• Category Archives Humanities

  • Wintertide is Coming

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Wintertide  December 21 to February 1

    Conifer. Evergreen. Pine. Get it? We live in Conifer, often shop in Evergreen, and I pass through Pine once a month on my way to the Happy Camper in Bailey. Though a bit on the nose, if you visited our mountain towns, you would see how these small communities got their names. Lodgepoles. Ponderosa. Spruce. Dominant here. Greening mountain sides. Out my loft/studio window Black Mountain rises up to 10,000 feet, almost a thousand above our home on the peak of Shadow Mountain. The shadows make it appear Black right now, but in other times of day it is green with the Lodgepoles that cover it. Our backyard. Lodgepole.

    This is their season. When they stand green while the Aspen and the Willow and the Ash put away their leaves for the winter. Now, as far back in human history, these trees seem to carry on through the cold and Snow of Winter, ever living, their needles green.

    Think of it. The Sun sank lower and lower, the nights grew longer, the air colder. The Maple and the Oak and the Elm and the Willow and the Ironwood all lost their leaves, seemed to shrink into themselves. The gardens had only dead stalks of Beans, Tomatoes, Cabbage. They would stick out, above the first winter Snow, sad and fallen. Dead. The Grasses were brown, bowing to the coming of the Winter King. Nothing that bore food lived. Or, so it seemed.

    Except. Conifer. Evergreen. Pine. Maybe a Douglas Fir, a soaring Redwood, a Sequoia. A Jackpine. Still green. Yes. These cold fallow days were not all powerful. Even though the sun had begun to disappear, these trees braved the elements. Still green.

    Since Summer’s End, Samain, the time of the last harvest, until Imbolc, February 1st, celebrating the coming of the Ewe’s Milk, there would be no new nourishment from the land, from the world of plants. Even the game in the woods grew thin, suffering the death of the green things as humans did. Fish required chopping through thick ice. Standing in the cold.

    Bring in the tree. Bring in the Pine, the Conifer, the Evergreen. Bring them into the house to celebrate the hope, the wish for a new growing season. We need them in the house before the Winter Solstice, when the night and the dark have their victory, light vanquished for as long as it will be all year. Maybe we put stars on them as a Martin Luther tale suggests he did after a Christmas season walk. Or, maybe tree lights remind us of Adam, the first human, who put flaming sticks in the ground for 8 days starting on the Solstice. By the 8th day he trusted the sun would return.

    And, bring in a log. A thick one. One that can burn a while. A Yule log. We’ll put it in the fireplace, light it, then put it out each night. At the end of the season we’ll save enough of it to start the fire for the Yule log next Wintertide.

    Go outside. Bring in the slash from tree cutting. A few thicker logs. A bonfire! Crackling, sending sparks in the air, up toward the heavens. (not here right now though. wildfires.) Fire. Evergreens. In the fallow time.

    Those Romans. Hey, they were something, weren’t they? Saturnalia. Celebrated Jupiter’s overthrow of his father, Saturn. A new world order. It ran from December 17th to December 24th. A lot of decorating,gift giving, feasting, singing songs, giving each other candles to celebrate the eternal light. No Rudolf or Reindeer. Later on.

    Lots of other links to these holidays. If you’re interested, find a copy of The Winter Solstice: the Sacred Traditions of Christmas, by John Matthews. Also, good suggestions for celebration.

    This winter. This particular winter. Wintertide 2020/2021. So much struggle and pain. So many broken promises. So many damaged homes and souls. And, worsening. Right now. As Wintertide comes into its own. Cases in the quarter million or so a day. Deaths over 370,000. Trump still swinging the wrecking ball. Proud Boys in the streets of D.C. Climate change reappearing. Demands to heal centuries of injustice still heating up the body politic. A divided nation. Oh, my.

    So what’s Wintertide all about? Those evergreen Trees that live in the cold and fallow months. Conifer, Pine, Evergreen. The Yule log that burns this year and the next. The long journey into darkness finally comes to a climax. The children of wonder whose births have come to be celebrated now: Attis, Mithras, Baal, Tammuz, Apollo and Dionysus, Jesus. All those architectural monuments to the Winter Solstice: Chichen Itza, New Grange, Stone Henge.

    each birth, always

    They congregate now, in the fallow time, as human markers of lived hope. Look, the Evergreens can survive! Here’s the piece of the Yule log from last year. Last year! This will end.

    Happy birthday baby gods. Reminding us that the true power lives in each of us humans. The sun coming through great hall of New Grange to light up the spirals for seventeen minutes. Kulkukan, the feathered serpent, visible on the steps to the top of the temple at Chichen Itza. We’ve been here before. And made it through.

    Trump will leave. We’ll gather round to work on our nation together. The vaccines will arrive and Covid will get pushed back into the ranks of a seasonal flu at most. You and I will see each other. Give those hugs and kisses and handshakes and wiggles that have waited through this benighted year. That’s what Wintertide is all about.

    So bring in the mistletoe. Hang some green boughs. Light some candles. Make some glog. Sing songs. Read poetry. We’ll be ok.


    Great Wheel Holidays Humanities Myth and Story Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.

  • 8 Lights for Covid Nights

    Posted on by Charles Comment

     

    Samain and the Moon of Thanksgiving

    Saturday gratefuls: A full week of workouts. Garlic steak bits, Shrimp, Broccoli, Rice. The Cow that died for our meal. The Shrimp, too. 46 days. K=shaped recovery. Essential Workers. Hanukkah. Yule. Winter Solstice. Christmas. Lights. Decorations. Music. Good cheer. Remembering the Maccabees. The menorah. The prayers. Solar Snow shovel. Cod. Drug holiday for mirabegron. Cribbage. 7 Wonders Duel. Deepening intimacy. Covid. Its horrors and its wonders. The election. A new year coming.

    Did some decorating yesterday. Will finish today. Up here in the  loft? Pagan mysteries time. Lights. Santa Claus. Ornaments. Christmas quilt. Christmas pillow. Katy did them. Bill’s gift Christmas tie and Santa hat on my Woolly Mammoth. Snow globes with Christmas scenes. Grandma’s holiday music on Pandora. Grandpop’s, too. A tree, too, possibly today.

    I’m reclaiming childhood memories and welding them onto the thinking I’ve done. Long since childhood passed. This house is Hanukkah house and I’m glad. This loft is a Christmas without the birth loft and I’m glad. Oh, the weather outside is not as frightful as I’d like, but up here it’s delightful. Down below it’s all dreidels and gelt and candles. Also delightful. Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

    What are you gettin’ for Hanukkah? For many Jewish kids Hanukkah is the Jewish Christmas. A time for gift giving and receiving. No Santa Claus, but, hey. Many, including those who do give gifts, light the menorah, one candle a night for 8 nights, say the prayers, then it’s done. You can’t blow out the candles and you can’t use them, i.e. read by them, use them to light your way to bed, hunt for a fallen coin. At certain points dreidels come out, gelt-now mostly gold foil wrapped chocolates, singing.

    Back of all this. A more interesting story.

    Alexander the Great divided up his empire among his favorite generals. Seleucus I Nicator got Western Asia, a large chunk of land that ran from present day Turkey in the west to parts of present day Uzbekistan and Pakistan in the east. They pushed the Ptolemy’s out of Palestine around 200 b.c.e. Hellenization, in which many upper class Jews dropped their religion and adopted Greek lifeways, was already well underway when Antiochus IV Epiphanes took over the Seleucid Empire in 175 b.c.e.

    Thus, there was a conflict not only between Jews and the Seleucid empire, but between Hellenizing Jews and those determined to maintain their faith and practice. Antiochus came into the latter conflict by declaring traditional Jewish practice forbidden.* This led to the Maccabean revolt, a guerilla war fought by traditional Jews against the Seleucids. They won.

    And, now. Hanukkah. The Seleucids, perhaps Antiochus himself, had profaned the second temple. (see the wiki entry below) When the Maccabees got the temple back, they found all the oil in the temple desecrated save for one amphora that still had its priestly seal intact. Then, a miracle occurs.

    No new oil could be obtained for 8 days and the amphora contained only enough for one day. Still, the temple menorah had to be lit. During the night all seven lights were lit. Always. When the temple menorah, which was huge, received oil from the one still blessed amphora, it stayed lit for 8 days until fresh sanctified oil could be had. The miracle.

    Though the temple menorah only had seven lights, the Hanukkah menorah has nine. 8 of them commemorate the miracle and the 9th, the shamash, (helper, servant) is lit first and lights the other candles. In the tradition that we follow, on the first night there is one candle, on the second two, on the third three and so on until 8. Kate lights the candles and reads the prayers. I recite them with her. If the kids are here, gifts get distributed. Much like Christmas.

    The first level of meaning is the miracle of the oil. That’s the one most recall. The second level of meaning lifts up the willingness of traditional Jews to take up the fight against the mighty Seleucid empire. And win! A third level of meaning is that the traditional Jews fought for the right to be different from their imperial power. Although. The traditional Jews may have also been fighting to reclaim Judaism from the upper classes who had assimilated.

    It is a minor holiday compared to the High Holidays, Pesach, Sukkot, Simchat Torah, but it is the holiday most visible to the goyim. And, it has been made to fit into the whole Christmas holiday dither.

    Ruth at Beth Evergreen, new year’s 2017, end of Hanukkah

     

    *According to 1 Maccabees, Antiochus banned many traditional Jewish and Samaritan[14] religious practices: he made possession of the Torah a capital offense and burned the copies he could find;[24] sabbaths and feasts were banned; circumcision was outlawed, and mothers who circumcised their babies were killed along with their families;[25] and traditional Jewish ritual sacrifice was forbidden. It was said that an idol of Olympian Zeus was placed on the altar of the Temple and that Israelites set up altars to Greek gods and sacrificed “unclean” animals on them. Wiki


    Colorado Family Holidays Humanities Judaism Myth and Story Our Land and Home Shadow Mountain Third Phase

  • Kakun

    Posted on by Charles Comment

     

    Samain and the Moon of Thanksgiving

    Wednesday gratefuls: Kakun, family precepts. This article. Ikigai. Ichi-go, Ichi-e. Cribbage. Card decks. Playing as the snow came down yesterday. Other cultures. Repositories of wisdom about how to be human. Ours, too. The snow on Black Mountain. The beauty here. Politics. Covid. Going, Going.

     

     

    Japan. An old, sometimes conservative, sometimes radically modern place. So much to learn from them. The article I link to above: This Japanese Shop is 1,020 Years Old has three ideas that resonate (thanks, Tom, for reminding me of this idea). Kakun, family precepts. Many Japanese families have a motto, or a family saying that guides them. Like those quotes at the bottom of European heraldry, I suppose. “Live long, live healthy, die suddenly.” “As long as you strive to be popular, you will remain unpopular.”  “Boys must help with the housework.” Quotes from this website, SoraNews. It’s masthead reads: Bringing you yesterday’s news today.

    Shinise. This term connotes a business that has been in business for a really long time. 19 for over a thousand years. 140 over 500 years. 3100 over two hundred years and 33,000 with over a hundred years. In this last group are Nintendo and Kikkoman. These businesses, especially the older ones, have opted out, really probably never participated in, the notion of maximizing profit, expand all you can. Seems like an idea that might be important in late stage capitalism. The more shinise, the more stable the economy.

    Kakun + shinise = Ichiwa. Family precepts, or values, married to a shinise approach to business, can yield stability and security that lasts. Makes me wonder about our individualistic, upwardly striving, materialistic culture. But, as a counter point. A useful reminder that there are many ways to be human.

    As I age, I find myself more interested in family, about what mine means, about the message, the kakun, that is implicit in ours. Not sure what it is, but I think there is one. One thing that’s a part of our kakun is service as a calling. Teachers. Warrior. Doctor. Organizer. Writer. Journalist. Maybe you can think of others? Pass them along if you do. Perhaps another is: Learn. Lottsa graduate level education. Travel? Read?

    In a mixed economy shinise might play a disproportionate role. While the necessary matters like housing, medical care, and sufficient income for food and education would be governmental responsibilities, there are plenty of opportunities for businesses that have kakun and shinise at their core. In Bangkok, 2004, I visited a small community of folks whose only product was Buddhist begging bowls. The bowls required several different steps, all done by hand, and the steps got distributed among families. Bought one and it sits nearby.

    We’re so binary. Liberal? Conservative? Which are you? Well, on this, I’m liberal. On this, conservative. On this, maybe, neither one. Are you an individualist or a communitarian? Are you gay, straight, trans, bi? Life requires nuance. Ideology is good for critiquing, but not so good for planning.

    It might be that a conversation around these values is what we, the USA, needs.


    Asia Family Humanities Myth and Story Politics Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant. Shadow Mountain Third Phase Travel US History World History

  • Thanks for the Body Contact

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Samain and the Moon of Thanksgiving

    Tuesday gratefuls: Kate’s good days. Cottage pie. Rigel in the bed. Her licking my hand this morning. Kep peeking over the edge of the bed, “Get up, Get up!” Charlie Haislet, may his treatments succeed. CBE. The blues shabbat this Friday. Chess. Stefan Zweig. His Dark Materials. Phillip Pullman. Vaccines. Covid. Sleep. Electric blanket. Cool nights.

     

    The other night Kep got up, turned around three times, and laid down with his back snug up against mine. I know this is probably weird to non-dog people and that some dog people say my dog will never be in my bed. Fair enough. For me, however, it was an affirmation of the hug. Of love between species. And, it got me thinking. About hugs and sex and general body contact.

    When I was in Seminary in the early 1970’s, all of us had to go through the University of Minnesota’s sex education seminar. No, it was not pictures of penises and vaginas with pointers and the guy who couldn’t teach anything else in charge. No, this was a week long event, the chairs were bean bags, and there was the “desensitization” morning where they showed multiple pornographic films at the same time. The idea was to produce clergy who were not afraid of either their sexuality or the sexuality of their parishioners. Not sure whether it achieved that lofty goal, but it did make conversations about sex and sexuality easier.

    “Thank you for the body contact.” We learned to say this whenever we bumped into someone or accidentally brushed up against another person. I know. But, it was the 1970’s. The purpose of this phrase was laudable, imo. Normalize body contact, don’t fear the touch of another. Of course, boundaries. Of course. But don’t treat contact with another as if it meant they had cooties. Or, Covid. Yes, in today’s Covid infected world this advice would be anathema, but Covid won’t last. Hugs and touching will.

    Anyhow, I went immediately, as you might imagine, to the concept of dasein. Heidegger’s idea of being there, of being in the world, reminds us that our place in this world extends beyond the limits of our body, beyond our skin, into the worlds of the other. In some ways this is obvious since our sensorium collects information from all around us, even from very far away. In a variation on this idea I’ve seen recent articles suggest mind is not limited to our body either, and for some of the same reasons.

    Existence before essence*. Wherever you may stand on this philosophical chestnut, hugs and sex and hand shaking and accidental bumps into another affirm the existence of an-other. If you think hard about being in your own body, you can come to the conclusion, as the Sophists did, that you and your body is the only thing that matters. In fact, you can stretch it to include the idea that you might be the only thing in existence. That’s solipsism. You’ll just have to trust me that you can get there logically, unless you already knew that. I reject it, as I imagine you might, too.

    Though we might not go that far, it is easy, especially now during the wear a mask, don’t touch, wash your hands moment we’re all having, to not contact another warm body. Spouses and dogs, children being the important exceptions. Feeling Kep’s 102 degree body heat radiating from his body to mine made his presence very real. As did the weight of him. More than that. It was love that prompted him to lie down next to me, close enough that we touched. Kep’s dasein and mine became entangled for that time.

    In my world existence does precede essence. Your presence and how you show up is much more important to me than your “human nature.” As my presence and how I show up is more important to myself than whatever human nature I might be said to have. We need reminding though of the flesh and blood reality of the other. That they are like us in some fundamental manner even if it’s not something we can understand or access. Hugs. Sex. Handshakes. Crowded rooms. Or, the simple act of a dog, a friend, a life partner.

    Thanks, Kep, for the body contact.

     

     

    *The proposition that existence precedes essence is a central claim of existentialism, which reverses the traditional philosophical view that the essence of a thing is more fundamental and immutable than its existence.Wikipedia

     

     

     

     

     


    Beyond the Boundaries Coronavirus Dogs Family Friends Humanities Letters Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant. Third Phase

  • Zozobra

    Posted on by Charles Comment

     

    Samain and the Moon of Radical Change

    My post below is an instance of zozobra. Who am I? Where am I? Who am I with? Are there others? Not sure about Portilla’s comments about the natural world, but this is the first time I’ve encountered these ideas. Mexican and Spanish philosophers, Unamuno chief among them, reach deep into souls torn by conflicting loyalties, culture clashes, indigenous versus invader paradoxes. I think this is an important idea. What about you?

    Read this article from the Conversation.

    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
    Partners

    Ever had the feeling that you can’t make sense of what’s happening? One moment everything seems normal, then suddenly the frame shifts to reveal a world on fire, struggling with pandemic, recession, climate change and political upheaval.

    That’s “zozobra,” the peculiar form of anxiety that comes from being unable to settle into a single point of view, leaving you with questions like: Is it a lovely autumn day, or an alarming moment of converging historical catastrophes?

    On the eve of a general election in which the outcome – and aftermath – is unknown, it is a condition that many Americans may be experiencing.

    As scholars of this phenomenon, we have noted how zozobra has spread in U.S. society in recent years, and we believe the insight of Mexican philosophers can be helpful to Americans during these tumultuous times.

    Ever since the conquest and colonization of the valley of Mexico by Hernán Cortés, Mexicans have had to cope with wave after wave of profound social and spiritual disruption – wars, rebellions, revolution, corruption, dictatorship and now the threat of becoming a narco-state. Mexican philosophers have had more than 500 years of uncertainty to reflect on, and they have important lessons to share.
    Zozobra and the wobbling of the world

    The word “zozobra” is an ordinary Spanish term for “anxiety” but with connotations that call to mind the wobbling of a ship about to capsize. The term emerged as a key concept among Mexican intellectuals in the early 20th century to describe the sense of having no stable ground and feeling out of place in the world.

    This feeling of zozobra is commonly experienced by people who visit or immigrate to a foreign country: the rhythms of life, the way people interact, everything just seems “off” – unfamiliar, disorienting and vaguely alienating.

    According to the philosopher Emilio Uranga (1921-1988), the telltale sign of zozobra is wobbling and toggling between perspectives, being unable to relax into a single framework to make sense of things. As Uranga describes it in his 1952 book “Analysis of Mexican Being”:

    “Zozobra refers to a mode of being that incessantly oscillates between two possibilities, between two affects, without knowing which one of those to depend on … indiscriminately dismissing one extreme in favor of the other. In this to and fro the soul suffers, it feels torn and wounded.”

    What makes zozobra so difficult to address is that its source is intangible. It is a soul-sickness not caused by any personal failing, nor by any of the particular events that we can point to.

    Instead, it comes from cracks in the frameworks of meaning that we rely on to make sense of our world – the shared understanding of what is real and who is trustworthy, what risks we face and how to meet them, what basic decency requires of us and what ideals our nation aspires to.

    In the past, many people in the U.S. took these frameworks for granted – but no longer.

    The gnawing sense of distress and disorientation many Americans are feeling is a sign that at some level, they now recognize just how necessary and fragile these structures are.
    The need for community

    Another Mexican philosopher, Jorge Portilla (1918-1963), reminds us that these frameworks of meaning that hold our world together cannot be maintained by individuals alone. While each of us may find our own meaning in life, we do so against the backdrop of what Portilla described as a “horizon of understanding” that is maintained by our community. In everything we do, from making small talk to making big life choices, we depend on others to share a basic set of assumptions about the world. It’s a fact that becomes painfully obvious when we suddenly find ourselves among people with very different assumptions.

    In our book on the contemporary relevance of Portilla’s philosophy, we point out that in the U.S., people increasingly have the sense that their neighbors and countrymen inhabit a different world. As social circles become smaller and more restricted, zozobra deepens.

    In his 1949 essay, “Community, Greatness, and Misery in Mexican Life,” Portilla identifies four signs that indicate when the feedback loop between zozobra and social disintegration has reached critical levels.

    First, people in a disintegrating society become prone to self-doubt and reluctance to take action, despite how urgently action may be needed. Second, they become prone to cynicism and even corruption – not because they are immoral but because they genuinely do not experience a common good for which to sacrifice their personal interests. Third, they become prone to nostalgia, fantasizing about returning to a time when things made sense. In the case of America, this applies not only to those given to wearing MAGA caps; everyone can fall into this sense of longing for a previous age.

    And finally, people become prone to a sense of profound vulnerability that gives rise to apocalyptic thinking. Portilla puts it this way:

    “We live always simultaneously entrenched in a human world and in a natural world, and if the human world denies us its accommodations to any extent, the natural world emerges with a force equal to the level of insecurity that textures our human connections.”

    In other words, when a society is disintegrating, fires, floods and tornadoes seem like harbingers of apocalypse.
    Coping with the crisis

    Naming the present crisis is a first step toward dealing with it. But then what is to be done?

    Portilla suggests that national leaders can exacerbate or alleviate zozobra. When there is a coherent horizon of understanding at the national level – that is to say, when there is a shared sense of what is real and what matters – individuals have a stronger feeling of connection to the people around them and a sense that their society is in a better position to deal with the most pressing issues. With this solace, it is easier to return attention to one’s own small circle of influence.

    [Deep knowledge, daily. Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter.]

    Uranga, for his part, suggests that zozobra actually unifies people in a common human condition. Many prefer to hide their suffering behind a happy facade or channel it into anger and blame. But Uranga insists that honest conversation about shared suffering is an opportunity to come together. Talking about zozobra provides something to commune over, something on which to base a love for one another, or at least sympathy.


    Feelings Humanities Letters Literature Politics US History World History

  • Soul

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Fall and the Moon of Radical Change

    Sunday gratefuls: Jon, Ruth, Gabe. Kate. Jon’s drawing for the gate at the bottom of the loft stairs. Ruth’s Apple fritters. Easy Entree’s beef stew. Borgen. Kate reading Jennie’s Dead, what’s written. The 8 point Buck in the back yard. Kep trying to decide what to do.

    “When I think of soul of the nation,” Joy Harjo, the United States poet laureate and a Muscogee (Creek) Nation member, said, “I think of the process of becoming, and what it is we want to become. That is where it gets tricky, and that is where I think we have reached a stalemate right now. What do people want to become?” Elizabeth Dias, NYT, 10/18/2020, Biden and Trump Say They’re Fighting for America’s ‘Soul.’ What Does That Mean?

    Highly recommended. Elizabeth Dias is smart and knows her soul history. Of all the wonderful reflections on what the soul of the country might mean, I found Joy Harjo’s the most cogent.

    Our soul, our American soul, becomes knowable in the thousands of tiny decisions, and big ones, that we make every day. Where do we live? With whom do we live? What do we drive? What do we eat? For whom do we vote? Who deserves our attention?

    It’s possible, in a country as affluent as ours, to get lost in the tiny decisions. Will we wear a mask? Whose mail do we read? Whose products do we buy? Where and how do we get our healthcare? These are all important questions in our daily lives, but we often forget that the aggregate of our choices has enormous consequences for our mutual well-being. If we don’t pay attention, we forget the other, imagine that our choices matter only to us, only to the ethical framework of our family, our work, our small community.

    One way to infuse those tiny decisions with broader meaning is to become intentional about them. Remember think global, buy local? If you want peace, work for justice? Do I buy the gasoline powered car or do I buy the electrically powered car?

    Our national soul gathers force, gathers power, gathers momentum for change in these choices. Easy to forget. And, I agree with Harjo that we’ve reached a stalemate of sorts now. Our attention has been distracted by 2020.

    What’s next? Locust? Volcanoes? Asteroids? No. What’s next is November 3rd. This is a big decision. But it will be our collective choices that make it. America will announce to the world the state of its soul’s health on November 3rd.

    Is our soul just an enlarged continuation of the white male project? Or, do others have a voice? Do those who value community, diversity, globalism have the strength to redefine our soul. We will see.


    Beyond the Boundaries Commentary on the news Coronavirus Family Health Humanities Minnesota Our Land and Home Politics Shadow Mountain US History

  • Unanswerable Questions.

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Fall and the RBG Moon

    Sunday gratefuls: Orion, clear and distinct, like Descartes wanted his ideas. The night sky, visible again! Meatloaf from Easy Entrees. Learning to sleep all night on my side. The lens in my left eye. Kate, waiting for relief. Ruth will watch Kiss the Ground. Groveland wanting to hear me again after all these years. It’s Beyond Me.

    Three days post-op now. Biggest surprise so far was Orion, there. No longer several bursting flares, but his own, distinct self. Rigel there, too, his left foot, bright and clear. Ah. It’s good to see an old friend looking well.

    I no longer need glasses for television. But, I did order three pair of 2.5 cheaters off Amazon. I can still read now with my right eye, but that goes away on the 8th of October. With the artificial lens I can’t focus anymore.

    This surgery is such a good metaphor I wonder why it’s not deployed more often. Our vision gradually becomes clouded, the world becomes less and less easy to see. What do we need to remove our political cataracts and gain a humane vision? Those cataracts that have developed over years of lesser evils and disappointing politicians. Do we all come with the cataracts of racism and classism or do we develop them over time? Who will be our surgeons?

    Shifting. It’s Beyond Me. I’ve had fun gathering answers to Groveland UU’s question: What are the origins of religious beliefs?

    Finding an anthropologist, Harvey Whitehouse, has worked on the subject pleased me. He’s a cognitive anthropologist, a specialty that had little footing when I studied anthropology back in the late 1960’s. They study the way our mind shapes our understanding, rather than the understandings themselves. Whitehouse’s work is bloodless, but it has high points.

    This presentation has to be a discussion. It asks an unanswerable question, my favorite kind. Each of us has an intuition about the answer. It will be interesting to learn what others have concluded. I have several notions to throw into the pot, but the answer is lost in the long ago, far away.

    Doing presentations is a delight. I get to do research. I get to think about a topic. My ideas and conclusions get an airing. Feedback comes. On occasion cash, too.

    It’s also unsettling. The research has to stop. The thinking must end. No matter how tentative, the ideas must be articulated. Exposed. Naked. And, in person.

    My work doesn’t include the realm of the certain. I cannot say what the origin of religion is. No one can. Then I here Wittgenstein, of that about which we cannot speak, we must be silent. I only speak about such matters. A challenge, for sure.

    So right now I’m anxious, teeth a bit clenched. Zoom adds another layer of uncertainty. Also a layer of experiment, of trying something new.


    Commentary on Religion Faith and Spirituality Great Wheel Health Humanities Minnesota Myth and Story Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant. Science Torah Writing

  • Courage and Sadness

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Mabon (Vernal Equinox) and the RBG Moon

    Tuesday gratefuls: Kate resolving the missing $5,500.Rigel eager to get up this morning. Orion in the south. Mars in the west. Venus in the east. Sirius in the southeast. Small bursts of color. The Great Wheel, turning.

    The vernal equinox. When the night hours increase. Daylight shortens. Crops come to fruit. The Earth begins to gather back to itself the plants that grew in fields and meadows.

    The Elk rut. That strange strangled cry of the bugling bull Elk. The cough of the mountain lion as they hunt in the dawn and twilight. Bears in their hyperphagia phase (a new word for me), 20,000 calories a day. Preparation for hibernation. Upturned trash cans, detritus on the roads.

    Orion returns to the night sky. Getting the paper while feeding the dogs. In the dark now. Seeing the stars. Or, rather, their cataract driven explosions of light.

    Earth/Sky, a favorite website, has a fascinating short article about the Chinese sense of autumn. This observation I found significant: “…it’s part of Chinese culture to maintain and add to ancient wisdom. In contrast, we in the Western world tend to replace old ideas with new ideas. So – although our Western way of thinking encourages advances in things like technology and economics – the Chinese understanding of natural cycles remains far deeper than ours.”

    The emotions associated with autumn for the Chinese, courage and sadness, rise in full measure this 2020 harvest season. Sad. The feeling of Leaves falling, Grasses withering, light diminishing, the Sun’s angle shortening. RBG’s tzaddik death. The pandemic. Our beleaguered and chaotic nation. Isolation and its discontents. Courage. Facing the election, doing what’s necessary. Mourning, then fighting. Going on as the Vegetative world dies, changes. Living with the pandemic instead of in spite of it. Leaning into the third phase for those of us old hippies and radicals still here.

    The Great Wheel is ancient Western knowledge. I have chosen to maintain it and, I hope, add to it. As the Earth/Sky article notes: “To the Chinese, nature means more than just the cycling of the seasons. Nature is within and around us…” It used to meant that in the West, too, but our emphasis on reason, on results, on arriving at destinations, on a monotheistic creator who controls nature, have become mature cataracts for us, occluding our vision.

    We see what we believe useful. We find the laws of nature, then proceed to own them, use them. This gives us the impression that, like magic or miracles, we can control nature. The rapid warming of our planet gives the lie to that.

    I’m neither a Luddite nor anti-reason, anti-science. I am sad about what we’ve lost in our rush to understand and after having understood, manipulate.

    I find comfort in knowing as autumn comes to the Rockies, it has also come to me. My life has matured, has headed for the fallow season, the long season in which I return those borrowed elements, become again one with the universe. Though of course I’m one with it now, too.

    Which makes me feel the turning of the wheel, it tugs on me, pulls me toward not only death, but also spring. The cyclical renewal. Who knows? Maybe autumn prepares us not for annihilation, but transformation and renewal. It does for Mother Earth. Why not us?


    Aging Asia Beyond the Boundaries Commentary on Religion Great Wheel Holidays Humanities Mountains Myth and Story Original Relation Plants Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant. Shadow Mountain Third Phase Weather +Climate

  • Neurotic

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Summer and the Moon of Justice

    Sunday gratefuls: A mowed and less cluttered backyard. Jon and the grandkids coming tonight. Pick-up groceries. Safeway. Even though. Kate’s feeding tube. Her appointment with an ostomy nurse. House cleaning. The dishwasher. The final days of our freezer. This pulse of energy I have for domestic work. May it last. Cool mountain mornings. Trump and his racist ways.

    Not all who wander are lost. This Tolkien quote could be my family crest. Mary and Mark living the expat life. Kate and I finally come to rest, like Noah, on a mountain top in the Rockies. And that’s the external reality.

    A few days back I surfaced the wandering going on in my inner life. Last night, as my plugged up nose kept me awake, an old shard of psychiatric shrapnel worked its way up again. Philosophical neurosis. Diagnosed with this in 1969. After, I think, the MMPI and one or two visits with a doc. Neurosis got ejected from the DSM in 1980, but not before it struck me with the force of a hidden mindmine.

    Nowhere in searches on Google or in any book on psychology have I found the term. The psychiatrist who diagnosed me is lost to memory, as well as any explanatory information from him. Those two words, philosophical neurosis, have many synaptic threads attached to them and they tug out of the basement every once in a while.

    Philosophical neurosis. It had the unusual impact of pathologizing a key aspect of my personality. I take nothing for granted. Discovering there was an entire, storied academic tradition of people who did the same transformed me over the course of a semester. Even though I came to love anthropology as much as philosophy, philosophy shaped me, made me a critic and theorist at heart.

    When I was a young boy, my bedroom adjoined my parents. My father and I would “talk about tractors” for a while before going to sleep. As I recall, this meant talking about a diverse range of topics. Early on though it exposed me to critique. Even at age 7 or 8, I would pursue the logic of a topic to its fullest extent. Dad never had dad authority. He could tell me something, but I would as often say, I wonder about that, as I would nod my head.

    He called me tech. As in, technical. I always argued about the mechanics, the structure of an observation. Wish I could give you an example from that time, but my main memories around being “tech” was Dad’s growing frustration with me. He had been raised by his German physician grandfather, Jonas Spitler. My impression is that Jonas had dad authority. Always.

    It came to me from the womb. I had, and have, an instantaneous realization of a contradiction or a flaw in an argument. It was no surprise to me when I took the Meyers-Briggs personality inventory and discovered my letters: INTP, an introverted intuitive thinking perceiving type.

    “Logicians are known for their brilliant theories and unrelenting logic – in fact, they are considered the most logically precise of all the personality types.” on the INTP personality, 16personalities. Poor dad. I came with this mental equipment, discovered philosophy and politics. Our relationship was over right about then. He had strong, definite opinions. With which, unfortunately for us, I often disagreed.

    Then, that psychiatrist nailed me with what I now believe was a made-up diagnosis. Maybe he was an incarnation of my father’s persona. I do remember he told me I had to find values that I could embrace or my life would be, well, shit.

    Embracing or conforming to a belief system defines blasphemy and anathema for me. If it makes sense to me, sure. I can go there. But if it doesn’t, now or later, then I’m on another path, another ancientrail.

    This explains why I’ve always felt like an outsider in any job I’ve ever had. Even the ministry. In the end, it has to make sense, the assumptions, the framework of the job. And the world does not divide logically. So, Charlie out. Sorry.

    Philosophical neurosis. As much as I hate to admit it. Fair enough. I have to approach the world as I am and that does seem, at least at 73, to be who I am, one who can’t turn off the analytical part of his mind. Doesn’t I mean I’m not loving, caring. I am. But don’t expect me to buy the shiny new religious or political system you’ve discovered. I probably won’t.


    Friends Humanities News of the Strange Third Phase

  • A Druid. A Priest.

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Beltane and the Corona Lunacy II

    Friday gratefuls: Beau Jo’s pizza. A rain cloud creeping down Black Mountain. What’s your fire? Ode’s question for Sunday. Mussar folk. Silence. Clean speech. Jews. CBE. Alan on zoom yesterday. The Denver Post. The Washington Post. The New York Times.

    Charlie. You’re a druid! That was the Reverend Doctor Ackerman, my spiritual director. He was on staff at Westminster Presbyterian, the big downtown church in Minneapolis. He was my second spiritual director, the first being a nun in St. Paul.

    The nun, whose name I don’t recall, had me write a gratitude journal. She told me that gratitude was the root of all spirituality. I’ve heard similar things many times since, but she was the first one to open my eyes to that important link between spirit and gratitude.

    Ackerman was a psychologist as well as clergy. By the time I got to him I’d had many years of Jungian analysis with John Desteian, a rich and transformative experience. Jung understood better than any other psychotherapist/psychotheoretician the link between the religious journey and individuation. Going into the ministry and marrying Raeone (in the Westminster chapel) had evoked deep fissures in my psyche, places where my old, wounded self pulled apart.

    The deepest rift lay between my 17th year, when mom died, and the adult persona I had crafted. I did not face her loss. I ran into the black abyss of her absence and hid there, afraid to venture out, fearful something new and awful might happen. Over that abyss I built bridges to the adult world.

    The most obvious one and the easiest for me was academics. I plunged into philosophy, anthropology, geography, theater history, and later the vast intellectual world of Christianity. When I was in a library, with books on the shelf of a carrel, head down, pen in hand for notes, the anxiety disappeared. The world of ideas both excited and distracted me. This bridge still stands, the sturdiest and least pathological.

    The most unconscious bridge construction came in my freshman year at Wabash College. Mom had just died. I was in a school where many of the 200 other freshmen were also valedictorians, leaders in their high schools. I was, for the first time in life, among intellectual peers. Wabash was tough.

    We had to pledge a fraternity. Upper classmen got first choice on dorm rooms, filling them. Freshmen had to live on campus. So. I became a Phi Kappa Psi. Drinking, smoking. That’s what I got from being a Phi Psi. They slipped into my life, those two, and I would spend my twenties captive to both. I also picked up philosophy there, a companion for my life pilgrimage.

    The addiction bridge, a destructive way to navigate the fissure, both helped to assuage the anxiety and to increase it. That bridge began to break down in my late twenties, but not before I’d decided to finish seminary and, later, marry Raeone. Both were mistakes.

    Ackerman caught me as the Christian bridge, a potholed one from the beginning, had begun to crumble. About three-quarters through the Doctor of Ministry program out of McCormick Seminary in Chicago I had discovered fiction writing. I already knew then that I had to get out of the ministry.

    The last bridge to adulthood I had built was marrying Raeone. Not her fault my construction project wasn’t about her, but about a need to have someone in my life, someone close. When I got sober, both the Christian and Raeone spans began to have structural problems.

    To feed my growing interest in writing fantasy novels I decided to look to my past, my family. Richard Ellis had come to this country in 1707, his father a Welsh captain in William and Mary’s occupation of Ireland. The Correll’s were famine Irish. Celtic. It was the Celts who changed my life forever.

    Celtic Christianity, a branch of Christianity that preceded the Roman Catholic Church in Britain, welcomed the folk religion of the Celts, incorporated it. An odd thing happened when I met, through the Celtic Christians, this ancient Celtic faith. I switched sides. It took a while, but the concept of the Great Wheel of the Seasons came to make more sense to me than any redemption or resurrection narrative. Discussing these realizations with Ackerman lead to his, You’re a Druid!

    Later, after divorcing Raeone and leaving the ministry, detonating those bridge behind me, Kate and I began to build adult lives that did not need the bridges over our pain. I was sober when I met her. My mistake with Raeone had been acknowledged. With Kate I began to write, to garden, to keep bees, live with many dogs, cook, be a better father; and, much later, to wend my way with her into the large world of Jewish civilization.

    That’s my adult life, this last paragraph. The only bridge remaining from the frenetic years after my mother’s death is academics. I still love it, still read, think, write. Judaism honors the academic, the intellectual. The members of CBE have gathered both of us in and hold us close.

    Here’s the punchline. Following my academic inclinations, I’ve been studying Kabbalah with our very bright rabbi, Jamie Arnold. He knows me now after several years of collaboration and classes. In class on Wednesday he referred to the four covenants: the Noachic, the Abrahamic, the Mosaic, and the Davidic. These identify different aspects of Israel’s relationship with the One: between Humanity and the One, between the seeker and father of faith and his descendants, between Israel and the law, between Israel and the monarchy, the nation. We need a fifth now, Jamie said, one between us and the earth. This is the endpoint of Art Green’s argument in Radical Judaism.

    “I’ll join up with that one,” I said. “Oh,” Jamie said, “I think you’re already a priest of that one.” Still buzzing in my head. More on this in another post.


    Beyond the Boundaries Colorado Commentary on Religion Dogs Faith and Spirituality Family Feelings Friends Garden Great Wheel Great Work Humanities Jefferson County Judaism Kabbalah Memories Minnesota Myth and Story Original Relation Our Land and Home Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant. Sierra Club Weather +Climate Writing