advised the physical therapist, “and you will return to walking and just about anything you wish.”
The exuberance that overcame me after accomplishing a simple thing like a 3-mile painless walk inspired me to continue both spiritual and physical core strengthening. And this led me to a recent return to that same redwood forest of my youth.
This time I would not only inhale the woodsy air of these ancient trees, but I would embrace every bit of their wisdom. And, yes, I could again trek up an inclined trail—albeit not like the lithe youth 45 years back—but I proved to myself that core strengthening works in both body and spirit.
Nature’s cathedral is not temporary like politics and power. Nature’s temple nurtures without a demand for anything other than reverence and respect.
My silver hair and softened body announces that I’m a senior citizen. A brief timeout at sunrise with the trees brought life back into its proper perspective.
There is much work to do as my California girl’s spirit reawakens.
From the Last Vestiges of America’s Middle Class
My grandchildren have wonderful parents, a comfortable home, and a good education. It’s what Americans strive for. I don’t know if I will live deep into my grandchildren’s future, but I do suspect that their future will be much different from what I experienced.
While my life was imperfect, there was always hope and opportunity. The only thing that hampered my future, was my personal lack of confidence. But that is not the point of this post.
My upbringing was solidly middle class. Church on Sunday with a Sunday dinner served in the dining room on a clean white tablecloth. Homemade chocolate cake for dessert. I saw the USA inside a rolling Chevrolet. Fundraising barbecues. State fair on Labor Day. Clear blue skies. Smog was something new in Los Angeles: “It’s when the fog and smoke mix together,” the adults explained over beer and baloney sandwiches.
Political rallies with us kids dressed in red, white and blue. We were Democrats who picnicked at Disneyland with our Republican friends. We liked Ike. JFK a saint. When poverty and segregation lifted its ugly covers, Americans worked to change those wrongs. It wasn’t American to let this continue. The Civil Rights Act. The War on Poverty.
Tucked away from my world view, ideologues sited folly in this mid-century middle class well-being and common good. Meanwhile women unbound their mammaries, men grew their hair, citizens defied a useless war, and President Nixon got caught in a lie, and then kicked out of office. Denizens convened and swore that there was enough of this liberal crap running amuck in America. Values. Moral Majority. Loud mouth pundits. End tax. More guns. More crime and prisons. Fear. Loathing. Separation. Money for war. Nothing for education.
Unfortunately, for the now, and for who knows how long, achieving and maintaining middle class status in America is a fading dream. A recent New York Times headline, “Hardship makes a new home in the suburbs,” reviews the most middle of middle class regions, Los Angeles suburbs, where the possibility always loomed as bright as the California sun. Now some of the industrious sell goodies from their kitchens, and make just enough money to fill in where food stamps leave off. Food stamps? Yes. Former two-income households in newer tract homes fight for their dream regardless of low wages, jobs shipped to other continents, mounting bills, and a plutocratic gang of lawmakers who believe these citizens were not smart enough to reach the pinnacle of material wealth.
So, the woman featured in the NYT story who now makes popsicles to sell in parking lots, maybe bringing in $100 per warm day, earning about a $50 profit, is a slacker and unworthy of compassion and dignity, because the common good is a misnomer to a rising group of philosophical followers.
It wasn’t always that way for the popsicle maker. Three years ago, she and her husband lost their jobs. “We used to have a different kind of life, where we had nice things and did nice things. Now we just worry,” she told the NYT reporter.
Feed em cake! Twist the story. Falsify a new reality.
My head swirls with conspiracy plots, armed militia filled with questionable purpose, and the spin masters who toss about looming threats of Marxism, Hitler, Stalin, and firmly state that black is white, no matter how you look at it. And, oh yeah, let the free market fix it. The free market, however, is, now, another quaint and misused phrase funded by uber-billionaires that care-less for you, me, or the woman struggling to feed her family by making and selling popsicles after they took her job and sent it to Pakistan. She’s inconsequential, as are the men, women and children in Pakistan’s sweat factories earning poverty wages making stuff to sell in America and elsewhere. Profits are the point.
So I’d guess that my last sentence makes me some sort of socialist/communist/marxist. Balderdash! But that’s how some categorize one who looks from the heart and through the words of honored spiritual leaders. “Silly folk. Well meaning, but oh so wrong.”
It’s all temporary. But not really. How we live today will impact tomorrow. And this brings me back to my grandchildren.
I’m comfortable knowing that opportunity can be theirs because they have a leg up over the majority of their contemporaries. The trick will be assuring that they find their connection to the true riches in life: A healthy planet, understanding their heart and soul, and then take their education and make a stand that melds the good from both ends of life’s spectrum for the greater good of all through hope and opportunity.
Happy Dancing and Listenting to the Pontiff’s Words
Yes, I am cherry picking words from the recently published Apostolic Exhortation by Pope Francis. I can’t slow dance with every statement in the document–I guess I’m too… Read more “Happy Dancing and Listenting to the Pontiff’s Words”
“Would You Sleep With a Black Man?” — Thoughts On Racism
Passionate and powerful writers lay their words on cyber paper about the state of racism in America today. Some scribe and speak (lightly veiled) disgust towards the… Read more ““Would You Sleep With a Black Man?” — Thoughts On Racism”
The Muse Pallet 