Minnesota, Politics, US History

Love is the Power.

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Monday gratefuls: Good sleeping. Cold weather. A bit of Snow. Shadow, sleeping. Roxann, recovering. Tom, too. Jessie. Alex Pretti. Rene Good. Minnesota strong. January in Minnesota. Marilyn and Irv. Tara and Eleanor. Paul, shoveler of Snow. Braiding Sweet Grass. Furious Minds. Prostate Cancer. Western medicine.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Minnesota

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Rachamim. Compassion.

While chesed (lovingkindness) often refers to a choice of action, rachamim is deeply tied to visceral emotion and empathy—feeling the pain of another. 

Tarot: #6, The Forest Lovers

The Forest Lovers represent a positive spiritual force of creative emotional energy and a universal desire for harmony. The inhabitants of the Greenwood revere and respect the rites of love as the force that ensures the unfolding cycle of creation and emotional stability. Always bring the light of love with you; allow it to illuminate the darkest corners of your world and support you through whatever you set out to do.

One brief shining: Yogurt, yes, cheese and Egg burrito, yes, protein bar, yes, a tin of Sardines, yes and I’ve hit sixty grams of protein, ah, still finessing my diet, the biggest challenge of my life after Kate’s death, neither great nor bad, if not quite good, nourishment, I know. I know.

 

Tarot: I’m so glad I drew the Forest Lovers this morning. The Birch Tree wound with green Vines reminds me of Minnesota, especially the Arrowhead where Paper Birch, Aspen, Balsam, Spruce, Jack Pine, and White Pine continue the southern reach of the Boreal Forest, enclosing the many Lakes there and providing habitat for Moose, Wolves, Canadian Lynx, Black Bears, canoers, and other Wilderness loving tourists.

The reminder of Wild Minnesota and the reminder of the power of love to illuminate even the darkest corners of our world encourages me to see our political dark corner from a different vantage.

Non-violence as a strategy assumes power comes from helping others see the oppression, the injustice that can only endure when people of conscience look away, pretend it isn’t there. Non-violence chooses love as a healing force, as a way to make change, to be the difference the protester wants to see in the world.

There is an argument that non-violence cannot work in an authoritarian polity, like say Hitler’s Germany. If the ruling authority does not care about public perception, about individual human lives, then protest can be silenced either though violence or stopping it before it happens.

While it’s true that the Miller/Trump/Noem worldview reads as authoritarian, and that the leadership of ICE and the Border Patrol are outright authoritarians, we’re not Germany in the 1930’s. Not yet.

Why? Because there are still millions who love freedom, liberty, and justice. Sure most would rather ignore the immigrant among us. Many never encounter an immigrant, documented or undocumented.

But the love of our friends and neighbors in Minnesota will not let us look away. They brave the cold and the danger to awaken that ember within, to ignite a Wildfire of love that can burn down the twisted, dark forest of hate. Open your heart and you will become a wildfire of your own.

I will never forget Rene Good and Alex Pretti who gave their last full measure of devotion. I hope you won’t either.

Family, Far Right, Friends, Minnesota, Politics, White Supremacy

Sad. Yes. Despair. No.

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Sunday gratefuls: Minnesota. Each whistle. Each winter garbed protester. Each person of brown skin living there. Each act of defiance. The wonderful spirit of all those out in sub-zero weather melting ICE. Shadow, who comes inside. Work outs. The haiku writing glass lady of Bernal Hill. Its owls, coyotes, dogs. Counterrevolutionaries. Against radical reactionaries.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: America

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Rachamim. Compassion.

While chesed (lovingkindness) often refers to a choice of action, rachamim is deeply tied to visceral emotion and empathy—feeling the pain of another. 

Tarot: King of Vessels, Heron

The King of Vessels (Heron) encourages you to trust your intuition and move through life with the calm assurance of someone who understands their place in the natural world.

One brief shining: Shadow goes out and comes in, rolls her red Kong ball, eating treats as they fall out, picks up her Barkely bone with the marrow now licked out, grinds it in her strong jaw, grating her teeth, flops over on her back still holding the bone, another Mountain morning well underway while the America we once knew lies broken, a ravaged bone beneath the feet of oh, so sad delusionaries.

Here’s my letter to the editor on an NYT article: Watching America Unravel in Minnesota.

Yes, the American government has revealed its dark, dystopian nature and how this ugly chapter can only worsen. It is unraveling.

But not America. As a 40-year resident of the Twin Cities, I’ve never been more proud of my adopted home state. America has shown up on the streets of Minneapolis, in a thousand acts of protest, in a general strike!

Bend no knee. Blow a whistle. Organize your neighbors. Say no to tyranny. That’s my America. And, my Minnesota.

I wish I had a lighter side to offer this morning, something to whisk away the descending darkness, reveal the ohr that I know lies hidden under the masked, jackbooted thugs, yes, even them. All I’ve got is a faith in the millions and millions of Americans who know in their heart that shooting civilians, killing them has never been acceptable. Who know that the deaths create martyrs for the cause of liberty and justice for all.

I cannot tell you the depth of my sadness. My ongoing grief as this, this tawdry simulacrum of democracy, continues to lay waste to American cities, laws, norms of decent behavior. At how it feels to near my 79th birthday and find my home shaken to its core, divested of harmony, all in service of long discredited ideas: xenophobia, white supremacy, oligarchical greed, and a devastating lust for power.

Yes, sad. Despair, no. My Wild Neighbors continue to thrive. Shadow sleeps after her morning’s play. I have family I love. Friends I love. Artemis has Garlic Cloves ready to send up Scapes in the warmth of Spring. Tara and I will plan our gardens this Tuesday. My birthday present to her. Ruth has begun her training to become a phlebotomist. Gabe feels life beginning to change as he enters the last semester of his senior year. Roxann had a successful procedure. Tom and Jessie supported each other. Alan has a new left knee. Life continues.

 

Minnesota, Myth and Story, Reimaging revelation, Seed Keepers, Weather +Climate, World History

Is This a Friendly Place?

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Shabbat gratefuls: Shadow, chewer of bones. Ruth and phlebotomy. Gabe beginning to grasp leaving home. Rabbi Jamie, grieving his dad. Tom and Jessie. Roxann. Star Trek: Discovery. Joe and Seoah. Afar Hafar. Down Under Melbourne. Up high Shadow Mountain. Minnesota. Its culture.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Science Fiction

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Rachamim. Compassion.

While chesed (lovingkindness) often refers to a choice of action, rachamim is deeply tied to visceral emotion and empathy—feeling the pain of another. 

Tarot: Page of Bows, Stoat

  • Spirituality: It represents a free spirit, a prodigy, and the realm of dreams and visions.
  • Connection to Nature: The Stoat serves as a guide to help you reconnect with the sacredness of the ground beneath your feet

One brief shining: Waiting outside while a loved one is in a surgical suite, a shiva minyan, a young man looking into the future, a young woman educating herself with joy, people close to me at inflection points, moments when life can feel the wind shear of change, perhaps moments after which the journey alters in a significant way. Bless them all.

 

First. Minnesota. Land of 10,000 protesters. A general strike! From the yesteryear of the labor movement. Wonderful. Chesed, loving kindness in concrete action. Solidarity. Across racial, class, and sexual preference lines. Our America live now on the streets of my former, yet forever home.

100 clergy arrested at the airport. Those who know justice will roll down like a Spring Mountain Stream. Those who feel the oneness, who pray for peace and acts of compassion. Those who risk themselves to say NO to this Stephen Miller fever dream, this Trumped up version of law enforcement. My peeps.

I could not be more proud of this out of the way state, on nobody’s well traveled path, up north, bordering Canada. Yes. That Canada. Who also stood up to our naked would be autocrat.

Minnesota, the only state in the lower 48 which never lost its Wolves. Landed sister to the great Gitchee Gummi. Where the Boreal Forest sweeps around crystalline Lakes carved out by receding glaciers. Where the Anishinaabe and the Lakota  have lived for centuries. A beautiful, proud state with a long history of radical politics, of caring for the other, of owning the past and its failures. Of looking for solutions that include, not divide.

These cruel, cold weeks we are all Minnesotans. Melting ICE. Showing love for our neighbors. Standing tall against injustice.

 

Second, is the universe a friendly, unfriendly, or neutral place? A question Einstein saw as the most important of all as humanity advanced into an increasingly technological future.

Perhaps since late high school, certainly since my first philosophy class, I’ve been in the neutral camp. I never believed in a god that reached into human lives and changed them. Or, one that changed history. My gods were abstract expressions of human projection. Merciful, demanding, angry, loving, just. As we are.

Once I disabused myself of gods altogether, I saw the universe as awesome, wondrous, and indifferent. How could it be otherwise? An infinite game of pool with one atom striking another, repeat, form something new, repeat, until without a guiding hand, on this Rocky, Watery world evolution took hold. As wondrous and awesome as the creation of the universe, but still random. Mutations, extinctions. until, in a rare geological epoch, a goldilock moment favored a bipedal life form with a big brain. Could have been otherwise, eh?

Well, yes. It could have been. But it wasn’t. This last week I’ve considered all the same data and have come to a different answer to Einstein’s question.

Friendly, I now see. The universe is friendly. How could it be otherwise. Random its working may have been, yet can I deny that those random acts of Star creation, solar furnaces in which the elemental structures of the universe were brought into being, did not seed the Galaxies and Solar Systems with the needed material to create Water, Mountains, Land, life?

And, can I deny that over the 4 billion year history of this single Planet-one of trillions captive to those solar furnaces-the interactions of gravity, erosion, freezing and thawing, lightning strikes, volcanic explosions made it possible for the vagabond continent of Africa to become home to the hominid evolutionary path that led to Homo Sapiens.

Further, can I deny that that evolutionary path led some early humans out of Africa and into what is now Europe, India, China and that further travels of my/our ancestors eventually found what is now the Americas.

Lastly, can I deny that if the long, amazing chain of atoms striking atoms, the kindling of Stars, the subsequent creation of Planets and solar systems, the emergence of life on Earth, and the long, long, long path leading to Mom and Dad, which led to my birth proves the universe to be friendly? I cannot. Neither, however, do I believe that the universe qua universe works as a somehow god, finding our everyday actions a place to intervene.

Yet, we are all part of this marvel, this miracle and in that connectedness find our mutuality, not only with other humans but with the Bear, the Lion, and the Platypus, the Ocean and the Desert, the fertile Land and the frozen poles. And even the most distant Stars and Galaxies.

Far Right, Fourth Phase, Holidays, New Apostolic Reformation, Politics, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., US History, White Supremacy

Values and Norms

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Friday gratefuls: Shiva Minyan for Dick. Visiting times today. Ellen. Jamie. Russ. Asher. Isaac. Tol. Jonah. Mikaela. CBE. Shadow of the morning. Kate, always Kate. Gabe, looking at college. Minnesota melts ICE. Courage. Bravery. Resistance. Living from your nefesh. Refreshing the soul. Tom. Roxann.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Cold

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Daat.    The Bridge Between Mind and Heart

“If Chokhmah (Wisdom/Inspiration) is a seed and Binah (Understanding/Analysis)  is the soil that develops that seed into a plant, Da’at is the nervous system that carries the vital life force from the brain to the rest of the body. It is the point of transition from “thinking” to “being.””

Tarot: Three of Bows, fulfillment

Meaning: Nourishment from a spiritual source gives inner security and joy. Goals and desires are reached, making life rich with emotional scrutiny and a sense of completion.

One brief shining: Cold Air descends to Shadow Mountain, a Snow Storm comes behind it, offering another reprieve from dangerous Wild Fire conditions; life here at Shadow Mountain home greets the cold and awaits the Snow with joy, displaying, as Mary Oliver put it, stars on our shoulders.

 

Funerals/Memorial Services: Had an insight about these rituals of remembrance. Yes. Helping family and friends grieve. Yes. Public acknowledgment of a loss and the beginning of a readjustment in the community. Who will we be without Dick. Important work, for sure. And well known.

Another, perhaps more subtle effect. The reinforcement of community norms, what we consider virtues. So, when Marilyn said Dick personified the mussar traits of humility, compassion, gratitude, and generosity, we learned to measure ourselves.

When Jamie said his father hated funerals, it gave us permission to hate them, too. When Russ talked about reading The Prophet with his father, reading and spending time with our parents while they’re alive got underlined.

This is not insignificant. I went to bed last night wondering how I showed up for others. Was I humble? Aware I did not show up for my dad. These tensions between our perceptions of ourselves and the virtues our community values become a growing edge for each of us. No. Not to wallow in regret or to compare ourselves against the life of another, rather to weigh ourselves against our own aspirations, our own behaviors.

Weddings. Swearing in of public officials. Baptisms and bris. Observing holidays. Protests. All have norm setting, norm reinforcing moments. It’s how we learn to be Jewish, American, Christian, Coloradans. Minnesotans. MAGA or progressive.

 

Just a moment: Nearing the end of Furious Minds, the Making of the MAGA New Right. Dense and scholarly, Field’s points to three main intellectual sources for Trumpism and MAGA. First, Claremont College and Institute, where paleoconservatives and downright scary thinkers gather and push each other further and further to the right. Second, postliberalism, especially the work of Notre Dame scholar, Patrick Deneen, in books like Why Liberalism Failed. Third, National Conservatism, in particular the work of Yoram Hazony as in his National Conservatism, Rediscovered.

We can add Field’s work to the Violent Take It By Force in which Matthew Stafford offers a summary of how the New Apostolic Reformation aided the success of MAGA at the polls and influences the Trump Whitehouse.

Over the next few weeks I’m going to, at times, pull the focus off the latest outrage to discuss how we got here. What are the sources, the political and mass movement impulses that have put us in such a dismal damned place.

Aging, Far Right, Fourth Phase, Friends, Politics, US History

Transformations

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Thursday gratefuls: Rich. Dick. Tara. Laurie. Susan. Ron. Marilyn. Jamie. Joanne. Roxann. Tom. Shadow and her bone. The Dog run. Nathan. Kalispell. Dreams. Visions. Growing with the soul. Tarot wisdom. Furious Minds. The alt-right. The far right. DJT, wrecker of a nation. Rebuilding our country. NATO. Allies and enemies. Kong.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Minneapolis

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Daat.    The Bridge Between Mind and Heart

“If Chokhmah (Wisdom/Inspiration) is a seed and Binah (Understanding/Analysis)  is the soil that develops that seed into a plant, Da’at is the nervous system that carries the vital life force from the brain to the rest of the body. It is the point of transition from “thinking” to “being.””

art@willwordsworth

Tarot: Ten of Bows, Responsibility

  • Prioritization: A call to assess what truly matters and learn to say “no” or ask for help.

One brief shining: One scoop, a cup, prozac in a pill pocket, crunching sounds, check her water, listen to her lapping it up until she comes next to me, asks to go outside, open the door, and Shadow disappears into the morning darkness.

Aging diary: No, not mine this time. Others.

Thinking about Dick’s sudden, unexpected death. A gut blow to his family and friends. Yes. As a way to die, which is something those of us in our golden years have to consider. And do, from time to time. Yes, please. Now I lay me down to sleep.

A friend, recovering from his own no good, terrible week, has his beloved suddenly scheduled for surgery. Aging demands so much of us at times. Collapses matters that would bring us to our knees in midlife into days and weeks of insults. Calls on reserves, resilience, often more than we may feel we have. When friends and family can step in, shore up the wave punished dock of our soul.

Another friend. Finally sold his business. This last month! So happy for him. A creative guy. Musician. Actor. Playwright. Scriptwriter. Author. Married to his best friend for forty years. Released now.

Go with your soul in all these instances. Link life changes to the deep purpose you and only you can fulfill. Then we can die with grace, console and comfort each other, once again let our soul free to create.

Just a moment: Our elected agent of chaos gives voice to and puts the unparalleled power of a waning hegemon behind racism, xenophobia, downright madness. An unwanted wrecking ball to years of liberal hubris. Imagining we could proceed with half measures, leaving out this constituency for the next one, not paying attention to the realpolitik of our nation.

We remain a creedal nation, one devoted to the dream of a place where many peoples have a chance, and only a chance, to learn how to live with each other in spite of the abysses of otherness. Somehow gaining strength and joy from staring right into the chasms between us, then eagerly building bridges across them.

I see today and yet hold fast to a new nation, one reimagined and committed to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. For all.

Judaism, Politics, US History, World History

Greenland

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Wednesday gratefuls: Tom recovering. Dick Arnold. Ellen. Jamie. MVP group. Death. Kate, always Kate. Jon. Regina. Pronoia. Shadow and her treat ball, her bones. Mussar. The Dog run. Our Snowless Winter. Christopher and transcranial magnetic stimulation. Hafar from afar. Mary down under with animals that attack. Murdoch. Annie and Luna. Eleanor.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Greenland

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Daat.    The Bridge Between Mind and Heart

“If Chokhmah (Wisdom/Inspiration) is a seed and Binah (Understanding/Analysis)  is the soil that develops that seed into a plant, Da’at is the nervous system that carries the vital life force from the brain to the rest of the body. It is the point of transition from “thinking” to “being.””

Tarot: Ten of Arrows, Instruction

  • Focus on the “Why”: Connect your current hard work or training to a larger guiding principle or long-term goal, much like following a “Pole Star”.

One brief shining: Thresholds, liminal spaces, liminal moments like dusk and dawn, a babies first breath, that moment when liking turns to loving, when a thought passes into understanding and action, like death on a cold Evergreen night when it came for Dick Arnold.

 

Rabbi Jamie’s dad died Monday night. He went to sleep around eight p.m. and when Ellen, his wife, went to check on him he was cold. Dick’s death has hit the congregation hard.

Dick, as Tara noted, lived in the back ground. A master carpenter, a licensed consulting psychologist, and an accomplished golfer, Dick specialized in showing up. When shelving needed putting up. When Tara needed help working with drywall. When LGBTQ+ youth needed a psychologist.

Had we gone to Israel on our ill-fated 2023 trip Dick and I would have been roommates. His funeral takes place Thursday at 11:00. Shiva minyan Thursday night.

Just a moment: Our President, denied the “Noble” prize, admitted in a letter to the Norwegian Prime Minister that he could now think about things other than peace, like seizing Greenland.

I can’t improve on this Robert Reich piece sent to me by his Substack:

“Friends,

It could be a Monty Python skit from forty years ago: A demented U.S. president demands the Nobel Peace Prize (which he initially spells “Noble”), after converting the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War and abducting the president of a Latin American country by force.

When he doesn’t get the Prize, he says he’s no longer in favor of peace and decides to invade Greenland. When Greenland refuses him and Denmark and the rest of Europe make a fuss, he goes into a rage, raises tariffs on Europe (which are really import taxes that cost Americans dearly) and threatens war on NATO. The president of Russia is delighted.”

A five-year old playground bully who will brook no dismissal of even his most outlandish wishes and wants, red tie guy had better retake that cognitive test followed by one gauging e.q.

 

Back Pain, Cancer, Fourth Phase, Friends, Health, Hermitage, Post Polio, Shadow Mountain

A Life Transition

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Tuesday gratefuls: Gloriana frangipana! (first line of the Indiana University school song) Jane Pauley. Dick Pauley. Uncle Riley. Diane. The farm. The Blue River. Hancock Cemetery. Morristown. Milan. Bobby Plump. The Indy 500. The Indiana Republican party. Turkey Run State Park. Spring Mill State Park. The Alexandria Times-Tribune. Muncie. Wabash. Ball State.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: I.U.

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Daat.    The Bridge Between Mind and Heart

“If Chokhmah (Wisdom/Inspiration) is a seed and Binah (Understanding/Analysis)  is the soil that develops that seed into a plant, Da’at is the nervous system that carries the vital life force from the brain to the rest of the body. It is the point of transition from “thinking” to “being.””

art@willwordsworth

Tarot: Ten of Bows, Responsibility

  • Overextension: Pushing yourself too hard, sacrificing well-being for responsibilities.
  • Perseverance: The strength to continue despite heavy loads, finding inner resolve.
  • Completion/Release: As a “10” card, it signals the end of this phase, often with the potential for release or freedom after enduring the trial.
  • Prioritization: A call to assess what truly matters and learn to say “no” or ask for help.

One brief shining: Eleanor bounded down the stairs, Shadow twirled at the scent of her friend, Tara hollered we’re here, and the Shadow/Eleanor run, twist, smell, wrestle all the time day began when I opened the door, Eleanor pushed through Shadow greeting her with a jump and a play bow.

 

Sport: Pride of place belongs to I.U. football. National champions. Undefeated. Bringing gloriana frangipana to the nation’s attention. I listened to an all red chorus sing the I.U. school song and it washed over me, redolent of nineteenth century American higher education. Made me wish, again, that I’d chosen I.U. over Wabash.

Jane Pauley, married to Gary Trudeau and former host of the Morning Show, made this tribute piece: Hail to Indiana. Cousin Diane found it. Jane often came to our family reunions since her dad, Dick Pauley, and Diane’s father, my uncle, were like brothers. If you watch this piece, Uncle Riley is to the left in the old photograph shown near the beginning. Family.

 

Soul Work: This year, let’s start it on February 4th, 2025 when I adopted Shadow from the Granby Shelter, has been a humbling one, physically. Over the course of a long, loving, difficult time developing a relationship with a traumatized puppy, I’ve had multiple diagnostic procedures followed by several courses of varied treatments ranging from radiation to nerve ablations. The whole process exhausted me.

Since the last meeting of our Mussar Vaad Practice group a month ago, one I had to leave in the middle due to extreme discomfort from a hernia, I’ve grappled with a persistent issue: if I go out, even on small jaunts, I come home drained. A combination of my head drop from post-polio, right lower back and hip pain added to a general weakness due to sarcopenia and the energy my body has to expend making up for the resources cancer steals from it.

The soul work has been around accepting that I have become almost home bound. Here, in a chair that supports my neck, with my home gym, I achieve a normal day without depleting myself. When a day on my calendar is clear, my lev is happy.

I don’t like this, but I’m increasingly unable to live the life I developed after Kate’s death. Question. Can I still live a significant, loving life under these conditions? My answer is yes, of course I can. As I said a week or so ago, recounting my talk with Rachel, my social worker.

I’ve come to this conclusion. My life is now mostly here at Shadow Mountain Home. That means no traveling, fewer trips out and those more calibrated than before. Leaning on my friends for help when I need it. Beginning to think about some more paid help around the house.

A life transition, not one I sought, but one to which I have to adapt. See the ten of bows.

 

 

Far Right, Minnesota, Politics, US History

Minnesota Proud

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Monday gratefuls: The Ancient Brothers on books. Rams v Bears. Cold. A dusting of Snow. Field Guide to the Soul. Shadow, her joy. My joy. Mary’s pics of the Royal Show in Melbourne. (think State Fair) Mark’s conversation with Salman, his student. Joe back home. Ruth and her new car. Morning darkness.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Books

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Daat.    The Bridge Between Mind and Heart

“If Chokhmah (Wisdom/Inspiration) is a seed and Binah (Understanding/Analysis)  is the soil that develops that seed into a plant, Da’at is the nervous system that carries the vital life force from the brain to the rest of the body. It is the point of transition from “thinking” to “being.””

Tarot: Two of Arrows, Injustice

“The scales of natural justice have been skewed by false judgments, ignorance, or arrogance. Sitting in judgment with unbalanced scales to an untrue premise, however ardently or sincerely, will not prevail. The bow is broken and useless through prejudice and misuse.” Parting the Mist

One brief shining: Martin Luther King would have stood with the protesters, blown a whistle, followed ICE agents, taken videos of their corrupt action; wherever the scales of justice stood unbalanced, weighted on one side by ignorance or arrogance or false judgments, his moral compass led him to the other side of the scale. Minnesota proud.

Gemini struggles with images, too. But you get the point.

Never felt so much pride in my home of forty years, Minnesota. Pushing back against corporate and government arrogance runs through the veins of Minnesota’s left, sure, but it also comes naturally to a Scandinavian influenced culture which believes the common good should drive decisions.

It does not surprise me that just folks have their whistles, neighborhood phone trees, and a willingness to stay in the fray. Nor does it surprise me that Tim Walz and Jacob Frey (mayor of Minneapolis) have called out the storm trooper invasion by red tie guy and that weasel, Miller.

When I first moved to Minnesota in 1970, the anti-war movement had a very strong presence. When police came to arrest a student at my seminaryfor draft evasion, a guy I didn’t know very well offered to ride along with him.

Howard Vogel, who became a good friend and would go on to win a landmark environmental lawsuit against Reserve Mining Company, surprised the arresting officers with his humble appearance and his knowledge. My friend came back to the seminary that same day.

I spent fifteen years organizing in Minnesota. It was never difficult to find ordinary citizens who understood why it was not a good idea for Control Data to run the Elliot Park neighborhood. Or, why General Mills didn’t belong in the landlord business in Steven’s Square Park.

The Democratic Farmer Labor party, the DFL, has its roots in radical left politics. A Minnesota third party, the populist and leftist Farmer-Labor party merged with the state’s Democratic party in 1944. Hubert Humphrey. Walter Mondale. Paul Wellstone. Al Franken. Standard bearers.

What a state.

Family, Far Right, Friends, Politics

A Political Culture That Defeats Them

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Sunday gratefuls: Broncos. Shadow, crosser of liminal spaces. Ruth, the kind. Joe back home in Korea. New Moon, dark Sky. Moon phases. Waxing, Full, Waning. Like a life. Tom in recovery. Books. Where do we find them? Drought. Snow. A-Basin. Jon. Kate, always Kate.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Family

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Daat.    The Bridge Between Mind and Heart

“If Chokhmah (Wisdom/Inspiration) is a seed and Binah (Understanding/Analysis)  is the soil that develops that seed into a plant, Da’at is the nervous system that carries the vital life force from the brain to the rest of the body. It is the point of transition from “thinking” to “being.””

Tarot: Ten of Arrows, Instruction

  • Passing on Wisdom: It asks what legacy or skills we are leaving for the next generation. It encourages moving beyond past struggles or frustrations to share the beauty of inspiration and dedication.
  • Focus on the “Why”: Connect your current hard work or training to a larger guiding principle or long-term goal, much like following a “Pole Star”.

One brief shining: She displayed her new-to-her Subaru Forester with a Vanna White sweep of the hand, pointed out the heated mirrors and heated wiper blades, the all-weather car mats, the three, yes, three screens, the manual handbreak, the shifter that was not a dial, and started Frances to give me a quick ride around the neighborhood so I could get the full experience.

 

Ruth did it right. She had a pre-purchase inspection of both the Mazda she liked and the soon-to-be Frances. Detailed reports on each at $200. The Mazda, a Wisconsin gal, had rust and eight pages of mechanical problems. Frances had only minor notes.

She bought a two-year warranty. Joe suggested that. As a college student she doesn’t have cash reserves adequate for a large repair bill.

 

Tarot: I’m focusing on two aspects of the Ten of Arrows. What inspiration and dedication am I modeling for the next generation and what is the pole star for my commentary project?

First, I’ve written Ancientrails, a bread crumb trail to the forest of my life. In my will a codicil ensures it will remain available in case Joe, Ruth, or Gabe want to consult it.

Second, modeling. I spend time each week with friends, in person and on zoom. Also with members of CBE through mussar and Torah study. I love and care for Shadow.

I greet Ruth and Gabe with joy each time I see them, encourage them, assist them when I can. Make sure they know Grandpop loves them.

I maintain close contact with Joe and Seoah. Even with 6,000 miles between us. Also with Mary and Mark, 8,000 miles away.

My commentary project needs tighter ratcheting to find its pole star. Even with the narrow parameters I established as I started, it’s too broad, not specific enough to make it distinctive. Probably headed towards a focus on the far right since I see very few folks doing regular reporting on it and I love the subject.

Know the opposition, build a political culture that defeats them.

Feelings, Writing

En-Theos

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Yule and the 1% Crescent of the Moon of New Beginnings

Shabbat gratefuls: Joe’s visit. Ruth, too. Shadow. Tom and his week. Cold. 11. Prostate cancer. Its many treatments. The Dog run. Nathan. Natalie. Dr. Josy. Broncos v. Bills. Oh, my. Minnesota proud. Melt ICE. Politics. Poetry. Mary Oliver. Billy Collins. Rilke. Longfellow. Yeats. Eliot. Coleridge. Whitman. Dickens.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Ruth

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Daat.    The Bridge Between Mind and Heart

“If Chokhmah (Wisdom/Inspiration) is a seed and Binah (Understanding/Analysis)  is the soil that develops that seed into a plant, Da’at is the nervous system that carries the vital life force from the brain to the rest of the body. It is the point of transition from “thinking” to “being.””

Tarot: Four of Vessels, Boredom

I take this as a caution, a yellow light. As I’ve been doing research for both Superior Wolf 2.0 and trying to figure out a cadence and a method for political research, it’s easy for me to get caught in the paralysis of analysis. Or, stasis. i.e., boredom.

One brief shining: Interesting, the dynamic tension between da’at and the four of vessels; if anything can connect inspiration to understanding, it’s da’at, linking the mind to the heart, ensuring the electricity of inspiration does not dissipate, become blocked, a blockage we could call boredom, “He’s lost in thought.”

I may have mentioned before that I get enthusiasms. Can be an idea, a person, a political movement, a poem, a book, a line of thought.

In using notebooklm, for example, I started out with two notebooks: political commentary and Superior Wolf. I meant to focus my thinking, my inspiration in those two areas, creating two channels which both limit my reach and give me space to expand within those boundaries.

Worked for a week or so. Then, I thought, hey, I could use a notebook for Talmud Torah, so I made one. Then, why not one for managing Shadow Home. OK. Opened that. Well, there’s always the Great Work. Yep. One more. And, hey, mussar, too. While I’m at it, let’s throw in one for Ancientrails. See what I mean?

En-theos. Enthuse. To find a feeling of godly grace, curiosity. Chinese culture and other tradition oriented cultures, too, I imagine, see curiosity as a danger, drawing us away from daily life, from the proven path and into the unknown. Uncertainty. Resulting, in this cautious view, either in stasis, boredom, or more seriously, rebellion.

My library contains a literary record of my enthusiasms. Latin. Ovid. The Classics. Poetry. Minnesota. The Civil War. The Arts. Travel. Fiction. Celtic history and myth. Horticulture. Military history. Philosophy. Christianity. Judaism. Dogs. Depth Psychology. And, more.

I have often gotten stuck at the en-theosing stage. Too much learning, analysis. Too little action. The result is a time of stasis, of stuckness. Or, boredom. In these moments da’at could have helped me, yet I never consciously focused on this character trait, how to bridge enthusiasm and planning, understanding.

I’m glad the four of vessels showed up on the day I switched my week kavannah to da’at. It encourages me to not get stuck in the ideas, the inspiration. And, it gives me a character trait I can practice for doing just that.