Category Archives: Politics

Acting, Feelings, Judaism, Politics, Writing

Chesed and The Emotive Presidency

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Lughnasa and the Herme Full Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Gabe coming up today. We’ll see Oppenheimer together tomorrow. (He said he was going to wear a suit.) Prolia. Bone density. Resistance work. 2 hour workout yesterday. Ann. Her good work on The Trail to Cold Mountain. Zoom. Skype. Pixels. Computer GPUs. CPUs. Screens. Keyboards. ChabotGPT4. AI. Skynet. The Internet. Laptop. Desktop. Tablet. Smartphones. Our world of small miracles. The James Webb. Starlink. The Book. The Chair. Vision.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Internet

One brief shining: “Charlie,” the woman in the blue coat called through a cracked door so I got up and went to her; she had her left leg wrapped in blue with an orthopedic black boot up to the calf  and resting on one of those little scooters you see every once in a while now; her name was Carol it said on her blue coat, “Sit here,” I did and she placed a small tray with a syringe near me, had me turn to face the wall since the Prolia shot goes in the back of the arm, she stuck me, I said thank you, and left.

 

I mention Carol because her demeanor was so calming and warm. An instant connection. This woman cares. I could feel it. Kindness came off her in waves. Due to my delicate condition I see lots of medical professionals over the weeks and months. Few of them are robotic or uncaring, but many, most of them are hurried. And I know why. The era of corporate medicine times “patient encounters” and the ability to upcode. A patient’s feelings or the end result of a visit are not part of the metrics. In spite of those cute little surveys sent out after each encounter. Be ye not fooled. They are not striving to improve their service though they may be trying to improve how you evaluated your visit. Not. The. Same. Thing.

 

Fell back asleep this morning. Happens some times. Up at 8:30! Oh, my. I chuckled at myself. Today is Trail to Cold Mountain day. Editing the script, refreshing memory, going one page deeper into memorization. Acting class tonight.

Gabe’s visit will include Oppenheimer tomorrow. Looking forward to having him here. I need to see these kids more often. Not sure how to do that. Their lives are busy now and I can no longer hop in the car to go see them without losing a day after to recovery from the drive. A conundrum.

 

Let the silly season be seen as well underway. A NYT article reports Trump and Biden tied in a hypothetical rematch. Not sure I can stomach much more of this. Already. And we’re a year plus away from the voting. How he wrote wonderingly can this be? A man with indictments already in two investigations and other indictments likely in two others against a man whose performance in office has not been flashy, but has been much, much better than I anticipated. And in the midst of genuine crisis after crisis. Covid. The Ukraine. Inflation. The economy post Covid. We are well and truly divided.

Read this George Will column for a cogent explanation as to why this upcoming election may be so painful. Here’s a quote from it: “In a National Affairs essay with that title [The Emotive Presidency], Mikael Good, a Georgetown University political theory student, and Philip Wallach, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, argue that “Trump’s masterstroke” was to realize that, for his core supporters, his governing is of secondary importance.”

 

 

 

Commentary on Religion, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Judaism, Politics

Religious Life

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Summer and the Herme Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Erica, Yolanda, Nancy, Sophia. Helen. Stacy. Jamie. Alan. Ann. Gracie. The Bread Lounge. Evergreen Market. Sugar Jones. CBE. Evergreen. The Muller Retaining Wall company. Gettin’ the job done at Evergreen Lake. The detour. All detours. Hunting for the sacred. Finding the holy. Walking with the divine. Racial justice. Economic justice. The Ancient Brothers. My convergence. That Bull Elk. Still imprinted and present. Korea. Israel, a land of revelation.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Revelation

One brief shining: CBE filled up with members of For His Glory church last night a project of Rabbi Jamie’s to advance racial justice by partnering with a black church, sharing services, gospel music, and friendship first through that most religious of human activities, a potluck, then a kabbalah shabbat service with traditional music.

 

I went for the potluck. Met Erica, Yolanda, Nancy, and Sophia. We had a long conversation. In a difficult setting for me. The Sun shone in my face and the babble of others filled my one hearing aid. Talked with them about my conversion. About their lives. Erica manages corporate relocations internationally. About Kate. They wanted to know if I could remarry. Yes, I said, but it would have to be a very special woman and I haven’t met her. At least not yet. Tithing and the synagogue’s dues structure. Tzedakah. Yolanda wanted to know what questions the rabbinic court (beit din) might ask. Hmm. I said. That’s a good question. I’ll have to ask Rabbi Jamie.

My sense of politics wants to move faster, engage quicker. Do something. Always. But this approach may work over a longer time. Building friendships. Shared experiences. Then let the political grow organically. Grow out of a common life nurtured over potlucks and joint services.

 

News of my conversion has begun to leak out. Not that it was in hiding. More and more people know. And the warmth I’m experiencing makes me feel good. Mindy came up last night and said I hear you’re going to have a very special moment in Israel. Yes, I am. She offered to help me with my Hebrew or anything else. Her husband David said later as I was leaving, one thing I love about Judaism. We’re not evangelical, but if you decide you want to join we’ll find a way to include you. Over lunch on Thursday Rebecca, on hearing my news, said, Welcome. Alan wanted to know about my bar mitzvah.

 

Revelation has begun to loom much larger in my thinking since the Bull Elk and the conversations stimulated by God is Here. Here’s a wiki definition: “In religion and theology, revelation is the revealing or disclosing of some form of truth or knowledge through communication with a deity or other supernatural entity or entities.” As I’ve begun to think about it more, I realized that revelation is at the base of most if not all religious truth claims. In other words revelation can be seen as the core religious experience, the one from which all others grow. Think of Joseph Smith and his golden tablets. Moses on Mt. Sinai. Mohammed and his angel. Jesus in the desert.

The problem comes when we ossify and/or reify the revelations of others. When we stop hunting for or opening ourselves to revelation. More to come on this. Much more.

 

 

Asia, Dogs, Fourth Phase, Judaism, Korea, Literature, Politics, US History, World History

Korea and Reading

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Summer and the Summer Moon Above

Sunday gratefuls: Leo. Lying here beside me. Luke out having fun. Books. Oh, did I mention books? Korean history. Seoah. Murdoch. My son. Working hard. Korean schools. American schools. Having a dog in the house. Korea. The Korean civil war. The armistice. Kim Il Sung. Kim Jong Il. Kim Jong Un. Presidents in South Korea. Chaebol. Zaibatsu. Samsung. LCD. Hyundai. Different ways of organizing economies. And nations. Trump’s legal trouble. The House G.O.P. The Extremes. Showing us a path to nowhere.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Knowledge

One brief shining: Leo lies here on the green rug with Cypress Trees, I write this blog letting my fingertips move over my split keyboard, all while a bright blue Colorado Sky backdrops Black Mountain its Lodgepoles and Aspens, there is no sound except the slight click of the keys.

 

More reading in Cuming’s history of Korea. Two chapters on the Korean civil war. He believes we should have let them fight it out, burned out the divisions and reordered their culture. As we had to. As Vietnam had to. Instead we put in amber the tensions and conflicts present after the Japanese Occupation ended. If I read Cuming’s account correctly, the North would have won the civil war, probably easily without us. Even with our involvement they came close. Then Koreans themselves would have had to sort out a new political order. Instead we have my son and his colleagues still in country, maintaining a very fragile and often fraught peace.

It was a time of big power conflicts, especially the USSR and the US. The architects of the idea of containment Dean Rusk, George Kennan, and Paul Nitze influenced the U.S. role in the war. Containing the Soviets, not China.

Korea is more than you know. Much more than I knew.

 

Realizing I privilege reading over most other activities. If I’m on a topic, an enthusiasm, I’ll sometimes read for hours at a whack. For days on end. Cup of coffee at hand. Now with my reading glasses perched on my nose. When I get tired, as I did yesterday, I watched a TV program, a K-drama just to stay in the the mind-world and went back to Cuming’s afterward. I’m neither a fast nor slow reader, I adjust my pace to the material. If it’s difficult, I’m slower. In the middle, as history usually is, I go a bit faster. With fiction I gallop.

Right now, as you can tell, I’m on Korea. When I finish Cumings, I’ll start another, the Two Koreas. Though. I might go back and reread the earlier chapters in Cumings. His long synopsis of Korean history before the late 19th century fascinated me since it contained so much that was new. For me.

Also, I’m building a conversion library. I already have a lot of books on Judaism, but I’m going to organize the ones I need for my study and put them up here in the home office. Had to order others. Looking forward to that reading, too.

 

Asia, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Holidays, Judaism, Korea, Politics, Travel, US History

Happy Birthday to the good ole U.S.A.

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Summer and the Summer Moon Above

Tuesday gratefuls: Acting class tonight. First half of Israel trip paid for. Herme introduction rewritten. Parchment paper ordered. No Fireworks up here. Good for Dogs. Fire. Air. Thin air, melting into thin air. My feet and toes. Holding me up since 1947. My ankles and calves and thighs. Mobility. My pelvis, butt, penis and testicles. Sitting, twisting, elimination. No joy at this point in my life. My thorax. Holding important stuff in. My arms and fingers. Dexterity for all my needs. My shoulders and neck. Supporting my head. My head, mouth, nose, ears, and eyes. Eating, hearing (sort of), seeing, smelling, taking in oxygen, a case for my brain. All these years forgot to be grateful for that which is closest.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: My body

One brief shining: Can you imagine the evolution of the eye or the slow changes necessary to create a thumb perhaps you are the one who can follow the path from our One-Celled ancestors to a beating heart maybe you grasp the folding and intricate interlacing of brain matter neurons synapses the marvel of language as it first sat on the first tongue to express a thought through sound oh this everyday miracle our body ourselves our home for life.

 

I’m a Yankee Doodle Dandy, a real live nephew of my Uncle Sam, born on the Fourth of July. Today is Seoah’s Yankee Doodle birthday. What a great birthday for a naturalized U.S. citizen. Seoah and my son. Ruth and Gabe. My immediate family. Mark in Saudi Arabia. Mary to return to Malaysia and South East Asia. They are my hope for this country. Them specifically and what they represent.

Seoah, a Korean by birth and a citizen of Korea until two years ago. She married my son, a Bengali by birth. Both now naturalized citizens of the U.S.A. My son serving this country in the military. Both abroad, in Korea, protecting not only the U.S.A. but much of Asia as well. This is, in these two people, the most fundamental promise of America. That you can come here from wherever you were born, no matter the circumstances, and become a citizen, a full-fledged participant in the colorful tapestry of American life.

Or consider Ruth and Gabe. On their mother’s side Jewish, their grandfather a Romanian Jew from Bucharest and their grandmother of an immigrant Jewish family as well. Third generation. On their father’s side Norwegian ancestry four generations removed from Bergen. They are also both Gen Z, the most politically aware generation since the Boomers. They will need to be with the crushing weight of adaptation to climate change they will have to carry.

Mary and Mark. The expat life. Being American on foreign soil. Contributing to the lives and welfare of Saudis, Thais, Malaysians, Japanese, and Singaporeans. Representing the American ideal of a world known for its inclusion rather than its chauvinism. Representing our country to other cultures. Being the good American rather than the ugly American.

How can I not be hopeful when I can see in my own family the very America I hold so close and dear. Especially on this day.

 

Acting, Asia, Poetry, Politics, Shadow Mountain, US History, Weather +Climate

Who can leap the world’s net?

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Summer and the Super Full Summer Moon Above

Sunday gratefuls: Sundays. Ancient Brothers. The Fire This Time. Jude. Jessica. Neighbors. Derek. Mark in Camel Land. Mary in Friday Night Fish Fry Land. Me in the Land of Mountains and Dogs. Mountain Wild Flowers. The spike Mule Deer Buck eating dandelions. The Doe who came again. A day of small chores, reading, Han Shan poetry. Releasing.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Letting go of the to do list

One brief shining: The Mountain Streams have calmed down only running now as they might after a wet Spring that ended in early June temperatures though remain cool a couple of hot days as a reminder but we hope for the Monsoon rains to start to tamp down the remaining fire risk and give us a low Smokey sign for an entire year which would be a first for me.

 

Sat down in my upstairs chair yesterday. Finished memorizing my fifth Cold Mountain Poem:

 

I’m on the trail to Cold Mountain

The trail to Cold Mountain never ends

Long clefts filled with rock and stones

Wide streams buried in dense grass

Slippery moss, but there’s been no rain

Pine trees sigh, but there’s been no wind

Who can leap the world’s net

And sit here in the white clouds with me?

 

After this I realized I’d paid all my bills, had food in the fridge, no urgent chores. I was caught up. A twinge of anxiety. Searching for something that needed my attention right now. Nothing. Well now. How about that? I could leap the world’s net and sit in the white clouds with Han Shan.

So I did.

 

In case you need some slivers of hope in this benighted decade here are a few I’ve found of late.

 

Miss Texas Averie Bishop. Read this Washington Post article about an Asian Miss Texas who is shaking up the majority-minority state that is current day Texas. We don’t know yet how the demographic changes that have slowly edged their way closer to reality will affect us politically but if Miss Bishop is any indicator watch out Far Right and moderate Right.

 

Déjà News by Rachel Maddow. Alan suggested this podcast by the MSNBC news personality. Here’s the podcast’s description from its website: ” In each episode, Rachel and co-host Isaac-Davy Aronson seek a deeper understanding of a story in today’s headlines by asking: Has anything like this ever happened before? Would knowing that help us grapple with what’s happening now… and what might happen next?”

 

Consider this very strange NYT story. A ‘Cage Match’ between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg? Yes. There is a current discussion on the details of a cage match between these two titans of American commerce. Need I say more?

 

My own reading over the last six months or so has made me aware of the sine wave nature of extreme right wing politics dominating either states or the Federal Government or both, then being pushed back by an onrushing tide of progressivism. I admit it looks bleak in many ways right now, but consider the end days of the KKK in Indiana as evidenced by Fever Dream in the Heartland. Or, consider the Reconstructionist pushback against a wave of nativist sentiments before and just after the Civil War. Consider the demise of the Joe McCarthy era and the liberal era of civil rights and anti-establishment politics that followed.

We’re overdue for a liberal backlash and I hope women, minorities of all kinds, and those who would move up our socio-economic ladder link hands and throw the capitalist, white supremacist, homophobic, misogynistic minority back on the trash heap of history where they belong.

 

Acting, Asia, Commentary on the news, Poetry, Politics, Science, Travel, US History

Summer, the American Season

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Summer and the Summer Moon Above

Friday gratefuls: Mini-splits cooling. A cool night. Good sleeping. July 4th. Seoah’s birthday. Sending her a Jacquie Lawson card. Mary in Eau Claire. The most recent CJ Box book. K-dramas. Stranger. Sky Castle. Itaewon Class. Cod. Potatoes. Collard greens. Herme.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Our Earth

One brief shining: Geez Tom passed on an image from JPL that showed all the asteroids that could strike the Earth and they wove in and out of the Solar system creating a web of white that looked like doom doom doom for the Planet but no JPL says not this century.

 

Learned another one:

 

I traveled to Cold Mountain,

Stayed here for thirty years.

Yesterday looked for friend and family

More than half had gone to the Yellow Springs

Slow burning, life dies like a flame,

Never resting, passing like a river.

I stand in my lone shadow,

Suddenly, the tears flow down.

 

Summer feels like the American season to me. The 4th of July. The Indianapolis 500. NASCAR. Baseball. Family reunions in city parks and on family farms.

For many years I would take the summer to read American history, political philosophy, political analysis. Haven’t done it for a while but recent reading about the far right was the sort of thing I would do.

I also have a modest Civil War jones. I love to visit battlefields. Again, like the summer reading, it’s been a while since I’ve set out on a road trip to visit Civil War sites. Thinking I might do it next year. Visit Sarah and Jerry, Paul and Sarah. This year’s occupied with Korea and Israel.

Let me see. I’ve been to Manassas, Antietam, Shiloh, Ft. Sumter, Stones River, Vicksburg, Ft. Donelson, and Andersonville. Still missing Gettysburg and several others. Enough for a long trip.

 

Guess I could also visit Trump era proto-Civil War sites like the Capitol Building and Richmond, Virginia.

With the Extremes dismantling  years of liberal policy and law trying to take us back to their own future, a dismal and cruel place, learning what the far right wants has become more and more important.

They want no special treatment for African Americans. Even if the special treatment of slavery skewed not only the politics of our constitution but embedded racism in the very interstices of our law and governance. Even if the special treatment of slavery ginned up the falsest of lies, white supremacy. Even if we know all of this for sure.

They want all life held sacred. Except the children born to poor parents or the children of immigrants. Or the victims of mass incarceration who end up dying needless deaths in prisons across the U.S. I mean not only, not even primarily, capital punishment, but deaths of despair, of under treated illness, deaths of families living without fathers.

They want to be left alone in their enclaves of Christian Nationalism or survivalist paranoia or anti-globalist, America first isolation. They want to treat all Federal lands as personal property and suffer no accountability for their actions.

They want guns to protect their liberty from the fascist Federal government while supporting the actual fascists who will certainly take their liberty and impoverish them even more.

They want the libtards to stop trying. We cannot, must not. Ever. Stop.

 

Poetry, Politics, Weather +Climate, Writing

Cold Mountain

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Summer and the Summer Moon Above

Thursday gratefuls: Great workout. Learning Cold Mountain, one poem a day. A good night’s sleep. Protein. Carbs. Veggies. Fruit. Eat the rainbow. Exercise as a mood lifter. Challenges. Developing Herme. Cloaks. Psilocybin. Spores. Growing my own. A gray day. The Monsoon. Korea. The Hermit Kingdom. The Land of the Morning Calm. Chaebol. Kangim. Keshet. Beit She’an. Good food. Cod.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Hooded Man

One brief shining: Writing again beyond Ancientrails this time a one man short play enjoying dialogue as the only tool well stage directions too beginning to soar again feeling the sun under my wings the air over my head timeless now while I dive into the deep pool below cast a net bring out a flopping sentence or two to advance the story. Landed it!

 

Happy to say I’ve sidewised myself back to writing. This Herme project. Rolling, rolling, rolling. Dialogue advances. The idea emerges.

Second Cold Mountain poem from memory: (well, mostly)

 

One thousand clouds, ten thousand streams

Here I live, an idle man

I roam green peaks by day

Back to sleep by cliffs at night.

One by one, springs and autumns go,

Free of heat and dust, my mind.

Sweet to know there’s nothing I need,

Silent as the autumn flood.

 

Plan to weave together a Celtic backstory, throw in a bit of magic, and a Tarot major arcana archetype-the Hooded Man-with the Chinese Rivers and Mountains school of poetry. Liking the idea of turning it into a one man show. Still.

 

On top of Shadow Mountain sits my home

Lodgepoles and Aspens, Bunch Grass and Spruce,

Cedar siding and Solar Panels outside

Inside I ride out my days alone, yet not alone

Accompanied by the dead and their living souls

By the words of poets and writers, movies

By words from my own hand, written

Yet often unbidden. A man untroubled.

Rock beneath stays quiet, unmoving.

 

Playing now. Having fun. What creation can bring into a life. My life and yours. Who cares about legacy? Not important. Who cares about today, this wonderful only ever never again day? I do! Ichi-go, ich-e.

 

Purple Haze. Nope. This time. Rust colored, apocalyptic sunseen and sungone. Bad air for all. Courtesy of the Ancient Brother’s Sunday topic: Fire. Yet this is also true. Those burning parts of Canada will resurrect, become green again. Yes, their carbon dioxide has gone up in, well, smoke. But the recapture of it on Mother Earth’s own schedule has already begun. We may not be around to experience that rebalancing. But it will happen.

 

I see the Extremes knocked down affirmative action at Harvard and UNC. Expected. Never been sure how I felt about affirmative action. Its intent? Sure. Necessary. How it actually worked? Always wondered how those who were considered admits by affirmative action felt. I know for sure how some white parents and students thought. A toxic mix at best. We’re not done with this work and this sets us out on a different road to achieve results. Perhaps California’s reparations?

 

 

 

Acting, Asia, Politics, Shadow Mountain, Travel, World History, Writing

First World Problems

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Summer and the Summer Moon Above

Tuesday gratefuls: Friends and family visiting. Visiting friends and family. Travel. Korea. Israel. Murdoch and his pink slipper. Conifer Cafe. A great workout, 140 minutes. Loaner hearing aid. New one on the way. Amy. Her trip to New Zealand to watch the U.S. Women’s Soccer team. Honeycrisp Apple and Peanut butter. Aspen Perks. Primo’s. Breakfast Places. The Bread Lounge. Parkside. Wildflower. Blackbird Cafe. And friends to eat breakfast with. Tom. Alan. Rebecca. Marilyn and Irv. Tara.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Sharing meals

One brief shining: The often empty hearts of politicians seeking advantage power and wealth collude with the often empty hearts of the wealthy who want or is it need advantage power and wealth too so often this happens that the two become the same seeking that which is unnecessary for tasks that no one wants completed in the process ruining lives soil a planet the only one we have while what they truly need doses of love justice and compassion eludes them both.

 

Yesterday. Breakfast at the Conifer Cafe. Tom. Violet there, too. This time with red hair. I may go blond soon, she said, as she poured me some more coffee. Tom and I dealt with first world problems needing solution. His: AC problems. A tradesmen inflicted wound of a compressor coil which knocked out one. Stress after that knocked out the other one. With Kate this would have qualified as a reason to visit a hotel until all was well and truly cool again. Mine: a hearing aid that won’t charge. Made an appointment with Amy. Went down the hill to see her. She gave me a loaner and says a new one is on the way.

As I said a few posts ago, we can view these problems as hassles or as evidence of our continuing agency. We’re not dead yet. They are opportunities to retain contact with the world, meet new people, cement working relationships. And as my buddy Alan says these are first world problems. Not talking about starvation, war, oppression, poverty. A useful reminder when things bump bang and whimper in the night.

 

I plan to spend most of today working on Herme. I’d like to get at least two different sets of Cold Mountain poems organized. Both with an internal trajectory. I also want to spend a good bit of time on the introduction to the project. Playing further with the idea of a one-act play.

 

Also need to call Colorado Gas and schedule a change out of my meter.

 

Beginning to think about the Korea trip at a bit finer grain. Gifts for Seoah’s family. For her and my son. A house warming gift for her parents. Seoah’s brother built them a new home. I did buy today two contemporary histories of Korea.

 

Oh the winds of change. Noticed Putin’s face looked a little sour in a Washington Post photo. Well it might. Strong men who suddenly look weak often don’t last long.

Until tomorrow.

 

 

 

 

Asia, Commentary on the news, Politics, Shadow Mountain, Weather +Climate, World History

Hail, Hail, the Hail’s all here

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Summer and the Summer Moon Above

Thursday gratefuls: Tom. Arriving today. Dick Arnold. My roommate in Jerusalem. Jamie. Herme. His story. Diane. The Ancient Brothers on Earth. A blue Sky. Slight Wind. Hail and Thunder last night. More Water. Planning, making trips real. Vince, coming to mow today. Shadow Mountain. Writing dialogue for Herme. And Ovidius Publius. Joan and Ruth. Gabe and his new guitar, amp. Sarah and BJ. Unloading books. In BJ’s own personal Idaho.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: South Korea, K-dramas

One brief shining: Life with that old excitement you know things to do in the future and a good day today Korea in August and Israel in October the Herme project beginning to take shape with Herme and the Old Grey Magician and Cold Mountain sharing a room together at the showcase upcoming, taking a bow before taking a plane.

 

Hail lies thick on the driveway and covers the Dandelions like Snow. The Thunder roared, the Clouds were big. The Lightning flashed and killed a Pig. Recalled that ditty many times in Minnesota, rarely here. Last night though…

The night of the Summer Solstice and the temperature went down to 46. The Hail pounded so hard on the windows that it woke me up and kept me up until it passed. Even with my hearing issues. Small Hail, larger than Grappel, around pea sized. The Aspens lost some Leaves, but not too many. Glad for that. The Irises are still Leaves only above the Soil so they’re fine. The Lodgepoles seem unflustered.

An exciting night.

 

The submersible. Gosh. Every cell of my claustrophobic body clenches up when I read the news about the Titan. It has seventeen bolts which tighten from the outside. No way out. No need at the crushing depths it visits anyhow. Though a lot of my claustrophobia focuses on could I get out if something bad happened. Why I couldn’t even go down the elevator in the mineshaft at the Lake Vermillion-Soudan mine. I wanted to go see the neutrino experiment at the very bottom. I looked at the elevator. I looked at its route, twenty-four hundred feet through solid rock at a slant. I bought tickets. I looked at the elevator. Its route. Nope, I turned around and walked away.

Even with a spare $250,000 you wouldn’t find me in that submersible. Would I want to be there? Yes. Could I? No. I’ve never done the gradual exposure therapy that can cure phobias.

 

Politics and its bedfellows. India and the U.S. Sure the world’s soon to be largest country has English as a common language with the U.S. Along with hundreds of other languages. Sure my son’s from Bengal. Sure the British stamp on India remains indelible if still deplorable. And yes India prefers to count itself as non-aligned, neither pro-Russian nor pro-China nor pro-West.

Yet India also has extensive commercial ties with Russia. There is, too, the India of Narendra Modi summarized in this NYT article today. Which disturbs me. A lot.

This is the classic example of the enemy of our enemy, China, might well be our friend. Maybe? But. Do we want to be buddies with an autocratic chauvinist who has sidelined Muslims and other non-Hindus, encouraged caste discrimination, and started a push to devolve the status of women? From a geo-political perspective it’s a tough call. A humane perspective though suggests now is not the time.

Cooking, Denver, Politics, Sport, US History

Nuggets Win!

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Beltane and the Shadow Mountain Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Michelle. Bond and Devick. Investments. Cold Mountain. Chinese Rivers and Mountains poetry. Acting. Acting class. Character study. The Hermit. Tarot. Herme. Neon. Water. Air. Earth. Fire. The comfort of my home. Black Mountain Drive. Brook Forest Drive. Evergreen. The detour. The Elk herds that cause Elk jams. Black Bears. Rummaged trash bins. Travelers. Tourists. A bit of each, I guess. Plant Stems. Tree Trunks. Sturdy. Allergens. Air purifiers. Cast iron skillets.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The four elements

One brief shining: How often the Sun emerges after the darkness of night casually including us in its energy giveaway, how often the Moon rises after the brilliance of the Sun and bathes us in its soft reflected light, changing from tiny sliver to a full lantern then waning and disappearing only to return again and again, how often the stars dance a slow gavotte as our Earth turns and rushes around the Sun, how often we fail to notice them.

 

Ah. A good day. Cardio. Two sets of resistance, feeling my muscles respond. Chorizo and home fried potatoes, an egg for breakfast. A Rockfish sandwich for lunch on Bread Lounge multi-Grain Sourdough. Frozen Mango chunks for desert. An apple and chunky peanut butter for supper. Organizing Cold Mountain poems, information on the MIA’s Jade Mountain, the Hermit card of the Tarot Major Arcana. Building my character.

 

How bout those Nuggets! A gentleman’s sweep over the Heat in 5. First NBA title for Denver. Such a difference from the Twin Cities with the Timberwolves, the Cubs simulacrum Vikings. The Denver Broncos. The Avalanche. Superbowl and Stanley cup winners. Though. The Twins brought home two World Series titles while my son was young. And the Rockies may not reach that goal by the time he’s old. Sports. Not really my thing, but still… Fun. And, yes. F1. Basketball. So.

 

Say you’re a defendant in a Federal case. Say you’ve stiffed lawyers your whole life. Not to mention contractors and probably the lunch room lady at school. Say you had a first court appearance tomorrow. Say available lawyers looked at your payment record and the case against you and said no I don’t think so. What then? Yes, what then, Donald?

 

America, the land of the free and the home of the brave. Feels like satire doesn’t it? And that makes me sad. I love our country, our experiment with liberalism, with the expansion of individual freedom while maintaining a sense of nationhood. I love our willingness to take in the huddled masses yearning to be free. When we do it. I love our insistence that all are equal before the law. I love our regional differences, accents, cuisines. I love our Mountains and Plains and Rivers and Streams. I love our rich Soil and all of our Wild Neighbors. I love my family and its deep roots here. I love the cities and small towns.

Yet. We have these deep and lasting scars, don’t we. Slavery. The genocide of the First Nations. Our abandonment of working class families. Our treatment of women and those of differing sexual orientations. Of Jews and Catholics.

We have a history filled with good deeds and bad. We are not the Great Satan nor are we the savior of the world. We’ve done well and we’ve done poorly. We’re human. We’re all trying in our own way to live in a country we can be proud of. Realizing that is an important first step in moving beyond our current impasse. More to come.