Three Part Harmony

                           Vision Quest Series                                    Spider Rock 09-09-09                          c-2009

Three Part Harmony

Well we finally ventured out together for more than a few hours today after a week of contending with a version of respiratory yuk that included rib breaking hacking, fevers and overall blah. The worst part of this particular version of illness was the low gas mileage. Edy had it far worse that I, but it was one of those maladies that was very tricky. “I feel SO much better” you’d tell yourself and then by the time you got to where ever it was you were going (the store or the bathroom) you would soon be moving solely off of fumes so that by the time you finally returned to bed you HAD to stay there because there was no gas to start the engines again for anything else. Ugh.

Of course in the good news-bad news lenses which I see things we are building up further immunities to other variations of yuk out there and we also get to be together a lot and read more too, so it all evens out as things tend to do in life. Harmony.

One of the books I recently read was by one of my favorite SW-USA airplane novelists. I actually found a hard cover volume in the display in our lobby and “checked it out”. It was a fast read as his adventures always are and his Navajo Police Characters “got their man” as I knew they would. I was reminded as I read the story about how enthralled I am with the different ways in which people pray, believe and my overall fascination with “sacred places” anywhere/anytime. Navajo have an especially lovely way of looking at things and dealing with life I find refreshing. Granted “back in the day” they were not all “mellow folks” they stole, raided, kidnapped and took their own form of coup but for the most part because of their location and size of their tribe they were more mellow than others.

Essentially they , the Hopi and most Puebloan cultures believe that any upsets are due to an imbalance of sorts, a dis-harmony with the natural balances and if it gets bad they call in a “sing” and gather all the people close to that person to sing, chant, feast and pray until harmony is restored. This goes along with sickness or a guy driving drunk into your pick-up. You don’t sue him, you call together a “sing” and pray that he is released from the alcoholism that has him acting in ways that are not in harmony with his true self. Anyway, that is the Cliff Note version I encourage more study on your own.

Another one of the books I “checked out” from our beautiful lobby display is one from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn who I have been big fan of since High School. I love history and am always amazed at the depths of depravity and abuse humans can go to even in this day and age AND yet those being oppressed by “The Man” continually find ways to survive and thrive in the most abhorrent conditions for generations. The 3^rd and 4^th eyes developing with each generation to keep watch on who’s watchin who…..or is it whom ? I can never get that right. Anyway I have such huge respect for him and his ability to continue to write despite imprisonment, black listing, exile and constant arrest and harassment. A lesser man would have just gone off and made “shoes for industry-comrade” and left the “stories and truths” for others.

One leg of the excursion Edy and I braved today was to the Museum of Fine Arts to view an exhibition they have from the Prado in Madrid. It was breath taking! Every one of the finest examples of painting from the period was represented. I had forgotten too just how itinerant the painters of Europe were during the 15^th and 16^th century. “Going with the flow” …Being paid with gold from the cconquered Incas was A-OK with all the courtly painters as they flocked to get their piece of the New World Pie. They were prolific in their production. Quality improved as competition from afar came “right next door” and magnificence was de’riguer. Although our gas tanks were running low we took in the whole show and some of the permanent collections too as we are always amazed at the quality of the work right here in our own backyard.

We felt even more energy when we left and despite the “fumes” continued on to make a few more stops on the way home. I made us lunch when we got home and Edy went in to rest while I went downstairs to work a bit on my modeling projects and some orders for a client.

Slowly I can feel the gas tank getting filled as I remember each of the paintings we viewed this morning. I think that for us ART in all its forms is required for balance and harmony. It’s not a luxury but a necessity for daily living.  Note to self.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have met the enemy.....

         Frozen Whispers Series                                                   "Rockettes"                                                         c-2011

I have met the enemy……

I picked Edy up at the airport a few evenings ago and boy was I glad to have her home. Aside from missing her terribly,  I’d been sick while she was away and she came down with the same affliction too, so we both were a bit under the weather and coughing duets as we made our way to baggage claim hand in hand. We were accosted by a very loud guy in a suit behind us who was making a point, to make a point to whoever he had hostage on the other end of his cell phone and I cringed. Edy informed me that “Mr. Wonderful” had also been on her flight making sure everyone knew just how important he was throughout the entire flight and I cringed again when I heard this.

We stood at the baggage carousel and waited for her bags as we then watched Mr. Wonderful walk up to a double amputee and say “wow, sorry you got hurt man”……….then spun around and walked off speed dialing yet another victim in the wake of carnage that obviously followed him like a dark cloud. I cringed yet again as the “you spot it – you got it” played loud in my head and I said a silent prayer of gratitude that my “important days” are behind me.

Yes, days of double cell phones, Seat 5A, “getting there fast” – “getting it done” – “getting YOU to get it done”  and overall planetary rotation monitoring have been replaced with bike rides to yoga or  any other place I want to go and no cell phones at all for over 3 months.  As it turns out nobody even knows I haven’t had one, which is how important I am these days.

When the two older grand kids were about 3 & 4 I heard them out on the portal talking to someone and thought “what the heck? “, who could that be?”  First one then the other would be talking , not to each other but to someone else. I walked out to find one on one end of the long outside porch and the other on the other side “talking” into one of the dozen or so old cell phones I let them play with. I mean TALKING up a storm!! I poked my head around the corner and first one  then the other held up their hands to say “don’t disturb me” – “I’m on a really IMPORTANT phone call and will be with YOU when I am free”……..I went back inside and waited.

When I heard a lull in conversation I poked my head around the corner again and as soon as they saw me they picked up the phones, put them to their ears and started another animated conversation giving me a kind “wink and nod” to let me know they saw me and would be with me “shortly”. I slunk back to my desk and wondered just what kind of game they had invented?

Soon they both came in and informed me that they had just had long conversations with “Banjo”.   “Banjo?” I asked, “Yep, Banjo is our friend and we talk to him a lot on our phones and well we’d love to tell you more but we need to get this call as it’s him calling again”……………and off they went into the not so cute anymore pretend conversation with “Banjo” while I sat at my computer scratching my head wondering where they could have ever learned THAT kind of behavior.

One of the crazy things about being sick and feverish is the intense dreams that come forth during fever induced insanity. This past week while Edy was away I’d been doing some modeling for an industrial project and would fade in and out of fever/sleep/dreams wondering about modeling terminology and if I had modeled my dinner or pillow with the correct normals or Boolean operations or some other whacko thought that my feverish brain called out.   I would drift in and out of the wackiest scenarios and remember them vividly when I awoke. 

During times when I’d get up and try to get some work done, I’d do my best to  just stay focused on the task at hand and not give up until  I made a certain benchmark I’d set  earlier. “Ok, now we’re JUST going to model the burner assembly in the ovens, then move on to the robotics later”, I’d coach myself.  With each successful benchmark completed,  I’m certain I could hear encouragement coming from someplace in the room. I’d shake the feverish cobwebs out of my head and plug away again for awhile until another benchmark was met and in the distance I could hear........... “way to go!” – “Hooray” – “you’re the best!” –“awesome work” !.......!!

 Yep, “ME and Banjo” , saving the day, one 3D line at a time.

 

Hole Lotta Love

Hole Lotta Love

I awoke this morning and scooped Edy to walk over to the corner coffee place with me to start our morning. The weather is very warm and damp and the ground fog must have been super heavy as the lower floors of our building were sopping wet.

The usual long line of fuel wasters were queued up to be handed re-fueling liquid as they headed off to do their list of errands in the short time they had on their day off. Inside was quite and we sat at a table and chatted for a bit before checking in with the world on our portable electronic devices. Humm, “some sickness in Austin”, “ugh hope they feel better”, “it’s going to be rainy for several days now”, ugh #2 and then I noticed a Facebook post about the passing of someone I had known for a very long time, became very close with for a short while, then lost track of over the years. Ugh #3………. “Poof you’re gone”.

We’ve had a lot of discussions of late within our Village about “holes”.

These are the nagging places we all have as humans that motivate us consciously or sub-consciously toward just about everything we do and also don’t do. These include the various wounds of infancy and childhood from divorce to abandonment and pains and struggle of later years that propel us to resonate with other humans and form relationships to help fill them and then of course there are the holes that come from such relationships as we grow and evolve. Then of course there is life itself which has inherent challenges and on and on.

In most cases humans do a pretty good job via knowledge, karma, fate, logic, gumption, reason, talent, heart etc to fill in the majority of the holes and usually “destiny” in the form of other humans allows other holes to be filled as we progress on our “earth walk”. Sometimes we get really upset when what we thought was going to fill a hole doesn’t. Be it a Person, place or thing, when we have expectations that “it” will be filled and “it” isn’t we react. “If only x,y,z would have ……(fill in the blank) I would not have to feel this way………”  Seeking fulfillment from outside sources only works for so long as we all seem to also have what we term the GOD Hole.

This is the place that it’s just you and your Higher Power (fill in the blank here too). Money, Fame, Books can’t fill it, Places of worship can’t fill it, and teachers can’t fill it and all  the things that used to work in the past seem not to work  either . It’s just YOU and (your) God.

Bucky talked about “No more 2^nd Hand God” ,Van Morrison sang of “No Gurus” and we, in our Village speak about the God Hole that no one but us (as individuals) can fill, yet each one of us recognizes and honors within the individuals of our group and also the world.

I was intrigued to learn that most hard core Japanese businessmen seek further Buddhist teachings and knowledge as they retire. I had always envisioned them swinging their corporate swords until it was time to move on to the great beyond. I learned about this 30+ years ago and it did not make too much sense to me then. “Why waste those final years learning about THAT when you could be doing SO much more”, I thought at the time.  Ahhh, ignorance WAS bliss !

So as I ponder the fragility and brevity of life as we know it today, I also give a lot of thanks and praise directly into my God Hole for the blessings of health and love I have received in the past, currently enjoy and will continue to receive as long as I “keep the connection open” with LOVE.  “A Whole Lotta Love.”

XY

XY

I attended a Men’s Group Meeting at church the other evening that I had been hearing about all last year. It is one of the many things that our church puts together as support for its “flock” and one of the many reasons I feel so comfortable there. It’s all free, just like the Tax preparation, 3^rd world medical outreach, veteran’s assistance and childcare to list a few.  There were about 50 guys there and several of them also attend another group I belong to, so it was a comfortable environment.

As a life student I am always intrigued be new schools of thought on various subjects and being a Man, this one peeked my curiosity after hearing others speaking about this topic of “Authentic Manhood”. Essentially this multi-week program is geared to looking in depth into the current life of a male in today’s (USA) society although I believe it could conceivably be relevant to other countries without much “history” like Canada or Tasmania.

The speaker is an old Nam-Vet I know from my other group and all I can say is I’ll bet he was a “peach and a half” before he became part of the church circuit. (whoops !! - Spot it – you got it?) Anyway he gave us some background that I found interesting on how MEN have lost their identity since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution due to the fact that prior to that HUGE shift we were primarily an agrarian society relying on the family unit for security, comfort and lively hood.    

A man’s role for the prior millennia was to farm, hunt, ply his trade and bring up his children to do the same with the wife/mother taking care of the home and assisting in the communal efforts they all required to survive. Yes it was simple in terms of “brain power” but harder than anything physically, spiritually and emotionally as drought, flood, freeze….locusts…etc… were screwing with you every moment. The one good thing throughout all of these “issues” was that the whole family was together and sons would learn from fathers and daughters from mothers as to how to handle situations good/bad. When the opportunity to work in factories were presented many families separated as the men “went off to work” leaving the women to “stay here and work” as they had been doing since day one, a gazzilion years prior.   When the men returned home they were beat from the hours they had just spent making “widgits” and began to isolate with these feelings because wives/daughters did not “know” about widgets and this was the beginning of the wedge we now are feeling in our society.

The other contributor to this is post industrial cocooning was WAR.

Civil War a bit, more in WW1 but by WW2 men returned from war unable to assimilate fully into a “family “unit” after witnessing the atrocities and loss. “Work” became a great escape. Factory jobs turned into office jobs for many and wives and daughters knew little of office stuff and neither did sons for that matter. Sure economies bloomed – babies boomed and hot wars became cold wars, but at home Dad settled into his new Lazy Boy, popped a cold one and found comfort with TV, Playboy or Sports Illustrated or any other form of exit he could find so as not to relive the memories of “over there”. Page by page, year by year, beer by beer Dads became less and less available to their families and sons until a “rumble in the jungle” of the women left to deal with these man-shells started to rise up and say ……….“WTF??”    

Bringing us the seeds of feminism.  Interesting , yes ?

{I need to stop here for a second and say that Edy and I have a LOT to say on the subject of Masculine/Feminine Energy, a LOT. This is not to be confused with Male and Female energy which we also have a lot to say about , oh and feminism, soft males and on and on…. Lest this blog go on forever suffice it to say that you will be reading more of these topics later, for now I’ll just keep to the Men’s Group}

This particular class also conveniently breaks down Male Characteristics into four categories with the associated extremes for each listed as balancing on the opposite end of the spectrum

 King (Tyrant-Abdicator) , Warrior (Executioner–Wimp), Lover (Critical –Cold) , Friend (Loner–User)

The physical example of these would be a 4 legged stool with each leg representing a characteristic and each extreme within each of these represented by the length of the legs. So if like (the old) me you were a Tyrant-King and Executioner-Warrior but a more Critical-Lover or Loner-Friend your stool would be pretty darned stable but everyone around you would run for the hills because you were essentially an a jerk.

Then (hypothetically) imagine that all of the sudden you woke up and found the woman of your dreams in front of you  in Southern France. You did not want to be a jerk, but you just for an instant saw that you were and decided to change and become different than you had ever been before because she was “spectacular”.    

So, (hypothetically) lets say you want to be a better friend to start with.

Zoooooop the Friend Leg grows a bit to be more compassionate and a better listener, thus leaving three legs almost even and that one “off” a bit. Then as the relationship evolves you determine to become a more caring and open Lover and Zoooop……that leg grows too ……Of course the King and the Warrior are wondering what the heck just happened to their SOLID-STABLE (feeling) World and they become outraged and seek to find balance by any means necessary and in some cases (so I’ve read) you get knocked right on your butt as stability is sought.

Anyway as I sat through the lecture I became aware that many of the questions about “what the heck just happened” I’ve sought answers to through the years via other seminars, counseling, books out the wazoo and of course “Dr. Google”  were answered a 90 minute free presentation. I also felt compelled to share it because I know of a number of other Men who have decided to make a few “minor changes” in their lives and found themselves wobbling in confusion.  Hang in there my friends and remember the “objective”.

I believe we all want to be “Better Men”

…and now we return you to our regularly scheduled programming…..

…and now we return you to our regularly scheduled programming…..

Edy and I awoke to a quiet house this morning. VERY quiet.

Weeks of sharing the middle of the bed with spontaneous “ninjas”, sounds of harmonic snoring and little voices of “grammy, grammy, grammy” in the early morning have been replaced with the familiar drone of the “wave machine” ; JUST the wave machine…………... CRAP !

Despite loads of practice, a lot of pre-minding and much preparation; it happens every time……..REALITY steped out of the corner and grinned…………. “IIIIIiiii’m baaaaa-aaaack”.

It’s much harder on Edy than it is for me and my heart breaks for her longing to have all of her brood surrounding her constantly. Her tender heart just wants them all here 24/7, which is not currently possible. It puts me in a place of “powerless-ness” that eclipses the other places of “powerless-ness” I already feel. Hard places X2.

Lately we have been discussing the various “roles” we have taken on as we live each year. For me Son, student, worker, husband, father…….etc…Somewhere along the line I received some programming that told me that to live fully I needed to love & be loved & be useful & be needed.  I pretty much had this tattooed in my being for decades and just last year started to question such programming, which then lead to other questionable programming which then lead to reverse engineering  of many other beliefs I have held forever which initiated a complete gesso’ing of the canvas that is ME. By the end of 2012 I was pretty well “white” with a  few areas of old poking through that even today I gesso over to make way for the new………….(whatever that is).

Sure, love is a wonderful and to be loved is super, BUT, to be useful and needed?

I’m now not too sure about these now as I always used my work to fall back on to “check off” whether or not I had accomplished said task. Last year’s project list has shown me that I’ve not been needed too much in that regard and therefore have not been too useful either, so I might as well embrace it for all it’s worth.  Sometimes when confronted with “powerless-ness”, I just want to withdraw completely and embrace it as yet another example of my usless-ness, regardless of the knowledge that there are many things that are just not under my control. Perhaps it’s just one of those “wisdom to know the difference” things?

Different months of last year were dedicated to among other things “thwarts”, “disappointments”, “insignificance”, “lost dreams” , now in 2013 “usless-ness” and within all of these “gratitudes”. Always, (in truth, almost always) the Gratitudes.  It has been a very important exercise to keep the gratitudes at the forefront as it is just way too easy to evoke the old tired program of sliding down the “slippery slope” …

What felt like thwarts were actually guard rails, disappointments turned out to be life rings, insignificance pointed back to what really matters, lost dreams opened doors for NEW Dreams and usless-ness…….well,  we’ll just have to stay tuned for what this one holds as it’s too early to know.

So for today, despite the missing, the empty house and the overall sadness - I give HUGE thanks for fun times we had together and the MORE fun times we are all certainly going to have in the future.

January THE tooth

January THE tooth

Coming off of an intense Holiday period is always challenging.

The Christmas-New Year Season seems to always be one fraught with a lot of BIG Energies both, pre-holiday (building) and post-holiday (depleted). We were fortunate to have a house full of guests this year and that energy combined with tons of food and fun were enough to put me over the top. Also, I was only able to make two yoga classes in the past two weeks which also contributes to my feelings of being a bit  “out of sync” today. Oh well, the truth is I would not have it any other way.

 2012 was a very interesting year to say the least.

It started out with a calendar full of plans and expectations but ended with a review of “Holy Smokes – ALL of THAT in one YEAR !!.......Wow and we’re still standing !

January THE tooth was  generally the date when I would begin cementing all the plans I had been formulating over the previous quarter and add action steps to, to ensure “objectives” were met and  missions accomplished. In fact I woke up this morning with a sense of urgency toward just this end only to realize that the only things that were urgent were out in the kitchen yukking it up with Edy while she made yet another batch of French toast for growing bodies.

 During the holiday were treated to mild temperatures and body surfing for a bit until a very intense winter storm came in while on Galveston Island. It was a doozie !  

Gale force winds, driving  rain and continually dropping temperatures turned pleasant to uncomfortable quickly as the high pressure frontal system moved in and through. The next day we saw the damage the storm did to the surrounding area but the beach was swept clean and an unusually low tide made it look like  the “Merry Maids” had been there during the night to clean the entire length of beach. Beaches are a perfect place to see just how “Things change”.

 Holidays are also perfect times to reconnect to witness other such changes.

We are so fortunate we enjoy each other and actually like being together for days at a time. Very fortunate!

 Looking back at 2012 I must say that it was a “doozie” in a long line of “doozies”.

We heard a gent say the other day that 2012 was the pre-launch count down to a major exploration adventure that was planned for 2013. Well I’m ready………10,9,8,7,6,…