Category Archives: Shadow Mountain

Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Health, Hermitage, Judaism, Shadow Mountain, Writing

Laying-In

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Shadow Mountain Moon

Thursday gratefuls: Leslie. Her laying-in. CBE. Steve and Jamie Bernstein. Rebecca. Joann. Tara. Irene. Rabbi Jamie. Mark and Dennis. Good conversation last night. Prostate cancer. Liver cancer. Breast cancer. Aging. Stents. Psilocybin. DMT. Bufo Frogs. Mescaline. The 60’s.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Human composting

One brief shining: Ode thinks my work needs on occasion more juice the trail of droplets not so easy to follow as the short sometimes terse words of my main voice and he’s not wrong but this kind of sentence takes more more of what I’m not sure but more and I do not always have more just what I say and that’s that and I write on.

 

Leslie’s funeral in addition to the usual kaddish and eulogizing by the Rabbi and memorilization by family and friends had on the title of the service a laying-in ceremony which sounded to me like something for babies you know putting one in the crib for the first time or beside the mother for nursing. Obviously not it. So what.

After the service had concluded and Leslie’s wonderful life had brought smiles and tears and laughter the two young attendants from Feldman’s mortuary went over to the pine box that held Leslie’s body and took off the top. Inside Leslie had a covering of silk on which those at the service poured wood chips and compost. The laying-in. Human composting.

Judy Sherman died of ovarian cancer earlier this year. She chose aquamation and had the liquid result poured around a special tree at Seven Stones Cemetery. Body disposal practices have begun to change and change dramatically. Two years ago I did what Kate wanted and had her body cremated. I’ll choose one of these alternatives. Not sure which. Research. The thing they have in common is less to no pollution.

I found the laying-in ceremony at the same time thoughtful and affecting. Given a paper cup we all dug around in sacks of the wood chips and compost for enough material to fill the cup. Moving to the Pine box we chose where we wanted to distribute the material. I chose what I imagined was her head. Each in turn passed the cup to the next person in line.

Instead of dust to dust which has an evanescence about it this felt more like earth to earth, a return to the Mother in the way of all animals and plants. It was typical Leslie. A pioneer and in a way that had a certain political edge but a gentle one.

I dressed up. Sport coat. Gray slacks. Blue shirt. Silk tie. Panama hat. First time in nine years. I knew Leslie and wanted to respect her life. Still felt weird. More like costuming. I remarked to Irene, the dream lady, that it came from a past life.

 

Dennis and Mark came last night around five. We talked about drugs and art and Mark’s road trip. The upcoming conference in Aspen. I’ll buy them breakfast this morning and send them on their to Paonia where both Dennis and his brother Terence are from. Also where the High Country News is published.

Good to have Mark here in the flesh. It’s been a while. Dennis is an unassuming guy, bright and like the rest of us hearing aided and surgically restored. In his case six stents thanks to a recent stint in the hospital.

Massage later this morning, then on to Mussar.

Art and Culture, Dogs, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Health, Mountains, Mussar, Shadow Mountain, Weather +Climate

Memory

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Shadow Mountain Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Leo. Luke. Leslie. Her daughter, Megan. Jamie Bernstein. Ellen Arnold. Leo’s bone. Rain. Good Rain, drought go away Rain. The flooded out Italian Grand Prix. My son, his wife, and Murdoch. Residents of Korea. A new Day, a turned Earth revealing a brilliant Sun in a clear blue Colorado Sky. A cool night. Good for sleeping. That $60 bill from Centura.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Black Mountain

One brief shining: August 3rd bone scan long billed to me at $5,000 or so now reduced to $60 which I paid yesterday May 20th after the uneven teeth of the bureaucrats of AARP Insecure, Optum Care, and Centura meshed, moving the whole process to a different gear one that recognized the contractual obligations that left me free of responsibility a mere ten months after the initial attempt to wring thousands out of my bank account.

 

Leo lies on my rug up here in my home office. Chewing on a meaty marrow rich bone his dad left with me. A happy dog. Luke’s in New York at a cousin’s wedding upstate. Leo came Thursday night and will be here through Tuesday. It’s a delight to have a furry presence in the house. And, like a grandchild, one that will go home after a few days.

Speaking of grandchildren. Gabe’s coming up today with his buddy Seo. When I take him home we’ll stop at Twist and Shout a vinyl record store on Colfax. My grandchild insisting on going back to a technology I left behind long ago. One of the inevitable ironies of aging I guess.

 

While Robin and Michele hung my art, I got breakfast at Aspen Perks. After I drove over to Bailey. A Happy Camper run. It was a Rainy, Foggy morning the Mountains capped with Clouds and Mist, sometimes obscured altogether. On these rare mornings I often feel like I’m in the Smokies, not the Rockies. Expect to see signs for boiled peanuts, old race cars put out to literal pasture, a stars and bars flying from a local flagpole. Nope. Conifer Ranch. Rural electric co-op headquarters. I’m on 285 South which runs not to Asheville, North Carolina, but Santa Fe, New Mexico. Passing through the Platte River Valley.

Weather can transport me far away. Another for instance. A humid, not too cool early morning reminds me of Hawai’i where I often got up at 5:00 am to get my exercise in before the heat of the day. When the rains pounded down the other day and thunder roared directly overhead, I was back in Andover glad the weather was watering my vegetables, the orchard, the flowers. The Great Wheel turns and returns. The seasons flowing out from each other round and round, the cycle of life.

 

Leslie’s sudden plunge into hospice has stayed on my mind. I posted this on April 28th.

“It was my first time back to Thursday mussar since January, maybe earlier. I’d attended on zoom some, but with Kep’s decline and the snow and other things, I hadn’t felt up to the drive. Two of the women, Leslie and Rebecca, both kissed me on the head! Not sure what that was about though it was clearly a sign of affection.”

Less than a month ago. Cancer. As I said.

 

 

 

 

Art and Culture, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Memories, Mussar, Shadow Mountain

A Bastard

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Shadow Mountain Moon

Friday gratefuls: Rain. Leo. Luke. Robin and Michele. Hanging art. Shadow Mountain. Black Mountain which I cannot see. Fog. Rain drops on Lodgepine Needles.  Walking outside with Leo in the rain. Thatching in Japan and in England. Crafts as history, as DNA of a culture. Korea. Israel. Ecuador. Travel. Mark, the Teacher. Mary, the Teacher of Teachers. The Middle East. The Far East. South America. Cultures and their diverse answers to the human questions of meaning, eating, reproducing, governing. Leslie. Cancer. Charlie H. Charlie B-E. Karen. Judy, may her memory be for a blessing. Kep and all the dogs taken by cancer.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Duchenne Smile

One brief shining: Cancer a bastard an intimate assassin who lies in wait hidden somewhere in spots too difficult to see like a sniper on a rooftop or an umbrella spiked with polonium or that ring with a small latch which carries poison to put in the cup of an unsuspecting dinner guest, an impolite guest within my body, within the body of many others, including Leslie who went in thinking hepatitis and came out in hospice care for metastasized liver cancer. As I said. A bastard.

 

Leslie went to the doctor, then to the hospital for a hepatitis workup. Nope. Liver cancer, metastasized. Instead of going home with medication she went home to hospice. As I said.

Had an 8:30 am call with my radiation oncologist. No immediate after effects. Check with us in a year. A continuing story. As with Charlie H. and Karen. So, so many others. Not an isolated experience. At all.

 

More art hanging happening today. More to come. Reflected on the reasons for art in a home. Not only beauty. Maybe not even primarily beauty. Memory. That poster of the French island Charon. Given to Kate and me as a present by the owner of the laundromat where we did our wash in Paris. The somewhat treacly but also beautiful in its way painting of the sea turtle. Kate’s aesthetic and her totem animal. That dancing prophet in the blue robe with the big beard. A symbol of what the Presbytery thought of me. A gift when I retired. The Hermit neon. How I felt in the months after Kate died. Those stone sculptures. Bought in Siem Reap. Made by Cambodians learning the ancient art on display in the temples of Angkor Wat. The wooden plaque with a Moose, a Bear, and a Beaver. A gift for Kate’s 75th.

Jerry’s paintings the two large scale semi-impressionist works of landscape in on near Bellews Creek, N.C. are beautiful and make a huge splash on the walls. Even there. Painted by Kate’s sister’s husband. For her town home. Moved after that to our first home together on Edgcumbe Road in St. Paul onto our 20 year home in Andover and finally making the trek to Shadow Mountain.

And all those works of Jon. Beautiful in their abstract way. Even more now. A testament to the rebellious and innovative print maker he was.

Of course memories. Photographs. Yes. Those too. Art. So important in my life. Maybe in yours, too.

Acting, Art and Culture, Health, Hermitage, Shadow Mountain

Swole. Art.

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Mesa View Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Robin and Michele. More pruning and hanging of art. Leo. Luke. Sleep. Getting up on time. Chatbotgpt4. Mountain Streams. Water running free. Beaver Ponds. Park County #63. Burning Bear Trail. Marmosets in Staunton State Park. That young Moose Bull roaming around here. The Black Bears out of hibernation. Elk Calves and Mule Deer Fawns. The Great Wheel turns in the mountains.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: William Wordsworth

One brief shining: The treadmill, invented as a source of punishment in England I believe, has served me well these many years as a place to think, a place to watch movies, a place to keep my heart working at or near its healthiest, when I climb on my body knows its time to work, work hard and sweat, these bodies of ours they need, need, need to move.

 

Mondays. Wednesdays. Fridays. I’ve gotten back to my old routines. 130 minutes yesterday. Treadmill. Anytime on the machines. Prioritizing workouts now. Not seeing them as intrusions but as key components of my week, of my self care. Feeling stronger and healthier. Resting bpm down to 62. I’d love to get it below 60.

Anytime Fitness has the machines I feel better using for now. It also has a large carpeted area for free weights. Each time I go I sit on one of the machines the leg press, the leg curl, the leg extension, the shoulder press, the bicep curl, the chest fly and while I do, I watch the swole guys grunting, putting on weights in the 200 pound range. Then dropping them. Clank.

They seem pretty serious. As if the weights were some woke Antifa protesters they got their hands around at last. Probably stereotyping. There are too the more slender folks, women mostly but some men. I wonder what they train for. Up here it might be rock climbing, hiking, skiing, trail running, mountain biking.

Humans come in many sizes with varying motivations for all that they do.

 

Today Robin and Michele come. More closets cleaned out. A pile of unused sweaters on a chair. Old pillows and sheets from our queen sized bed no longer needed. Same for duvets. Some tech to go. Like that internet radio. Never could make it work right. Found four more pairs of jeans I didn’t know I had. Some winter wear that I’m saving. Keeping all the boots. The Sorels. The LL Bean duckies. The new, lighter Snow boots. Cleared out old tennis shoes. More quilting books. A monitor.

If we have time, we’ll work on the storage beneath the benches that Jon built. I don’t even know what’s in there.

Top priority though is hanging art. Retrieving some from the loft, other spots. I have most of it already placed. But there’s more I want to get down. Looking forward to this. Next up after this is reupholstering the couch. I also want to get a company out here to deep clean all my tile floors and rugs. And, maybe, somebody to clean the windows, too. Finishing touches to two years of work.

 

First character study acting class tonight. Tal at CBE. A busy day. Gotta make sure I eat.

Acting, Art and Culture, Asia, Bees, Commentary on Religion, Cooking, Dogs, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Fungi, Garden, GeekWorld, Great Wheel, Great Work, Hawai'i, Health, Hermitage, Humanities, Judaism, Kabbalah, Korea, Latin, Letters, Literature, Mountains, Mussar, Painting, Photography, Plants, Poetry, Politics, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Science, Shadow Mountain, Sierra Club, Sport, Tarot, Tea, The West, Travel, Weather +Climate, Woolly Mammoths, Writing

Entheos

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Mesa View Moon

Monday gratefuls: Curiosity. The Ancient Brothers. Mark and Dennis. Coming May 23rd. Yet more Rain. Even more swollen Streams. Ancientrails as a life project. Tom and his time with Charlie H. Bill and his time with Bella. Mark and his time at the gym. Anytime Fitness. My treadmill. Marilyn. Ginnie. Josh. Jane. Kat. A banker. Vulcan Centaur.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Rocket Scientists

One brief shining: A beautiful woman with a long braid dangling over her t-shirt down to her space themed spandex had, on the back of the blue t-shirt an outline of the Vulcan Centaur rocket, on the front ULA and I asked, I’m too ignorant to know but is that a real rocket ship?

 

Yes. She answered. And I was working on it until I quit my job a year and a half ago. What was your area of expertise? Vibration and acoustics. Oh. I see. Not sure why I keep running into engineers. But I do.

CBE is amazing. All these smart people. This was at the Dismantling Racism class yesterday afternoon. Looked up the Vulcan Centaur and it’s been under development since 2014. Supposed to fly for the first time in July. Had a setback a month ago though with a second stage explosion during preparation for a launch.

The class has gotten better. Taking a mussar approach to the work. I like it for the inner work though I chose an opponent for my practice this week. Four areas of possible practice each week: with HaShem (God), with Self, with a fellow, especially a victim of anti-black racism, or with an opponent.

My practice involved an e-mail to a person with whom I’ve had long standing differences. Sent it last night and got a reply this morning. A sweet one. Maybe there’s something to this approach. The middah this week is kavod, or honor. Honoring self and other. The theological idea is the all made in God’s image trope. Said another way, we’re all human, all riding this blue spaceship our only home together with all the other critters and plants. Honor it all.

 

During the Ancient Brothers session on curiosity I identified curiosity as my defining characteristic. And naming what I call the valedictory lifestyle. As a valedictorian myself I’ve occasionally become curious (see!) about what happens to others who graduate first in their class academically. Turns out usually nothing spectacular. Sure a lot go into academics. Some have successful careers in business or the sciences.

But usually no stars. No one off achievements. No amazing inventions. Why? Because we’re generalists. We easily get sidetracked by something new and shiny. If purity of heart is to will one thing, we’re not at all pure.

I call them enthusiasms. My enthusiasms can last a long time. Religion has turned out to be the longest lasting, but inside that broad category I’ve been all over the place. From existentialist atheist to Christian to Unitarian-Universalist to Pagan and wanderer with the tribe. There’s a piece of each of these, often substantial pieces that remain intact within me. All somehow glued together with Taoism.

There’ve been many others. Art, my twelve years at the MIA. Politics, lasting almost as long as religion, but again all over the place in terms of action. Islam which I studied after 9/11. Horticulture. Cooking. Heating with wood. Beekeeping. Dogs. World travel. F1. Science. Tarot and Astrology. Cinema. Acting. Writing. Getting degrees. Tea. Korean and now Spanish. Oh, and one that actually has been lifelong, reading. Not sure when I learned but I’ve never ever stopped. Buying books, too. To feed the habit. I’ve dabbled in painting and sum-e.

Enthusiasms in my life are more than dabbling but less than enough to gain full mastery. But I must admit it’s been, is being, a hell of lot of fun.

 

 

 

 

Colorado, Great Wheel, Jefferson County, Mountains, Plants, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, Weather +Climate, World History

So it has been and so it shall be

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Mesa View Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Rain. Rain. Rain. Floods. Full Creeks and Streams. The greening of the Mountains. Can allergies be far behind? Rebecca. Joann. Tal. Dismantling Racism from the Inside Out. Marilyn and Jamie. My son and his wife. Murdoch. Getting on a jet plane. For the Far East. Today. The World in all its distinctiveness and all its connectedness. All my relations.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Ancientrails

One brief shining: Snow packs, Rains pound, from the top of Shadow Mountain, of Black Mountain, of Conifer Mountain, of Berrigan Mountain the Sun shines and melts the Snow, the Rain accelerates the melt and the Streams, Maxwell Creek, Cub Creek, Shadow Brook, North Turkey Creek, Kate’s Creek, flood spilling over into wetlands, high marsh grasses welcoming their abundance as they roll on into Bear Creek, widening its banks, carrying Soil and Pebbles and Rocks on their way to the North Fork of the South Platte and on to the great World Ocean.

 

In media deluge. We’ve had Snow and we’ve had Rain. And the Rains will come again. Tonight. Tomorrow night. And the night after that. And the night after that. Keeping that Smoky the Bear sign pegged right where we want it: Low fire danger. Mostly good news. The not so good part is that Rain promotes greening. Grasses. Flowers. Shrubs. Plants considered out of place, i.e. Weeds. As long as they remain green. Fine. But once the Rains dry up and they turn brown.

Driving down to Evergreen the other day I had trouble keeping my eyes on the road as I looked over to Maxwell Creek which drains the northwestern Slopes of Shadow Mountain. Muddy and full, it rippled and raged where it didn’t pool in grassy areas alongside it. The strange mix of culverts some concrete, some ribbed metal, some made of rock both hid and revealed the power of the water.

Noticing a particular culvert, a one piece concrete structure with a rhomboid opening maybe 5 feet high, I saw Maxwell race through it in a torrent, spilling out of the opening in a manmade waterfall. The creek itself was only a foot deep at the most. The rest of the height serving to support a bridge for the property above it.

At various points formerly dry Grasslands now served as basins for an expanded Creek. Functioning ecosystems taking some of the  Water’s power and distributing it over a wider area, taking also some of the particulates and building the Marsh. The unleashed force diminished for a bit.

Orogeny. Geology speak for Mountain building. These Mountain Streams are its opposite. The deconstructive forces of Pachamama, sending nourishment to Deltas far away from our spot here on Shadow Mountain.

Alan Watt wrote Tao: The Watercourse Way. Driving up here in these late Spring days the Tao is not invisible. It is palpable. The water goes where it can, goes where it must, and if blocked will work to unblock itself without losing hope or purpose.

Taoism remains the most salient way of understanding our place in the World, this one life we get as this consciousness. For me. Our lives are Water Courses racing down the days and weeks and months and years toward the Collective Unconscious, the Ocean of All Souls. Along the way we go where we can, we go where we must and, if blocked we work to unblock ourselves.

Each of us a Stream running down the Mountain that is this Reality in this spot of the Universe, taking bits and pieces of it along with us to enrich Deltas far away and out of sight. So it has been and so it shall be.

Fungi, Plants, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain

Microdosing

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Mesa View Moon

Monday gratefuls: Miami Grand Prix. Sacred objects. The Most Ancient and Proud Brothers. Psilocybin. CBE. Dismantling Racism. Depth. This time. Anger/Patience. K’ass and Savlanut. Simcha. Joy. Ed Brill. Comedian. Laughing. Ginnie. Ron. Alan. Cheri. Tara. Suzy and Pete. Josh. Those Mountain Streams, full. The Ponderosa Pines lower down. Their beautiful Bark and Branches. Tall.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Community

One brief, shining: Took another microdose of psilocybin yesterday and it moved into me with subtlety and power, creating a slight aura of light and deepening my vision, especially into the Trees, the silent gentle guardians of our Mountain World, and as I considered them my feet became Roots, spreading like Rhyzomes into the Soil beneath my feet, my spine and upper torso lengthened as I reached toward the Sky, feeling minute movements in the Air around me, feeling a Squirrel run up my Trunk, and a Robin land on one of my Branches, until I stopped growing for a moment, standing there knowing why I had chosen this spot for my eternal home.

 

Psilocybin is so gentle. Each time I’ve used it. It feels like an inner deep massage, muscles relaxing while sensory input sharpens. And it attunes me to plant life. Set and setting, I suppose. Timothy O’Leary’s contribution to the field of psychedelic research.* Plants have been and still are so important to me. These friends. Wild neighbors, too.

The Lodgepoles and Aspens that line my every drive whether to Evergreen or to Aspen Park. Corridors defined by and watched by Trees. The Lodgepoles and Aspens add to their number Ponderosa Pines, Colorado Blue Spruce, White Pine, Willows, Red Osier Dogwood as the Mountain Valleys descend from the top of Shadow Mountain.

The Trees observe, feel our passing. Shade us. Breathe out Oxygen, take in our  CO2. Yet we treat them as things. To cut. To remove. To use in building our homes and places of work. It occurred to me that every tree is Shel Silverstein’s Giving Tree. Giving of itself to us until we take all from it. Yet growing again, and again, and again.

I stand with them. Plant Trees. Love them and they will love you back.

 

Agnostic.** Pagan. In relation to ideas of God in any religion, I am agnostic. In relation to where I find divinity and sacredness, I am pagan. As I demonstrated above. My sense of God is the inner divinity to whom I bow when I say namaste. In that sense I am a polytheist with 7,942,645,085 other Gods in my pantheon. I could easily increase that number by each Tree on Earth. Each Elephant. Each Dog. Each Mackerel and Krill. Each drop of Water, each tongue of Fire, each inch of Soil, and all of the Sky. Yet I am no pantheist.

Why? While I believe in an ultimate unity of all things, I do not believe in an homogenization of all things by using any concept as inherent in everything. In fact I believe that God, in the sense I’m using it, creates, emphasizes, celebrates uniqueness. The great mystery is the powerful, the wonderful combinatory affect of all this uniqueness into one pulsing living whole.

Nothing is outside it. Nothing is rejected. Everything is held in its sacredness, in its true divinity without sacrificing its own distinctiveness. Matter is energy. Energy is matter. When one shifts to the other, the divinity, the sacredness it carries is not lost but transferred. How could it not be? Therefore the distinctiveness which it has created remains as it shifts in form and kind.

I suppose I could argue, maybe I am arguing that this proves a life beyond death. Maybe. Who knows? Kate. Kep. Dad. Mom. Regina. They know.

 

 

 

*Set and setting respectively refer to the internal and external factors that influence your psychedelic experience. “Set” is a reflection of your inner climate—your mood, personality, beliefs, perceptions, and so on. “Setting” refers to all that’s going on outside, such as the people around you and their behaviors, the music playing, the smells and weather in the air, even the cultural forces that aren’t as readily visible. Bailey Elyse, Double Blind, Oct. 2, 2020

 

**agnostic (n.)

1870, “one who professes that the existence of a First Cause and the essential nature of things are not and cannot be known” [Klein]; coined by T.H. Huxley, supposedly in September 1869, from Greek agnostos “unknown, unknowable,” from a- “not” (see a- (3)) + gnōstos “(to be) known” (from PIE root *gno- “to know”). The coinage is sometimes said to be a reference to Paul’s mention of the altar to “the Unknown God” in Acts, but according to Huxley it was a reference to the early Church movement known as Gnosticism (see Gnostic). The adjective also is from 1870.

I … invented what I conceived to be the appropriate title of ‘agnostic,’ … antithetic to the ‘Gnostic’ of Church history who professed to know so much about the very things of which I was ignorant. [T.H. Huxley, “Science and Christian Tradition,” 1889]

The agnostic does not simply say, “I do not know.” He goes another step, and he says, with great emphasis, that you do not know. [Robert G. Ingersoll, “Reply to Dr. Lyman Abbott,” 1890]  etymonline

 

Dogs, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Great Wheel, Health, Hermitage, Judaism, Shadow Mountain

Friends and Acquaintances

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Mesa View Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Joann. Rebecca. Terry. Coal Mine Chinese Restaurant. Evergreen, my Mountain town. Grieving. Alan. The Wildflower Cafe. Anytime Fitness. Doug Doverspike, bit in the face by a Catahoula. Dave. Urku. Catacachi, Ecuador. Rabbi Jamie. Tal. Character Study class. Kate. Her Creek running full into Maxwell Creek. Daffodils. Red Tips on the Aspen Branches.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Friends

One brief, shining moment: A blossoming time for me, a Beltane aspect of my Winter years, friends becoming richer and more available, travel prospects offering themselves, workouts back to resistance as well as cardio, a hobby with F1 and motorsports for diversion, feels like coming out of Plato’s Cave.

 

Small groups like mussar, mvp, dining out with friends either one-to-one or maybe four at most. Yes. Needed. Appreciated. Loved. More than that? Draining. Exhausting. So. I don’t do those hardly ever.

Last night out with Joann Greenberg, Rebecca Martin, and Terry, Rebecca’s partner. The Coal Mine Chinese Restaurant in Evergreen. They all knew the owner and all the owner’s kids. Lots of Evergreen years among those three. A thick culture. And with Rebecca and Joann even more years as friends. Back before CBE. Both at its beginning. 50 years ago. Felt privileged to be included.

 

In the morning yesterday breakfast with Alan at the Wildflower Cafe. Sitting at at their outside tables on the Evergreen boardwalk. Breakfast nachos with carne asada, cheese, red sauce, Avocado’s. Coffee. Alan shaved his beard! For my craft, he said. He’s in a play that required him to play a younger character. Only the third time since 1977 he’s shaved. Grows back in about a month. No big deal. That’s Alan. He takes what comes and smiles about it.

After he left, I spent a little time wandering around the shops. I rarely do this because this part of Evergreen is touristy. Went into two places geared to separating the visitor from their money. Not interesting. However, the longtime shoe repair had a going out of business sale and I picked up a couple of pocket knives, nice ones, for $30.

 

Worked out for the second time at Anytime Fitness. Cardio at home, then 10 minutes over there. Swipe my fob. Hit the machines. Legs and upper body. What I needed. Not having to think about form. I already feel the pleasant exhaustion in my muscles afterward. Not sure how long I’ll use the machines because I’m used to using my own equipment. Though. Right now I need the ease of using the machines to get some strength back.

I did run into Dr. Doverspike there. He got bit by a Catahoula. And had the healing scars to prove it. The Dog launched himself at Doug’s face. Did not puncture his skull. But could have. Yikes!

 

Beltane celebrates the start of the growing season after the first renewal of Spring. Hand fasting marriages contracted for a year and a day. Farm labor hired. Sympathetic magic. Sex in the fields to encourage the union of the Maid and the Green Man. Jumping over fires for fertility. The May Pole.

I feel right in synch with the season. And it feels good.

 

Feelings, Fourth Phase, Fungi, Plants, Shadow Mountain, Weather +Climate

Naturally

Leave a comment

Beltane and the Mesa View Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Beltane. The growing season. Rebecca. Tom. Bill. Paul. Ode. Diane. Kep, my sweet boy. And Kate, who remains even though gone. A soaking Rain yesterday. Thunder. Walking the perimeter. Psilocybin. The house from within my stand of Lodgepoles. Bunch Grass. Bear’s Claw. Wild Rose. Living in the Mountains. Marilyn. Dismantling Racism. Oh.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Lodgepoles in the Rain, their piney scent

One brief, shining moment: Rain coming down like a fine mist, I walked the fenceline, as I used to do in Andover every spring, looking for breaches, places the fencing has pulled away from the posts, and while I walked the smell of Pine, the Mountain Soil, a Rabbit still with a great dark Eye, a Robin on a Lodgepole Branch, a Squirrel scrambling up a Tree Trunk.

 

Lot of advice on stress. Go to Nature. First, you can’t not be in Nature. A subtle way of wedging us further and further away from our reality as part of, rather than apart from, the Natural World. In this sense meditation is going to Nature. Part of why it works for so many?

The Japanese have a term you’ve probably read, shinrin-yoku. Forest bathing or taking in the atmosphere of the Forest. That’s not the same as saying get out in Nature. It’s about going to a specific part of Nature. Not sure why I’ve never seen Ocean Bathing as a similar idea, but it must work the same for a lot of folks. Or, for that matter, Mountain Bathing. Lake Bathing. Garden Bathing. Sex Bathing.

Anyhow I went shinrin-yoku on my property here yesterday. (Whenever I write in the possessive about property or Trees, I wince. Only temporarily mine and then only in the sense of stewardship. Not to mention how much of our Land used to be the territory of other Nations.)

I thought of Rigel as I walked out the door. The Rabbit who likes to sit under the fire pit darted out from there, stopping about twenty feet from its home under the shed. Still. He can’t see me

A soaking rain fell as I walked. Started at the point where the garage meets the fence. Past that point, where the fence turns north, there is a shallow trench maybe 30 feet long with a pile of soil at the far end. Evidence. Doggy running. Rigel, Kep, Gertie, Vega. Jude’s dogs on the other side. Zeus, Boo. Then, later Thor.

Further on green Shoots had begun to emerge through the Bunch Grass. Old Logs were wet, waiting for Mushroom Spores. I surveyed all the Fire mitigation I had done after we moved. Stumps cut low. Clumps of trees left out here, at the far fenceline, well over a hundred feet from the house. Looking toward the house, the thirty foot zone with no Pines and between that line and where I stood, smaller stands, one or two or three Trees at least ten feet apart.

The house and its cedar siding, the shed, the garage, also wet from the rain were in their literal element. And looked beautiful to me.  How lucky am I, I thought.

There were the Lilacs planted per Kate’s dying request at the same time I had the Iris bed expanded. Part of the same wish from her. Lilacs and Irises. Kate.

Coming inside I felt renewed from a half hour of shinrin yoku, never leaving the borders of Shadow Mountain Home.

 

 

Acting, Colorado, Cooking, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Hermitage, Jefferson County, Judaism, Mountains, Mussar, Politics, Shadow Mountain, Writing

The Time Has Come To Cross

Leave a comment

Spring and the Mesa View Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Luke. Leo. Rommertopf. Psilocybin. Younger friends. Tal. Character study class. Murphy and Pete. Kat. My son and his wife. Their furry one. Snow. Melting. A Mountain morning. Sunlight on the Lodgepoles. The Snow that stays on the north side of my house. That Mule Deer Doe.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The threshold. *reposted the O’Donohue quote

One brief, shining moment: Liminal spaces, third spaces, often overlooked, undervalued, yet the Dawn and the Dusk, the doorway and the window, the death bed, the coffee shop, the neighborhood bar, churches and synagogues, neither home nor work, neither light nor dark, neither in nor out, neither life nor death, points of transformation, places where we can practice being another version of ourselves, meet people we would not otherwise know, thresholds between this life moment and the next, or between this life and what comes after.

 

I’m an old man. Been a lot of places. Experienced weirdness. I identify with the Grateful Dead’s: what a long, strange trip it’s been. Yet these last few days have left me marveling at what’s happening.

Now that I’m writing about it, I think it may have begun to crystallize when I spoke with my son last Sunday. Be spontaneous, he said. Go for it. Take the trip. We had been discussing my trip to Korea and the trip to Israel.

And, I did. I raised my hand. Yes, I’m going with you. I’ll be there in Jerusalem. Not an hour later.

Dismantling Racism class, a mussar approach came next. Mainlining my past with talk of injustice, the struggle, la lucha. Going down old pathways with new folks, from a new perspective.

A heavy workout on Monday. Another heavy one Wednesday. Where I was left shaky, feeling off. My resting heart rate actually increasing. Worried me. Made me feel vulnerable.

On Thursday I had breakfast with Alan, catching up. Then my massage and Thursday mussar. Where Rebecca and Leslie both kissed me on the head. After mussar I encountered Luke and Tal outside the synagogue. Tal told me the next acting class was going to be character studies. Sounds good to me. Ready to continue expanding.

On Friday I went to sign up at Anytime Fitness. With Dave, the 65 year old manager. Quite the talker. Where you from? Raised in Indiana. Really! Where! Alexandria. Anderson. Muncie. I know them. I was raised on the southside of Chicago. But we moved to Calumet. Ah, I said. Da region. He laughed. Right. My brother worked in the Calumet mill.

Not sure how the conversation veered to his life as a battery salesman working out of Madison, Wisconsin. His alcoholism, cocaine addiction. 25 years sober, he said. 43  years here. Instant deep connection. In the program. Lifers.

A thick, muscular young guy walked past. Clayton, Dave hollered. Clayton, meet Charles. 43  years sober. Clayton’s got 109 days. Clayton and I fist bumped.

A strange but instant fellowship, wrought by inability or unwillingness to contain appetites. Then, to wake up. See another way. And walk it. With others.

Went back home. Clicked on a zoom link. First time with the Dream group. Dreamers and dreams. The dream of of the White Tomb. Realizing the threshold had come to meet me. People on the call from Santa Fe, England, the Netherlands, Conifer, Evergreen.

Then. Later that day. In the desert of the afternoon hours. Feeling aimless. Projects around the house winding down. No Dogs or humans to care for. More hours than I needed.

Next morning. Off to Aspen Perks to have breakfast, begin my re-read of Why Liberalism Failed. Maybe see Kat. She was there. She smiled when she saw me, came over and squatted down. What  you reading? I showed her. I don’t agree with all of his arguments, but it’s a powerful read. She looked at it. Yeah, I have a Steven Hawking book like this. I put it down. Take it up. Well, I’m trying to really understand this guy’s arguments. So I’m doing something unusual. Rereading.

Ate my chorizo and scrambled eggs. Read Deneen. Got up to go. A tall man, maybe 50’s, sitting with an older man, closer to my age. Hey, I was wondering. What ya reading? I showed him the book. Gave him the two minute version. He reached over to shake my hand. Murphy. Matt Murphy. This is Pete. I want to have some time to bother you about that. What do they call ya? I told him. See you next time I come in maybe. We’ll talk.

Went over to Safeway. Picked up the Chicken, Carrots, Potatoes, Pearl Onions, Garlic for the Rommertopf Chicken. Back  home I did the prep. Soak the Rommertopf. Peel the Pearl Onions. Cut up the Potatoes. Slice and quarter an Apple. Stuff it in the Chicken. Put butter and Garlic under the skin of the breast. In the oven.

Luke came and stayed for three, four hours. Leo sniffing around. Finding things.

Can you feel the threshold moving toward me? I sure can. Definitely time. Gonna discuss a ritual with Rabbi Jamie, Tal.

 

*”At any time you can ask yourself: At which threshold am I now standing? At this time in my life, what am I leaving? Where am I about to enter? What is preventing me from crossing my next threshold? What gift would enable me to do it? A threshold is not a simple boundary; it is a frontier that divides two different territories, rhythms, and atmospheres. Indeed, it is a lovely testimony to the fullness and integrity of an experience or a stage of life that it intensifies toward the end into a real frontier that cannot be crossed without the heart being passionately engaged and woken up. At this threshold a great complexity of emotion comes alive: confusion, fear, excitement, sadness, hope. This is one of the reasons such vital crossings were always clothed in ritual. It is wise in your own life to be able to recognize and acknowledge the key thresholds: to take your time; to feel all the varieties of presence that accrue there; to listen inward with complete attention until you hear the inner voice calling you forward. The time has come to cross.” John O’Donohue in his book, To Bless the Space Between Us.