The Elegance of the Hedgehog

Has anyone else read "The Elegance of the Hedgehog"?  I'm half through and it feels like such an original. 

One of the themes in the book is loneliness--how we seem hard-wired for community and really seem to flounder without it..  Thinking, too, about Steve's blog of the concert and how the two people he went with were looking to connect more with him and he was looking to connect more with the music.  And even Tim's passing.....how that could have been such a lonely stretch for Tim and Suzanne but instead it was a gorgeous picture of community.  A small world, really, built around him and finishing their house with family and friends and Eagles music and drinking and laughter.

So in this book, Elegance of the Hedgehog, it's about one expensive apartment building in Paris and the concierge of the building and a 12 year old resident and the new Japanese owner of one of the apartments. All very subtle and wonderfully rich but yeah, loneliness keeps coming up.

It's been hard for me to live apart from my daughters the last few months and my women friends of long-standing and my wonderful hairdresser/shrink Beau.  I really had created such a rich complete world in Colorado.  But I go for walks in the dry canyon near our home here and more often then not I walk with one of my Colorado friends via cellphone.  So I stay connected with all the richness but I build new life here with Mac.  I feel such a completeness here with him.  We went for a walk last night in the blustery chilly wind and I could warm my hands in his and then we made our first fire of the season in our woodstove and read by it's warm glow.  So this is another world we are co-creating, the world of marital happiness, and it has its own cycles and I am trying to savor all the nuances.  That's what I'm learning from the book.....nuances are way cool.

Tim

This morning I woke up with the words "I've got a peaceful, easy feeling..." in my head. The Eagles were Tim's favorite band, bar none. Oh sure, he got into Metallica and Godsmack and the like, but it was always The Eagles above and beyond them all.

So I'm taking this to mean that we are to have a peaceful easy day, today, September 30. I'm on it. Get on it.

September 29

This morning I wrote this letter to a friend. Then I thought, hey this applies to me. So I'm posting it as is:

Good Morning,

So, last night I was lying in bed watching the moon fly. It tore across the sky, blinding in its whiteness, then dove headlong into a patch of clouds, dipping and dodging, tattered fragments of atmosphere clinging to it momentarily like cobwebs, before it emerged again and raced clean and clear against the stars. And even when it battled the clouds, even when the clouds gathered round it and clung to it, obscuring it completely, its light gilded their edges, and used their own efforts against them to cast a new and bright light.

I know the moon doesn’t really race. I know the clouds were the ones moving in the wind. But that isn’t what it looked like. So it doesn’t matter. I saw what I saw, and it was beautiful.

This morning, well it is this morning, I’ve just finished casting a simple spread from my Rumi deck as the means of getting something going in the foggy recesses of my brain towards a morning meditation, and as always it was more revealing than I wanted. Rumi is like that. Uncomfortable and terrible and terrifying and magnificently gorgeous all in one. Well sometimes, depends on where you are sitting and what you’d like to hear I guess.
Going further, I am pondering this quote today: It comes ripping across seven centuries from the mind of Mahmud Shabistari. “The past has flown away. The coming month and year do not exist. Ours only is the present’s tiny point.”

I’m grateful for today, September 29…this is the day pesky Mercury begins to move in the other direction, and this awkward month of mis-steps and communications gone round the corner comes to an end. What a cause for celebration. I would dance in the rain if the rain came again today.

So its 6:20am and I’m up and about. My house is chilly what with the windows open, but the coffee is hot. In about an hour I’ll walk down to the school and clean the floors with my student crew. Then I’ll talk about personal inventories for half an hour. Then I’ll be done for a bit, and then this afternoon I’ll return to the task of harvesting food, and this evening I’ll teach a class on language. It looks so schizophrenic spelled out that way, but I love the patchwork of it because it all ties together.

So, my friend, today for you…I wish you the moon’s passage. Tear across the world, shining a bright bright light no matter what clings to you. I’m looking forward to seeing you soon.

Keep smiling,

Dan

Earth Dance

I went to Earth Dance at Arcosanti Saturday night with a friend and a friend of hers. We got high. I really got into the surreal free form electronic dance scene with Cirque De Soleil performers mingling in costume and on stilts and swinging from long fabric streams hooked to the high ceiling. My reverie was mostly inside me, me and the music making this architectural energy ride for me to find my rhythmic way with. What I didn't do very well was include this friend and her friend. I was sort of going solo and assuming they were finding there way among all the energy fields just fine without me. But then it appeared after the fact, that I didn't measure up to there desire to be included very well.

So you know, it can be hard to include everything and everybody simultaneously. Always the probability of leaving someone out. And that can chip away at feeling entirely triumphant in one's lust for life. But I suppose it all continues to add to the the gathering storying we're always about. Everyone gets to play all the characters in some kind of random chancing at taking turns and being turned. And I'm apparently many persons depending on what other persons are measuring me for. Sometimes I measure very poorly, even though no actual agreement was ever made for how we would attend each other. So easy to disappoint while assuming the best, and even while having a rather good time in the moment.

-Steve

Getting What I Want

It's been hot. Damn hot here. Sweaty, sticky, baking sun on rain drenched earth hot. Yesterday I agreed when one of the students said they couldn't wait for it to cool down. Last night it cooled down. This morning, I'm almost chilly.

What if it was always that simple. Ask for it, and it happens. Yeah, thats my power, to change the weather. I'm like an X-Man. I can do that. Wait, no I can't. But what if it was that simple?

Sometimes, and this occurs to me in random moments, though, it is.

Thats where I am right now. Something elusive in my life has come knocking. Something I thought about, something I wanted. Something good.

And now... well I don't know what the hell to do.

It's like going to bed in the heat and waking up in the cool. You have to ask yourself, did I do that? And if I did, what do I do next? How do I respond to a Universe which says yes. I think the answer might be to go ahead and show up, and say OK, thanks for that gift. I think the answer might be to be grateful, rather than to pick it apart at the seams and find all the reasons why it wasn't what I wanted after all.

So, now I'm wondering if I can do that.

Because the ride is worth it.

This is a pretty profound sum of just why souls choose Earth life, risky as it is...

http://www.lawofattractioninteraction.com/video/The_Most_Profound_Q.html

-Steve

Amazing news...

My daughter Emily just called me to say that she is pregnant.  She has been married for 2 years to Sterling and they are ecstatic.  And so am I.  I will be a grandmother for the first time and she will get to be a mother, the best gift of all.  Talk about happiness?  I can't stop crying.....tears of joy.  :)

Looking for September 29

I don't live my life by the zodiac. Never have.

But the last three days have been classic Mercury in retrograde days. Navigating the tripwires and little buried triggers that make up my emotional minefield has been a tricky business. My desire to set off explosions which will satisfy my "NEED TO KNOW NOW" impulses has been an almost constant and obsessive drive.

So I turned to this set of directions: "During this time of revision, change is compounded and confusion is created by our reactions to the ever-changing situations. Thus anything started during this time will ultimately be taken back or even revised further, making for a high-frustration time. This will be especially true with changing our minds, reviewing new ideas and our communication being improved and honed so not to be mis-understood. The best mode to be in during a Mercury retrograde is one of "non-reaction", and with air signs being impacts, things will be changing continually during a Mercury retrograde Treat the time period as a time of gathering information, yet because the information will be in constant change it would be like trying to comb your hair in a wind storm. Best to wait until the changes stop before attempting to make things orderly. Therefore, just let the winds of situations blow around you without reacting. Once Mercury turns direct, take a look at the information that is still around at that time and go about putting everything in order, while maintaining the fine art of flexibility."

Mercury goes direct on September 29.

With that in mind, I am setting a task for myself to float. Just float. And to keep in mind this:

"Tempest tossed souls, wherever ye may be, under whatsoever conditions ye may live, know this -- in the ocean of life the isles of Blessedness are smiling, and the sunny shore of your Ideal awaits your coming. Keep your hand firmly upon the helm of thought. In the bark of your soul reclines the commanding Master; He does by sleep; wake Him. Self-control is strength; Right thought is mastery; Calmness is poer. Say unto your heart, 'Peace, be still.'"

May the forces of the universe be with me and you and all around the world.

Walking on Air

Last night I finally got around to watching Man on Wire, and today I'm still floating on the hangover feelings of elation.

The chord that rang and rang for me was towards the end, when Phillipe was questioned by the police and the media, and the question of "why?" was asked over and over. There was no answer to the question other than "because."

Did you see? Did you see me walking on the clouds? How can you ask the question why?

Live your passion is a theme I need to revisit often.

Summer Clothes

At 6:15am this morning, I folded my summer clothes. I had run home between lunch and chores and done a load of laundry, then bolted back to the school, leaving it in the dryer. This morning I took care of that.

And so there I am, coffee in hand, folding shorts, and swim trunks, and t-shirts, and all this goes through my mind.

Where did it go? This summer, that I looked forward to for so many months back in April and May. What happened? It came and I missed it, I let it slip away, let it slide by too lazy to reach out and grab it, and now its gone, and it won't return for so many months, and I will regret its passing.

Bollocks, I think to myself.

It came, and it was, and it stayed for as long as it should. And I swam in the pond when it was hot, and I bucked hay bails, and sat in the grass and watched Night at the Museum at the drive in, and I watched fireworks, and I drove across country, and I ate at Muggsys with Suzanne and Carol, and I picked carrots with PL, and weeded in the morning with Margaret while Liam read aloud. I browsed art in Chattanooga and walked along the river in Knoxville. I saw friends, and I saw family, and I worked and I laughed. I played with the kids, and rode the Virginia Creeper Trail. I milked the cow, and fed the chickens. I went bowling. I saw movies.

I didn't write a novel. I thought I might, but I didn't.

So, I can focus on what did not happen, and see it all a grand loss...a space of time marked by not enough and too little.

But if I itemize, break it down to the days and the months and the faces and the voices and the landscapes and the miles and the music and the conversations. If I break it down to the number of times I just sat talking, and the number of books I read, and the dawns I watched, and the calf that was born...it was a grand summer. It was my summer. It was the summer I needed most.

So I put away the shorts and I rolled up the beach towel, and I dressed in my school uniform, and I drank another cup of coffee. And now, I'm looking forward to the day ahead. The week ahead. The month and the months ahead. Will this be an easy year? I don't know. Chances are good it will be one of my most challenging years, and chances are better it will be one of my most rewarding.

So, rather than look towards June, I will sit in September, and I will examine the leaves of the day as they turn. And I am grateful.

Straw for the fire

I am reading a book called "Straw for the Fire"......a collection from notebooks of the poet Theodore Roethke, compiled by his student after Roethke's death.     Roethke left behind 277 spiral notebooks filled with poetry fragments, journal entries, random phrases, and various brilliant miscellany.  They used 12 of the notebooks for the book.  It's a pleasure to read.  Random sentences that feel like green and clear ponds-- struggled to through undergrowth.  My own mind is such a tangle.  But maybe, like his, we can glean out a few thoughts that are worth saving?

Here's one of Roethke's:  "Like the paper birch I delight in the company of conifers and the presence of water."

And one of mine?  Poetry intimidates but my best moments are in its presence.  Same with love.....

Saturday Morning

I slept so well last night, it was almost as though it was the first sleep. I am awake now, coffee by my side, and silence. A mouse, which has a strange habit of running from my laundry room into the bathroom every morning, has just made it's trek.

My head is full of thoughts about so many things today. None of them seem connected, and yet in their lack of connection they seem to be a puzzle to be assembled. If I can turn them right, I can find what I need.

The Van Gogh quote, "I am seeking, I am striving, I am in it with all my heart," has been on a run through my brain for these two hours I have been awake. Also running through my head are my thoughts on the Crusades and the Inquisition. Strange yes, but I have been listening to a history of these two events over the past couple of weeks. Also running through my head is how I should feel about Joe Wilson, or whether I should feel anything.

And ever present is the school year, which begins tomorrow. We look at this differently, we are preparing, we are recruiting, we are nailing down the last of the young unformed persons who will walk through our doors tomorrow. They are doing nothing but arriving.

What is all this? Is it passion? Is it passion which makes a man yell in frustration at the most inappropriate of moments? Is it passion which drives a knight onto his horse and across all the miles to the deserts of North Africa? Is it passion which drives a monk to torture a man in order to ascertain his allegiance to God?

Maybe I should rein in my interests, in order to keep my focus? Am I too distracted by the energies of the various histories present and past which swirl through my mind?

"I am seeking, I am striving, I am in it with all my heart." Grand but what of context? Why was this written, or spoken? About what, and when? How can I simultaneously revere these words while knowing of the eventual suicide of the man from which they originated?

I can't stop thinking, I can't stop wondering.

I am looking for my crusade.

Idaho

I'm in Idaho this week, visiting Carol who I have known since 1977.  She is one of the contributors on this blog and will write soon.  (She keeps talking to me and I say "Write that on the blog....") and she will, once her garden-on-steroids quits producing like a 100 tomatoes a day.

Anyway, I'm in Idaho.  Everyone is at work and soon I will hop in the hot tub in the early fall chill.  The Selkirk's are obscured by puffy white clouds but Paradise Valley is clear and achingly lovely below.

I had a piece of apple pie for breakfest.  Carol and I decided that we would make one new pie every day this week from a new cookbook she gave me called "Sweety Pies".  The crust from the cookbook is to die for and so far all the pie's themselves get up and sing happiness.  Huckleberry the other day, Apple last night and Lemon will be this afternoon.  Plus, to add another note to a good song-- the huckleberries Carol herself picked and the apples I plucked from her orchard.

I've given up pursuing happiness because it just shows up all on it's own.

Donna

Mist

Fields above are vanishing this morning, fading into tracings of trees and blades of grass in the mist. But I'm clear, and I'm real, and I'm grateful. My lines are firm, and I know where I begin and end.

Expectations

The bathroom didn't turn out like I expected. The top layer of old existing paint on the walls was less stable than I'd hoped, so I spent a bunch of time chipping it away, sweeping up all the debris, and finally accepting it was more trouble that it was worth to remove all of the old top coat. The unevenness of the seam between ceiling and walls made it impossible to paint a smooth straight edge, not to mention the not so great brushes I was trying to paint with and the awkward position of having to paint while looking up steeply, and the fickleness of my paint delivery. Then I found that the earthy red paint that Rosie chose went on too thin to cover with a first coat. 

What I've ended up with so far doesn't match my image of the results I was hoping for. The off-white underneath is showing through, some places are much darker than others, and the edges are all rough and wobbly looking. Definitely not the even and clean look I was anticipating.

Somehow, this didn't really upset me too much. I sorted through the mess of stuff packed away in cupboards and shelves. I got to listen to a bunch of interesting podcasts. I stopped and ate chocolate now and then. I got the bathroom a lot cleaner than it was before. And the way it looks now sort of makes me laugh. It's satisfyingly odd and quirky and defiantly disordered. It looks like something a peasant might have done in 16th century Europe.

I can put another coat of paint on eventually. And meanwhile, I can enjoy the relative artful chaos as it stands now.

I could have been perturbed that the results didn't match my expectations. But I wasn't for some reason. I guess I just didn't want to get that upset. What happened, happened. Kind of amusing, actually. I'd say I found a satisfying amount of happiness throughout the overall process, quite aside from the limits of my expectations. Maybe expectations aren't all they're built up to be.

--Steve

Herbal Remedies

I have a to do list and a deadline. The deadline is September 13, when the new school year begins. The to do list is all the things we have to do, in order to be ready and able to welcome the new students. Anxiety around all of this...new students, new school year, enough students, enough money, enough time, enough skill, enough paper, enough clothing, enough tents...oh, and those last three...not on my to do list, however i'm more than available to absorb the anxiety from the lists running alongside mine.

Anxiety, and I will use Steve's term, is oh so NHI.

Now the picture, for all of the above, improves daily. The to do list gets whittled away , and the students sign up. But not at my pace. Not fast enough. Not good enough. Not enough enough.

Yesterday, was herb harvesting day for me. A line on my to do list. Harvest herbs.

What is the point of that? You must be kidding? In the grand scheme of things, with all that is to be done, and all that is still unknown, I should harvest herbs? Not likely. I should really walk around with my brain ponderously jitterbugging, throwing my hands up in frustrated despair, perhaps cussing. I should conceive of Plan B, and Plan C, and Plan D. I should immediately begin work on Plan B, and then abandon it to begin work on Plan C which I will toss to the side to commence Plan D. Then, with the to do list undone, and three alternate plans incomplete, I should erupt and then collapse. A better use of my time for sure.

Instead, I forced myself to harvest mint, lemon balm, dill, and coriander.

The sun was hot and the bugs plentiful in the herb garden. Flies buzzed and tiny gnats whizzed in and out of my ears. The mint and lemon balm was a tangled jungle of snaking vines, frustrating any attempt to cut in an orderly fashion. I snipped away at whatever came before me, taking this and that and accumulating little in my buckets. I began to seethe at how many hours this was going to take. How much wasted time. How little I had to show for all of my sweaty distracted work. And the flies buzzed and the gnats whizzed and the vines remained tangled.

By accident, standing on the edge of the timber that borders the herb garden, I dislodged it. It fell away from the tangle of vines, and as I bent to replace it I saw, nestled against the dirt, a thick wooden vine, from which sprouted, probably 20 additional vines. With my clippers I cut at the base, and pulled, and a huge tree of mint came away.

Now in view, sprouting directly from the earth, were more and more of these thick vines. Pushing my face forward into the shady jungle floor I began to clip. One, two, three, four. And the jungle in that spot was cleared. From that perspective I could easily see where the mint and lemon balm separated. I clipped away at the mint filling bucket after bucket. Then I started on the lemon balm. More buckets. More clearing. In almost no time at all, that section of the bed was cleared, and I had hauled three or four five gallon buckets of mint and four or five buckets of lemon balm to the kitchen.

I used the same technique of on the towering, exploding dill and cilantro. That took less time.

The sun moved east, and cooling shadows crept in from the surrounding woods. I was upstairs in the school, removing thousands of dill seeds from the spindly stalks I had collected earlier. Frustration returned.

As seeds scattered about, and barely an inch developed in my bag, I again thought to myself. What is the damn point of this? I will be doing this until midnight, and I still have the coriander. Plus I have to tie up and hang all the mint and lemon balm. I'll just do this tomorrow.

But I didn't want to carry it over until tomorrow. Tomorrow has its own lines on the list.

Then I picked up my mail, and I had netflix. I've Loved You for So Long and The Wrestler. Haven't seen either. So I lit a kerosene lamp and pulled the school TV out of the closet, and watched movies in the dark, and plucked seeds. Then I buried my arms to the elbows in cool damp fragrant mint and lemon balm and hung them to dry. And the day ended. And I scratched something off my to do list. And the school will have lots and lots of tea, and we can make dilled sourdough and serve it with a spicy stew seasoned with coriander. And I watched two amazing performances. And today's list is waiting, so rather than get out my hammer and nail down what all this means, I'll move on. Suffice to say, I learned what I needed to learn.

Mirrors, Realms, Spheres, Levels, Categories All

Yesterday, I was driving home from work and volunteer litter pick-up along a walkway constructed under a major new overpass project up by the Mall. I was thinking about what kind of take-off on the Gandhi quote (You must be the change you wish to see in the world) that I could see putting up in places where I notice people like to gather and trash public areas. In this lulling preoccupation, I happened to spot a bird standing sideways on a stalk of mullen:

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPwu7Tkxrggb5c2hUkYWaInwDDLGS7eTjz4rDiBAvxbLngTuVlskRghCin8V9La7JFvvgOYUTUjiKaIl7nS_2ElfRMrmILLBY609pKmI_1XeP4fC-SopLmUuyXnC8w1S3FVYbVnhzf2FY/s400/Mullen2.jpg

- which grows wild along country roads out our way. And it made me laugh suddenly, to see this bird perched at a funny right angle to the seed stalk, feeding away. And that got me seeing how my awareness operates on many levels, and how varied they are, and how they don't necessarily inform each other, but live distinctly separate lives and processes. And that got me thinking about how happiness can be very present on some levels, like the sudden instance of me seeing that bird, while being quite absent on other levels, like concern over people who trash public through-ways and what to do to encourage them to be a presence they are actually proud of being in the world.

And then I thought about how there are way deeper levels than that, like the podcast I had been listening to while picking up trash. It was called "The Cruelty of Children", Episode #27 on This American Life -available for free at iTunes Store or at NPR website. I especially thought of Dan, as this first story was about a guy reflecting on his realization that he liked guys, and how difficult that was for this story teller growing up among the teasing and taunting of peers as well as the awkwardness of teachers and culture in general. But actually, his story was quite funny, read more like a dark comedy, and he had a way of really entertaining his audience with his wincing stories. Laughter of recognition, of confession, of relief!

And that made me think of how happiness seems to need its opposites, like hardship, suffering, isolation, confusion, constriction, whatever that essence is that makes happiness feel good as a liberation from all that seems to hem things in, make things feel harsh and difficult to endure. Happiness is the relief from those hardships. Happiness is an aha! after some amount of oppression.

And that reminded me of a theory I have, that this human plane seems to be curiously, cleverly devised to set people into limits that then make happiness show up in contrast to the limits. And we're all sort of experimental limits set into play in order to reap the best bang for our buck of happiness. Like there's a correlation between amount of suffering and how much happiness can come in contrast to it. In other words, if you have a relatively light easy upbringing, then profound happiness may be less likely in contrast. Whereas, if you have a miserable upbringing, then happiness is perhaps bound to show up much more pronouncedly. -There's something perhaps morbid in this dirty little secret, but it might explain why so often it seems the worst personal catastrophes get the most air play. The best bragging rights come from those with the most obvious and outrageous suffering. Happiness stands on the shoulders of mounting suffering.

But back to this piece's title and this theme of the weave of things and how consciousness lives in so many realms and categories and levels and spheres in this hall of mirrors many-mansioned universe we find ourselves in. One's upbringing realm may be seething with sores, while the horizontal bird catches some other sector of our eye's aptitude for that kind of bird/nature amusement. An ongoing story line having to do with a particular friend/relation may be winding a curiously hand-wringing path in some sphere of our preoccupation completely disregarding the upbringing realm or the bird sphere, or perhaps finds ways to integrate them in. The point being, how amazingly we are capable of investing so vividly in all these extraordinary ordinary states of mind that cubby us this way and that, level upon level, sphere next to sphere, all hall of mirrors reflecting things interesting enough, captivating enough, if not exactly happiness cultivating, but lulling us to go further and further in to see what's in there. Or staying out, for fear of the uglies or pains or intolerables. And meanwhile, happiness is sprinkled among it all, like little bright spots, little rings of the bell, little packets of refresh that in and of themselves help to sustain us, animate us, get our tails wagging, even while inner and outer wars may be waging in other concomitant spheres.

We are among a legion of everything with happiness sprinkled among tuned to the frequency of our capacities to see and feel happiness there, even while certain bottles drain dry, and sustenance wains and infinity floods in unannounced and relentless.

How to take all of that in, in any overall sense of how much it makes us happy or not, is a not any easy reconciling. But it does make me wonder, and somewhat wide-eyedly, even happily so.

--Steve

In the Mix of Happiness and Not Happiness

 (I meant to put this as a comment after Dan's last entry, but it was too long. :-)

Wow, Dan, what a great story from so many angles. You really brought something out here.

To me, Jane is symbolizing that part of us that would like simply to reduce everything to its utter absolute nature, of either totally good or totally bad, right or wrong, brilliant or shitty. Something about our more basic thinking/reacting, maybe due to fight or flight reactions which must make decisions very quickly to avoid harm. But this tendency to overgeneralize a complex field, can very much have people thinking that for example the Bible is the word of God, and Muslims are all terrorists, and the American flag is a symbol of absolute good in the world, and I really hate my step sister, and black people are only 2/3 human, and as Jane was wont to affirm, life is totally shitty, etc etc.

It feels good to be absolutely certain in one's assessment of a thing. Certainty feels empowering. Meanwhile, the more accurate truth may be that rarely are things very certain.

For example, yesterday, after work, I decided to take our dog, Milo, for a walk in the woods. He'd been cooped up all day, and I feel for his frustration. Now, granted, I'm not much of an alpha leader for dogs. So they tend to sense they can get away with doing their own thing without having to give in to my power over them. I'm kind of happy about this and yet not always happy with the outcomes. I didn't choose to have this dog be a part of our lives. Kim and Rosie did. But I often feel Milo's urge to get out of the confines of the house, and partly I like to oblige him.

So, during this walk, I've got a big trash bag and gloves and a litter picker-upper, and Milo's trotting along in front of me sniffing around and so forth. Even our cat, Cora, is following along, which she only occasionally does. And we're getting pretty far out in the woods, and I'm in basic overall happiness mode, listening to a podcast about the kindness of strangers, and then I can't find Milo. I'd noticed a group playing paintball some distance off. So I leave my trash gear and walk toward them, and sure enough, Milo was making new friends.

What I noticed, in terms of pursuit of happiness, is what a mix it can be between that which is felt to be happiness-inducing and that which feels not-happiness-inducing. We can abbreviate to H.I. And N.H.I. So taking the walk was H.I. with a bit of not N.H.I of feeling somewhat obliged to relieve Milo of his cabin fever, which wasn't really my responsibility, but I felt bad for him feeling bad. Picking up trash is also some combination of pro and con H.I. as really it's not my trash in the first place, and I'd prefer people took care of their own trash. But there it is, and I feel good about helping to keep the forest looking nice and trash free. Then finding Milo had run away was N.H.I, though when I did find him making new friends, that was H.I. and fun for me to meet new people and see how much they liked Milo and see how happy Milo was to be among this new stimulation. But then trying to keep him with me as we were leaving this group was mostly N.H.I. because I could tell he was still in independent spirit mode, and not really caring much to respect my wishes that he stay with me. And sure enough he wandered off again while I was wanting to finish up my trash collecting and get back home, which of themselves were H.I. for the most part, though I was getting my fill of those pursuits so beginning to feel somewhat more to the side of N.H.I. Then I had to go back and find Milo again which was more N.H.I. And I went into that scoldy emotional state toward Milo, at what a bad boy he was being, which of course was only from my point of view, wishing he'd keep to my bidding. But then I notice how much I like my freedom from having to oblige myself to others, how there are definitely parts of me that find the pursuit of happiness in going my own way and leaving others out of communication with me when I'm enjoying going off on my own unaccounted for.

So, what I'm seeing is that going through life triggers a kind of alternating current between the things that add happiness vs the things that subtract it, and this can happen within the same thing so that we're among a kind of variable register of how much everything's inducing happiness even while partly it may be inducing unhappiness. It's all a mix of qualities rarely totally one way or the other, but a sort of linear on/off switch of gathering yes's and no's that do add up being either mostly happiness inducing or mostly not happiness inducing, were we to give an overall assessment, even while some of both happiness and not happiness are sprinkled among all experiences. "Woven in" as we've said.

And I think as Dan points out, as we get better at staying open for the good stuff, the less we are shut down by that part of us that wants to paint the whole thing black or white. Black is really almost always too black and white is often too white. Too much pessimism misses whatever joy may actually be there, and too much optimism is at risk of being sorely disappointed eventually at expecting too much of a thing that really can't deliver the good as much as you might like.

We're really always among a mix of qualities, and happiness can suddenly jump out of situations that could seem convincingly horrible through and through. So congratulations and thanks to Dan for seeing further into the complexity and staying open, even beyond very challenging suggestions to the contrary, to close off, shut down, and join Jane in this overgeneralized assessment that life IS shitty! and look at all her evidence to prove it.

For me, then, "faith", as Dan pointed out, is the willingness to stay open for happiness to show up even in the places you might be completely convinced there is no happiness to be found. And of course, I'm quite imperfect at this, though at times, I do manage to see through some of my own limitations at this.

You might have heard the story of the Buddhist Monk is running away from a tiger, then falls over a cliff, is hanging from a branch about to drop to his death, and look, he spies a fresh ripe wild strawberry! He plucks it, pops it in his mouth, savors it. Ah, happiness for that moment, quite aside from his probably demise.

--Steve

Further thoughts on "Among the Weave"

Good Morning --

I'm really enjoying what Steve's blog triggered for me. I know, I know, this should all go into the comments section, but what the heck. I think, more than anything, what I'm feeling after reading his post is how it captured the whole bloody point of this exercise for me.

This is where I can go: That didn't work out, so damn it...everything sucks. Like this, my friend Bob has this friend Jane. All this happened years and years ago,...anyway, Jane was dramatic, she seemed somehow to have cast herself as the tragic heroine in her own story. And the universe responded. In large ways and small, like one time we were eating dinner. Eating dinner with Jane always had this air of suspense, because she would never really quite get to eating. She would load her fork and then talk, and raise the fork, and stop, and talk some more, the fork suspended. Then the fork would descend back to the plate, still full, unload itself, and reload. And rise slowly, while she was still talking. And I would find myself beginning to focus on whether or not the fork would ever find its destination, or would simply contine to rise and fall without ever delivering its payload. And all the while, a story was unfolding, a story of injustice, and how nothing in life ever ever succumbed correctly to her careful manipulations. Adding to that were moments, such as this particular dinner, when in watching the fork rise and fall, I began to notice something. There is something odd about her salad. Is it the lighting? Is it my eyesight? Then Jane looked down, finally, at her meal and screamed. Not a small shriek, but a full throated, goggle eyed berserker of a scream. Heads turned, hearts stopped, and in the middle of it, we all were drawn to notice that Jane's salad was moving. The whole thing. Undulating almost. Her salad was full of small green worms. There was another time involving a sandwich. I wasn't there for this, but I heard about it. They were eating in an outdoor cafe, and the sandwich rose and fell and rose and fell, until just as it was finally finally approaching her mouth, a bird unloaded on her hand. Inches from her open mouth.

So anyway, Jane went with Bob to see Sophie's Choice. Now, granted, there is not much to celebrate in that particular film. But they emerged from the theater in silence, and walked part way to the parking lot, where Jane stopped, and firmly announced that "That just proves that everything is shit." And then she burst into tears.  Like I said, there is not much joy to wrangle out of Sophie's Choice, but I'm not sure exactly how it can be summed up thematically with that statement.

But then again, as a matter of choice, everything can be summed up with that statement. Its all dependant upon the part you look at. I can choose to look at what I don't like. Or I can choose to find what I love, what works for me. And focus my attention there.

For example. I'm uncomfortable around born again Christians sometimes. Okay, that's not even fair. I'm uncomfortable around zealotry. It doesn't matter where it originates. I get a sinking elevator feeling when I find myself caught up in it's web. Like yesterday.

I had a loose crown. So I went to the dentist and had it fixed. The woman, and I really wish I was better with names, because she was really nice, and I'd like to say more than "the woman," and I were chatting, and she said everything looked fine.

"So, I don't need a root canal?"

"Oh, no."

"Great. The whole time I was driving over here, I was praying, please please please don't let me have to have a root canal."

"It's nice when He answers our prayers."

Oh. Well, I was speaking more rhetorically. I wasn't really praying.

"Right," I said.

Anyway, we were off and running on to the topic of dental stuff, and comparing wisdom teeth stories, and we both had had two dry sockets when we had our wisdom teeth out.

"Yeah, oh it was horrible, I woke up at two in the morning, nothing to do for hours, but lie on the floor and moan," I told her, "And say 'please please please just let me die...'"

I don't learn the first time.

"I bet your glad that He didn't answer that prayer..."

Really? Why? Why is this conversation happening? I don't want this conversation to be happening. I don't want to have to pretend to agree with you because you have sharp instruments in your hands.

But the big deal is exactly what? My discomfort is about me. She's perfectly fine, and after all I was the one who brought up praying, albeit inadvertently. Then she had a coughing fit and had to leave the room. When she returned she explained she had bronchitis, and that she was fine, but the cough stuck around. We compared notes on that, laughing, and then she said that she was a little worried because she was supposed to have surgery, but she knew they wouldn't do it while she still had the cough. We were wrapping up, and I said, well I'll keep my fingers crossed (I had learned about the praying thing...) that your cough goes away before the surgery.

"Well, we're still praying that the surgery won't be necessary..."

I didn't ask, what the surgery was for. I figured that if she wanted to tell me, she would.

She continued by saying, that the whole thing was in God's hands, and she was really fine with that.

"It's the scariest thing thats ever happened to me, but I've never been more at peace."

At this point, I'm so glad I kept my mouth shut. I'm so glad I didn't feel the need to announce that I wasn't on her page. Because in that statement, she nailed it. In that statement she and I got to the exact same place.

"Thats fantastic," I told her. "Thats really what faith is right? I mean its easy to have faith when everything is going great and you're just pushing your grocery cart through the store."

She laughed.

We all find ourselves in the dark from time to time. Scared. Lonely. Hurt. Faith is the thing behind us, the thing we can reach out in that darkness and hold onto, the arms we can fall back into. I have that. She has that. We call it by different names. So what?

And I'm grateful that I didn't stumble over the detritus on the tracks of our earliest words together, those bits of gravel and broken things that might have kept me from experiencing something with her. I'm glad I kept my mouth shut. I'm glad she was so kind and sweet that she kept my mind open to her. Because I got to lie in that chair, while she leaned against the counter, and we looked into each other's eyes and shared something. Found our common ground and recognized each other as simply beautifully real and human.

Like you said Steve, its among the weave.

--Dan

Among the Weave

Yesterday, I was noticing how happiness shows up among the greater weave of all things showing up. Happiness is sprinkled among it. Things that make me happy tend to come forward while everything else recedes in the undulation of everything weaving together.

I noticed that first glances at things can be at first disconcerting, like the shape of that man's head, or the pull of that other man's voice, or that gift store with too many things to look at. Relaxing and looking again can see through initial prickly reactions, and new appreciations can form.

I attended a performance last night by the poet fiddler of Alaska - something like that. I didn't really like his sloppy look or his subtly oppressive need to speak. But if I closed my eyes and let the music and words play in my imagination, I got into it, could hear the wisdom in the fiddle music beyond the performer, could let go all those words having to be gathered and made sense of.

On the way home, so many things registered as happiness-inducing. Too many to list. But they zoomed forward into my line of sight and my inner ear, leaving the rest of the weave of all things tp draw back into the shadows. Were I not driving from theater to home, I wouldn't have had occasion to experience all those parts of happiness. So much of happiness arrives simply by driving into it without any idea what of it will come.

During sleep, I dreamed of a romance that may well only ever exist there in that dream. The pursuit of it pulled all my attention. The embrace of it rewarded me with happiness, though without the same pull toward me as I toward the pursued. Perhaps that made it all the more entrancing.

After all, we're talking about the pursuit of happiness, which implies not being it, but reaching out for it as though it is not already here.

I notice the French chose *fraternity* over the *pursuit of happiness* in their constitution. I hear their conversations are more a gathering of reflections about a shared topic than what in America is often more about who can talk about themselves the most impressively.

Here's to the happiness in both pursuits,

--Steve