My Daddy Man's Valentine

The following is taken from a site called Said the Gramaphone that I've just discovered:
"The little Latvian man played My Funny Valentine. The song by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, made famous by Chet Baker. Chet Baker died as he was climbing from one balcony to another at an Amsterdam hotel, looking for money to buy heroin. Six months ago I stood outside that hotel, and I thought about this. The view is of boats.

A basement in Latvia, a little man in a sweater playing the piano, playing so well that I think I stopped breathing. The man played with practice. He bent towards the keys as he played them and then withdrew, listening, sometimes wincing (but not looking at us). I couldn't tell if he was wounded by the sound or soothed by it. He was very careful, like someone could get hurt. He played the melody but he also played more, playing around the tune, playing it with gaps, filling the gaps with long silences and wrong (right) notes. I wrote in my journal, - I do not usually keep a journal (I have a blog, see,) but I kept one then, - I wrote that he was "trying to find the vocabulary for heartache". It was very sad. Very, very sad. The man didn't look at us as he played. He looked at the keys, as if he was trying to read them."

My Daddy Man's Valentine
Adrian Eve Revenaugh (with nods towards me Hunny Man: "I'm stirring the pot here")

I'm starving here in my little bottle, spidy webbed over, watching the planet melting down, beyond the window panes. Makes me hungry for 'de world in de' flesh!

I never really expected to find myself here! That age old surprise, right? Busy doing what you do, getting along pretty well, then, Bam!

Well no, in all honesty, it didn't really go that way. Worked hard for a lot of years. Played just as hard, with lots'a play mates. You were a pretty damned good sport about all of that.

The time came, after enough fights around the bedroom, that we kinda reached an agreement; a parting of the ways. The creativity just sort of shriveled up and died. Like one of the meals I've so carefully wrapped up here; little dead parts hanging out. None too appealing now, when you're not hungry. But later on, when the appetite flares up again? Man! Heaven!

I guess, that's kinda what I kept hoping would happen for us, doll. You were not only the brightest, bar none, but the best in the sack; a real mink , a vixen.

You made love like all the wrongs in the world could be set straight by our screwing. Every noble cause. Every sin committed. Every personal wound, done to you, including the sins I'd committed. Your piss-ed-ness at your Father and your anger with the Holy Ghost, and humanity, or the lack there of. All could be made right again in that single act of passion. And, I was only too obliged to help you act out all those transgressions.

Funny, the last time we were in each other's company. Remember? It was one of the kid's weddings, Melody's I do believe, to that asshole, the pretentious Jew kid, from that wealthy, Bay Area family. I remember, Me and the Lady Winnefred had driven down from Washington in her Delta 88. Man what a rig! And she drove it like she was still flying for the Civil Air Patrol. Quite a Dame!

Anyway, we'd been drinking; arrived in good order and settled in for the night in that cheap motel. You must have been there with little Matthew, who wasn't so little any more, what? maybe 14 or so? Great kid by the way. Our final edition. You've done well. You didn't know it, but, I knew you would.

Any way, I don't quite remember how we got to that point in the conversation, but it was heated. I told you that making love to you was like being in bed with Abraham Lincoln.

Hey! I was drunk and pissed, and you were righteous and angry. Rightfully so.

But now, having been dead all these years, and being able to see old Abe in ways that a guy only gets to from down here, in the doon, I just wanted to tell you. What was intended as a jab back then, was actually true. Didn't have nothing to do with your perceived, lack of femininity. Lincoln was probably a pretty sexy guy, with out the beard. Ha! I mean, Illinois farm boy that he was. I'm kidding here. Thursa! Wait. Hear me out. Don't get pissed all over again.

What I'd been trying to say was that having you in bed was like trying to sort out everything that's good, and evil. Wild, and angry enough to cause the Earth to split open. And the sky to fall. Angry enough to cause civil wars.

Your furious, hungry, passion, driven from God only knows where, was like being embodied by all that is good. And it was Me that you chose to do it with! Many times over! In spite of all my failings and infidelities. You swallowed me whole.

And that's why we created such amazing children, six of them. You did that!

I just had fun planting the seeds.

(kinda makes me the father of our country doesn't it? now, what do you think of that?)

An Afternoon's Walk

“All of us run out of time. But for those who have who have a legacy of doing what we do best, time becomes the muse.” unknown author
I marvel at the metaphor that can crawl up the pant leg of Life.
Here’s one. A Burmese python.
The one I saw last weekend was sixteen feet long. Magnificent, timeless beauty. A global symbol of knowledge and wisdom gained, of creativity and change.
I'd just come from a visit to Barnes and Noble.
At the corner I was attracted by an old for sale sign. Caldwell Banking hung from a large metal pipe. A house I’d passed a couple of times this year, caught my interest. In this economic climate? In one of California’s counties, worst hit by the rampant housing foreclosure nightmare. I know.
However, this little house had whistled at me as I was pushing my grocery cart by. It has obviously been unoccupied for at least ten years. I was curious.
It used to sit out on the edge of the irrigated oasis, now surrounded by the blossoming strip mall tenderloin district. I remember the last time I noticed the place thirty-five years ago, when I lived here as a kid. Then it was surrounded by fields, with farm equipment and family life, around and with in it. I could still see the oak and hawks circling, silhouetted in the dust inspired, fiery sunsets. It used to have a creek nearby. It probably still gets wet, from time to time, in the present ditch lined by security fencing and razor wire.
I stepped up to the green wooden frame screened door being held closed by a box from the Children’s Hunger Fund. Probably dropped there during Christmas for the non occupants of this sad hungry looking little house. A reference to Psalm 145 /13-16 was tacked to the box. I thought I’d check that out later.
The little house was completely in tact. No broken windows or vandalism visible, stunning considering the dodgy flavor of the surrounding neighborhood. I rolled my cart up and peeked in through the rusty screens of the green trimmed windows, and I wrote down the Realtors number. I just wanted to get inside.
I could make out that all of the original 1930's fixtures were in place, electric candle shaped sconces, glass built in hutches. The floral wallpaper was browned and peeling from years of the 116 degree summer weather.
Tongue and groove wooden siding, old school carpentry, fits of 0.32 to an inch, spoke to craftsmen with hand saws and knowledge. The skill and pride taken in their work still shone.
The cement foundation was still sound and square, also remarkable in this vast basin above the San Andres fault.
It appeared well preserved by the dry, arid climate and years of good care.
It also reeked of stories left for someone to discover.
Visions of a coffee house or community soup kitchen for drop-ins tickled my cockles. Maybe a resource information center for poet musicians, art students from the street and elsewhere.
It has a nice porch, front and back and a empty double-wide lot, perfect for a huge neighborhood vegetable garden; old people teaching kids who’ve never grown tomatoes or watered pumpkins. I sat for awhile and just let the imagination roll. It felt good. Number 801 Real Road. Has a nice ring to it.
The long walk back towards the park across the street from my mother’s Bungalow was most pleasant. I parked my cart with books, computer bag, and sweater next to the amphitheater where the young men practice SK8 boarding on Saturdays, across from the pick up basketball courts.
Not too many picnics, too cool yet I guess. There was the remains of a birthday party just breaking up.
The guys gave me the nod of approval to an eyebrow request to sit and act as audience. Everybody was strutting their stuff. Great jumps and noisy flips accompanied by the novice crashes, all so important (though not desired) to show you’re tough enough to take the impact. Young flesh, bones, joints and concrete, challenging gravity. My insides cringed, yet I recall that sort of thrill.
Soon every body split to go see “ A !!!HUGE, F--888--ING snake!!!”.
Everybody but the littler guys who were so focused they couldn’t be bothered. One of the fellas, who’d actually smiled at me, shrugged his shoulders when I asked him if there were any ‘women’ SK8’ers. That’s the same response I get wherever I go to watch. I told him, “I’da been there but for losing a cousin to a head injury on an old shoe skate-tacked-to-a- board misfire.” I could tell he was moderately impressed. Not by me but my casually delivered story. He said his dad skated like that.
The new kid who arrived with Ma and baby sister in tow, was maybe seven. Dressed high, in full Christmas camo, pants, jacket, still new and stiff. This one was sporting a helmet and was highly skilled. Junior jumps and turns ensued. This skater was also disciplined. This is an athletic art form, akin to dance, and though obviously still a beginner the newbie was not looking for an audience, just focused and practicing. When the curve of the amphitheater brought her close enough for me to make eye contact, I noticed the pink rhinestone earrings sparkling out from under her long ringlets, pulled back in a tail.
I watched long enough till the big guys came back and then it was time for me to go. As I moved across the park, my trail intersected with Steve the walking Python-mule/man, who was packing Jake the snake.
I love snakes. Always have. I was the kind of kid who tried to keep the baby garters in a cigar box tucked under my silky day of the week undies.
Jake was magnificent. His mule person, Steve, gave quite the informational spiel, warmed up from an hour as special guest at the birthday party. I learned volumes during those ten minutes. Holding Jake’s four inch diamond head, while allowing him to smell me with his tongue reminded me of being close to an elephants curious trunk.
He slowly descended off of Steve’s body, down onto the ground. As I crouched within arms reach, it was obvious Jake enjoyed my slow steady stroking of his magnificently patterned body. The feeling was mutual.
As Steve spoke on and a couple of other spectators stepped up, I noticed the little camoed SK8 queen had come close. She stood very, very quietly, hands held behind her back, breath caught, tree like. I encouraged her with my eyes to come closer which she slowly forced herself to do.
It took everything she had to reach out towards Jake’s slowly gliding body. The dry smooth warmth of his magnificently beauty so surprised her she began to smile, as I felt grateful tears trickle down my cheeks.

Shoot an Iraqi

From The Bob Edwards Show (linked in the title) Monday, February 2, 2009:

"When Iraqi-born Wafaa Bilal's brother was killed at a U.S. checkpoint in 2005, the artist channeled the experience into a performance piece. For a month, Bilal lived alone in a room the size of a prison cell -- in the line of fire of a remote-controlled paintball gun. A camera connected him to the internet where people could watch him - and shoot at him - 24 hours a day. The piece was titled "Domestic Tension" and The Chicago Tribune called it "one of the sharpest works of political art to be seen in a long time." In 1992, Bilal came to the US where he became a professor, artist and now author. His new book is called Shoot an Iraqi: Art, Life and Resistance Under the Gun".


This is an important site as well for stepping up the effort to help returning veterans.Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans Administration.

My Trip To The Market

Retail Therapy? Oh, grocery shopping day.

I arranged time yesterday for Elder Ma to have a care provider so I might walk my 'rescued' cart across town to make a badly needed stock up of groceries.

In route, I gleaned a delicious array of experiences including being able to walk for five hours. School yards, dogs, unemployed, or happily retired people sitting on the corners. It's an old downtown neighborhood.

The nonlocal retailer (the only book store in town within reach), allowed for a replacement copy of my favorite volume of Rainier Maria Rilke's, Book of Hours, translation by Anita Borrows and Joanna Macy. My borrowed or care package library has grown since I left home a year ago. Empty suitcase home, heavy return.

The store also provided me with a listing of upcoming events to plan toward. The Big Read, featuring The Empty Space Theater will be presenting a dramatic reading from Their Eyes Were Watching God, a 1939 novel by Zora Neale Hurston. Her work was central to our home school effort as the kiddos were growing up and bled into studies of other women authors.

The evening of the dramatic reading, a workshop for local word-smiths will be held. at the same location, handy on foot. Or perhaps I can lure Mom out. Though terribly cumbersome for her, the city transportation system provides excellent curbside wheelchair service on request.

But the major imperative of the outing yesterday, was to find a temporary replacement for the ice cave where I generally like to sing when I'm home. The acoustics in the deep, blue cave are pretty impressive. The sound of the melting ice dripping into the river sized creek is well...let's just say the sounds reverberate pretty nicely. The river flat and snow trails through the forest ring too. Combined with a lengthy walk, one gets a pretty good glow going.

The most recent replacement while here in Bakersfield, is beneath an interstate overpass with a six lane thorough fare below. Just one lane away, hundreds of vehicles hurtle past, doing at least sixty. I let my body hang very loosely, arms through fingertips extending outwardly, spine fully lengthened and eyes closed as I give myself over to vocalized transportation. As I vary range and intensity of volume, looping it back and forth with the streams and variety of traffic, it's like hurtling through space.

I practiced this most intently once on the back deck of a tug boat in 40' seas. Then, I had to be sitting in full rain gear with the waves crashing down around me. That particular storm, the back deck won out over being stuffed down into my tiny state room, waiting for the storm to subside. It gave me the illusion of having some say in the matter, as though the sea was a symphony in accompaniment to my relinquishing desire for control.

Yesterday, I'm sure I gave the motorists something different to ponder before lunch, though people here are used to crazies. I didn't cause a wreck, as far as I know, and it's free entertainment for all. Singing is very good for the body and soul, and something I try and undertake where ever I am. Cathedral, culvert, open sea, underpass, shower.

Back home however, out of doors, there's no one about but the occasional snow shoe hare or ptarmigan. Snow Chicken. And I think they get a kick out of it.

Eclipse

The morning has slipped in on a sticky fog.

Another long night's vigil leave tattered hearts and endless Mind, shakey from boundless connection.

No longer asking Who's razor edge?
Nor How.
And Why vanished with the bang.
"What"--- is well, everything, and everything IT is not.

Leaving ....when... open ended.
Now, is the effort at hand, quietly focused.

Breathing with her, every draw, though lungs went sludge from pollution, I enshrine new potted green, left from the holidays, near her bed, so she can smell a promise of our love returned. She's awake, frightened as am I, that Our deeply held convictions won't be enough. Though magical thinking dumps countless thimbles full of evidence, the rooms are papering with ghosts.

The trash collector moves. Hydra armed noise muffles high banshee wailing, sweetly symphonic though lacking the mercy of a lethal kill. She stays alone, woefully unprepared, more so as the gray matter dwindles. Or is she?

I light a candle and make jokes to see her radiant smile.

Thirteen swans draped with dawn, V their way South.

But wait...

It's spring.

My Morning Brew Taj Mahal/Sacred Hour --- mixed bag radio

"In the end, ultimately the music plays you, you don't play the music."
Taj Mahal

The thigh deep waters and the frigid current feels somewhat intimidating.
Though very old this bright day, I'm a strong and keen navigator.
I'm quite familiar with the stream, now freezing from the bottom up.

Because of this, making my way across takes total concentration.
The other shore beckons and I'm happy to go towards it alone.
The brilliant sun is bouncing off the snow.

Both sides of who I am, Male and Female are fused and charged, a shuffleing deck of cards. Blacks and reds flying into each other, clear distinctions meld into me.
I'm headed up river.

I'm across the water. Now to clamber to the top of the slippery snow berm, white and fractious, This requires time and patience. I use my snow shoes to dig footholds. Climbing straight up, toes slamming into the white wall, brings me out, and onto the other side of the main channel.

Back on the other shore, Raven sits. Watching. Chuckling. He's also me, my lover.
He'll be Mountain Activated. I'll be the decomposing process. Making things fertile. The zestiest of actions.

Love to my dear ones! Off to walk pavement today, in a brackish, glowered city gray!

I'll Come Following You / flock member on individuality

Good morning,
I'm up early. The "gleaners", those folks who salvage recyclables from the streets and other peoples trash cans, are working hard and fast this morning. It's cold! Cold not in an Alaskan way. Or a New England way. But cold enough that if you live outside, you sleep for a few hours during the day, and keep moving at night.
The sounds of their amazing wheeled contraptions jingle and ring as they are pushed or pedaled along. A few degrees lower and Ma says the 'warming centers' will be opened.
I'm thinking about fear this morning. Comes in so many flavors, and triggers so many responses. The fear of change, of having to give up what defines us. I'll bet there's a lot of fear in the Nation this morning.

I wondered in the dark of the night about the millions of folks world wide who operate on fear so crippling, it triggers a response like not being capable of accepting help when freely offered.

Thousands, during this last severe stretch of extreme weather were in peril. Many Homeless,are once again taking their chances, rather than opting for the possible entanglement of assistance.Being a ferociously independent person, I deeply relate.

What about those of us with developmental disability, or brain injury, the onset of Alzheimer's or other dementias, and disease. And what of the courage required to brave the mainstream world, our health care systems, our educational systems when we're up the creek with just half a paddle? Quality of life is so relative and as different as a person's internal workings.

So many of us are thinking, working, growing, going nose to nose, toe to toe. Often around our parts, just as entertaining discourse. Many of us are busy nurturing a nonjudgmental, compassionate community. It's who we are in LIFE and the world. Effecting change, we practice how to set aside our own egos enough to BE "other", not just imagine what it would be like.

A Nation has been newly inspired by one particular pumpkin grin, brilliant as his mind and convictions.
I've been inspired by yesterday's conversations with Ma and bolstered by listening on the XM Radio to the Inaugural affairs.

That Jingle Jangle Morning Song has me rolling.
Ooo. Better set my recyclables out before everyone passes.

Adrian

The Freedom Of Motion

It all began with the monkey bars, horseback riding or twirling around in the front yard, faster and faster, dervish style until you fell over in the cool, cool grass and tried to stop your vision from twirling long enough to wish on the first star of the evening.Tall tall trees were a major factor too.
And then we discovered dancing. And that wasn't just girl stuff, boys knew it too. And the Elders remembered.

Any one climb a tree lately? Or gone dancing? Highly recommended!

Year's End And New Beginnings '09

It's been an absolutely wonderful end of 2008 and opening to 2009.

I left for NYC Dec. 25, to spend a week with Micah Rudy. We did it all. Everything rolled beautifully with out cramming. From live performances to elbow time catching up, looking at pictures, talking of literature and philosophy, and following up on a few projects which had lost momentum. A bicycle and a guitar, and a new winter coat.

Micah and I worked his Uncles bicycle on the wrought iron veranda of the brick apartment building. His street, slung low with small mature trees and electrical wires draped closely, criss cross back and forth from building to building and are subject to downages during a big windstorm, like the one they'd just had. Coupled with heavy ice accumulation, there were many red plastic taped fallen power lines clouded with the scent of burnt ozone, strapped to similar wrought iron gate works all along the street.
This Queens neighborhood is equipped with one of the best Asian grocers, department store complexes, subway stop, and families of every immigrant status in the modern world. I was able to meet and visit with the Chinese father of Micah's landlord, a guy in his early 70s. We chatted over stolen cigarettes about his richer days when two or three bottles of good cognac a month and his state of the art European aluminum racing bike, able to be lifted with one finger, was the direct result of high status employment. He's enthusiastic that Micah is a good man; a studious and quiet man, always ahead on his rent and able to fix his own bicycle; clever. I concur.

We caught A Prairie Home Companion at Town Hall on the 27th. It was odd watching our favorite old school satirist, faithfully listened to since my early days in Alaska, and shared with each of the children since infancy. There he was forty feet away. Could have swept over and kissed him. And Micah and I just kept laughing, marveling and sucking in as deeply as possible. Town Hall felt like our Chilkat Center, on only a little larger scale. The theater had red velvet cushioned seating with a wide curved balcony, resplendent with an adoring audience. There were many gray heads, but just as many younger fans enjoyed the show.
The scripts and musical choices felt hand picked for us and left us feeling connected in ways which are only magical. We laughed at our country, at our need to be spiritual and relevant, at ourselves. Garrison read our own personal message which I nearly missed and was caught hoping, someone from home was listening. We sang Auld Lang Syne first for the listening radio audience, with gusto, while recognizing our New Year's had come a few days early. Then we sang again off air, with both conviction and commitment, as if among 1800 new old friends.
We stepped out of the theater to find Russ Ringsak waiting with the big beautiful semi-tractor and trailer, ready to haul back to Minnesota all of the production equipment used during the four NY shows. Russ' story is here. He's quite a delightful author and well worth reading.
Micah then took me out for my first introduction to Thai food. The establishment known as Spice was as eclectic and authentic as it gets. The music caught my interest as did the waiting diners lingering around the door. Micah introduced me to Standing On Line, Manhattan style and vintage Techno from the late 80's. Vintage for a clientele of no one under the age of twenty-eight, other than myself. The food was all "Vegan friendly", and as hearty as a SE, Ak. spread of venison and Ptarmigan. Sumptuous.
We then went out for a couple of dark beers at an old, worn, neighborhood watering hole until it started getting rowdy enough that we couldn't talk with out yelling.

The next day, a quick train trip up to the Berkshires brought me for my first New England visit with sister Melody and her family. Once again, the feeling that family matters a lot was brought down. Wonderful food and closeness were capped by a return to the city with my 13 year old nephew aboard the great public train transportation that makes East Coast existence so rich. The young man was making the trek to purchase his first electrical guitar with his other Auntie, Mickey, the center of our distant family relations. Our hub.
All together the next night, we hit Prospect Park at eighteen degrees and a good strong head wind to freeze our way through a dandy fireworks display and the change of the New Year. We danced a few frozen steps with a funk band at the park gates.
Bidding Mick and Dakotah good by beneath Grand Central station and thousands of Times Square revelers, we frozenly hobbled our way back to Micah's warm apartment, nearly keeping our Town Hall agreement of an early New Year's celebration.

It is so wonderful when new infusions of home blood come on board and rekindle your day to days.

I returned to Merrick and Joey reaching the Southern terminus of their West Coast tour. We've spent the past few days working on projects and venturing out to explore the stunning mountain surroundings of the Southern Sierra's.
For the first time since leaving California in 1971, I discovered an area here in the mountains where I could almost envision myself growing older. Among mountain Oaks hanging off vertical hillsides, we frolicked above the southern string of Sierras while Kern County lay fuzzed in fog and blue haze, gullied below. Atop individual granite pillars, we watched the birth of the new full moon of '09. The chilled air sparked with frost and last weeks big snow, newly melted into the ground where we were sucking up the fading blue sky filled with weakened sunlight.
At Grandma's we spent a rich week together working on art in the backyard. Making silver ornaments cut from garage sale silver platters and helping to prepare for a puppet show which they're taking on their travels down into Mexico. We all crammed into Ma's tiny bedroom, the large wooden chest stage with props, Seven Marionettes, two willowy puppet masters, six large family members piled up to watch the Lampoon debut in Spanish. It was a riot.

Now those two left this morning, in the deepest of chills from this winter. They're driving towards the Mojave and the hot springs in the gorgeous "Lola" a 1977 maroon Mercedes. Styling!

And I'm left welcoming in the New Year still!

Our Meadow

Sweet Northern Sister from Cordova sent this recently.

"yes, i have truly gone digital.
i -
have started -
a -
blog.

i still can't type without looking at the keyboard, but i have my very own piece of the cyberpie, and that's what counts.
to any and all interested,

clickity here

i welcome any tips re: it doesn't work, pictures don't load, you misspelled neccesary, even with spell-check? etc, but if you don't like my writing or subjects in general, keep it to yourself. start your own damn blog. nyah.

hope you're all having a delightful christmas, or whatever jewish, muslim, pagan and/or heathen holiday you celebrate in december. at the very least, happy winter!

m.


Go Girl! We LOVE YOU!

Magnet Leaf Writings/ random hand full fridge poetry For The Dark Eyed Gypsy Twin, sister Merry Lea

Languid recall
takes our moment.
Thousands may love mean, ugly,
red tongue drooling.
The girl of mad language who's
still delirious after a sordid
delicate, juice shake,
lies beneath
her gorgeous and elaborate garden
listening.

True diamond,
pink mist of my woman cry
and you speak of a need
to sleep. This could produce a
repulsive blue
skin
Have no will like my
getting his
moan on.

Take a moment's recall
of our languid
love.
You may do,
"she's a mean girl",
and thousands of tongues
trudge skin
colored language.

These want what
frantic produces.

Could Pink Diamond Road drunk,
puppy up us away?

Yes.


Meadow's Blog clickity here
Go Girl!

2008 THE LAST FULL MOON <<>> my, what a decade...

At this moment, as another spiral pass, in this cosmic spiral arm is marked, incrementally tick-tocking, by our people/style measurement of time, I'm sitting quietly.

That's at THIS moment.

But..., I've got a formal invitation to dance! That fella called. He's asked me to join him tonight; yup, he wants to see me dance again.

Well, yea though a sizeable length of the North American continent lies between us, I told him I'd be out; thrumming my heels against the hard baked, back yard, urban desert soil.

I'll take up this invitation, in spite of the helicopter night patrol beaming it's protective intrusiveness. I'll flap my wings and suck down LOW to the ground, pumping my goods for us, for us all, until the Raven there, in our snow drenched peaks, and the Mockingbird here within the chain linked green, call: LAST DANCE.

Hey, this girl has a moonlight date, with the one she's always dreamed of. To bad he's out of kissing range.

Well, that's as it is. There's always dream time. And hey, that's not like I'm waiting by the phone.

Remembering John Lennon, Remembering Mark L. Revenaugh /big weather boys

Today,through this offering, in combined honor of brothers John Lennon, and Mark Revenaugh, each stolen from life too soon by twisted forces of a saddened humanity gone hay wire, I give tribute.

And to be melded to my deepest love, the landscape of home and my beloved Alaskan family; two footed, four, and non footed, I'm offering my best wishes and please know I'm there with my metaphysical snow shovel.

I now share with you a snapshot of the incoming weather that my honey man sent this AM, December 9,2008.

YADDAH! Here it comes!!!


Hello Adrian,
I guess that a big one is supposed to hit tonight. They are calling for 3 ft or so for the next 20 hrs. Town was 'a twitter' today and hunkering down for this. Large winds too ......anyway I have attached a picture of it as of 4:30 pm. Hope it turns out for you to see. It's a beauty!

Love you gal,

J. B.

encspsulated truth

Quietly practicing ones craft, while leading from the center position, one can't help but recognize great need in the world. Sometimes silence is the surest response.

Redemptive Value: The Society of Crow

Recently, a wide spread effort from many places around the globe, caught my attention. Out the front window of my Mother's 1930's bungalow, I've been able to watch the steady parade of pickers who are trash gleaning in the Oleander area of down town Bakersfield, Ca.,

I was newly arrived from a place where the "Spring Cleanup" is generally conducted by the Boy Scout Troop, the Friends of the Library, the Takshanuk Water Shed Council, and various other service groups. There, there is a ferociously friendly competition for prizes to honor those with the most trash gathered, complete with the celebration dinner and a front page newspaper spread. It ain't Woebegon, but it's close.

So, early this summer I went to see what the BARC collection point at Magoo's Pizza on Brundage lane was about. It's one of several dozen recycling drop off centers in Kern County that are commercially owned and buy back harvested trash via the CVR, (Calif. Refund Value) incentive program.

The parking lot swarmed with folks from far away and all over. Some were new comers from distant lands. Many were from here, most from Kern County's streets and shelters. All arrive with tremendous loads gleaned from every imaginable source. Mine was a medium sized load, what my brother's bike could carry.

Pedal powered or push/pull carts, fashioned from infant strollers, grocery carts, bicycle trailers, and myriad other forms of wheeled device, are cleverly modified to double as an object to serve as home base, and /or work vehicle.

Cash returns are handed out as half a dozen employees shuffle overflowing, ever filling, 75 gallon plastic trash cans. Those are then emptied, two people to a can, into huMungus nylon fibered bags and commercially sized dumpsters. Glass, plastic bottles and containers, all shapes, colors and sizes, plus aluminum drink cans galore, each with it's own redemptive value, flow like rivers to the sea of solid waste.

While resting in the shade of 103 degree day, a gangling middle-aged fellow laughed and shook his head at current gas prices which were pushing past $4.00 per gallon.
As he straddled his well worn bike he said he felt proud that his morning earnings would feed him for the next few days with a smaller carbon footprint for his efforts.

I was glad to add that a tiny tributary had been diverted from the over burdened waste stream and would now be recycled thanks to his efforts. How's it go again? The "three R's"?

Reduce/ Reuse.....then ,IF there's still more left over, Recycle.

His mornings gleanings were hard to come by, miserably hot in the doing, but a highly honorable effort. I wonder what he's doing for Thanksgiving?

I'm off to work with wood today, cut up portions of "dead" yet standing trees (in my book, living via the decomposing process), being moved toward the next incarnation via our involvement.

Splitting, stacking, bending, breathing the woodsy scent keeps me well, twice warmed and humbled by the awesome structure of the once mighty giant moving onto another level.

In an attitude of appreciation, the maul severs cleanly.

In a lesser frame of mind, the work seems almost to pick a fight and often wins.

Call me crazy.

I have lived a rather monastic lifestyle for many years in the heart of wild open country. Away from modern culture but always a student, I've learned to watch and listen to the landscape, a grand teacher.

The mirroring, echoing, synchronous delights that give a snapshot of the moment, informs our senses, and indeed winks occasionally in a pre-cognizant manner, is, and has always been available. Sadly, our two legged, upright "thin-slicing" species is rather rusty and cut off from the source. As moderns we experience the planet and all of it's systems predominantly as backdrop.

Too preoccupied with human business generally to work through personal growth, it's often left avoided until a crisis or a long steady decline demands attention be paid.

Working with Hospice clients, being open to how others have experienced their lives and prepare for death, is a privilege I recommend for everyone.

We can learn so much about life from each others stories and observations. Today, elders are left holding vast experiential knowledge with limited ways to pass it on. Once again, we cut ourselves off at the roots.

The evolution of soul is a timeless pursuit. But what else do we really have time for?

Taking A Wednesday Posistion

Days are short. It's the end of October in the middle portion of the Northern Hemisphere, election year '08. The fall of change has been hard on this nation used to so much, hungry beyond satisfaction.

A fevered ring echos throughout the land. Many people feel it from within pressing out and certainly from beyond pressing in. A sort of frenzied desperation effecting every level of their lives causing them to behave in ways less than how they would if things were different.

When I step outside my door this dark, wet morning, a silenced hush is weighing more heavily than even the mighty hemlock and spruce can bear. Darkness has swallowed all visible detail but for the faint tracing of tree forms. Tremendous drops of snowy tonnage crash from the trees as a one or two degree rise cause the deep accumulation to slip from the branches above.

And all is as it is this perfect morning.

A Sweet Nothings Blush

Home. I find myself in a near state of vertigo as four legged Steve Mason and I walk through the upstream cloud layers. This drenched landscape, thickened with early winter, settled and muted watercolor rinse, holds me with vibrant familiarity. I'm walking through the outdoors version of a deeply cherished love affair, tremulous to the core with the buzz of germination.

Cabaret Of the Stars

I'm hearing the last of summer. The crickets slow their symphonic blend and range for a cooler dance. Sliver of a maid high above, veils and twirls, pale with abstinence and sure knowledge of her lovers dive toward the abyss. Irridescent shot to the side pocket in the southern sky graces me far below with a wink. I double step my own complicated backyard jig drumming with heels to hard pack, breathing freely.