#26 (or so)

Beltane                                                              Emergence Moon

 

Tomorrow through Sunday the Woolly Mammoths will tramp through the village of Frontenac. Our 26th retreat happens at Villa Maria Retreat Center. The theme, as I’ve noted before is, What is your walk? This is vague. Yes, but it allows a good bit of filling in with whatever makes sense to the individual.

We plan to take some hikes. Perhaps do the labyrinth. We may discuss our walk. Or we may not. On Friday night the herd will wander into Red Wing for dining at the St. James Hotel.

The last time we were at Villa Maria it was a very cold January weekend, a weekend that had a lunar eclipse. Many of us went outside on the retreat center’s grounds, found an open area and watched as the blood moon developed.

We used to structure our retreats with great care, making sure that each of us had plenty of time to present and get feedback. Over the last few years the structure has tended to fall away in favor of a more relaxed time together.

 

 

Beltane                                                            Emergence Moon

Not a lot to say right now. Feeling written out or repetitive. So, shhh. for now.

CONOP 8888

Beltane                                                             Emergence Moon

OK. Here’s what puts Minnesota Whackos in perspective. An actual plan, created in 2009, by our army, to deal with a zombie threat and to preserve non-zombie life. Let it be known right here that I’m relieved. I thought John LaDue, Byron White and the corpse containing RV, with the late addition of the anti-neighbor Zumberge family (see earlier posts if these names are new to you.) had established Minnesota as the current reigning whacko champ.

But, no. The army is there to create a national whacko moment far exceeding our home grown ones, even though our whackos are above average. Seriously. below from The Situation Report: 

“”…As its authors note in the document’s ‘disclaimer section,’ ‘this plan was not actually designed as a joke.’ Military planners assigned to the U.S. Strategic Command in Omaha, Nebraska during 2009 and 2010 looked for a creative way to devise a planning document to protect citizens in the event of an attack of any kind. The officers used zombies as their muse. “Planners … realized that training examples for plans must accommodate the political fallout that occurs if the general public mistakenly believes that a fictional training scenario is actually a real plan,” the authors wrote, adding: ‘Rather than risk such an outcome by teaching our augmentees using the fictional ‘Tunisia’ or ‘Nigeria’ scenarios used at [Joint Combined Warfighting School], we elected to use a completely-impossible scenario that could never be mistaken for a real plan.”

 

“… Under ‘Zombie Threat Summary,’ the plan highlights the different kinds of zombie adversaries one might find in such an attack. They include not only vegetarian zombies (‘zombie life forms originating from any cause but pose no direct threat to humans because they only eat plant life’); evil magic zombies (‘EMZs are zombie life forms created via some form of occult experimentation in what might otherwise be referred to as ‘evil magic’); and also chicken zombies.”

 

‘Although it sounds ridiculous, this is actually the only proven class of zombie that actually exists,’ the plan states. So-called ‘CZs’ occur when old hens that can no longer lay eggs are euthanized by farmers with carbon monoxide, buried, and then claw their way back to the surface. ‘CZs are simply terrifying to behold and are likely only to make people become vegetarians in protest to animal cruelty,’ according to CONOP

Wrenched

Beltane                                                                    Emergence Moon

The more I consider this, something to keep me alert and awake (he said sardonically.), I think the move is causing my insomnia. It’s not whether to move or not, that’s settled and I feel good about it. No, it’s the interim period, the appearance of staying in place as things were when in fact things have changed dramatically.

Projecting this activity and that into the future, in a new home. Wondering about how to deal with all of our stuff. Remembering moves past and how unpleasant they were. Then heading over to the Colorado Real Estate site to run through my list of zip codes, trolling for places. Looking up places to see horse racing.  Jazz clubs and festivals.

I’m constantly taking myself out of the now and putting myself into a future moment. In some ways this is inescapable since good planning requires it, but I’ve got to work through a way of keeping my attention in the here and now. Not sure how to do that right now since all the various aspects of a move act like a wiggly tooth waiting to come out.

Beltane                                                                 Emergence Moon

Once again, early morning. Up since 3:30. Not worried, just not sleeping. Lying there as the moonlight streamed in the window, turning to this familiar posture, then that. Mind chugging along, chewing on something which, even at this point closest to it, I can’t recall.

Calm. Just. Awake.

These times puzzle me with their resistance to solution.