America's present need is not heroics, but healing.
President Warren Harding
**********************
Come visit.
----------------------------
Are we creating a nation of belligerent fools? Sometimes I think so. I wonder if I am the only one appalled at the juvenile behavior of many members of congress, governors and politicians, spokespersons for various political ideologies, talk show hosts, news programs and late night comics.
We have already had too many examples of why we should not trust CEOs of large corporations to act like honest citizens. Now we watch Congress people, with sibling rivalry, vote against a bill not because it's wrong but because it comes from the other side. So called responsible government officials caught in some scandal or other. Talk show hosts who won't shut up and let their guests answer the questions, TV panels where everybody yells at once, late night comics who put down everyone and everything with vicious humor, a media that thrives on gossip and new's anchors who are simply ignorant. More and more people are practicing road rage. Soccer dad's are beating up referees. Children are in peril. Fists are flying all over and the fingers of blame point in every direction.
Some people are still beating the bushes for Communists, the monster in the closet. Some people still claim the old style economic patterns are the only ones that work even though they have brought us to our knees financially. Some people still carry on the cave man mentality that we should not deal with nations who hate us. But it has been said many times that if you want peace, talk to your enemies.
I don't know about you, friend, but I'm sick unto disgust of it. What kind of a nation are we leaving for our children and grand children if this sort of stupidity is held up as an example of adult behavior.
Some people feel we are a nation in decline and I'm not sure I disagree with that. How can this nation perpetuate itself as a world leader when we can't put forward grown ups as examples of who we are.
I love my country and, as we approach another birthday, I want to feel that we can become a nation of decency, compassion, cooperation, friendship, neighborliness and hope. We need a re-creation, a revolution, to kick through the doors of hate, rage, scorn and selfishness and let some positive light shine in on us.
DB The Vagabond
*********************
Have a sunny thought today and share it.
____________________________________
SUMMER QUIZ
This is not a contest.
A young man out west just took home 88 million dollars from the lottery.
Whether you play the lottery or not, if you suddenly had 88 million dollars what are the first three things you would do with it?
You have all summer to answer if you wish.
6 responses so far.
DB
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Monday, June 29, 2009
Gentle Groan 8/29/09
If you have love in your life, you have life.
Bernard Goetz
****************
'Lo.
---------------------
Most of my life I knew nothing about love. I still don't, but I'm beginning to get an inkling. It takes being alone for a long time to teach you how important other people are in your life. I've been essentially alone now for about 15 years. For 5 or 6 of those years I was in New York City, so there was plenty of human contact, but no one to come home to. For the past 9 years I've been living here where if I don't go to the market I see no one at all. Sometimes I sit downstairs and wait for the mailman just so I can say hello to somebody.
I maybe feel capable of loving someone now, but I don't feel capable of doing anything about it. Living alone also makes one self-centered and habitual in so many ways. I don't think I could seriously change my behavior to suit anyone, nor do I suppose anyone would put up with me, I have lapsed into eccentricities, ideosyncracies and stasis. My enthusiasm for life is tempered by having to rest up after every single task.
But I'm slowly beginning to learn about care, compassion, comradeship, sharing, thinking about someone and including them in my life. That's all theoretical, of course, because there's no one else here.
It was suggested that I go down to the senior center and make friends. I went there and watched the same old women play bingo and listened to the same old men tell the same old stories of what they did in the great war. I may be a senior citizen, but I'm not an old man. Oh, alright, I'm an old man.
Someone said I should get a pet. I signed a no pet lease. Even so, a dog won't do. Being on the 3rd floor there's no easy access for taking it out. It would probably poop on the carpet before I got my clothes on. A cat could get out but it would no doubt fight with the feral cats that rumble over the roof at night. I thought of getting a giraffe. She could chew on the leaves of the trees outside the window. But she'd probably go and get pregnant and then what would I do. I thought of a platypus, they're cool. But I hear they like water and I don't have a bath tub. I could get an iguana but I really don't care for reptiles all that much. I'll just have to settle for the fly that whispers in my ear and kisses my face.
"To be alone is to be different, to be different is to be alone" wrote Suzanne Gordon. I might as well face it, I'm a misfit. I belong with the misfits, wherever you are. Maybe there I can discover love.
DB
___________________
Sing a summer song.
*******************
Bernard Goetz
****************
'Lo.
---------------------
Most of my life I knew nothing about love. I still don't, but I'm beginning to get an inkling. It takes being alone for a long time to teach you how important other people are in your life. I've been essentially alone now for about 15 years. For 5 or 6 of those years I was in New York City, so there was plenty of human contact, but no one to come home to. For the past 9 years I've been living here where if I don't go to the market I see no one at all. Sometimes I sit downstairs and wait for the mailman just so I can say hello to somebody.
I maybe feel capable of loving someone now, but I don't feel capable of doing anything about it. Living alone also makes one self-centered and habitual in so many ways. I don't think I could seriously change my behavior to suit anyone, nor do I suppose anyone would put up with me, I have lapsed into eccentricities, ideosyncracies and stasis. My enthusiasm for life is tempered by having to rest up after every single task.
But I'm slowly beginning to learn about care, compassion, comradeship, sharing, thinking about someone and including them in my life. That's all theoretical, of course, because there's no one else here.
It was suggested that I go down to the senior center and make friends. I went there and watched the same old women play bingo and listened to the same old men tell the same old stories of what they did in the great war. I may be a senior citizen, but I'm not an old man. Oh, alright, I'm an old man.
Someone said I should get a pet. I signed a no pet lease. Even so, a dog won't do. Being on the 3rd floor there's no easy access for taking it out. It would probably poop on the carpet before I got my clothes on. A cat could get out but it would no doubt fight with the feral cats that rumble over the roof at night. I thought of getting a giraffe. She could chew on the leaves of the trees outside the window. But she'd probably go and get pregnant and then what would I do. I thought of a platypus, they're cool. But I hear they like water and I don't have a bath tub. I could get an iguana but I really don't care for reptiles all that much. I'll just have to settle for the fly that whispers in my ear and kisses my face.
"To be alone is to be different, to be different is to be alone" wrote Suzanne Gordon. I might as well face it, I'm a misfit. I belong with the misfits, wherever you are. Maybe there I can discover love.
DB
___________________
Sing a summer song.
*******************
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Famed Formula 6/28/09
Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral law is written in the tablets of history.
James Forude
******************
Welcome to my world.
-------------------------
So what is the moral law? It has been stated by many writers, speakers and philosophers over the years in many different ways. Very simply put it comes down to this: Humility in the presence of deity. Respect for others. Honesty with oneself.
If it's so simple why is it so damn difficult to understand and practice? When I first started to read philosophy, a subject which covers every aspect and experience of human life, it was the study of Ethics that attracted me. I wanted to reduce ethical thinking to a very simple statement, something I could mentally digest and use as a rule of life, such as "My freedom to punch you in the nose ends at the point where your nose begins." But the more I read the more I realized how complicated the subject is. Different circumstances require different actions. But every action or reaction should be directly related to a basic rule of behavior.
Humility in the presence of deity. One does not have to be a theist to understand that rule. The mistake we often make is to imagine that somehow we are greater then the sum of the parts. If we really understood and could utilize the vast intelligence that operates the universe there would be no need for science. Almost any scientist and thinker will admit to being amazed at the discoveries still to be made in every area of investigation into the workings of the natural world. With an infinite, unmeasured universe in front of us, how can we not be humble, even given our abilities to discover. If you are pleased with the idea of relating those discoveries to the process of understanding more about God, then good for you.
Respect for others. This poses an interesting question. Does everyone deserve our respect? I have a former friend in California for whom I no longer have any respect. I initially respected him very much, in fact I looked up to him for many years. My loss of respect for him is solely related to his treatment of me, but there are many things about him that project a sterling character. The lesson I learned is that I put my respect where it didn't belong. I trusted incorrectly, I needed to learn to respect him for who he is and not tie it to a betrayed trust.
The respect for others should also include animals and plants, even down to the lowly weed pushing its way up through the cracks in the sidewalk. Loving the weed or the skunk is not necessary, but giving it its right to be what it is is essential.
Honesty with oneself. Ah, here's the tricky one. I am reminded of two famous quotes. "This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man," wrote the amazingly intelligent Shakespeare. While Abraham Lincoln said: "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time." How often do we fool ourselves? Some of the time? Or all of the time? Why is it so important to stop fooling ourselves and how do we go about it?
I think understanding ourselves, which is no small enterprise, is a combination of all three moral codes: humility in the presence of deity, respect for others and honesty with oneself. Immanuel Kant taught that one of the most important reasons for philosophy is an investigation of what the human being is capable of becoming. Thomas Hobbes wrote at length about our ethical responsibilities and relationships to other people and the society in which we live. And Friedrich Nietzsche dismissed doxological thinking for an investigation and realization of the indwelling intuitive and instinctual abilities of humans.
Yesterday I wrote about the supposedly 85% of the brain we don't use, and yesterday's Vagabond Jotting asks if the soul is something living inside the flesh. If you look at yourself squarely in the face when you approach a mirror and ask "Who am I?" be still, and let the intuitive portion of your mind, the 85%, answer. When the honest answer comes and is the real revelation of a creature that is part of the infinite universe, with an invisible nature, a soul, outside the flesh, indissolubly linked to light, space and all other creatures, and capable of becoming at one with great goodness, then you are alive. in every way.
If you reach that goal, or even approach it, "thou canst not them be false to any man" including yourself.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_____________________
Have a nice sunny Summer Sunday
--------------------------------
Weekend Puzzle
_ H _ / _ T E /N _ _ _ _ E _ N S / _ _ T H / _ _ S E _ H _ N E /
( _ H E N /_ _ N _ _ _ _ T E/ _ _ S / _ _ _ _ ) ?
Ask me for a letter, fill it in and voila, you have a song title.
We have two winners.
C'est l'amour. Bon chance.
James Forude
******************
Welcome to my world.
-------------------------
So what is the moral law? It has been stated by many writers, speakers and philosophers over the years in many different ways. Very simply put it comes down to this: Humility in the presence of deity. Respect for others. Honesty with oneself.
If it's so simple why is it so damn difficult to understand and practice? When I first started to read philosophy, a subject which covers every aspect and experience of human life, it was the study of Ethics that attracted me. I wanted to reduce ethical thinking to a very simple statement, something I could mentally digest and use as a rule of life, such as "My freedom to punch you in the nose ends at the point where your nose begins." But the more I read the more I realized how complicated the subject is. Different circumstances require different actions. But every action or reaction should be directly related to a basic rule of behavior.
Humility in the presence of deity. One does not have to be a theist to understand that rule. The mistake we often make is to imagine that somehow we are greater then the sum of the parts. If we really understood and could utilize the vast intelligence that operates the universe there would be no need for science. Almost any scientist and thinker will admit to being amazed at the discoveries still to be made in every area of investigation into the workings of the natural world. With an infinite, unmeasured universe in front of us, how can we not be humble, even given our abilities to discover. If you are pleased with the idea of relating those discoveries to the process of understanding more about God, then good for you.
Respect for others. This poses an interesting question. Does everyone deserve our respect? I have a former friend in California for whom I no longer have any respect. I initially respected him very much, in fact I looked up to him for many years. My loss of respect for him is solely related to his treatment of me, but there are many things about him that project a sterling character. The lesson I learned is that I put my respect where it didn't belong. I trusted incorrectly, I needed to learn to respect him for who he is and not tie it to a betrayed trust.
The respect for others should also include animals and plants, even down to the lowly weed pushing its way up through the cracks in the sidewalk. Loving the weed or the skunk is not necessary, but giving it its right to be what it is is essential.
Honesty with oneself. Ah, here's the tricky one. I am reminded of two famous quotes. "This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man," wrote the amazingly intelligent Shakespeare. While Abraham Lincoln said: "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time." How often do we fool ourselves? Some of the time? Or all of the time? Why is it so important to stop fooling ourselves and how do we go about it?
I think understanding ourselves, which is no small enterprise, is a combination of all three moral codes: humility in the presence of deity, respect for others and honesty with oneself. Immanuel Kant taught that one of the most important reasons for philosophy is an investigation of what the human being is capable of becoming. Thomas Hobbes wrote at length about our ethical responsibilities and relationships to other people and the society in which we live. And Friedrich Nietzsche dismissed doxological thinking for an investigation and realization of the indwelling intuitive and instinctual abilities of humans.
Yesterday I wrote about the supposedly 85% of the brain we don't use, and yesterday's Vagabond Jotting asks if the soul is something living inside the flesh. If you look at yourself squarely in the face when you approach a mirror and ask "Who am I?" be still, and let the intuitive portion of your mind, the 85%, answer. When the honest answer comes and is the real revelation of a creature that is part of the infinite universe, with an invisible nature, a soul, outside the flesh, indissolubly linked to light, space and all other creatures, and capable of becoming at one with great goodness, then you are alive. in every way.
If you reach that goal, or even approach it, "thou canst not them be false to any man" including yourself.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_____________________
Have a nice sunny Summer Sunday
--------------------------------
Weekend Puzzle
_ H _ / _ T E /N _ _ _ _ E _ N S / _ _ T H / _ _ S E _ H _ N E /
( _ H E N /_ _ N _ _ _ _ T E/ _ _ S / _ _ _ _ ) ?
Ask me for a letter, fill it in and voila, you have a song title.
We have two winners.
C'est l'amour. Bon chance.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Empirical Emergency 6/27/09
Beware when the great God lets loose a thinker on this planet.
Emerson
******************
Howdy
=======================
I wonder, with anxiety, what it is that has stupified the human race. It seems to me that very few things we humans do make any sense. We have wealthy Congressmen deciding on legislation to affect the poor, and if, by chance, it looks worthwhile, they vote against it. We have men who couldn't throw a football if their lives were at stake discussing the relative merits of one athlete over another. We have folks who would be frightened to death to step out on a bare stage in front of an audience critiquing those who do. We have those who are too old to go into battle sending others off to do it. We have men and women fighting in a foreign land under the ruse of defending ourselves and then coming home in boxes. We have children disappearing or being abused at home, We have pastors preaching honesty and family values who have mistresses on the side. We have medicines which are dangerous to our health. We have products that can cause accidents. We have economic theories that feed the greedy and starve the poor. We have banks that plunder people and courts that tie them down. And we are all out to get even with somebody.
What has brought us to this point of stupidity? Social structures, traditions, fear?
I don't know where to point the finger of blame except at myself. I learned a while back that it's no use complaining about a problem unless you are prepared to do something about it. I wonder what more I can do. I write in this journal every day and pray that my words have some positive effect somewhere in the world. Whatever teaspoon of wisdom I have comes from decades of trying to overcome my own ignorance. But it does seem futile sometimes when faced with the bland, blind nonsense I see and hear around me, nonsense that is gleefully accepted and seriously put into practice by all of us.
Where are the thinkers? Where did they go? They can't all be hiding out in some secret Bohemian Club, or securely tethered to a University post, or masquerading in a blue collar on some tight lipped assembly line somewhere. Wisdom often comes in strange forms and from unexpected places, but it takes a thinker to recognize it.
I like to read books, journals and magazines hoping to become a thinking person. But I also like to read newspapers because in the haystack of useless ink every now and then someone writes something intelligent. With the demise of newspapers, the haystacks have grown into wastelands. I think so.
To be a real thinker in this age is to be an odd, eccentric, unorthodox, illfitting, dangerous crack pot who has to face the demonic outrage and lethal attack upon himself by the general population. Maybe that's why it is so hard to find any. We need to pray to the great God to let loose a few more thinkers from under His protecting wing.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_________________________
May you have a relaxing weekend.
_______________________
Emerson
******************
Howdy
=======================
I wonder, with anxiety, what it is that has stupified the human race. It seems to me that very few things we humans do make any sense. We have wealthy Congressmen deciding on legislation to affect the poor, and if, by chance, it looks worthwhile, they vote against it. We have men who couldn't throw a football if their lives were at stake discussing the relative merits of one athlete over another. We have folks who would be frightened to death to step out on a bare stage in front of an audience critiquing those who do. We have those who are too old to go into battle sending others off to do it. We have men and women fighting in a foreign land under the ruse of defending ourselves and then coming home in boxes. We have children disappearing or being abused at home, We have pastors preaching honesty and family values who have mistresses on the side. We have medicines which are dangerous to our health. We have products that can cause accidents. We have economic theories that feed the greedy and starve the poor. We have banks that plunder people and courts that tie them down. And we are all out to get even with somebody.
What has brought us to this point of stupidity? Social structures, traditions, fear?
I don't know where to point the finger of blame except at myself. I learned a while back that it's no use complaining about a problem unless you are prepared to do something about it. I wonder what more I can do. I write in this journal every day and pray that my words have some positive effect somewhere in the world. Whatever teaspoon of wisdom I have comes from decades of trying to overcome my own ignorance. But it does seem futile sometimes when faced with the bland, blind nonsense I see and hear around me, nonsense that is gleefully accepted and seriously put into practice by all of us.
Where are the thinkers? Where did they go? They can't all be hiding out in some secret Bohemian Club, or securely tethered to a University post, or masquerading in a blue collar on some tight lipped assembly line somewhere. Wisdom often comes in strange forms and from unexpected places, but it takes a thinker to recognize it.
I like to read books, journals and magazines hoping to become a thinking person. But I also like to read newspapers because in the haystack of useless ink every now and then someone writes something intelligent. With the demise of newspapers, the haystacks have grown into wastelands. I think so.
To be a real thinker in this age is to be an odd, eccentric, unorthodox, illfitting, dangerous crack pot who has to face the demonic outrage and lethal attack upon himself by the general population. Maybe that's why it is so hard to find any. We need to pray to the great God to let loose a few more thinkers from under His protecting wing.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_________________________
May you have a relaxing weekend.
_______________________
Friday, June 26, 2009
Dangerous Diminishment 6/26/09
Iron rusts from disuse, even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.
Leonardo Da Vinci
***********************
Hello again.
----------------------------
I believe in mental might. Years ago I read a statistic which claimed that on the average we use about 15% of our brains. I thought, then what do we do with the rest of it? Let it rust?
I decided to investigate the thinking of those who I was sure were more intelligent than I. While some of them, it turned out, were actually at the 10 or 11% level of mental use, there are some, such as Da Vinci, who were pushing at the limits of their mental usefulness. The common quality they all seemed to express was curiosity. Albert Einstein once humbly remarked that he wasn't all that clever but that he was just very curious. He also wrote "It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education."
Then I wondered just how much our formal education dumbs us down to our 15% capacity. I saw that it wasn't education itself, but the way it was presented. So much of how I was taught growing up was about incapacity, not capacity, of mental ability. I was taught what to think not how to think. If my thinking did not conform to the rules of the day, I was deemed "wrong," Once I got out from underneath the dictatorial dogma of public school education I learned that not only could I think for myself, but that some day I would even learn to think beyond myself.
It's a truism to say we are all capable of more than we do. But wisdom can't stop there. If so, how do we learn to do more? How do we increase our capabilities, our capacities for doing more? Fearlessly and unashamedly admitting our useless 85% is a good start. It's like owning a 100 acre plot of land and never venturing past the back yard. It's safe. It's easy.
One day in a life drawing class I was sitting next to a woman who stopped drawing at one point and put her pen down. I asked her why and she said that she didn't like the pose. I suggested that she should draw it anyway. If we only draw the poses we like we won't do much drawing nor will we learn much.
Mighty mentality can't be gained by sticking with the safe and easy. If I come to a thinker whose ideas perplex me I don't want to turn away and say "It's too confusing. I don't understand it." Rather I want to stick with it until I do. Curiosity and expansive thinking are what get me out of my backyard and into the fascinating forest beyond.
Vagabond Journeys
___________________
May you see something pretty you haven't seen before.
---------------------------
SUMMER QUIZ
This is not a contest.
A young man out west just took home 88 million dollars from the lottery.
Whether you play the lottery or not, if you suddenly had 88 million dollars what are the first three things you would do with it?
You have all summer to answer if you wish.
6 responses so far.
DB
Leonardo Da Vinci
***********************
Hello again.
----------------------------
I believe in mental might. Years ago I read a statistic which claimed that on the average we use about 15% of our brains. I thought, then what do we do with the rest of it? Let it rust?
I decided to investigate the thinking of those who I was sure were more intelligent than I. While some of them, it turned out, were actually at the 10 or 11% level of mental use, there are some, such as Da Vinci, who were pushing at the limits of their mental usefulness. The common quality they all seemed to express was curiosity. Albert Einstein once humbly remarked that he wasn't all that clever but that he was just very curious. He also wrote "It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education."
Then I wondered just how much our formal education dumbs us down to our 15% capacity. I saw that it wasn't education itself, but the way it was presented. So much of how I was taught growing up was about incapacity, not capacity, of mental ability. I was taught what to think not how to think. If my thinking did not conform to the rules of the day, I was deemed "wrong," Once I got out from underneath the dictatorial dogma of public school education I learned that not only could I think for myself, but that some day I would even learn to think beyond myself.
It's a truism to say we are all capable of more than we do. But wisdom can't stop there. If so, how do we learn to do more? How do we increase our capabilities, our capacities for doing more? Fearlessly and unashamedly admitting our useless 85% is a good start. It's like owning a 100 acre plot of land and never venturing past the back yard. It's safe. It's easy.
One day in a life drawing class I was sitting next to a woman who stopped drawing at one point and put her pen down. I asked her why and she said that she didn't like the pose. I suggested that she should draw it anyway. If we only draw the poses we like we won't do much drawing nor will we learn much.
Mighty mentality can't be gained by sticking with the safe and easy. If I come to a thinker whose ideas perplex me I don't want to turn away and say "It's too confusing. I don't understand it." Rather I want to stick with it until I do. Curiosity and expansive thinking are what get me out of my backyard and into the fascinating forest beyond.
Vagabond Journeys
___________________
May you see something pretty you haven't seen before.
---------------------------
SUMMER QUIZ
This is not a contest.
A young man out west just took home 88 million dollars from the lottery.
Whether you play the lottery or not, if you suddenly had 88 million dollars what are the first three things you would do with it?
You have all summer to answer if you wish.
6 responses so far.
DB
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Caustic Care 6/25/09
Fools are more to be feared than the wicked.
Queen Christiana
********************************
Don't stand around outside. Come on in.
-----------------------------------------
There are many sorts of fools simple ones, old ones and great ones, and all of them are dangerous, in way or another.
We all know those who are capable of making some totally daft decision that adversely affects themselves, their families, their town or their country. The wise are hard to find. Fools are a dime a dozen. Foolishness is everywhere. You don't have to look very far. "What fools these mortal be" wrote Shakespeare.
This morning I was amused at the news item about the 2009 National Conference - Building The New Majority where the subject was making English the official national language. The large banner over their heads read 2009 National Conferenece, (Conferen[e]c). If they want English to be the national language in this multi-lingual nation the least they can do is learn to spell it correctly.
It reminds me of the time the Senate was trying President Clinton. The pens they all pompously signed in with read Untied States Senate and not tied together properly it certainly was.
Let's face it, we are all capable of foolishness sometimes, some of us most of the time. If I started listing examples of my own foolery there's no telling how long this entry would be. So i won't, thank you.
Some unknown author wrote "Fools rush in where fools have been before." One of the purposes of regrets, as nasty as they can be, is to remind us of the stupid things we did so that we will remember and not do them again. So then why do we keep fooling ourselves, flopping and stacking up regrets? Maybe it's because we don't trust our own foolishness, don't believe that we were really wrong. Go ahead and touch the iron to see if it's hot. It won't burn you this time like it did before.
Ah, but what if you have to confront a fool, especially one in authority? That's a sticky problem. If you're a loyal worker you go around picking up the pieces that your boss leaves behind and agree to ignore his foolish fiats. If you're not a loyal worker you might point out his nonsense to him and then visit the unemployment office. I worked for one of those once, who shall not be named. I finally quit the job and moved on, just to get away from his idiotic bungling.
And what if the fool gets into the position of running the country. It happens. It's a potential disaster. One can only hope there are enough levelheaded people in the government who can say "How clever" and then work their way around and out of the danger. We have no way of knowing how many anonymous civil servants of many nations have quietly slipped past the brainless barriers imposed by some simple minded monarch.
But there's another sort of fool. I have long believed that one of the things wrong with this dangerous world is the demise of the court jester, the "allowed fool" hired by the king to keep him honest.
In olden times if a simple jester stepped over the line he could be whipped or hung. But an Allowed Fool was free to utter anything that was relevant to the situation, in the court or out of it. Rulers depended upon them to point out their and other people's foolishness, which they did with wit and comical sarcasm. The court jester was often smarter than anyone else around. The court fool was dangerous to pretentiousness, dishonesty, artificiality, and cant.
Now just imagine what the world would be like if there were such a humorist on the payroll and in the presence of every monarch, premiere, prime minister, president dictator, field marshal, CEO and chairman. We very well might be laughing instead of bombing.
DB - Vagabond Journeys.
___________________________
May there be bubbles of joy in your day.
*******************************
Queen Christiana
********************************
Don't stand around outside. Come on in.
-----------------------------------------
There are many sorts of fools simple ones, old ones and great ones, and all of them are dangerous, in way or another.
We all know those who are capable of making some totally daft decision that adversely affects themselves, their families, their town or their country. The wise are hard to find. Fools are a dime a dozen. Foolishness is everywhere. You don't have to look very far. "What fools these mortal be" wrote Shakespeare.
This morning I was amused at the news item about the 2009 National Conference - Building The New Majority where the subject was making English the official national language. The large banner over their heads read 2009 National Conferenece, (Conferen[e]c). If they want English to be the national language in this multi-lingual nation the least they can do is learn to spell it correctly.
It reminds me of the time the Senate was trying President Clinton. The pens they all pompously signed in with read Untied States Senate and not tied together properly it certainly was.
Let's face it, we are all capable of foolishness sometimes, some of us most of the time. If I started listing examples of my own foolery there's no telling how long this entry would be. So i won't, thank you.
Some unknown author wrote "Fools rush in where fools have been before." One of the purposes of regrets, as nasty as they can be, is to remind us of the stupid things we did so that we will remember and not do them again. So then why do we keep fooling ourselves, flopping and stacking up regrets? Maybe it's because we don't trust our own foolishness, don't believe that we were really wrong. Go ahead and touch the iron to see if it's hot. It won't burn you this time like it did before.
Ah, but what if you have to confront a fool, especially one in authority? That's a sticky problem. If you're a loyal worker you go around picking up the pieces that your boss leaves behind and agree to ignore his foolish fiats. If you're not a loyal worker you might point out his nonsense to him and then visit the unemployment office. I worked for one of those once, who shall not be named. I finally quit the job and moved on, just to get away from his idiotic bungling.
And what if the fool gets into the position of running the country. It happens. It's a potential disaster. One can only hope there are enough levelheaded people in the government who can say "How clever" and then work their way around and out of the danger. We have no way of knowing how many anonymous civil servants of many nations have quietly slipped past the brainless barriers imposed by some simple minded monarch.
But there's another sort of fool. I have long believed that one of the things wrong with this dangerous world is the demise of the court jester, the "allowed fool" hired by the king to keep him honest.
In olden times if a simple jester stepped over the line he could be whipped or hung. But an Allowed Fool was free to utter anything that was relevant to the situation, in the court or out of it. Rulers depended upon them to point out their and other people's foolishness, which they did with wit and comical sarcasm. The court jester was often smarter than anyone else around. The court fool was dangerous to pretentiousness, dishonesty, artificiality, and cant.
Now just imagine what the world would be like if there were such a humorist on the payroll and in the presence of every monarch, premiere, prime minister, president dictator, field marshal, CEO and chairman. We very well might be laughing instead of bombing.
DB - Vagabond Journeys.
___________________________
May there be bubbles of joy in your day.
*******************************
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Breakthrough Behavior 6/24/09
The great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do.
Walter Bagtehot
***********************
Cheers.
-----------------------------
Dear "Eva Cartwright" readers, the story is continuing on Vagabond Tales.
http://db-vagabondtales.blogspot.com/ See you there. D
----------------------------------
One sure way to get my dander up, whatever dander is, is to underestimate me. If someone tried to tell me that I was not old enough, not tall enough, not strong enough or not smart enough to do something, I generally set off to prove them wrong. And the result, most of the time, was a non comment from the people who down graded me. At best it was "Huh. I'm surprised." or "I guess I was wrong." I even got the gruesome "Well, I can see it wasn't that difficult."
Having grown up with out much self-confidence, sometimes I was the nay sayer myself. Looking at a task that was very difficult I would question my own ability to carry it out. Under those circumstances I learned not only how strong I was but how to turn the task into an adventure. So what if I failed, and I rarely did, I wanted to see how far I could go in achieving success. Someone said you don't know what your limits are until you try to exceed them.
I was given a role once by a director who said that I was too young for the part and probably couldn't play it but that I was the only actor around so I had to do it. I did it so well that a famous Broadway actress who was in the audience came backstage to meet me.
Every time we accomplish something they tell us we can't do, we get stronger. When I first went into a radio studio the manager was certain I would fail. I didn't even know how to turn the microphone on. I didn't know anything about broadcasting. There was the nasty devil in my ear saying "Give it up DB, You can't do this. Tell them to get someone else." But I tamed the beast and by the end of the first hour I was playing songs and chatting away like an old pro. Oh, all right, like a young, green, wet-behind-the-ears pro, with a cow lick. But by the end of the first season I had a fan club (a small one).
About these accomplishment I'm not bragging. What I'm telling you is, if they say you can't do it, do it.
DB
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Have a glass of summer for me.
*********************
Walter Bagtehot
***********************
Cheers.
-----------------------------
Dear "Eva Cartwright" readers, the story is continuing on Vagabond Tales.
http://db-vagabondtales.blogspot.com/ See you there. D
----------------------------------
One sure way to get my dander up, whatever dander is, is to underestimate me. If someone tried to tell me that I was not old enough, not tall enough, not strong enough or not smart enough to do something, I generally set off to prove them wrong. And the result, most of the time, was a non comment from the people who down graded me. At best it was "Huh. I'm surprised." or "I guess I was wrong." I even got the gruesome "Well, I can see it wasn't that difficult."
Having grown up with out much self-confidence, sometimes I was the nay sayer myself. Looking at a task that was very difficult I would question my own ability to carry it out. Under those circumstances I learned not only how strong I was but how to turn the task into an adventure. So what if I failed, and I rarely did, I wanted to see how far I could go in achieving success. Someone said you don't know what your limits are until you try to exceed them.
I was given a role once by a director who said that I was too young for the part and probably couldn't play it but that I was the only actor around so I had to do it. I did it so well that a famous Broadway actress who was in the audience came backstage to meet me.
Every time we accomplish something they tell us we can't do, we get stronger. When I first went into a radio studio the manager was certain I would fail. I didn't even know how to turn the microphone on. I didn't know anything about broadcasting. There was the nasty devil in my ear saying "Give it up DB, You can't do this. Tell them to get someone else." But I tamed the beast and by the end of the first hour I was playing songs and chatting away like an old pro. Oh, all right, like a young, green, wet-behind-the-ears pro, with a cow lick. But by the end of the first season I had a fan club (a small one).
About these accomplishment I'm not bragging. What I'm telling you is, if they say you can't do it, do it.
DB
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Have a glass of summer for me.
*********************
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Atrophic Anger 6/23/09
Where there is great hatred are the fetters of hell.
Anonymous
**************
Join me for a bit.
------------------
This morning I made a vow to myself that for the next 24 hours I was not going to yell obscenities at my computer, no matter what it did to me.
I'm convinced one can discipline oneself out of rage and hatred just as out of any other bad habit.
I don't understand hatred. It must come out of reaction, not action. People don't do right. So what? Right is a subjective concept any way. People may deserve our criticism, disapproval, disappointment, frustration and disagreement. But hatred is a malignancy which says more about the hater than the hated.
People hated Clinton. Then people hated Bush. Now people hate Obama. I am fed up with listening to it on the radio and TV. I'm disgusted with seeing an adult, intelligent, well educated face screw itself up into a knot of fury over what some other adult, intelligent, well educated face is saying or doing.
Anyone who has experienced love to any degree will agree that love is good. It may have its degrees, but why make exceptions?
I don't like snakes. I fear them, but I don't hate them. They have a right to their existence and to be what they are. I give them space. I will kill the squirmy thing if it threatens me or anyone else around. But not out of hatred. The rattler was not sent by God to punish me for my sins. Nature made it.
There are people in this world whose behavior is so opprobrious it disgusts me, but I would not stand by and let them be attacked by the nasty serpent thinking it serves them right.
The only thing I can truly say I hate is excessive noise. But I don't hate the people who make it. Hatred is weakness, self-indulgence and destructive to the hater's moral and mental strength. Take it from me.
Hatred has no place in the human race.
DB
______________
A happy summer's day to you.
*****************
Anonymous
**************
Join me for a bit.
------------------
This morning I made a vow to myself that for the next 24 hours I was not going to yell obscenities at my computer, no matter what it did to me.
I'm convinced one can discipline oneself out of rage and hatred just as out of any other bad habit.
I don't understand hatred. It must come out of reaction, not action. People don't do right. So what? Right is a subjective concept any way. People may deserve our criticism, disapproval, disappointment, frustration and disagreement. But hatred is a malignancy which says more about the hater than the hated.
People hated Clinton. Then people hated Bush. Now people hate Obama. I am fed up with listening to it on the radio and TV. I'm disgusted with seeing an adult, intelligent, well educated face screw itself up into a knot of fury over what some other adult, intelligent, well educated face is saying or doing.
Anyone who has experienced love to any degree will agree that love is good. It may have its degrees, but why make exceptions?
I don't like snakes. I fear them, but I don't hate them. They have a right to their existence and to be what they are. I give them space. I will kill the squirmy thing if it threatens me or anyone else around. But not out of hatred. The rattler was not sent by God to punish me for my sins. Nature made it.
There are people in this world whose behavior is so opprobrious it disgusts me, but I would not stand by and let them be attacked by the nasty serpent thinking it serves them right.
The only thing I can truly say I hate is excessive noise. But I don't hate the people who make it. Hatred is weakness, self-indulgence and destructive to the hater's moral and mental strength. Take it from me.
Hatred has no place in the human race.
DB
______________
A happy summer's day to you.
*****************
Monday, June 22, 2009
Zenith Zeal 6/22/09
A genius is one who sees what is not yet and causes it to come to be.
Peter Zarlenga
*******************
Welcome.
------------------------
Question: What do the space shuttle, the 747, a blimp, a hot air balloon, a mountain climber, a tight rope walker, a pole vaulter and a good thinker have in common?
Answer: They all overcome gravity.
.......................................................................
We all daydream. A genius is one who takes his daydreams seriously. All the great and important things that have come to be have all started with thought. Not just any kind of thought, but the thought that reaches out beyond the established limits of what we suppose reality is made of. Not the downbeat thinking Loretta Young spoke of in my last entry. We dream of things that are not possible. We laugh at the absurd ideas that crop up in the free floating mind. And if, by chance, we perceive that there may be a remote possibility that what we dream of may someday become a reality, we turn the whole project over to the mysterious "They." "Someday they may figure out how to do so-and-so." Meanwhile the genius isn't content with waiting for "They," he becomes the "They" in question.
We are all capable of genius on one level or another. The "down beat" thinking that most of us engage in sometimes is one of the worst culprits in the world. It's the voice that says things can't be done, are impossible, against the laws of nature and morally wrong. "If God had meant us to fly he would have given us wings."
I'm an artist, and I know that an artist is also one who takes his daydreams seriously. Sometimes, when I view or hear the work of another artist I'm fascinated to think at what point the artist was in his life when the idea first occurred to him to try to create such a thing. I am equally fascinated by where my own ides come from.
I wonder the same about the great inventions of the world; some are magnificent, like the space shuttle, some are mundane, like the can opener, And yet they are all fingers pointing to the sign that reads "Genius At Work."
DB - Vagabond Journeys
__________________
Do a little summer dance today. Just a couple of steps will do.
********************
SUMMER QUIZ
This is not a contest.
A young man out west just took home 88 million dollars from the lottery.
Whether you play the lottery or not, if you suddenly at 88 million dollars what are the first three things you would do with it?
dbdacoba@aol.com
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/
Peter Zarlenga
*******************
Welcome.
------------------------
Question: What do the space shuttle, the 747, a blimp, a hot air balloon, a mountain climber, a tight rope walker, a pole vaulter and a good thinker have in common?
Answer: They all overcome gravity.
.......................................................................
We all daydream. A genius is one who takes his daydreams seriously. All the great and important things that have come to be have all started with thought. Not just any kind of thought, but the thought that reaches out beyond the established limits of what we suppose reality is made of. Not the downbeat thinking Loretta Young spoke of in my last entry. We dream of things that are not possible. We laugh at the absurd ideas that crop up in the free floating mind. And if, by chance, we perceive that there may be a remote possibility that what we dream of may someday become a reality, we turn the whole project over to the mysterious "They." "Someday they may figure out how to do so-and-so." Meanwhile the genius isn't content with waiting for "They," he becomes the "They" in question.
We are all capable of genius on one level or another. The "down beat" thinking that most of us engage in sometimes is one of the worst culprits in the world. It's the voice that says things can't be done, are impossible, against the laws of nature and morally wrong. "If God had meant us to fly he would have given us wings."
I'm an artist, and I know that an artist is also one who takes his daydreams seriously. Sometimes, when I view or hear the work of another artist I'm fascinated to think at what point the artist was in his life when the idea first occurred to him to try to create such a thing. I am equally fascinated by where my own ides come from.
I wonder the same about the great inventions of the world; some are magnificent, like the space shuttle, some are mundane, like the can opener, And yet they are all fingers pointing to the sign that reads "Genius At Work."
DB - Vagabond Journeys
__________________
Do a little summer dance today. Just a couple of steps will do.
********************
SUMMER QUIZ
This is not a contest.
A young man out west just took home 88 million dollars from the lottery.
Whether you play the lottery or not, if you suddenly at 88 million dollars what are the first three things you would do with it?
dbdacoba@aol.com
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Yokeless Yearning 6 21 09
I want no part in making any contribution whatsoever to the despair which eventually follows downbeat thinking.
Loretta Young
((((((((((((((((((((((
Hi
-----------------
What do the space shuttle, the 747, a blimp, a hot air balloon, a mountain climber, a tight rope walker, a pole vaulter and a good thinker all have in common?
DB
****************************
WEEKEND PUZZLE
Below is a list of 22 names. Your privilege is to rearrange the names into sets of two, a first name and a last name of two famous people. The 2 first names must be the same or the last 2 names must be the same, as in Joe DiMaggio and Joe Louis or Al Smith and Kate Smith. You may use any name more than once. To win you must use all the names and have at least 8 sets of two names each. Ready? Go !!!
Betsy
Berg
Bob
Danny
Diana
Dylan
Ford
George
Gerald
Gobel
Hamilton
Harrison
Hingle
Hope
Margaret
Molly
Pat
Picon
Robertson
Ross
Thatcher
Thomas
Good luck
Answer with winners will be posted on Sunday evening at 9 Eastern Time.
Note: 3 winners so far, 2 from the Email Lions, and 1 from the Blogspot Tigers.
dbdacoba@aol.com
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/
Loretta Young
((((((((((((((((((((((
Hi
-----------------
What do the space shuttle, the 747, a blimp, a hot air balloon, a mountain climber, a tight rope walker, a pole vaulter and a good thinker all have in common?
DB
****************************
WEEKEND PUZZLE
Below is a list of 22 names. Your privilege is to rearrange the names into sets of two, a first name and a last name of two famous people. The 2 first names must be the same or the last 2 names must be the same, as in Joe DiMaggio and Joe Louis or Al Smith and Kate Smith. You may use any name more than once. To win you must use all the names and have at least 8 sets of two names each. Ready? Go !!!
Betsy
Berg
Bob
Danny
Diana
Dylan
Ford
George
Gerald
Gobel
Hamilton
Harrison
Hingle
Hope
Margaret
Molly
Pat
Picon
Robertson
Ross
Thatcher
Thomas
Good luck
Answer with winners will be posted on Sunday evening at 9 Eastern Time.
Note: 3 winners so far, 2 from the Email Lions, and 1 from the Blogspot Tigers.
dbdacoba@aol.com
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Xenophilic Xylograph 6/20/09
Curiosity and a sense fo wonder keep me on the trail through the forests of philosophy.
DB - The Vagabond
'''''''''''''''''''
Come wander with me.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Check out the WEEK END PUZZLE below.
-----------------------
I've been many places and talked with many people and one of the primary discoveries I've been blessed to make is that it does no good to measure anyone by a limited set of standards. Even though it is the common "normal" way of reacting to the varied members of the human race, it forces decisions and opinions that prevent one from actually understanding oneself and others. Superficial judgements are bad ones.
As a college student I was assigned to read Plato and to discuss it in very prescribed, neo platonic terms, those which the professor had decided were the only ones worth discussing. In my career I spent most of the time with dramas, memorizing speeches and making some theatrical sense out of them. I didn't touch philosophy, If I had any free time it was spent with the daily newspapers.
But one day I picked up a book on philosophy, just out of curiosity. It's by Martin Heidegger (What is Called Thinking). I read it and as I was reading I found myself in a rich, fecund forest of ideas. It wasn't about how to behave or what to think. It was a challenge to understand what the whole process of thinking is about. This was a topic I had never considered. It was like posing the question "What is breathing?"
That experience took me into the study of philosophy and an awareness of how much philosophical thinking there is around me and how important it is to the basic human problems of existence. Much of philosophy addresses how to live a virtuous life but even that subject requires a vigorous exercise of analysis and interpretation. Philosophy concerns itself with everything from the mundane to the sublime, from good manners and healthy diets to the complex of metaphysics and the vast infinity of cosmology. Philosophic literature can be in one sentence or in a 1600 page book, as my complete Plato is. Yes, I finally went back to Plato to find out what Plato had to say about his philosophy and not what Professor So-and-so said.
Another discovery I made is that philosophy doesn't tell us what to think. It prompts us to think for ourselves and leads us in that direction. Any thinking person is a philosopher to one extent or another. We all have to confront the problems and dilemmas of life. It is an easy answer to let someone or something else tell us what to think or do. But if we learn to step up to the task with a sturdy respect for and trusty reliance on our own innate ability to question, reason and solve at least some aspect of the crazy riddle of life we are philosophers and much the better off for it.
And philosophy doesn't exclude science, religion, economics, mechanics, politics or the daily efforts to make a living. It includes, in fact it wraps itself around, all of those things.
Philosophers don't agree with each other. No matter. That's what makes it interesting. Philosophy is a walk through a wild and tangled forest of ideas and I enjoy it as much as I have ever enjoyed anything.
DB - The Vagabond
__________________
Summer is a-comin' in, Are you ready?
********************
WEEKEND PUZZLE
Below is a list of 22 names. Your privilege is to rearrange the names into sets of two, a first name and a last name of two famous people. The 2 first names must be the same or the last 2 names must be the same, as in Joe DiMaggio and Joe Louis or Al Smith and Kate Smith. You may use any name more than once. To win you must use all the names and have at least 8 sets of two names each. Ready? Go !!!
Betsy
Berg
Bob
Danny
Diana
Dylan
Ford
George
Gerald
Gobel
Hamilton
Harrison
Hingle
Hope
Margaret
Molly
Pat
Picon
Robertson
Ross
Thatcher
Thomas
Good luck
Answer with winners (I hope) will be posted on Sunday evening at 9 Eastern Time.
Note: 3 winners so far, 2 from the Email Lions. 1 from the Blogspot Tigers.
dbdacoba@aol.com
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/
DB - The Vagabond
'''''''''''''''''''
Come wander with me.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Check out the WEEK END PUZZLE below.
-----------------------
I've been many places and talked with many people and one of the primary discoveries I've been blessed to make is that it does no good to measure anyone by a limited set of standards. Even though it is the common "normal" way of reacting to the varied members of the human race, it forces decisions and opinions that prevent one from actually understanding oneself and others. Superficial judgements are bad ones.
As a college student I was assigned to read Plato and to discuss it in very prescribed, neo platonic terms, those which the professor had decided were the only ones worth discussing. In my career I spent most of the time with dramas, memorizing speeches and making some theatrical sense out of them. I didn't touch philosophy, If I had any free time it was spent with the daily newspapers.
But one day I picked up a book on philosophy, just out of curiosity. It's by Martin Heidegger (What is Called Thinking). I read it and as I was reading I found myself in a rich, fecund forest of ideas. It wasn't about how to behave or what to think. It was a challenge to understand what the whole process of thinking is about. This was a topic I had never considered. It was like posing the question "What is breathing?"
That experience took me into the study of philosophy and an awareness of how much philosophical thinking there is around me and how important it is to the basic human problems of existence. Much of philosophy addresses how to live a virtuous life but even that subject requires a vigorous exercise of analysis and interpretation. Philosophy concerns itself with everything from the mundane to the sublime, from good manners and healthy diets to the complex of metaphysics and the vast infinity of cosmology. Philosophic literature can be in one sentence or in a 1600 page book, as my complete Plato is. Yes, I finally went back to Plato to find out what Plato had to say about his philosophy and not what Professor So-and-so said.
Another discovery I made is that philosophy doesn't tell us what to think. It prompts us to think for ourselves and leads us in that direction. Any thinking person is a philosopher to one extent or another. We all have to confront the problems and dilemmas of life. It is an easy answer to let someone or something else tell us what to think or do. But if we learn to step up to the task with a sturdy respect for and trusty reliance on our own innate ability to question, reason and solve at least some aspect of the crazy riddle of life we are philosophers and much the better off for it.
And philosophy doesn't exclude science, religion, economics, mechanics, politics or the daily efforts to make a living. It includes, in fact it wraps itself around, all of those things.
Philosophers don't agree with each other. No matter. That's what makes it interesting. Philosophy is a walk through a wild and tangled forest of ideas and I enjoy it as much as I have ever enjoyed anything.
DB - The Vagabond
__________________
Summer is a-comin' in, Are you ready?
********************
WEEKEND PUZZLE
Below is a list of 22 names. Your privilege is to rearrange the names into sets of two, a first name and a last name of two famous people. The 2 first names must be the same or the last 2 names must be the same, as in Joe DiMaggio and Joe Louis or Al Smith and Kate Smith. You may use any name more than once. To win you must use all the names and have at least 8 sets of two names each. Ready? Go !!!
Betsy
Berg
Bob
Danny
Diana
Dylan
Ford
George
Gerald
Gobel
Hamilton
Harrison
Hingle
Hope
Margaret
Molly
Pat
Picon
Robertson
Ross
Thatcher
Thomas
Good luck
Answer with winners (I hope) will be posted on Sunday evening at 9 Eastern Time.
Note: 3 winners so far, 2 from the Email Lions. 1 from the Blogspot Tigers.
dbdacoba@aol.com
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/
Friday, June 19, 2009
Wrought Wisdom 6/19/09
Expect the best, plan for the worst, and prepare to be surprised.
Denis Waitley
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
Welcome.
-----------------------
"What if...?" "It'll never happen." "Never say never."
How well do we really know what we're doing? An idea comes, followed by a desire, then usually by some impatient action and, if we're lucky, some satisfying result. But what if it doesn't? What went wrong?
If we are intelligently patient we will carefully plan for the desired outcome. If we are willfully impatient who knows what the result will be. Part of careful planning is to take into consideration what might go wrong and therefore to compensate for it ahead of time.
My mother taught me to drive and one thing she told me has stayed with me my whole life, not just about driving, but about many things. She said "Always assume the other driver is going to do something foolish." That tactic has saved me from many accidents I might have gotten into. It doesn't mean the other driver is a fool, it merely means that under the circumstances the driver made a decision to do something I didn't expect. I explained that to someone one day and she thought it was one of the stupidest things she had heard. But I will be willing to bet if more people were alert to the unexpected turn or stop there would be a lot less road rage.
I was watching the NASA channel one day and they were talking about those sessions where one department would get together and bring up every possible thing that could go wrong and then make arrangements to prevent it or prepare for it. When you consider how vast, complicated and dangerous the space program is there must be an untold number of things that could mess up. If they didn't poke their noses into every connection, every bolt and wire, things would not go as smoothly as they do.
There are usually surprises built into every venture, things we don't expect no matter how much trouble shooting we do. I am still learning how to not get frantic when those things happen. Sometimes there are detours we have to make. There are a lot of detours in life. We might as well enjoy the surprising scenery while we keep a look out for the turn that takes us back the way we want to go.
We should expect the best from ourselves, not sell ourselves for anything less than the best we can do and be. We should recognize it when the lines of life are not going right and are not allowing us to fulfill ourselves, are limiting us and putting pot holes in the way of success and joy. And we should avoid making assumptions about who we are and where we're going to be at any destination we have planned for ourselves.
Is your life a roadmap? Well, whether you're planning to fly to the moon or begin a love affair (and there are similarities) study it carefully, watch out for the pot holes and send me a post card when you get there.
DB
___________
You're alive, thank goodness.
*******************
Denis Waitley
\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
Welcome.
-----------------------
"What if...?" "It'll never happen." "Never say never."
How well do we really know what we're doing? An idea comes, followed by a desire, then usually by some impatient action and, if we're lucky, some satisfying result. But what if it doesn't? What went wrong?
If we are intelligently patient we will carefully plan for the desired outcome. If we are willfully impatient who knows what the result will be. Part of careful planning is to take into consideration what might go wrong and therefore to compensate for it ahead of time.
My mother taught me to drive and one thing she told me has stayed with me my whole life, not just about driving, but about many things. She said "Always assume the other driver is going to do something foolish." That tactic has saved me from many accidents I might have gotten into. It doesn't mean the other driver is a fool, it merely means that under the circumstances the driver made a decision to do something I didn't expect. I explained that to someone one day and she thought it was one of the stupidest things she had heard. But I will be willing to bet if more people were alert to the unexpected turn or stop there would be a lot less road rage.
I was watching the NASA channel one day and they were talking about those sessions where one department would get together and bring up every possible thing that could go wrong and then make arrangements to prevent it or prepare for it. When you consider how vast, complicated and dangerous the space program is there must be an untold number of things that could mess up. If they didn't poke their noses into every connection, every bolt and wire, things would not go as smoothly as they do.
There are usually surprises built into every venture, things we don't expect no matter how much trouble shooting we do. I am still learning how to not get frantic when those things happen. Sometimes there are detours we have to make. There are a lot of detours in life. We might as well enjoy the surprising scenery while we keep a look out for the turn that takes us back the way we want to go.
We should expect the best from ourselves, not sell ourselves for anything less than the best we can do and be. We should recognize it when the lines of life are not going right and are not allowing us to fulfill ourselves, are limiting us and putting pot holes in the way of success and joy. And we should avoid making assumptions about who we are and where we're going to be at any destination we have planned for ourselves.
Is your life a roadmap? Well, whether you're planning to fly to the moon or begin a love affair (and there are similarities) study it carefully, watch out for the pot holes and send me a post card when you get there.
DB
___________
You're alive, thank goodness.
*******************
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Voided Variety 6/18/09
An artist is never ahead of his time but most people are far behind theirs.
Edgar Varese
*******************
Here again are you?
-------------------------
"I know everything about art but I don't know what I like" James Thurber has one of his characters say. That, of course, is a reversal of the usual cocktail party remark about art appreciation. One of the greatest disservices a person can do to himself is to stick to only what he knows and not open his mind to something new and different.
I think I've written before about the woman at the NY Philharmonic concert who sat in the back row of the balcony. When the Mozart or Schubert was being played she sat and listened, But when a piece of modern music, Webern or Berio, was played she would go out into the hall and wait for it to be over. She was making a statement. She wasn't going to listen to any of that "modern junk." It was totally silly because she could hear it out in the hall so she would know when it was "safe" to come back and sit down. This lady was purposely depriving herself of some amazing musical experiences. The lady had an "attitude."
There used to be a TV commercial from an outfit that was selling classical music records by subscription, to introduce fine music into the home of people who weren't used to it. One of the remarks the announcer made while pitching those records was "We've taken out all the unfamiliar music." I gasped.
What's modern music? It's all a lot of dissonant noise. You can't hum along or tap your foot. What good is it?
What's modern art? It's a lot of squiggles and blobs. What's it supposed to be of?
What's modern dance? A bunch of people falling down and rolling around. That's not dance.
When I first came into the world of 20th Century music I had been raised on a diet of Baroque to Late Romantic. I purposely bought and listened to the music of modern composers. I had a recording of a piece by an intense and seldom played composer named Karlheinz Stockhausen. I listened to it many times, trying to understand it. One day I had the record with me when I was visiting some dancer friends. They had never heard it, So I played it for them. They had no trouble with it. They immediately got up and started dancing. They caught the spirit and life of the music and taught me what it was about.
It's well and good to have favorites among the arts. Who doesn't? But the art of the 20th and 21st Centuries is the modern mind, with its modern sensitivities, speaking to the modern mind. If we don't pay attention to it we'll be left behind. Yes, it's difficult if you're not familiar with it. That's why it has to be heard and seen over and over again until it becomes familiar, until it becomes a part of our lives and we can know it and love it.
Art, like life, is a process of discovery. So look and listen and don't sit out in the hall.
DB Vagabond
_________________
Greet a stranger today. Why not?
*****************
SPRING QUIZ
THIS IS NOT A CONTEST
What do you think was the most important event of 2008? and
What was the most significant event in your life last year?
You have 3 days left to answer if you wish.
15 responses so far.
Leave answers on my email dbdacoba@aol.com or on my journal
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/. Thank you. DB
Edgar Varese
*******************
Here again are you?
-------------------------
"I know everything about art but I don't know what I like" James Thurber has one of his characters say. That, of course, is a reversal of the usual cocktail party remark about art appreciation. One of the greatest disservices a person can do to himself is to stick to only what he knows and not open his mind to something new and different.
I think I've written before about the woman at the NY Philharmonic concert who sat in the back row of the balcony. When the Mozart or Schubert was being played she sat and listened, But when a piece of modern music, Webern or Berio, was played she would go out into the hall and wait for it to be over. She was making a statement. She wasn't going to listen to any of that "modern junk." It was totally silly because she could hear it out in the hall so she would know when it was "safe" to come back and sit down. This lady was purposely depriving herself of some amazing musical experiences. The lady had an "attitude."
There used to be a TV commercial from an outfit that was selling classical music records by subscription, to introduce fine music into the home of people who weren't used to it. One of the remarks the announcer made while pitching those records was "We've taken out all the unfamiliar music." I gasped.
What's modern music? It's all a lot of dissonant noise. You can't hum along or tap your foot. What good is it?
What's modern art? It's a lot of squiggles and blobs. What's it supposed to be of?
What's modern dance? A bunch of people falling down and rolling around. That's not dance.
When I first came into the world of 20th Century music I had been raised on a diet of Baroque to Late Romantic. I purposely bought and listened to the music of modern composers. I had a recording of a piece by an intense and seldom played composer named Karlheinz Stockhausen. I listened to it many times, trying to understand it. One day I had the record with me when I was visiting some dancer friends. They had never heard it, So I played it for them. They had no trouble with it. They immediately got up and started dancing. They caught the spirit and life of the music and taught me what it was about.
It's well and good to have favorites among the arts. Who doesn't? But the art of the 20th and 21st Centuries is the modern mind, with its modern sensitivities, speaking to the modern mind. If we don't pay attention to it we'll be left behind. Yes, it's difficult if you're not familiar with it. That's why it has to be heard and seen over and over again until it becomes familiar, until it becomes a part of our lives and we can know it and love it.
Art, like life, is a process of discovery. So look and listen and don't sit out in the hall.
DB Vagabond
_________________
Greet a stranger today. Why not?
*****************
SPRING QUIZ
THIS IS NOT A CONTEST
What do you think was the most important event of 2008? and
What was the most significant event in your life last year?
You have 3 days left to answer if you wish.
15 responses so far.
Leave answers on my email dbdacoba@aol.com or on my journal
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/. Thank you. DB
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Unnecessary Urgings 6/17/09
Those who are possessed by nothing, possess everything.
Morihei Ueshiba
**************
Take a number and get in line.
-----------------------------------
This morning I astonished myself by realizing how much time I spend on the computer. Of course I really don't have much else to do, but considering that a scant 8 years ago I didn't even own a computer it's amazing how my life has changed. Now I act as if I couldn't live without it.
I actually never thought I would have one, because whenever I came near any one else's the thing would stop working. If I walked into a room where a computer was turned on, it would take one look at me and hide, or else it would start doing crazy things. So I genuinely believed that computers and I had an unsolvable adversarial relationship. I'll would stay away from them, if they would stay away from me.
Now, everything is different. I spend hours typing and reading. This computer is supposed to be a servant. HA! Which one of us is in charge? That's what I'd like to know. Certain things like sleeping, eating, cleaning, going to the market are highly resented intrusions upon the more important computer time. And I hardly ever play games on it. (No, I know what you're thinking. But it's true. I don't.)
In short, I'm possessed by the damn thing. "Please, release me, let me go" as the old country song says. But then I stop and think that if it weren't for my journal I wouldn't know a lot of fine people I've met through this same task master. There is a lot of information I wouldn't have at my busy fingertips. And, face it, what else would I do?
I don't own a TV or a motorcycle, I don't go fishing or play golf, I have no dog to walk or grandchildren to play with, my sky diving and bungee jumping days are over, I'm not in training for the marathon, they'd never take me on as an astronaut or a presidential candidate, Broadway isn't calling and neither is Hollywood, I'm too old for the Green Berets, to tall to be a jockey and to slow for the Everest Expedition, I'm too smart to join a street gang and too ignorant to be a nuclear physicist, I'm too sedentary to explore the Brazilian jungle and too tender footed to try ballroom dancing. I could go wrestle alligators, but I'd rather not.
No, I think I'll just sit here and be possessed. I've got almost everything in my possession that I want anyway.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
---------------------------
Have a sweet day.
**********************
Morihei Ueshiba
**************
Take a number and get in line.
-----------------------------------
This morning I astonished myself by realizing how much time I spend on the computer. Of course I really don't have much else to do, but considering that a scant 8 years ago I didn't even own a computer it's amazing how my life has changed. Now I act as if I couldn't live without it.
I actually never thought I would have one, because whenever I came near any one else's the thing would stop working. If I walked into a room where a computer was turned on, it would take one look at me and hide, or else it would start doing crazy things. So I genuinely believed that computers and I had an unsolvable adversarial relationship. I'll would stay away from them, if they would stay away from me.
Now, everything is different. I spend hours typing and reading. This computer is supposed to be a servant. HA! Which one of us is in charge? That's what I'd like to know. Certain things like sleeping, eating, cleaning, going to the market are highly resented intrusions upon the more important computer time. And I hardly ever play games on it. (No, I know what you're thinking. But it's true. I don't.)
In short, I'm possessed by the damn thing. "Please, release me, let me go" as the old country song says. But then I stop and think that if it weren't for my journal I wouldn't know a lot of fine people I've met through this same task master. There is a lot of information I wouldn't have at my busy fingertips. And, face it, what else would I do?
I don't own a TV or a motorcycle, I don't go fishing or play golf, I have no dog to walk or grandchildren to play with, my sky diving and bungee jumping days are over, I'm not in training for the marathon, they'd never take me on as an astronaut or a presidential candidate, Broadway isn't calling and neither is Hollywood, I'm too old for the Green Berets, to tall to be a jockey and to slow for the Everest Expedition, I'm too smart to join a street gang and too ignorant to be a nuclear physicist, I'm too sedentary to explore the Brazilian jungle and too tender footed to try ballroom dancing. I could go wrestle alligators, but I'd rather not.
No, I think I'll just sit here and be possessed. I've got almost everything in my possession that I want anyway.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
---------------------------
Have a sweet day.
**********************
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Tested Truth 6/16/09
Life is a library.
Joe Theismann
***********
Good day to you.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Ignorance is a terrible thing, but it's curable. Arrogance is also terrible, but much harder to cure, it seems. Some people have a nasty habit, when they learn something new, of acting as if they always knew it and putting down people who don't. I got a lot of that growing up. "You don't know such and such? What's the matter with you/" or "Where have you been?" Those remarks were usually accompanied by a scornful snicker.
"I'm better than you because I know something you don't."
"Well, then tell me and we'll both be better and the world will be a slightly nicer place."
Knowledge is not something worth getting arrogant about. Superior knowledge is nothing compared to a superior life.
"Life is a library." And we are all librarians, The tomes in your life may be different from those in mine, but they are all leading toward the same goal, which is wisdom. There's a saying, "When an old person dies a library burns down."
I like to think of life also as a farm. In our early years the harvest is small and we find we've garnered some useless crops. As we grow so does the farm and we become more careful about what seeds we sew.
As time goes by we gain a better harvest. We learn how to separate the true grain from the regrets, errors, mistakes, hates, rages, prejudices, fears and failures. We sift through what's left and one day we find we have more grain in the silo and more seeds in the bag than we can use. Then it's payback time. Time to provide for the young farmers just learning. Time to open wide the library and share the knowledge, free for all.
As senior citizens we have the right and privilege to do that. A life lived is an obligation to life. We have a sacred stock of wisdom, however great or small, to share with those who are no longer arrogant in their ways.
And that is what Vagabond Journeys is all about.
DB
__________________
May a nice spring breeze tickle your chin and mess up your hair.
*******************************
Joe Theismann
***********
Good day to you.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Ignorance is a terrible thing, but it's curable. Arrogance is also terrible, but much harder to cure, it seems. Some people have a nasty habit, when they learn something new, of acting as if they always knew it and putting down people who don't. I got a lot of that growing up. "You don't know such and such? What's the matter with you/" or "Where have you been?" Those remarks were usually accompanied by a scornful snicker.
"I'm better than you because I know something you don't."
"Well, then tell me and we'll both be better and the world will be a slightly nicer place."
Knowledge is not something worth getting arrogant about. Superior knowledge is nothing compared to a superior life.
"Life is a library." And we are all librarians, The tomes in your life may be different from those in mine, but they are all leading toward the same goal, which is wisdom. There's a saying, "When an old person dies a library burns down."
I like to think of life also as a farm. In our early years the harvest is small and we find we've garnered some useless crops. As we grow so does the farm and we become more careful about what seeds we sew.
As time goes by we gain a better harvest. We learn how to separate the true grain from the regrets, errors, mistakes, hates, rages, prejudices, fears and failures. We sift through what's left and one day we find we have more grain in the silo and more seeds in the bag than we can use. Then it's payback time. Time to provide for the young farmers just learning. Time to open wide the library and share the knowledge, free for all.
As senior citizens we have the right and privilege to do that. A life lived is an obligation to life. We have a sacred stock of wisdom, however great or small, to share with those who are no longer arrogant in their ways.
And that is what Vagabond Journeys is all about.
DB
__________________
May a nice spring breeze tickle your chin and mess up your hair.
*******************************
Monday, June 15, 2009
Smiling Sagacity 6/15/09
At first, I only laughed at myself. The I noticed that life itself is amusing. I've been in a generally good mood ever since.
Marilyn vos Savant
****************
Hello friend.
----------------------
The tragedies of life are generally the result of mistakes. The bigger the tragedy, the bigger the mistake. And the bigger the mistake the more people want to know about it. War is a tragedy, a big one, and when it's finally over it's time to count up the mistakes.
All the tragedies of the world can be traced back to things we didn't know about, things we didn't prepare for or things we did wrong. And they all make the news.
I like to approach things from a different standpoint. I prefer to look at things from the point of view of solving, healing and correcting. I never wanted to, and rarely did, plays about diseases, about sick people. I don;t want to watch someone suffering or dying from some ailment, and I don't want to portray such a person. I think it's cheap theatrics. Send it to the hospital.
The ancient Greeks wrote tragedies. People suffered and died but it wasn't because of an invasion of disease, it was because a major mistake was made. Hence there is something to be learned. A lesson. Shakespeare has only one character who is ailing unto death, but he gets healed by the second act. Shaw wrote a play about doctors, but not about diseases. And so on.
What I'm saying is that too much modern drama is taken up with the tragedy of something that no one can help and hence there is no message to humanity being delivered. People claim that the violence on TV and in the movies creates a violent society. I don't know. But much of it is without reason or justification, that's true.
Sometime around 1960 to 65 I began to observe and appreciate the ironies and absurdities of life. Certain circumstances that enrage some people simply make me laugh. I don't laugh scornfully, malignantly or sarcastically but with a heart full of compassion for those who suffer.
If you're not wearing your glasses, you can't find them. If you can't find your hat,it's probably on your head. A neighbor's dog used to wrap her leash around a tree. She would stand there and whine until he or one of his neighbors unleashed the dog, disentangled the leash and attached it to her again until next time. There was no coaxing her back around the tree the other way. She wouldn't do it. The poor dog suffered simply because she didn't know she could go the other way and free herself.
A physician neighbor of mine once told me that a patient at his hospital had undergone surgery three times on the wrong lung because a technician had mislabeled the X-ray.
A man drives to his home and finds his house has been destroyed. The wrecking crew had the wrong coordinates. It was the house across the street that should have been leveled.
Speaking of coordinates, the bomber crew gets the wrong ones and destroys an Iraqi family instead of the terrorist cell down the street.
The phone company erects a telephone pole equidistant from the others but it's right in the middle of the entrance to someone's driveway.
Geologists have been warning for decades what would happen if a major earthquake were to strike New Orleans. Were they prepared?
None of us are immune from life's absurdities. Last Thanksgiving I had a stove and oven that didn't work, nothing but canned foods to enjoy for my Thanksgiving dinner and my can opener broke. I dined on peanut butter.
I laughed.
Life is full of tragedies and most of them could have been avoided. That's what makes life so absurd. But we can't do anything about them if we sit around grinding our teeth in rage or punching walls. The only way to deal with the ironies and mistakes of life is with a clear, compassionate, abiding sense of humor.
DB - The Vagabond
_________________
Find some serenity this week.
********************
Marilyn vos Savant
****************
Hello friend.
----------------------
The tragedies of life are generally the result of mistakes. The bigger the tragedy, the bigger the mistake. And the bigger the mistake the more people want to know about it. War is a tragedy, a big one, and when it's finally over it's time to count up the mistakes.
All the tragedies of the world can be traced back to things we didn't know about, things we didn't prepare for or things we did wrong. And they all make the news.
I like to approach things from a different standpoint. I prefer to look at things from the point of view of solving, healing and correcting. I never wanted to, and rarely did, plays about diseases, about sick people. I don;t want to watch someone suffering or dying from some ailment, and I don't want to portray such a person. I think it's cheap theatrics. Send it to the hospital.
The ancient Greeks wrote tragedies. People suffered and died but it wasn't because of an invasion of disease, it was because a major mistake was made. Hence there is something to be learned. A lesson. Shakespeare has only one character who is ailing unto death, but he gets healed by the second act. Shaw wrote a play about doctors, but not about diseases. And so on.
What I'm saying is that too much modern drama is taken up with the tragedy of something that no one can help and hence there is no message to humanity being delivered. People claim that the violence on TV and in the movies creates a violent society. I don't know. But much of it is without reason or justification, that's true.
Sometime around 1960 to 65 I began to observe and appreciate the ironies and absurdities of life. Certain circumstances that enrage some people simply make me laugh. I don't laugh scornfully, malignantly or sarcastically but with a heart full of compassion for those who suffer.
If you're not wearing your glasses, you can't find them. If you can't find your hat,it's probably on your head. A neighbor's dog used to wrap her leash around a tree. She would stand there and whine until he or one of his neighbors unleashed the dog, disentangled the leash and attached it to her again until next time. There was no coaxing her back around the tree the other way. She wouldn't do it. The poor dog suffered simply because she didn't know she could go the other way and free herself.
A physician neighbor of mine once told me that a patient at his hospital had undergone surgery three times on the wrong lung because a technician had mislabeled the X-ray.
A man drives to his home and finds his house has been destroyed. The wrecking crew had the wrong coordinates. It was the house across the street that should have been leveled.
Speaking of coordinates, the bomber crew gets the wrong ones and destroys an Iraqi family instead of the terrorist cell down the street.
The phone company erects a telephone pole equidistant from the others but it's right in the middle of the entrance to someone's driveway.
Geologists have been warning for decades what would happen if a major earthquake were to strike New Orleans. Were they prepared?
None of us are immune from life's absurdities. Last Thanksgiving I had a stove and oven that didn't work, nothing but canned foods to enjoy for my Thanksgiving dinner and my can opener broke. I dined on peanut butter.
I laughed.
Life is full of tragedies and most of them could have been avoided. That's what makes life so absurd. But we can't do anything about them if we sit around grinding our teeth in rage or punching walls. The only way to deal with the ironies and mistakes of life is with a clear, compassionate, abiding sense of humor.
DB - The Vagabond
_________________
Find some serenity this week.
********************
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Retardanr Reasoning 6/14/09
It is for want of application, rather than of means, that men fail to succeed.
Rochfoucauld
******************
THE WEEKEND PUZZLE
Below is a list of 13 (your lucky number) 13 elements. Your mission is to tell me how many of them are phony names and which ones they are. Cheat if you have to, and then live with the shame.
7 guessers so far.
2 winners.
1. Americium
2. Californium
3. Canadium
4. Einsteinium
5. Europium
6. Hafnium
7. Lawrencium
8. Newtonium
9. Nobelium
10. Palladium
11. Roentgenium
12. Ruthenium
13. Seaborgium
Good luckium.
Results will be posted at 9 pm EST Sunday evening.
----------------------
"There's place and means for every man alive" wrote Shakespeare.
I was speaking with a woman this week who told me that her grandson was diagnosed by his teacher as probably having Attention Deficit Disorder. The boy is in second grade at the local elementary school. His mother knows that it isn't true because when he is home and has a project he applies himself to it with great interest, patience and rigor. The mother explained that to the teacher. The teacher was unimpressed. She just maintained that boy was fidgety and disruptive. When? asked the mother. Whenever a test is given. Does he finish the test? Yes, he finishes it quickly and then after a while he acts up and disturbs the other students. Are the other students still taking the test? Yes. Does my son always finish the test before the others? Yes. Well, then he gets bored. Give him more to do.
So the teacher prepared some material to occupy the boy along with the test. Behold. No more attention deficit.
The boy is obviously brighter than the other students. Why should he have to sit around waiting for them to catch up?
This cookie cutter idea of education, that all students are alike and should be treated that way, especially on the elementary school level, is a waste and an injustice. It goes without saying that there isn't enough money spent on education in this country, or, at least it isn't always spent wisely. And as a result adaptations have to be made. And it's also true that most kids survive and go on the get educated. But is that an excuse for maintaining a system of categorizing children and not being sensitive to their special needs?
I don't consider myself more intelligent than any one else, but I resent to this day some of things I had to suffer during my elementary school years. I was different, not odd, not strange, just different. I didn't fit the mould. I was laughed at by my 4th grade teacher for some of my likes and ideas. I was called ridiculous by my 5th grade teacher because I said I wanted to go to the moon. And I was called a liar in front of the whole class by my 6th grade teacher because I said I liked to watch the UN on TV. I didn't fit into the cookie cutter and there were a few other kids in my class that didn't either. Wounds were made and scars remain.
We must help those who are behind without holding back those who are ahead. Nobody said it was easy. But the means are there, they just have to be applied.
The teacher of the boy mentioned had the means as it turned out, but she took the easy route of categorizing him as deficient. Why? Because he didn't fit in the mould. It's probably not the teacher's fault.
What education means in this country needs to be rethought. The value of a nation is not in money. It's measured in cultural and intellectual worth. A nation, like this one, which produces more lawyers than scientists, is heading in the wrong direction.
It can always be better. There is always something more to do.
Vagabond Journeys
**********************
As you travel on through life
Whatever be your goal
Keep you eye upon the donut
And not upon the hole.
(Sorry, I couldn't resist that.)
**************************
Rochfoucauld
******************
THE WEEKEND PUZZLE
Below is a list of 13 (your lucky number) 13 elements. Your mission is to tell me how many of them are phony names and which ones they are. Cheat if you have to, and then live with the shame.
7 guessers so far.
2 winners.
1. Americium
2. Californium
3. Canadium
4. Einsteinium
5. Europium
6. Hafnium
7. Lawrencium
8. Newtonium
9. Nobelium
10. Palladium
11. Roentgenium
12. Ruthenium
13. Seaborgium
Good luckium.
Results will be posted at 9 pm EST Sunday evening.
----------------------
"There's place and means for every man alive" wrote Shakespeare.
I was speaking with a woman this week who told me that her grandson was diagnosed by his teacher as probably having Attention Deficit Disorder. The boy is in second grade at the local elementary school. His mother knows that it isn't true because when he is home and has a project he applies himself to it with great interest, patience and rigor. The mother explained that to the teacher. The teacher was unimpressed. She just maintained that boy was fidgety and disruptive. When? asked the mother. Whenever a test is given. Does he finish the test? Yes, he finishes it quickly and then after a while he acts up and disturbs the other students. Are the other students still taking the test? Yes. Does my son always finish the test before the others? Yes. Well, then he gets bored. Give him more to do.
So the teacher prepared some material to occupy the boy along with the test. Behold. No more attention deficit.
The boy is obviously brighter than the other students. Why should he have to sit around waiting for them to catch up?
This cookie cutter idea of education, that all students are alike and should be treated that way, especially on the elementary school level, is a waste and an injustice. It goes without saying that there isn't enough money spent on education in this country, or, at least it isn't always spent wisely. And as a result adaptations have to be made. And it's also true that most kids survive and go on the get educated. But is that an excuse for maintaining a system of categorizing children and not being sensitive to their special needs?
I don't consider myself more intelligent than any one else, but I resent to this day some of things I had to suffer during my elementary school years. I was different, not odd, not strange, just different. I didn't fit the mould. I was laughed at by my 4th grade teacher for some of my likes and ideas. I was called ridiculous by my 5th grade teacher because I said I wanted to go to the moon. And I was called a liar in front of the whole class by my 6th grade teacher because I said I liked to watch the UN on TV. I didn't fit into the cookie cutter and there were a few other kids in my class that didn't either. Wounds were made and scars remain.
We must help those who are behind without holding back those who are ahead. Nobody said it was easy. But the means are there, they just have to be applied.
The teacher of the boy mentioned had the means as it turned out, but she took the easy route of categorizing him as deficient. Why? Because he didn't fit in the mould. It's probably not the teacher's fault.
What education means in this country needs to be rethought. The value of a nation is not in money. It's measured in cultural and intellectual worth. A nation, like this one, which produces more lawyers than scientists, is heading in the wrong direction.
It can always be better. There is always something more to do.
Vagabond Journeys
**********************
As you travel on through life
Whatever be your goal
Keep you eye upon the donut
And not upon the hole.
(Sorry, I couldn't resist that.)
**************************
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Querulous Quest 6/13/09
One should live a well ordered life, but a little bit of chaos now and then keeps one alert.
DB - The Vagabond
*************************************
THE WEEKEND PUZZLE
Below is a list of 13 (your lucky number) 13 elements. Your mission is to tell me how many of them are phony names and which ones they are. Cheat if you have to, and then live with the shame.
5 guessers so far.
1 winner.
1. Americium
2. Californium
3. Canadium
4. Einsteinium
5. Europium
6. Hafnium
7. Lawrencium
8. Newtonium
9. Nobelium
10. Palladium
11. Roentgenium
12. Ruthenium
13. Seaborgium
Good luckium.
_________________________
This is a "woe is me" entry. Some people don't like to read about my problems. So, if you're one of those you can skip this part. "What? The Vagabond? Come on! He doesn't have any problems."
I have edited a few of my short stories and now they are ready for publication. I am almost finished editing my novel, "Brian and Christine" and it will soon be ready.
I read that some people I know are publishing their short stories here and there. And a couple have published novels.
I would surely like to do that myself, but to do that you have to submit a manuscript which means printing out the story, obviously. Doesn't it.
Yesterday I spent another 2 hours trying to get my printer to work. It worked a few times when it was first installed but hasn't printed anything now for a year. At one point yesterday it grabbed two sheets of paper and returned them blank. Most of the time it doesn't even do that. When I turn it on it clicks, clanks, rattles and thumps, then it stops and just blinks at me. I follow all the instructions and do what it says to do. Nothing. It scans just fine. It doesn't print. I can't afford to buy another one and this one is only a year old. Why doesn't it work?
Meantime I keep writing. The words, paragraphs, essays and stories keep piling up with nowhere to go. I want to publish my books, maybe do a collection of Vagabond Jottings and a collection of the "Best of Vagabond Journeys" with its mustard colored prose.
Never mind getting to first base, I can't even suit up and join the team if I can't print anything. It has caused me a lot of distress and discouragement. "For the want of a copy the book was lost."
DB
_________________
I am unhappy.
********************
If you think being querulous doesn' have its value sometimes, consider this: someone just emailed me with a solution to my printer problem, something I would never think of, and now it's gaily printing out my stories. Thank you.
DB - The Vagabond
*************************************
THE WEEKEND PUZZLE
Below is a list of 13 (your lucky number) 13 elements. Your mission is to tell me how many of them are phony names and which ones they are. Cheat if you have to, and then live with the shame.
5 guessers so far.
1 winner.
1. Americium
2. Californium
3. Canadium
4. Einsteinium
5. Europium
6. Hafnium
7. Lawrencium
8. Newtonium
9. Nobelium
10. Palladium
11. Roentgenium
12. Ruthenium
13. Seaborgium
Good luckium.
_________________________
This is a "woe is me" entry. Some people don't like to read about my problems. So, if you're one of those you can skip this part. "What? The Vagabond? Come on! He doesn't have any problems."
I have edited a few of my short stories and now they are ready for publication. I am almost finished editing my novel, "Brian and Christine" and it will soon be ready.
I read that some people I know are publishing their short stories here and there. And a couple have published novels.
I would surely like to do that myself, but to do that you have to submit a manuscript which means printing out the story, obviously. Doesn't it.
Yesterday I spent another 2 hours trying to get my printer to work. It worked a few times when it was first installed but hasn't printed anything now for a year. At one point yesterday it grabbed two sheets of paper and returned them blank. Most of the time it doesn't even do that. When I turn it on it clicks, clanks, rattles and thumps, then it stops and just blinks at me. I follow all the instructions and do what it says to do. Nothing. It scans just fine. It doesn't print. I can't afford to buy another one and this one is only a year old. Why doesn't it work?
Meantime I keep writing. The words, paragraphs, essays and stories keep piling up with nowhere to go. I want to publish my books, maybe do a collection of Vagabond Jottings and a collection of the "Best of Vagabond Journeys" with its mustard colored prose.
Never mind getting to first base, I can't even suit up and join the team if I can't print anything. It has caused me a lot of distress and discouragement. "For the want of a copy the book was lost."
DB
_________________
I am unhappy.
********************
If you think being querulous doesn' have its value sometimes, consider this: someone just emailed me with a solution to my printer problem, something I would never think of, and now it's gaily printing out my stories. Thank you.
Friday, June 12, 2009
Perpetual Prescience 6/12/09
Only the sage knows that the ten thousand ages are the same, that nothing is gained or lost.
Wang P'ang
****************
Salutations.
----------------------
"Hi buddy, what's new?"
"Nothing."
I sometimes have the fantasy that all the great thinkers of the past: the artists, philosophers, scientists, engineers and technicians, are sitting around in some vast invisible club house watching us earthlings make mistakes, grapple with and eventually solve problems. And every time a discovery is made one of them points down at us and says, "See? I told them so."
Back in the 17th Century a music critic was quoted as saying that all of the possible combinations of tones had been created and that there would be no new music. That was before Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Stravinsky and jazz. I think that critic's name has been lost, justifiably.
Anyone who thinks that human wisdom, knowledge and understanding are complete, codified and summed up is no sage and lives in a hole. What the sage knows is that it is all there waiting patiently, like a faithful pet, to be discovered.
The law of aerodynamics has always been there. It wasn't invented. The cave men had it. What they didn't have were airplanes. I think it is fascinating that there is so much more to be discovered that is already there and has always been there. We emerge from the smallest point of understanding and grow into a greater world of knowledge toward an infinity. What could be more exciting?
We stand on the shoulders of the sages and as we learn what they knew we prepare to offer our shoulders to the children of today. That's the way it works.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
____________________
May the day bring you unexpected delight.
*********************
Wang P'ang
****************
Salutations.
----------------------
"Hi buddy, what's new?"
"Nothing."
I sometimes have the fantasy that all the great thinkers of the past: the artists, philosophers, scientists, engineers and technicians, are sitting around in some vast invisible club house watching us earthlings make mistakes, grapple with and eventually solve problems. And every time a discovery is made one of them points down at us and says, "See? I told them so."
Back in the 17th Century a music critic was quoted as saying that all of the possible combinations of tones had been created and that there would be no new music. That was before Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Stravinsky and jazz. I think that critic's name has been lost, justifiably.
Anyone who thinks that human wisdom, knowledge and understanding are complete, codified and summed up is no sage and lives in a hole. What the sage knows is that it is all there waiting patiently, like a faithful pet, to be discovered.
The law of aerodynamics has always been there. It wasn't invented. The cave men had it. What they didn't have were airplanes. I think it is fascinating that there is so much more to be discovered that is already there and has always been there. We emerge from the smallest point of understanding and grow into a greater world of knowledge toward an infinity. What could be more exciting?
We stand on the shoulders of the sages and as we learn what they knew we prepare to offer our shoulders to the children of today. That's the way it works.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
____________________
May the day bring you unexpected delight.
*********************
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Outlandish Overcoming 6/11/09
To imagine the unimaginable is the highest use of the imagination.
Cynthia Oziek
#########
Welcome to my lab.
--------------------
I went with some friends to see the Ringling Brothers circus at the very large Madison Square Garden in New York City. After watching the clowns, the jugglers, the contortionists, the lions, horses, dogs and elephants, the tight rope walkers and trapeze swingers, the last act was the most amazing.
They wheeled out a cannon at one end, a guy climbed into it and was shot out of it, flying across the entire place at about 50 miles an hour. He landed in a vertical net on the extreme other side, bounced out of it into a horizontal net, bounced a few more times, rolled over and swung down to take a bow, The crowd went wild.
Of course I had heard of the act known as "The Human Cannon Ball" but I had never seen it before. I was very impressed. I got to thinking how and why anyone would think of doing such a thing. Cannons have been around for a long time but only for battle reasons. Many things have been fired from cannons: lead balls, of course, fire balls, chains, nails. I even remember reading that some artillerymen shot a bag full of poisonous snakes over an enemy's wall. Nasty.
But to shoot a human being out of a cannon is an entirely different matter, it's unimaginable, especially if you want them to survive. Someone had to imagine it, Someone had to imagine the unimaginable.
Well, someone did and it was probably a Canadian named William Hunt. But ironically Mr. Hunt was not the one who first came out of the mouth of the cannon. The first human cannon shot heard round the world was in 1877 in England. And the first Human Cannon Ball was a 14 year old girl named Rossa Matilda Richter who flew through the air under the name of Zazel. Not only did she survive but P.T. Barnum took her on tour with his circus.
Okay, you've imagined the human cannon ball, now imagine a small wooden bottomed boat sailing alone across the ocean to settle a group of people in a continent none of them have ever been to. Imagine a device that can transport people without using a horse. Imagine a machine you can sit in and fly through the air. Imagine a ship that sails under water. Imagine a cannon so powerful it can shoot people to the moon. Imagine going to Mars.
If we can believe it, it's believable. If we can conceive of it, it's conceivable. And if we can imagine it, it's no longer unimaginable. It's doable.
DB Vagabond Journeys
__________________
Tell someone you care about them and wish them well today.
*********************
SPRING QUIZ
THIS IS NOT A CONTEST
What do you think was the most important event of 2008? and
What was the most significant event in your life last year?
You have the Spring to answer if you wish. 10 days left.
15 responses so far.
Leave answers on my email dbdacoba@aol.com or on my journal
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/. Thank you. DB
Cynthia Oziek
#########
Welcome to my lab.
--------------------
I went with some friends to see the Ringling Brothers circus at the very large Madison Square Garden in New York City. After watching the clowns, the jugglers, the contortionists, the lions, horses, dogs and elephants, the tight rope walkers and trapeze swingers, the last act was the most amazing.
They wheeled out a cannon at one end, a guy climbed into it and was shot out of it, flying across the entire place at about 50 miles an hour. He landed in a vertical net on the extreme other side, bounced out of it into a horizontal net, bounced a few more times, rolled over and swung down to take a bow, The crowd went wild.
Of course I had heard of the act known as "The Human Cannon Ball" but I had never seen it before. I was very impressed. I got to thinking how and why anyone would think of doing such a thing. Cannons have been around for a long time but only for battle reasons. Many things have been fired from cannons: lead balls, of course, fire balls, chains, nails. I even remember reading that some artillerymen shot a bag full of poisonous snakes over an enemy's wall. Nasty.
But to shoot a human being out of a cannon is an entirely different matter, it's unimaginable, especially if you want them to survive. Someone had to imagine it, Someone had to imagine the unimaginable.
Well, someone did and it was probably a Canadian named William Hunt. But ironically Mr. Hunt was not the one who first came out of the mouth of the cannon. The first human cannon shot heard round the world was in 1877 in England. And the first Human Cannon Ball was a 14 year old girl named Rossa Matilda Richter who flew through the air under the name of Zazel. Not only did she survive but P.T. Barnum took her on tour with his circus.
Okay, you've imagined the human cannon ball, now imagine a small wooden bottomed boat sailing alone across the ocean to settle a group of people in a continent none of them have ever been to. Imagine a device that can transport people without using a horse. Imagine a machine you can sit in and fly through the air. Imagine a ship that sails under water. Imagine a cannon so powerful it can shoot people to the moon. Imagine going to Mars.
If we can believe it, it's believable. If we can conceive of it, it's conceivable. And if we can imagine it, it's no longer unimaginable. It's doable.
DB Vagabond Journeys
__________________
Tell someone you care about them and wish them well today.
*********************
SPRING QUIZ
THIS IS NOT A CONTEST
What do you think was the most important event of 2008? and
What was the most significant event in your life last year?
You have the Spring to answer if you wish. 10 days left.
15 responses so far.
Leave answers on my email dbdacoba@aol.com or on my journal
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/. Thank you. DB
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Nourishing Noise 6/10/09
Of those who say nothing, few are silent.
Thomas Neill
**********
Hail.
------------
I used to carry a card in my wallet which read "Keep Your Big Mouth Shut." Unfortunately, for myself and others, I didn't look at that card as often as I should have. In my younger years I was always sounding off about something with comment, criticism, opinion, judgment, etc. even if what I had to say had nothing to do with the subject under discussion.
In my home, growing up, I wasn't permitted to say anything without getting some form of scorn or critcism back: "Oh, you. What do YOU know?" "Where did you hear THAT?" and "Children should be seen and not heard." Is it any wonder that when I finally left home I couldn't shut up?
I had what was known as "the gift of gab" so one day, when I was out of work as an actor, I took a job as a radio announcer. It was perfect. I could talk all I wanted to and no one could interrupt me.
Then I met Herb. Herb was a scientist, a zoologist. He was a next door neighbor and a friend. He would come over, we'd sit, drink beer, watch TV or talk. No, I talked, he listened. But when he did say something, usually three words or less, it flew like a dart or lit up like a flash bulb. He had the gift of silence. I talked whether I had anything to say or not, he only spoke when he needed to. That was the difference.
A year later I moved on knowing more about him than he knew about me.
DB ' The Vagabond
_________________________
What is that tune you're humming?
***************************
Thomas Neill
**********
Hail.
------------
I used to carry a card in my wallet which read "Keep Your Big Mouth Shut." Unfortunately, for myself and others, I didn't look at that card as often as I should have. In my younger years I was always sounding off about something with comment, criticism, opinion, judgment, etc. even if what I had to say had nothing to do with the subject under discussion.
In my home, growing up, I wasn't permitted to say anything without getting some form of scorn or critcism back: "Oh, you. What do YOU know?" "Where did you hear THAT?" and "Children should be seen and not heard." Is it any wonder that when I finally left home I couldn't shut up?
I had what was known as "the gift of gab" so one day, when I was out of work as an actor, I took a job as a radio announcer. It was perfect. I could talk all I wanted to and no one could interrupt me.
Then I met Herb. Herb was a scientist, a zoologist. He was a next door neighbor and a friend. He would come over, we'd sit, drink beer, watch TV or talk. No, I talked, he listened. But when he did say something, usually three words or less, it flew like a dart or lit up like a flash bulb. He had the gift of silence. I talked whether I had anything to say or not, he only spoke when he needed to. That was the difference.
A year later I moved on knowing more about him than he knew about me.
DB ' The Vagabond
_________________________
What is that tune you're humming?
***************************
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Mastering Mayhem 6/09/09
A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.
Thomas Mann
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Good, You're here, Now I can begin.
------------------------
Before I started writing seriously I had a lot of respect for writers. I enjoyed and still enjoy reading books, magazines and newspapers when they are well written. I like reading news, both current and ancient. I enjoy reading various opinions on subjects that interest me. I love to follow a philosophers chain of thinking to an ultimate and sometimes surprising conclusion. And I enjoy a good tale.
Now that I'm writing myself and have to do all the creative work, making real literary events out of the stuff that swirls in my imagination, finding and retaining the right word that fits in the sentence, forming and shaping the phrases to clarify the thoughts of the sentence, crafting the sentences to express the ideas and events of the story and keeping the unraveling of the totality in a logical, believable pace, I have come to have even more respect for those who do it well.
I've read the flippant advice from other writers; less is more, cross out every other word or every other line, eschew obfuscation, etc. All of it is true up to a point. But the actual process of writing is far from flippancy. It's difficult work.
I was in a production of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. We had the blessing of one whole week of table time. Table time is what it sounds like. The actors sit around a table, read the play and discuss it. It's an excellent way to become familiar with the script, the other actors and the director's vision of the play, before facing the problems of memorizing the lines and dealing with the physical relationships. (In most productions one is lucky to get one morning of table time.) A day came that the director (Charlie Hensley, one of the best) had us read the play using our own language. I came away from that rehearsal not only with an even greater respect for the brilliance of Shakespeare's writing but a fascination of why he chose the words and phrases he did to convey what was being said. He didn't just choose words to fit the verse. Much of the play is in prose. In his plays, with his language, the characters are grander, grosser and more complex than in the average supermarket dramas of today.
From there I began to ask the same question of other writers and also of myself. A sentence is like a mathematical or chemical equation. The right words must be in the right order to achieve the desired effect. Being a beginning writer, I'm discovering these equations as I go. It's difficult.
Another chore a writer has to face is the matter of frankness and honesty. A writer must grasp every detail of what he's writing and test it on the touchstone of his own life experience. Mysteries must be revealed and secrets exposed. That means going back and challenging everything, making sure it's a truthful expression, conforms to the story and even adds some special color or tone to it. Everyone knows that brooks babble and thunder rumbles. But what do they really sound like to the character that's hearing them. The writer owes it to his reader to write the truth and not slide through an event on the skate board of the ordinary.
I feel a sense of obligation and responsibility. I have been given the gift of the English language. I want to use it to the best of my ability and beyond, no matter how difficult it is.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
____________________
Save a slice for me.
************************
Thomas Mann
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Good, You're here, Now I can begin.
------------------------
Before I started writing seriously I had a lot of respect for writers. I enjoyed and still enjoy reading books, magazines and newspapers when they are well written. I like reading news, both current and ancient. I enjoy reading various opinions on subjects that interest me. I love to follow a philosophers chain of thinking to an ultimate and sometimes surprising conclusion. And I enjoy a good tale.
Now that I'm writing myself and have to do all the creative work, making real literary events out of the stuff that swirls in my imagination, finding and retaining the right word that fits in the sentence, forming and shaping the phrases to clarify the thoughts of the sentence, crafting the sentences to express the ideas and events of the story and keeping the unraveling of the totality in a logical, believable pace, I have come to have even more respect for those who do it well.
I've read the flippant advice from other writers; less is more, cross out every other word or every other line, eschew obfuscation, etc. All of it is true up to a point. But the actual process of writing is far from flippancy. It's difficult work.
I was in a production of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. We had the blessing of one whole week of table time. Table time is what it sounds like. The actors sit around a table, read the play and discuss it. It's an excellent way to become familiar with the script, the other actors and the director's vision of the play, before facing the problems of memorizing the lines and dealing with the physical relationships. (In most productions one is lucky to get one morning of table time.) A day came that the director (Charlie Hensley, one of the best) had us read the play using our own language. I came away from that rehearsal not only with an even greater respect for the brilliance of Shakespeare's writing but a fascination of why he chose the words and phrases he did to convey what was being said. He didn't just choose words to fit the verse. Much of the play is in prose. In his plays, with his language, the characters are grander, grosser and more complex than in the average supermarket dramas of today.
From there I began to ask the same question of other writers and also of myself. A sentence is like a mathematical or chemical equation. The right words must be in the right order to achieve the desired effect. Being a beginning writer, I'm discovering these equations as I go. It's difficult.
Another chore a writer has to face is the matter of frankness and honesty. A writer must grasp every detail of what he's writing and test it on the touchstone of his own life experience. Mysteries must be revealed and secrets exposed. That means going back and challenging everything, making sure it's a truthful expression, conforms to the story and even adds some special color or tone to it. Everyone knows that brooks babble and thunder rumbles. But what do they really sound like to the character that's hearing them. The writer owes it to his reader to write the truth and not slide through an event on the skate board of the ordinary.
I feel a sense of obligation and responsibility. I have been given the gift of the English language. I want to use it to the best of my ability and beyond, no matter how difficult it is.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
____________________
Save a slice for me.
************************
Monday, June 8, 2009
Life's Lunacy 6/08/09
We build where monsters used to hide themselves.
Longfellow
***************
Welcome to my cage.
-------------------
I think it's possible that we are all born screaming, drooling, pooping mad, which is why, like any mental case, we have to be confined to cradles, cribs and carriages, and growing up is simply a process of trying to get sane. The questions are: Why, with all of our civilization, education, culture and society, does it take so long and why do some people never do it.
Within hours after it's born a deer knows it's a deer and has the fundamentals of survival down already. Whereas we humans just screw up our faces into an ugly mask and scream as loudly as we can. And the only thing we think we know is that if we do it long enough eventually someone will come by to do something. Meanwhile the fawn is cavorting in the forest with glee. Surely we, as the supposedly more intelligent creature, can come up with a better way of dealing with life. But no. We hold on to our insanity for as long as we can.
People do crazy things their whole lives and never question them. They will become so passionate about a ball game as to actually get violent. They will sit for hours and watch a film, which is nothing more than a two dimensional moving mural, and think they're seeing real life. What's the difference between the crazy old bag lady pushing her shopping cart full of who knows what down the sidewalk and the guy who fills up his garage with stuff he will never look at again to the point where there is no room for his car? Bungee jumping. What could be nuttier than that? Politics perhaps.
We are all born with monsters in our heads. That's the only way I can explain it. We have awakened from some desperate nightmare into the bright light of the living. We emerge into reality, bruised and battered, after doing battle with some savage, chimeras and we want to let everybody know about it. So we lie there crying and kicking.
Then, as we grow, we go from lying around to crawling and then to walking, we translate drooling gibberish into actual speech, get something which is called "an education" and join the community of other mad men in the cuckoos nest.
And if perhaps some genius gains enough enlightenment to be able to lead us back into the sunshine of sanity by his clear golden rationality he frightens us. We eschew his company, confine him to the crib of a tenured university professorship and forget about him. Why? Because he's not normal, he doesn't conform, he doesn't think and do the things the rest of us do. He's crazy.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_________________
May you find what you are looking for.
********************
Longfellow
***************
Welcome to my cage.
-------------------
I think it's possible that we are all born screaming, drooling, pooping mad, which is why, like any mental case, we have to be confined to cradles, cribs and carriages, and growing up is simply a process of trying to get sane. The questions are: Why, with all of our civilization, education, culture and society, does it take so long and why do some people never do it.
Within hours after it's born a deer knows it's a deer and has the fundamentals of survival down already. Whereas we humans just screw up our faces into an ugly mask and scream as loudly as we can. And the only thing we think we know is that if we do it long enough eventually someone will come by to do something. Meanwhile the fawn is cavorting in the forest with glee. Surely we, as the supposedly more intelligent creature, can come up with a better way of dealing with life. But no. We hold on to our insanity for as long as we can.
People do crazy things their whole lives and never question them. They will become so passionate about a ball game as to actually get violent. They will sit for hours and watch a film, which is nothing more than a two dimensional moving mural, and think they're seeing real life. What's the difference between the crazy old bag lady pushing her shopping cart full of who knows what down the sidewalk and the guy who fills up his garage with stuff he will never look at again to the point where there is no room for his car? Bungee jumping. What could be nuttier than that? Politics perhaps.
We are all born with monsters in our heads. That's the only way I can explain it. We have awakened from some desperate nightmare into the bright light of the living. We emerge into reality, bruised and battered, after doing battle with some savage, chimeras and we want to let everybody know about it. So we lie there crying and kicking.
Then, as we grow, we go from lying around to crawling and then to walking, we translate drooling gibberish into actual speech, get something which is called "an education" and join the community of other mad men in the cuckoos nest.
And if perhaps some genius gains enough enlightenment to be able to lead us back into the sunshine of sanity by his clear golden rationality he frightens us. We eschew his company, confine him to the crib of a tenured university professorship and forget about him. Why? Because he's not normal, he doesn't conform, he doesn't think and do the things the rest of us do. He's crazy.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_________________
May you find what you are looking for.
********************
Sunday, June 7, 2009
Kinetic Kindness 6/07/09
We are incessantly moved by the stream of time, and the change of sensations resultant from it.
Immanuel Kant
*****************
Hi. If you were affected by that awful Tagged scam yesterday, I am so sorry it happened to you. I had nothing to do with it. It was sending out messages all over the world, without my knowledge. Know that if I invite you to join some social network as my friend, or whatever, it is probably not from me. If, by some remote chance it is, I will let you know that ahead of time. This is about what snagged us:
Tagged.com Email Scam - "Your Friend Tagged You" - Phishing for Your Identity
------------------------------------------------
Be sure to checkout the Weekend Puzzle below. It is legitimate.
__________________________________
I was just thinking this morning about how much I have changed over the years. When I reflect on certain events and recall what my behavior was at those times I can feel regrets. But I find that knowing I will not do those things anymore is a partial treatment for those regrets. I have done a lot of things in my life I'm not proud of. Who hasn't? Today, I take no particular pride in knowing that I won't do those things again if the opportunity occurs. It's more a matter of feeling cleansed from much of the sarcasm, judgmentalism and negativity of the past. In short, I'm a nicer guy than I used to be.
It is also a satisfaction, and somewhat of a surprise, to find that a person can float on "the stream of time" into senior citizenship, even with illness. pain and trouble, without becoming curmudgeonly nasty with a basic distaste for life, as has happened to some guys, unfortunately.
I ignore the evil angel that talks of dissolution and decrepitude. I feel as much alive as ever but with a whole different set of sensations. The challenge of making a living has been replaced by the one of walking down the street. That's where the humor is. As I wrote to someone recently, I write because I think and I think because my mind is just about the only part of me that still works right.
I have come to not taking for granted many things. I know there is a future and that things change. I look forward to it.
"He's a tough old bastard." You betcha.
DB
_______________
Let Springdom Ring
*****************
WEEKEND PUZZLE
Okay. Here you go.
Without cheating (i. e. Googling), how many of the following can you identify with their full titles? Warning, they get progressively more difficult. The correct answers and winners, if any (heh, heh, malignant chuckle), will appear after 9 p. m. EST on Sunday. So get busy. No cheating.
1. PIN
2. NASA
3. CORE
4. FAA
5. ASCAP
6. AFL-CIO
7. AGVA
8. LASER
9. EDGAR
10. CARD
Good luck. You'll need it.
1 winner so far.
Immanuel Kant
*****************
Hi. If you were affected by that awful Tagged scam yesterday, I am so sorry it happened to you. I had nothing to do with it. It was sending out messages all over the world, without my knowledge. Know that if I invite you to join some social network as my friend, or whatever, it is probably not from me. If, by some remote chance it is, I will let you know that ahead of time. This is about what snagged us:
Tagged.com Email Scam - "Your Friend Tagged You" - Phishing for Your Identity
------------------------------------------------
Be sure to checkout the Weekend Puzzle below. It is legitimate.
__________________________________
I was just thinking this morning about how much I have changed over the years. When I reflect on certain events and recall what my behavior was at those times I can feel regrets. But I find that knowing I will not do those things anymore is a partial treatment for those regrets. I have done a lot of things in my life I'm not proud of. Who hasn't? Today, I take no particular pride in knowing that I won't do those things again if the opportunity occurs. It's more a matter of feeling cleansed from much of the sarcasm, judgmentalism and negativity of the past. In short, I'm a nicer guy than I used to be.
It is also a satisfaction, and somewhat of a surprise, to find that a person can float on "the stream of time" into senior citizenship, even with illness. pain and trouble, without becoming curmudgeonly nasty with a basic distaste for life, as has happened to some guys, unfortunately.
I ignore the evil angel that talks of dissolution and decrepitude. I feel as much alive as ever but with a whole different set of sensations. The challenge of making a living has been replaced by the one of walking down the street. That's where the humor is. As I wrote to someone recently, I write because I think and I think because my mind is just about the only part of me that still works right.
I have come to not taking for granted many things. I know there is a future and that things change. I look forward to it.
"He's a tough old bastard." You betcha.
DB
_______________
Let Springdom Ring
*****************
WEEKEND PUZZLE
Okay. Here you go.
Without cheating (i. e. Googling), how many of the following can you identify with their full titles? Warning, they get progressively more difficult. The correct answers and winners, if any (heh, heh, malignant chuckle), will appear after 9 p. m. EST on Sunday. So get busy. No cheating.
1. PIN
2. NASA
3. CORE
4. FAA
5. ASCAP
6. AFL-CIO
7. AGVA
8. LASER
9. EDGAR
10. CARD
Good luck. You'll need it.
1 winner so far.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Jotting Jobs 6/06/09
We work in the dark - we do what we can - we give what we have.
Henry James
************
A hearty good weekend to you.
------------------
Never call anyone a dope. We are all dopes, when you get right down to it. What I know can barely get me to the post office and back. What I don't know can get me to the edge of the universe and back. No matter how much I learn I am still in the dark about most things. Is that a good reason to stop trying to learn things? Of course not.
When I retired 8 years ago I naturally was urged to do what I had looked forward to doing, full time reading of the topics that interest me, which includes almost everything. I became and am a voracious reader of books, magazines, newspapers, cereal boxes, can and bottle labels, matchbooks, etc. It has led me into some surprising discoveries, some of which show up in my journal, from time to time.
Since I started reading my eyesight has dimmed a bit. Sometimes I have to read with a magnifying glass, so reading is slow going. But, one of these days, ONE OF THESE DAYS, I'll be able to get some reading glasses and then, Watch out !
During my working life I felt I was in the dark most of the time. I think any thing is on the job training no matter how well prepared you are when you go into it, whether it's rocket science or motherhood. Acting was much of a mystery to me all the years I did it. Along the way I noticed that those for whom it was not a mystery were not very good at it.
The common thread throughput my career, as it is with any important enterprise, was the act of giving. I had a talent, which is the word used to differentiate the performer from all the other people involved in theatre or film: such as "Who's the talent on this one?" But one does not get by on talent alone, at least not for long. After "talent" comes the hard work, and that's where the joy of giving comes in. I don't think there is an artist alive who doesn't feel that his talent and ability is a gift and that the work to turn that into something beautiful and meaningful for other people is his gift to life and to the world.
It's a strange thing in life that we don't seem to get as much as we give. We put out 100 per cent and we get back 50 (if we're lucky). And while it's true that some people seem to get back 200 after giving out 20, that's an exception.
There's an old saying in show business "Give me a bare board and a passion." In other words give me a place to stand up and something that moves my heart and my mind and I will entertain you. Al Jolson used to stop people on the street blow a tone on his pitch pipe and sing for them. If a painter has no canvas, paints or brushes he can make a beautiful picture with a jar of ink and a stick, if he's really an artist. I studied drawing with a teacher who actually made us do that, on a hunk of shelf paper.
Every time we recite a poem, sing a song or draw a picture we get one step closer to the edge of the universe. And it doesn't matter what your occupation is, if it's a giving thing you're on the same journey. As the old song puts it, "It ain't what you do, it's the way that you do it."
DB - Vagabond Journeys
___________________
Let your light shine. Please.
*******************
WEEKEND PUZZLE
Okay. Here you go.
Without cheating (i. e. Googling), how many of the following can you identify with their full titles? Warning, they get progressively more difficult. The correct answers and winners, if any (heh, heh, malignant chuckle), will appear after 9 p. m. EST on Sunday. So get busy. No cheating.
1. PIN
2. NASA
3. CORE
4. FAA
5. ASCAP
6. AFL-CIO
7. AGVA
8. LASER
9. EDGAR
10. CARD
1 winner so far
Good luck. You'll need it.
Henry James
************
A hearty good weekend to you.
------------------
Never call anyone a dope. We are all dopes, when you get right down to it. What I know can barely get me to the post office and back. What I don't know can get me to the edge of the universe and back. No matter how much I learn I am still in the dark about most things. Is that a good reason to stop trying to learn things? Of course not.
When I retired 8 years ago I naturally was urged to do what I had looked forward to doing, full time reading of the topics that interest me, which includes almost everything. I became and am a voracious reader of books, magazines, newspapers, cereal boxes, can and bottle labels, matchbooks, etc. It has led me into some surprising discoveries, some of which show up in my journal, from time to time.
Since I started reading my eyesight has dimmed a bit. Sometimes I have to read with a magnifying glass, so reading is slow going. But, one of these days, ONE OF THESE DAYS, I'll be able to get some reading glasses and then, Watch out !
During my working life I felt I was in the dark most of the time. I think any thing is on the job training no matter how well prepared you are when you go into it, whether it's rocket science or motherhood. Acting was much of a mystery to me all the years I did it. Along the way I noticed that those for whom it was not a mystery were not very good at it.
The common thread throughput my career, as it is with any important enterprise, was the act of giving. I had a talent, which is the word used to differentiate the performer from all the other people involved in theatre or film: such as "Who's the talent on this one?" But one does not get by on talent alone, at least not for long. After "talent" comes the hard work, and that's where the joy of giving comes in. I don't think there is an artist alive who doesn't feel that his talent and ability is a gift and that the work to turn that into something beautiful and meaningful for other people is his gift to life and to the world.
It's a strange thing in life that we don't seem to get as much as we give. We put out 100 per cent and we get back 50 (if we're lucky). And while it's true that some people seem to get back 200 after giving out 20, that's an exception.
There's an old saying in show business "Give me a bare board and a passion." In other words give me a place to stand up and something that moves my heart and my mind and I will entertain you. Al Jolson used to stop people on the street blow a tone on his pitch pipe and sing for them. If a painter has no canvas, paints or brushes he can make a beautiful picture with a jar of ink and a stick, if he's really an artist. I studied drawing with a teacher who actually made us do that, on a hunk of shelf paper.
Every time we recite a poem, sing a song or draw a picture we get one step closer to the edge of the universe. And it doesn't matter what your occupation is, if it's a giving thing you're on the same journey. As the old song puts it, "It ain't what you do, it's the way that you do it."
DB - Vagabond Journeys
___________________
Let your light shine. Please.
*******************
WEEKEND PUZZLE
Okay. Here you go.
Without cheating (i. e. Googling), how many of the following can you identify with their full titles? Warning, they get progressively more difficult. The correct answers and winners, if any (heh, heh, malignant chuckle), will appear after 9 p. m. EST on Sunday. So get busy. No cheating.
1. PIN
2. NASA
3. CORE
4. FAA
5. ASCAP
6. AFL-CIO
7. AGVA
8. LASER
9. EDGAR
10. CARD
1 winner so far
Good luck. You'll need it.
Friday, June 5, 2009
Inimical Instructions 6/05/09
Don't let anyone tell you that it doesn't matter what you think. Of course it matters. Above all else thinking matters the most.
DB - The Vagabond
*********************
Greetings
______________________
Things that must be written, must be written.
I made an appointment and went to see a very wise man, a well known provider of good advice and positive, practical solutions to life's problems and difficulties, My problem was that I felt I had no purpose and direction in my life, that I was aimlessly working as an actor with no reason nor objective, that I really didn't have any value in the world. In response to his questions I told him about growing up.
My father died when I was 4 years old. They never told me that he died. All they said was that he wasn't coming back. My mother, my grandmother, my sister and my brother; none of them told me. They say that I cried for many days afterward. For the next 8 years I expected him to return. The phone would ring, there was a knock on the door, it might be my father. I would look out the windows of cars and buses to see if he was walking down the street. Why did he abandon me? It must be my fault. I wanted to find him, to apologize and bring him back home. Finally, at the age of about 12 years, I accepted that he was in truth never coming back. Why didn't they tell me? Why wasn't I valuable or important enough to be told the truth?
The relationship with my mother was adversarial, My brother and sister left shortly after that, but when they were around they either ignored me or were critical of me. There was no love. I was not liked at home.
I grew up without my father's wisdom, advice, judgment, encouragement or approval.
I missed him. Ironically, it was at my mother's funeral, 40 years later, that I could grieve for him. At the cemetary I was placed in a chair directly over my father's grave and for the first time I read his tombstone. He was a young man when he went, only 53. He was a Lieutenant/Colonel in the U.S. Army. I wanted,with all my heart, to know the guy and wanted him to know me, his son. I wept.
"There is a sacredness in tears" Washington Irving said
As I spoke on with that wise man, I told him about the influences on my life after my father's death. How I had been criticized and minimized and disapproved of by everyone around me. How I had fought to reject other people's opinions of me and how I was trying to establish in my own thinking a positive structure of self-respect and self-approval but that I was having trouble doing it and needed help. Then this wise man, the purveyor of positive advice and well being said to me "Well, fortunately it makes no difference what you think."
How, after listening to my tale of deprivation and woe, could this wise man, this guru of positive thinking, this friend of mankind, this generous and compassionate dispenser of good, sound advice tell me that it makes no difference what I think?
I left his office believing him, and his words sank down into the very bottom of my being. After losing my father and not told why, after the scorn and resentment from members of my family and to be told it doesn't matter what I think, I realized what I was: a useless thumb on the hand of the world, a worthless appendage that needed to be amputated, something taking up space for no reason. As someone once said to me "I don't understand why you're still alive."
Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made:
Those are pearls that were his eyes;
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange,
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:
Hark! now I hear them, ding-dong, bell.
Shakespeare
In my mid 50s, when I had outlived my father, I began to understand some things. I began to put some pieces together and throw out some others. I may be a worthless and annoying hunk of junk as far as the world is concerned, I thought, but I was still alive, I was working, supporting myself and entertaining people. And if there was only one thing I knew it was that it did matter what I thought. My thinking was just as valid and important to the world as anyone else's. Thinking matters the most. And one who thinks is not a useless appendage, taking up space. That's something my father might have taught me when I was just a boy.
Shakespeare also wrote "There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so."
Even today, at 70, I miss my father. I miss what we might have meant to each other. I want the love only a father can give. I want the advice of someone who cares about me. I want the companionship of the man I can look up to and admire. I want the words of encouragement and approval from the man who is grateful I was born and is glad I'm alive. I want my Dad.
DB
*****************
DB - The Vagabond
*********************
Greetings
______________________
Things that must be written, must be written.
I made an appointment and went to see a very wise man, a well known provider of good advice and positive, practical solutions to life's problems and difficulties, My problem was that I felt I had no purpose and direction in my life, that I was aimlessly working as an actor with no reason nor objective, that I really didn't have any value in the world. In response to his questions I told him about growing up.
My father died when I was 4 years old. They never told me that he died. All they said was that he wasn't coming back. My mother, my grandmother, my sister and my brother; none of them told me. They say that I cried for many days afterward. For the next 8 years I expected him to return. The phone would ring, there was a knock on the door, it might be my father. I would look out the windows of cars and buses to see if he was walking down the street. Why did he abandon me? It must be my fault. I wanted to find him, to apologize and bring him back home. Finally, at the age of about 12 years, I accepted that he was in truth never coming back. Why didn't they tell me? Why wasn't I valuable or important enough to be told the truth?
The relationship with my mother was adversarial, My brother and sister left shortly after that, but when they were around they either ignored me or were critical of me. There was no love. I was not liked at home.
I grew up without my father's wisdom, advice, judgment, encouragement or approval.
I missed him. Ironically, it was at my mother's funeral, 40 years later, that I could grieve for him. At the cemetary I was placed in a chair directly over my father's grave and for the first time I read his tombstone. He was a young man when he went, only 53. He was a Lieutenant/Colonel in the U.S. Army. I wanted,with all my heart, to know the guy and wanted him to know me, his son. I wept.
"There is a sacredness in tears" Washington Irving said
As I spoke on with that wise man, I told him about the influences on my life after my father's death. How I had been criticized and minimized and disapproved of by everyone around me. How I had fought to reject other people's opinions of me and how I was trying to establish in my own thinking a positive structure of self-respect and self-approval but that I was having trouble doing it and needed help. Then this wise man, the purveyor of positive advice and well being said to me "Well, fortunately it makes no difference what you think."
How, after listening to my tale of deprivation and woe, could this wise man, this guru of positive thinking, this friend of mankind, this generous and compassionate dispenser of good, sound advice tell me that it makes no difference what I think?
I left his office believing him, and his words sank down into the very bottom of my being. After losing my father and not told why, after the scorn and resentment from members of my family and to be told it doesn't matter what I think, I realized what I was: a useless thumb on the hand of the world, a worthless appendage that needed to be amputated, something taking up space for no reason. As someone once said to me "I don't understand why you're still alive."
Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made:
Those are pearls that were his eyes;
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange,
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:
Hark! now I hear them, ding-dong, bell.
Shakespeare
In my mid 50s, when I had outlived my father, I began to understand some things. I began to put some pieces together and throw out some others. I may be a worthless and annoying hunk of junk as far as the world is concerned, I thought, but I was still alive, I was working, supporting myself and entertaining people. And if there was only one thing I knew it was that it did matter what I thought. My thinking was just as valid and important to the world as anyone else's. Thinking matters the most. And one who thinks is not a useless appendage, taking up space. That's something my father might have taught me when I was just a boy.
Shakespeare also wrote "There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so."
Even today, at 70, I miss my father. I miss what we might have meant to each other. I want the love only a father can give. I want the advice of someone who cares about me. I want the companionship of the man I can look up to and admire. I want the words of encouragement and approval from the man who is grateful I was born and is glad I'm alive. I want my Dad.
DB
*****************
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Hidden Heroics 6/04/09
The vision of a champion is bent over, drenched in sweat, at the point of exhaustion, when nobody else is looking.
Mia Hamm
*******************
Hello again.
--------------------------
Life is hard enough as it is, but to face it with no one around who cares about you, especially if you have stacked up some decades on yourself, is difficult indeed. Aloneness is a preferable condition under some circumstances, but when the tasks are done, the challenges met and the fears overcome it's so good to have someone with you who can share your victory.
The real heroics are never seen on the ball field, the stage or the orchestra pit. We see only the results: a scoreless game, an inspiring performance, the reaching into the higher levels of feeling and human experience by the musicians. The real heroics are invisible things, mental things. We cannot see them going on.
The nurse closes the curtain and leaves the room. Now the patient is alone facing fear, dealing with pain, desperate and unsure of what will happen, but fighting to stay alive, to get healthy, to survive. And there is no one there to see it.
I did a very difficult, vigorous and demanding solo dance in a musical. When it was over, panting for breath and sweating, I had to climb,a flight of stairs to my dressing room. I was so bowed over with exhaustion that it was all I could do to look at myself in the mirror to see if I was still all right. No one was there.
I spent one winter living in a farm house down a long dirt road in the north country. One freezing cold day while cutting some fire wood from downed branches the saw slipped and cut into my finger right down to the bone. I quickly shut down the saw and went inside. There were no bandages or anything of that sort in the house that I knew of, but there was a roll of paper towel. I wrapped my finger in it and held it as tightly as I could. The pain was horrible and the blood was flowing, I had no phone to call for help. I had no transportation to take me to a doctor. The nearest neighbor was 6 miles away and they usually were locked up and gone for the winter. I was alone and frightened.
Somehow I managed to feed myself and my cat and get a fire going in the wood stove, my only source of heat. I had to keep replacing the paper towel because of the blood. When I looked at the cleaned and open wound I could see the bone glistening in the light. I was afraid I was going to lose my finger, or worse. I was alone. There was no one there to whom I could explain my tears, show my panic or cry my pain.
The weeks went by. Slowly the wound healed, the bone strengthened, the flesh grew back, the skin grew over and now there's nothing left but a scar. And all that time, except for my friendly cat, I was alone.
If you have ever been bent over with fear and sorrow, drenched in sweat and tears, at the point of exhaustion, finality and surrender when no one was looking and you survived it, congratulate yourself, You're a champion.
DB Vagabond Journeys
_________________________
The glass is half empty? Well, fill it up.
*********************
Mia Hamm
*******************
Hello again.
--------------------------
Life is hard enough as it is, but to face it with no one around who cares about you, especially if you have stacked up some decades on yourself, is difficult indeed. Aloneness is a preferable condition under some circumstances, but when the tasks are done, the challenges met and the fears overcome it's so good to have someone with you who can share your victory.
The real heroics are never seen on the ball field, the stage or the orchestra pit. We see only the results: a scoreless game, an inspiring performance, the reaching into the higher levels of feeling and human experience by the musicians. The real heroics are invisible things, mental things. We cannot see them going on.
The nurse closes the curtain and leaves the room. Now the patient is alone facing fear, dealing with pain, desperate and unsure of what will happen, but fighting to stay alive, to get healthy, to survive. And there is no one there to see it.
I did a very difficult, vigorous and demanding solo dance in a musical. When it was over, panting for breath and sweating, I had to climb,a flight of stairs to my dressing room. I was so bowed over with exhaustion that it was all I could do to look at myself in the mirror to see if I was still all right. No one was there.
I spent one winter living in a farm house down a long dirt road in the north country. One freezing cold day while cutting some fire wood from downed branches the saw slipped and cut into my finger right down to the bone. I quickly shut down the saw and went inside. There were no bandages or anything of that sort in the house that I knew of, but there was a roll of paper towel. I wrapped my finger in it and held it as tightly as I could. The pain was horrible and the blood was flowing, I had no phone to call for help. I had no transportation to take me to a doctor. The nearest neighbor was 6 miles away and they usually were locked up and gone for the winter. I was alone and frightened.
Somehow I managed to feed myself and my cat and get a fire going in the wood stove, my only source of heat. I had to keep replacing the paper towel because of the blood. When I looked at the cleaned and open wound I could see the bone glistening in the light. I was afraid I was going to lose my finger, or worse. I was alone. There was no one there to whom I could explain my tears, show my panic or cry my pain.
The weeks went by. Slowly the wound healed, the bone strengthened, the flesh grew back, the skin grew over and now there's nothing left but a scar. And all that time, except for my friendly cat, I was alone.
If you have ever been bent over with fear and sorrow, drenched in sweat and tears, at the point of exhaustion, finality and surrender when no one was looking and you survived it, congratulate yourself, You're a champion.
DB Vagabond Journeys
_________________________
The glass is half empty? Well, fill it up.
*********************
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Guarded Genius 6/03/09
There are two kinds of people, those who do the work and those who take the credit. Try to be in the first group, there is less competition there.
Indira Gandhi
***************
Hello. Are you there?
-------------------
To me one of the saddest stories in the Bible is Ecclesiastes 9: 14, 15.
"There was a little city, and few men within it; and there came a great king against it, and besieged it, and built great bulwarks against it; now there was found in it a poor, wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city; yet no man remembered that same poor man."
What the mighty king wanted with this little city is a mystery. Perhaps it was in a strategic location. Whatever, it was important enough to built great walls of defense against it. The king was obviously, and probably incorrectly, expecting the little city to mount a fierce counter attack. And why did he put it under siege, allowing no access or egress until it ran out of food and had to surrender. Why didn't he just overrun it if he was such a "great king"?
Nevertheless, "there was found in the city a poor, wise man." Why did he have to be found? Was he hiding? I doubt it. Was he the only wise man in the city? Being poor, was he living in a hovel down a back alley perhaps, barely able to feed himself and his dog? And how did he save the city? Did he come up with some scheme to frighten the mighty king and his army to make them run away? Did he go out and negotiate with the king? And why would the mighty king give audience to a poor man? Kings don't usually discuss things with paupers.
Well, whatever he did it worked. The kings army packed up and left, and the poor man went back to his hovel with his dog knowing that he and his neighbors could sleep in peace.
No doubt the self important mayor, being a good politician, congratulated himself and his fellow citizens for their courage and commitment in protecting their freedoms, their rights and their way of life.
We will never know what the poor, wise man did to save the city. He never stepped forward to claim the credit. Besides he was just a bum who lived in a hovel and wasn't worth a damn. So they forgot about him.
I have seen it happen in my days. I'm sure you have also. Someone stands up, takes the credit, the award, the appreciation and applause for something he didn't do, oblivious to the existence of the one who actually did it. And often the genius who was really responsible is sitting and applauding with the rest.
As President Harry Truman said "It's amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit."
DB - The Vagabond
__________________
A blessing on you, whoever you are.
********************
Indira Gandhi
***************
Hello. Are you there?
-------------------
To me one of the saddest stories in the Bible is Ecclesiastes 9: 14, 15.
"There was a little city, and few men within it; and there came a great king against it, and besieged it, and built great bulwarks against it; now there was found in it a poor, wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city; yet no man remembered that same poor man."
What the mighty king wanted with this little city is a mystery. Perhaps it was in a strategic location. Whatever, it was important enough to built great walls of defense against it. The king was obviously, and probably incorrectly, expecting the little city to mount a fierce counter attack. And why did he put it under siege, allowing no access or egress until it ran out of food and had to surrender. Why didn't he just overrun it if he was such a "great king"?
Nevertheless, "there was found in the city a poor, wise man." Why did he have to be found? Was he hiding? I doubt it. Was he the only wise man in the city? Being poor, was he living in a hovel down a back alley perhaps, barely able to feed himself and his dog? And how did he save the city? Did he come up with some scheme to frighten the mighty king and his army to make them run away? Did he go out and negotiate with the king? And why would the mighty king give audience to a poor man? Kings don't usually discuss things with paupers.
Well, whatever he did it worked. The kings army packed up and left, and the poor man went back to his hovel with his dog knowing that he and his neighbors could sleep in peace.
No doubt the self important mayor, being a good politician, congratulated himself and his fellow citizens for their courage and commitment in protecting their freedoms, their rights and their way of life.
We will never know what the poor, wise man did to save the city. He never stepped forward to claim the credit. Besides he was just a bum who lived in a hovel and wasn't worth a damn. So they forgot about him.
I have seen it happen in my days. I'm sure you have also. Someone stands up, takes the credit, the award, the appreciation and applause for something he didn't do, oblivious to the existence of the one who actually did it. And often the genius who was really responsible is sitting and applauding with the rest.
As President Harry Truman said "It's amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit."
DB - The Vagabond
__________________
A blessing on you, whoever you are.
********************
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Fertilized Freedom 5/02/09
Education's purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.
Malcolm Forbes
****************
Good day to you.
---------------------
One of the strangest and most dangerous human aberrations is the inability to listen to an idea outside of one's prejudice without becoming enraged. Unfortunately we have seen a lot of that lately on the public political scene. I have also seen it in my private life.
When I was in high school we were told which textbooks to buy for the various classes, as was normal. Being a good student I carefully studied those books, on government, history and literature, believing I was reading a legitimate, unbiased account of those topics. As a grew up, got out into the world and heard and read other points of view, my mind broadened to accept the possibility of different ideas. Decades went by and one day I came across some of those high school texts that had somehow ended up in my sister's library. I read through them again and was stunned to find how one sided much of the writing was and how viciously the authors attacked the ideas they didn't agree with, some of which I had come to accept. The editorial content of the textbooks simply expressed the prejudices of my teachers. I went back further to consider what I had carried over from my sub-standard elementary school, remembering the scornful remarks of some of those teachers about certain ideas. It seems that my education was narrow minded, not open minded. My thinking had been closed up in a box, and I didn't know it. Fortunately I survived it, I hope. Some don't.
For over a year I have been making daily observations in this journal about ideas, events and human life. If I express my own opinion, I say so. Last year a friend of mine, an actor who I had worked with a few times and who I thought was a good guy, asked if he could be included on my list of those who receive my daily dollops of delight. So I did. But immediately he began responding to them in a very rude and scornful manner. He simply did not want to read anything that didn't conform to his vew of the world nor what he was convinced was the only truth. He finally said "Don't send me this crap." So I stopped.
The purpose of my journal has been all along to allow myself and others to think about things, to ponder and consider with an open, active mind the ideas that come across my desk. My motive has been out of respect and appreciation for the infinite and fascinating complexities of the universe of human thought. The reason for reading anything written by a thinking person (and I humbly consider myself one of those) is to provide nourishment for the heart, mind and soul. To disagree is healthy provided it comes from careful thinking and articulated with respect. But to a priori slam the door in the face of an opposing idea no matter how clear and thoughtful it is makes one a dangerous fool, in my opinion.
DB The Vagabond
________________
Suddenly it's June. Imagine that.
*****************************
Malcolm Forbes
****************
Good day to you.
---------------------
One of the strangest and most dangerous human aberrations is the inability to listen to an idea outside of one's prejudice without becoming enraged. Unfortunately we have seen a lot of that lately on the public political scene. I have also seen it in my private life.
When I was in high school we were told which textbooks to buy for the various classes, as was normal. Being a good student I carefully studied those books, on government, history and literature, believing I was reading a legitimate, unbiased account of those topics. As a grew up, got out into the world and heard and read other points of view, my mind broadened to accept the possibility of different ideas. Decades went by and one day I came across some of those high school texts that had somehow ended up in my sister's library. I read through them again and was stunned to find how one sided much of the writing was and how viciously the authors attacked the ideas they didn't agree with, some of which I had come to accept. The editorial content of the textbooks simply expressed the prejudices of my teachers. I went back further to consider what I had carried over from my sub-standard elementary school, remembering the scornful remarks of some of those teachers about certain ideas. It seems that my education was narrow minded, not open minded. My thinking had been closed up in a box, and I didn't know it. Fortunately I survived it, I hope. Some don't.
For over a year I have been making daily observations in this journal about ideas, events and human life. If I express my own opinion, I say so. Last year a friend of mine, an actor who I had worked with a few times and who I thought was a good guy, asked if he could be included on my list of those who receive my daily dollops of delight. So I did. But immediately he began responding to them in a very rude and scornful manner. He simply did not want to read anything that didn't conform to his vew of the world nor what he was convinced was the only truth. He finally said "Don't send me this crap." So I stopped.
The purpose of my journal has been all along to allow myself and others to think about things, to ponder and consider with an open, active mind the ideas that come across my desk. My motive has been out of respect and appreciation for the infinite and fascinating complexities of the universe of human thought. The reason for reading anything written by a thinking person (and I humbly consider myself one of those) is to provide nourishment for the heart, mind and soul. To disagree is healthy provided it comes from careful thinking and articulated with respect. But to a priori slam the door in the face of an opposing idea no matter how clear and thoughtful it is makes one a dangerous fool, in my opinion.
DB The Vagabond
________________
Suddenly it's June. Imagine that.
*****************************
Monday, June 1, 2009
Evil's Enemy 6/01/09
A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions and the roots spring up and make new trees.
Emelia Earhart
*****************
'Lo.
-----------------------
This is what kindness can do. It can feed a hungry child, ease the pain of an injured man, help the handicapped, guide the blind, rescue a suffering animal, provide for the poor, care for the elderly, visit the shut-in, educate the ignorant, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless and befriend the lonely stranger. But those things are only the beginning,
A kind act has a huge benefit attached to it that the care giver isn't even aware of at the time. A kind deed thrusts a sharp spear right into the very heart of evil.
There are many ways of being unkind, compassionless and unmerciful and many reasons for it. Self-justification is a popular one. "I'm just taking care of myself and my family. That's difficult enough. Why should I care about anyone else? That's their problem." Ignorance is another one. I'm reminded of the remark a woman made about wanting to give her leftover Thanksgiving dinner to the homeless but she didn't know where they lived. Tucked into one's safe and reasonably happy home it's easy to become benignly unaware of the desperation down the street. Then there are the religious reasons, which are the most insidious. It's alright to be cruel under certain circumstances because the Bible says this and the Koran says that and my guru saya the other thing and traditions must be followed.
Evil relishes the idea of going out into the gladiatorial arena and doing battle with kindness, charity, love and mercy. But in that arena evil has only one weapon. And that weapon is the human mind.
If evil can get you to believe that it's alright to kill, maim, torture, forget, ignore, turn away from, overlook, stay home, and let others take care of things because you can't be bothered, then evil has won the day.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
*********************
May you find unexpected joy today.
__________________________
SPRING QUIZ
THIS IS NOT A CONTEST
What do you think was the most important event of 2008? and
What was the most significant event in your life last year?
You have all Spring to answer if you wish.
15 responses so far.
Leave answers on my email dbdacoba@aol.com or on my journal
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/. Thank you. DB
Emelia Earhart
*****************
'Lo.
-----------------------
This is what kindness can do. It can feed a hungry child, ease the pain of an injured man, help the handicapped, guide the blind, rescue a suffering animal, provide for the poor, care for the elderly, visit the shut-in, educate the ignorant, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless and befriend the lonely stranger. But those things are only the beginning,
A kind act has a huge benefit attached to it that the care giver isn't even aware of at the time. A kind deed thrusts a sharp spear right into the very heart of evil.
There are many ways of being unkind, compassionless and unmerciful and many reasons for it. Self-justification is a popular one. "I'm just taking care of myself and my family. That's difficult enough. Why should I care about anyone else? That's their problem." Ignorance is another one. I'm reminded of the remark a woman made about wanting to give her leftover Thanksgiving dinner to the homeless but she didn't know where they lived. Tucked into one's safe and reasonably happy home it's easy to become benignly unaware of the desperation down the street. Then there are the religious reasons, which are the most insidious. It's alright to be cruel under certain circumstances because the Bible says this and the Koran says that and my guru saya the other thing and traditions must be followed.
Evil relishes the idea of going out into the gladiatorial arena and doing battle with kindness, charity, love and mercy. But in that arena evil has only one weapon. And that weapon is the human mind.
If evil can get you to believe that it's alright to kill, maim, torture, forget, ignore, turn away from, overlook, stay home, and let others take care of things because you can't be bothered, then evil has won the day.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
*********************
May you find unexpected joy today.
__________________________
SPRING QUIZ
THIS IS NOT A CONTEST
What do you think was the most important event of 2008? and
What was the most significant event in your life last year?
You have all Spring to answer if you wish.
15 responses so far.
Leave answers on my email dbdacoba@aol.com or on my journal
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/. Thank you. DB
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