Category Archives: Mussar

Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Judaism, Mussar, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Reimaging revelation

Call Me When You Get It

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Samain and the Choice Moon

Friday gratefuls: Good sleep. Laying around. Hanukah. Lighting my first candles as a Jew. Toba Spitzer. Mordecai Kaplan. Metaphor. God is Here. Mussar. Holimonth. Advent. Posada. The darkness. My inner Shadow Mountain. Tara’s cute new puppy. Kippur. Leo. Kepler of blessed memory. Rigel of blessed memory. Kate of blessed memory. A pinch of dysthymia. Oversleeping. Winds knocking over my trash can. Weather on the way. Cold and Snow. Rich. Diane. Tom. My son and Seoah and Murdoch.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Leo

One brief shining: The cloud as metaphor sitting in Evergreen, Colorado, talking to Rabbi Toba Spitzer in Newton, Massachusetts, while others dotted the screen from Lakewood, Georgetown, Conifer who was the live audience, us around the table in Beth Evergreen or the individuals in the cloud, or were we all simply in the Cloud alive to ourselves but bits and bytes elsewhere? The multiparity?

 

Not sure what’s going on with me right now, but I’ve slept in a lot this week. Over two hours this morning. Post-conversion dysthymia? That old melancholy coming up the chimney from its shack on my inner Shadow Mountain? Have felt slightly off for a few days. Negative thoughts showing up, not staying, not affecting my mood for long. Thanks to the how do I feel exercise Tal taught us. Yet they keep returning and oversleeping usually means a disturbance in the inner world.

 

When I drove back from p.t. yesterday though. Mary discharged me. Good work on the back and I now have the exercise tools to manage it, know when to ask for help if it flares again. Prior to seeing Mary we had the Zoom which included Rabbi Toba Spitzer answering questions about her book, God is Here. Loved her. A great mind working at the frontiers of religious thought.

Coming back up Brook Forest Drive I felt good. Reminded myself that people, people are good. I need people on line and in person regularly. Patted myself on the back for attending mussar, seeing Mary. Having meaningful connections in both places. Told Mary when she said something about her boyfriend that he was lucky, somebody out there needed her in their life, glad to know she’d found someone.

 

Janet and I had an interesting post-mussar conversation. She said the only way to find God is through meditation. She’s a Jewbu. A Jewish Buddhist. And a very bright lady.

Well, god is a universal idea so how can you be sure if the one you find in meditation is the One? Don’t we need each other for that sort of connection? She agreed we need the sangha, the synagogue.

 

I don’t think the only way to connect with the sacred is to go in. As most of you know. Though it’s a sound way. I find the sacred right out there on the surface of things. The Lodgepole. Janet. Black Mountain. Mary. Leo. Electricity. Computers. Darkness. Daytime.

Rich and I had a disagreement about this on Wednesday night. He wanted to preserve the particularity of Judaism, that its holy places in Israel, for example, were special. I asked him what Judaism points to.

I agree with his appreciation and love for the particularities of Judaism, its holy places, rituals, people. Otherwise I would not have converted. Yet. I also want to preserve the idea that we do not need the rock on which Abraham would have sacrificed Isaac, or the Western Wall, or Mt. Sinai, or even the Torah to find our way to the sacred, to recognize our inescapable linkage to and with it.

Here’s a poem that Tom offered this morning that says what I’m saying. By David Budbill

 

The Three Goals
The first goal is to see the thing in itself
in and for itself, to see it simply and clearly
for what it is.
No symbolism, please.

The second goal is to see each individual thing
as unified, as one, with all the other
ten thousand things.
In this regard, a little wine helps a lot.

The third goal is to grasp the first and the second goals,
to see the universal in the particular,
simultaneously.
Regarding this one, call me when you get it.

 

 

Feelings, Fourth Phase, GeekWorld, Health, Judaism, Mussar

Post Conversion Let Down

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Samain and the Choice Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Leo. Doggy presence. Luke in Florida. Tom in Atlanta. Paul’s birthday. 77. Whoa. He old. Great Sol brightening a Shadow Mountain morning. Last warm day for a while. Snow coming. Over spending on Snow tires. For safety. Giving myself the best odds. Living high. Colorado. The Rockies. The Himalayas. The Appalachians. The Smokies. The Atlas. The Alps. The Dolomites.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Mountains

One brief shining: Leo lies on my rug, legs sprawled out, head down, sleeping or resting, while I sit here typing, hitting key after key with the automatic movements learned first in typing at Alexandria-Monroe High School, perhaps the class I’ve used the most in terms of daily activity, odd to contemplate though paws on the keyboard, a million dogs would not produce the Britannica.

 

I slept in this morning. On purpose. Because I liked the feel. An oddity for me, yes, but fun in a I don’t have to so I won’t sorta way. Bright eyed and bushy tailed. Ever hear that one? Don’t think I’ve felt that way since I hit 70. Awake and alert, ready to go about the day, yes, but bushy tailed? Can’t recall the day. Maybe a feeling reserved for the get up and go ages of the twenties and thirties?

 

MVP tonight. Rabbi Jamie on trust/compassion with the metaphor of rock. This small group at CBE supercharges my month. We’ve been meeting for years now, lost two members to death: Judy and Kate, and have gotten as close as a group can get. Figuring what I can make since we always bring food.

 

So. An odd, kind of silly deal with my Snow tires. Jesus told me two of my Blizzaks were at 4 mm tread. I knew it, too. I took them back last year when a tech said they could go a little further. Nope. So Jesus offered me a deal. Salvation for two Blizzaks. I don’t know how they get away with that name even in Latino circles. Too many jokes, I’d think. Anyhow. He would give me a deal on two new ones. But. I’d have to leave the car until 1:30 pm. This was at 9:30 am. Nope. Put’em on.

Drove home, ordered two new Blizzaks from Tire Rack.com. About $20 more than what Jesus had offered. Shoot. Going to big O in Evergreen on Friday to have them put on. I know. But I brought this on myself. Having good tread and good winter tires for Mountain roads? Perhaps not necessary, but prudent. And damned if I don’t have a real strong prudent streak. Always surprises me, too.

 

Post conversion let down. Had such a buzz going the last month or so. Getting ready, making schedules, preparing myself for transformation. A peak on Tuesday in the mikvah. Slowly. Like air going out of a balloon. Life deflates. Not depressing, but a daily normal state over against a time of heightened anticipation, excitement. Maybe like the time after opening presents on Christmas morning. Gathering energy for the long haul now, a Jewish life until death.

Although. I do have an inner calmness now. As if some vibratory mechanism in my inner world got turned off. That is the opposite of an excited state and I’m still getting used to it. Feels like I have enough time now, as if the future has gone quiet, not clamoring for a piece of me right now.

Changes.

Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Judaism, Mussar, Politics, Travel, World History

Conversion on again

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Fall and the Samain Moon

Friday gratefuls: BA canceled my flight. So, I can get a refund. Parking refunded. Tour group money held over for a trip next year. All resolved for now. With some money coming. Conversion. At Temple Emmanuel mikveh. Last week of November. Mussar. Evergreen Market. Sugar Jones. Rabbi Jamie. Zionism. Very good workout. 2 sets of resistance. Luke. Anne. Darkness my old friend. Sounds of Silence. The 60’s. Jackie. Her and Ronda’s sweetness. Her sauna. Growing my beard out.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Ritual purity

One brief shining: Ruth called yesterday wanting to know if she and her friends could have a Friendsgiving at my house, of course I said, and checked in with her about an evening out at Dazzle, the jazz club, next Saturday works for her so so good to talk with her, hear Mia on the phone saying hi Grandpa, and her other friends saying hi. Made this old man happy.

 

I’ve taken Mia in as a granddaughter from another family. She was so helpful and kind when I had to euthanize Kep, helping the vet carry him up the stairs, staying with Ruth while Kep died. Mia grew up on Oahu, moving here when her father’s biochemical company needed better access to the U.S. as a whole. She even said she missed me. Aw.

 

Yesterday was busy. Diane in the morning. Then an intense and good workout. Going up on weights on some exercises. Back exercises added in. After that a shower and over to Jackie’s Aspen Roots hair salon. Was gonna be a sprucing up before my trip. Both Jackie and Ronda were glad I’m not going to Israel. I’ve never had so many people happy about a trip I’m not taking. As I left Jackie turned to Ronda and said, we’re going to have to start looking for someone for Charlie. Uh-oh.

 

From Jackie’s straight to CBE for Thursday mussar and my second conversion education session with Rabbi Jamie. In both the mussar setting and my session with him after the focus was Israel/Hamas. The topic for our session had been Zionism which can be seen as the proximate cause of the struggle Israel and its Arab neighbors have faced since its founding.  That is, it was the Zionist movement of the late 19th century which set off the chain of events creating a Jewish state in 1948. Immediately after Israeli nationhood Egypt, Syria, and Jordan attacked it with the stated goal of pushing the Jews into the ocean. The Arabs lost the war. But the conflicts signaled in that first military action may have changed actors from time to time, but not the goal of eliminating a Jewish presence in the Middle East.

 

When we moved onto my conversion, I said I wanted to get it done as soon as practicable. A little cold for going to a flowing stream or lake for a naked plunge. Though I would have been up for that. We settled on a newer mikveh, a ritual bath that has to be connected to flowing water, built by Temple Emmanuel, a large Reform congregation in south Denver.

Discovered that Joann Greenberg had asked to be a community representative in my beit din, house of judgement, or rabbinic court. That surprised and pleased me. I have about a half hour interview with her, Rabbi Jamie, and a third Rabbi yet to be named who will also be the one who draws a spot of blood from my penis. Then, naked immersion in the mikveh. And I’m part of the Jewish community for ever and a day.

Rabbi Jamie also asked me which parsha I wanted for my conversion week. A parsha is the long weekly section of Torah that allows the entire five books of Moses to be read through in a year. At first I thought, wha? Then I got it. I want the parsha with Jacob at the Jabbok Ford wrestling an angel. That story I consider paradigmatic of my own spiritual journey. If you know the story, Jacob’s name changes that night to Israel, one who struggles with God. That story shows up this year in late November which is why the conversion will be then.

 

Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Judaism, Memories, Minnesota, Mussar

Old skills

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Lughnasa and the Herme Moon

Friday gratefuls: Janet. Her name is Janet. Mussar. Leading a discussion. Metaphor and the sacred. Thinking. Feeling. Lev. Luke and Ann. Ian. Carol. Gracie and Leo. Sarah and Elizabeth. Judaism. Reconstructionist. Finding religion again with no reservations. Hallelujah. Conversion in Jerusalem. Prostate Cancer. Irv. Marilyn now home. Tara in Europe. The Trail to Cold Mountain. Final edits. Now it’s a script for me to learn.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Leading

One brief shining: In a far away state at a time now long ago I used to sit down often at a table or stand in front of a room knowing my job was to take a conversation with those present through difficult terrain, perhaps deciding how to take on unemployment or a recalcitrant landlord or an obdurate city hall or one of the many corporations that wanted to reach into people’s lives and take away their agency, then make a turn from conversation to action. Oh how I loved it.

 

Yesterday for an hour and a half. I led the mussar group through the most difficult terrain of all, those things that matter to our interior, to our souls. I’d forgotten how satisfying it is to do that. I avoid leadership roles these days. Saying no rather than yes. Saying been there. But as a substitute for the Rabbi. A one time thing. I said yes.

I miss it. Reading the pulse of a group, guiding in a gentle way or a forceful way depending on the need of the moment, offering my own thoughts lightly or not at all or for the purpose of digging further into the topic. Yesterday’s topic was the purpose of metaphor and the application of that purpose to language we use about God. Also, strangely and powerfully, the question: What is God for? A lot to be said on this. We spent a fun hour and half doing just that.

Perhaps I could find these moments a bit more often. I don’t want to chair a committee. Nope. But I sure did enjoy the time yesterday. Though. I did fuzz up Janet’s name. Conflated her with Marilyn who sat beside her. Because the group has three Marilyns and Janet’s name, for some reason, skipped my mind. Don’t you love that phrase, skipped my mind? Janet danced away from available attention, played hopscotch in another corner just out of reach.

She came up to me afterwards and said, “My name is Janet, Charlie.” Oh. Oops. Ian, a visitor from California gave me a fist bump.  He’s my age. Luke came up and gave me a big hug. There was a buzz in the room, the conversation spilling over past the end of the meeting.

On my way out to the car Ginny came up to me and asked if I was converting. Yes, I said. Could I talk to you about it sometime? Ginny’s an Arkansas farm girl turned opera singer then stage actor then nurse. I told her I’d love to. Maybe the Blackbird? Which is in Kittredge where she lives with her partner.

Colorado, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Judaism, Mountains, Mussar, Our Land and Home, Shadow Mountain, Travel

A Thursday with Friends

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Summer and the Summer Moon Above

Friday gratefuls: Tom. Ellen and Dick. Hail. Again. Cool nights. Good sleeping. God is Here. Metaphor. Kathy. Luke. Vince. Gutters. Psilocybin. Flower. Weed. Red Rocks. The Bread Lounge. A Cuban. Evergreen. Gracie and Ann. CBE. High water on the fish ladder. Maxwell Creek running full.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Friendship

One brief shining: Life in its fullness comes running at you, with you like a Mountain Stream after a heavy Rain, crashing over barriers, not allowing any obstacles, where necessary spreading out, then calmly, gently flowing into the placid waters of a great River, headed to the World Ocean.

 

Yesterday. A full day. Talking to Diane, always a pleasure. Catching up on family news. A favorite cousin for all of us moved into hospice. We’re all in the aging range. This group that used to play with each other at Thanksgiving, during family reunions at Riley Park, on the farm outside Morristown. Family in its longue dureé as Ginny, daughter of Diane’s sister, Kristen, gives birth to a new generation of the Keaton clan as have children of other cousins. We will wink out one by one, but the family will continue.

 

Over to the Bread Lounge to read a bit before Tom got here from DIA. Instead ran into Tal and Alan talking to each other. Alan in his  usual I’m here to assist you mode trying to figure out how he can help Tal’s new company, All in Ensemble.

Alan’s decided to let his beard grow back. I’m glad. It was odd seeing him clean shaven. He shaved for his art, as he says. A role in Zorro!, the musical.

Together we talked about Tal’s character study class, about mutual friends and family. The Bread Lounge serves as the student union restaurant for Evergreen. Go there and you see folks you know.

After Alan left, Tal and I discussed my character Herme. He liked my idea of a one-act play to introduce the Rivers and Mountains Poets of China to Mountain audiences. He offered to help me in any way he can. He’s bringing an outline from a playwrighting class to our next Tuesday class. Who knows? Perhaps the Hooded Man will play up and down the spine of the Rocky Mountains. Could happen.

 

Tom got to the Bread Lounge after navigating an overly busy DIA filled with summer travelers. We ordered sandwiches, which came late so we had to pack them up and head over to mussar. Where we discussed the role of metaphor in our daily lives and the implications of metaphor for understanding what we might mean when we use the metaphor God. A good heart/mind conversation.

Following mussar Tom and I were hosted by Ellen and Dick Arnold, Rabbi Jamie’s parents. A wide ranging conversation which had as its focus the upcoming trip to Israel. Dick will be my roommate for the group part of the trip.

 

When we got back to Shadow Mountain, Vince was here mowing and weed whacking. In the rain. Vince is a good guy. Lucky to have him as my friend and property manager.

Tom and I were tired. We talked, then went to bed. Getting ready now for our trip this afternoon on the Royal Gorge Rail Road.

 

 

Dogs, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Health, Hermitage, Judaism, Mountains, Mussar

Well. That Sucks.

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Beltane and the Shadow Mountain Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Leo. Marilyn and Irv. Heidi and Rider. Primo’s. Kep, his ashes and paw print. Another beautiful day in the Mountain hood. Rabbi Jamie talking about ritual. Rebecca. Ode and Dennis. Luke picking up Leo. Blood draw for PSA and testosterone. A good workout. Resting heart rate down to 61. Weight at 145. 5.5 inches tall, down from 5′ 7″. 76. Being alive.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Heidi

One brief shining: Picked up Kep’s ashes yesterday the receptionist remembered them all she said Rigel was a star as her voice broke when I came back to the car Leo wagged his tail happy to see me in my hand a bag with cloth cord handles, a bamboo box in a blue cloth sack and a small box with silver that held the imprint of Kep’s paw.

 

When the doctor blurted out Leslie’s diagnosis including that she had less than a month to live, she said, well. That sucks. I won’t be going to Poland. You had to know Leslie but it was in character and a solid way, imho, to meet the guy in black with the sickle. Acknowledgement. No bargaining. Reality. A bit of humor.

Her service is tomorrow. I’ll be there. And at her shiva tomorrow evening. How we do it.

 

Left 15 minutes early this morning for an appointment with Rabbi Jamie. Why? Downtown Evergreen is a must see now thanks to a summer long detour away from the lake. On Sunday it took me twenty minutes to get from my side of Evergreen to the synagogue side. Today. No trouble at all so I ended up 15 minutes early rather than 20 minutes late. Sunday was with tourists. Today not so much.

Rabbi Jamie and I discussed a ritual for crossing the threshold.  A mezuzah hanging will be part of it. Something also about being an elder and a male. We’ll discuss it over time. October 8th at ten am. He told me of a delightful ritual in Nepal. Apparently at 7 a boy becomes a man expected to participate in family and village life in a positive way. That phase lasts for 70 years. Then at 77, the man becomes a child again. On his 77th birthday the man leads a parade through the town where everyone greets him, blesses him. I like that idea, too. We’re going to discuss a late life ritual for men as well for my own situation.

Also his dad may go on the Israel trip and we could room together. Save us both $1,100. Winner, winner, chicken dinner.

 

After breakfast with Rebecca. Rebecca teaches ESL at a nunnery in northern India, one related to the Tibetan Buddhist diaspora. She’s 80 and travels there once a year for four months or so, living in the same quarters as the nuns. We sat outside at the Parkside in lovely 67 degree and sunny weather Colorado dogs and their humans coming back and forth through the tables.

Rebecca believes Leslie got a good result with a healthy life up till two weeks before her death. Probably right about that.

Life in the Mountains. And death.

 

 

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

Memory

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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

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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.

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Entheos

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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.

 

 

 

 

Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Mussar

Joy. Joy. Joy.

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Beltane and the Mesa View Moon

Thursday gratefuls: MVP. Simcha. Joy. The laughter and learning around the table last night. Going to one more CBE event this month. Snow! 33 degrees. Heavy rain last night. A solid workout yesterday. Cardio and resistance. Feeling good, in my body. Connection. Relationships. Nature. Self. Dogs. Animals. Citrus salad. Mark’s desert Pigeon. The real true desert outside his hotel window.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Joy. Joy. Joy.

One brief shining: Sometimes, once in a while, if the fates are kind, an evening turns from ordinary learning into a festival, a celebration of what it means to be human, to see into each other’s lives and learn in real time what throbs in the heart of another.

 

Last night was such a night at CBE. It was my turn to lead the MVP group, a monthly mussar evening. Simcha was the middah, the character trait we focused on both in MVP and the congregation as a whole. Simcha means joy.

I asked everybody to find two or three photographs that evoked joy for them. We wrote five minutes about them, then dove into what everyone wanted. Adult show and tell.

Pictures of siblings. Pictures of children at play. Pictures outside in the Mountains. Pictures of Dogs. Of family meals, of ourselves as children. Of parents being happy. Of survival.

We laughed. Smiled. Nodded. I asked how the photographs evoked joy. The connections. With our past. With relationships that held and hold deep meaning. A moment of being one with the Mountains. The profound love of Dogs. At a breast cancer walk. The Self in a moment of ecstasy. A life transforming moment. Play.

We pulled out of them connections, relationships, nature, and play as core components of what evoked joy for us in these pictures.

Then we moved on, as we do each month, to defining a practice. A practice is a measurable way we can increase the middah of the month in our life. One of us will set the sweet picture of young grandchildren on the ledge beside her computer and see it everyday. Another made a joy folder out of pictures from his favorites, set it to music and had the photo app sift through 25 or so in a creative way. He plans to see it first thing in the morning. Another will find joy in the moment instead of looking for a future time when joy will come. Yet another chose to remind herself of her natural, joyful reaction to events in her life and not let other emotions dominate that. I acknowledged finding joy with others and will attend one more event at CBE over the next month. (No, I am not turning in my introvert merit badge. I’ve earned it. I am saying yes to the joy I feel in the presence of others as well.)

I added something, something joyful, to folks lives last night. Felt really good. There’s life in this old man yet. What I mean by that is that I felt some of the juice from days of yesteryear. Leading by consensus, taking a group from one place to another and having everyone part of the movement. And feeling good about it.