Vagabond 196

Vagabondism #196 "If you must talk foolishness at least try to make it eloquent." http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/

Red

There is no beautifier of complexion or form of behavior like the wish to scatter joy around us.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Hello Lily
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I'm red.

I guess I have always been a misfit, as far as the rest of the world is concerned, as far as the "normal people" are concerned. I'm called unusual, eccentric, paradoxical, bizarre. "That DB is weird."

I'm what they used to call a "nonconformist" especially when it comes to holidays. I almost never send out Christmas cards. One year I tried making my own. They were a disaster. I won't do that again. The only time I marched in a 4th of July parade I stopped the parade by getting the American flag caught in a tree. I spent one New Years Eve in Times Square. I never did that again even though I lived a few blocks away from it for 20 years. And I certainly don't go tricking or treating on Halloween, and never did as far as I can remember.

But a few decades ago I went to a Halloween party. Well, I didn't actually go to it. It came to me. I had been out of town doing a show and arrived back the day before Halloween to discover that my girl friend had planned a party and had invited a lot of people. It was too late for me to find any sort of costume, so I thought I would just make myself absent until the next day. But she insisted she wanted me at the party.

She had some bright red, shiny, material that she was never going to use, so she made some quick measurements of me, cut up the cloth, sat down at her sewing machine and made some trousers and a pull over shirt. It was a terrible fit, but it was temporary clothing anyway so it didn't matter. I had my make up case with me so I dug out the rouge and painted my face and my hands red. She found a red knit cap in her closet and put it on my head. We couldn't find any red socks, alas, and the red shoes (those ruby shoes) were still with Dorothy in Kansas as far as we knew. So from head to almost toe I was "Red."

Many people showed up at the party in all sorts of costumes, angels, ghosts, fairies, TV and cartoon characters. At first I was getting a lot of strange remarks. "Who are you?" "I'm red." Or "Are you supposed to be the devil?" "No, I'm red." Or "Red who?" "Just red." Or "You mean you're the color red?" "Yes. I'm red. Can't you tell?"

The food was being eaten, the beer and tequila flowed and folks were having a jolly time. Soon people got used to me and enjoyed the disguise. "Hey Red, you want another beer?"

After that I thought why not. Why do you have to dress up as some sort of humanoid. Why not come as a refrigerator or a tree, or a bass violin or a ballet slipper. Or a color.

Those who live outside the spectrum of the expected, the ordinary, the normal, the traditional, often see things others can't see.

The one red leaf, the last of its clan,
That dances as often as dance it can,
Hanging so light, and hanging so high,
At the top most twig that looks up at the sky.

(Samuel Taylor Coleridge)
(Thank you Sue)

DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 5 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I eagerly await your answers.
DB
********************

October Snow

The world is a strange affair.

Moliere
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Hello Diane
***************
Yesterday was October 29, a nice warm Autumn day with pretty leaves and cool gentle breezes, birds cheerily chirping around the bird bath. Right? Wrong. It dropped to below freezing here and it snowed. A classic Winter day. Folks here in the northeast were in a state of shock. The car isn't winterized yet, the snow tires are still in the garage and there's ice on the roads. The boots and parkas are in the back of the closet and you can't find the mittens. Where's the snow shovel? You had an appointment to have the furnace checked but the man couldn't get to you because he was snowed in.

Trees came down, power lines came down, you can't watch the football game or hear the weather forecast. What's for dinner? Cold cuts. What's the loud scraping sound? It's the snow plow going down your street.

Will there be a snow man on the village green? Will you get hit by a snow ball? Will you throw one? Will they run the New York City Marathon in snow shoes this year.

It is impossible to be prepared for every eventuality in life, particularly when it comes to the shenanigans that Mother Nature pulls, but it does make sense to refrain from undue shock. Anything is possible. We might as well get used to it.

Trick or treat.

DB - The Original Vagabond
Never Give Up
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 5 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 194

Vagabondism #194 "Eat an apple every day from the tree of wisdom and plant the seeds in someone’s garden."
http://vagabondjottings.blogspot.com/

A Patch Of Ground

That sun's gonna' shine in my backyard some day.

Jim Kweskin
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Hello Teresa
***************
In New York City, as I'm sure in other cities, there are abodes known as "Garden Apartments." In New York they are ground floor apartments with a plot of land at the back. The plots in Manhattan are quite small, four giant steps will take you across one, and they have fences or walls at the edges to separate your plot from your neighbor's plot next door.

What people do with these plots are as varied as there are people living with them and they tend to express the character of those people. I was lucky. The man who lived on the ground floor of my building on West 75th Street had a small tree and a nice array of flowers growing in his. I was on the third floor and my place had a terrace in the back, so I could look down on his garden.

The man who lived across from us, on the 76th Street side, only grew grass in his. And once a week he would mow it with a mammoth lawn mower which made an unimaginable noise. He didn't care how much it disturbed his neighbors.

There were interesting stories about some of the other backyards in Manhattan. One man built a shed and kept a goat. He fed and took care of the goat and it would sometimes come out of the shed and eat whatever was growing in the plot of ground. I knew a couple who built a large cage with a roof and kept two wild bobcats in there. In the early days of the NY State Lottery, the first city resident to win it said he was going to retire, put in a tomato patch and tend it. There was another resident who used the plot as a dump. He had nothing going on in there but weeds and trash. And there are some who are struggling to do well enough to turn their tiny plots of land into something nice, someday.

There are almost no alleys in New York, so those buildings abut each other and if you drove or walked down one of those streets you would see the facades of apartment buildings that looked in good shape, with several floors of windows and evidence of people living there, but you would have no idea what was in the backyard.

If you walk down any city street you can see people going one way or the other, some dressed in suits or skirts on their way to an office, some in workman's clothes, maybe a few carrying musical instruments. When you get to your own job you will see associates, colleagues, customers, representatives and others. In almost every case what you see are facades, the public faces, the professional covers of the books of their lives. And you cannot tell what actions, events, worries, griefs, gripes, mysteries and secrets are hidden away behind those facades.

Are they the confident, contented life of flowers and trees, the desperate noise of callous egotism, some sort of bestiality, a simple life of a tomato patch, a life of ruins or a struggle to make a good and happy life, someday?

DB - The Vagabond
(Never Give Up)
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 5 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 193

Vagabondism #193 "Be careful that the idols you worship don’t fall on you."
http://tinyurl.com/6xvgzz8

100 Visitors

Knowledge stamped on the heart makes one wise.

Beth Moore
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Hello Linda
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I felt that my last journal entry "No End In Sight" was important enough to get some response. even contentious comments from people who disagreed. But on Saturday, when I posted it, I received only 18 visits instead of my usual 30 to 40 (high 20's on a slow day). I thought that was pathetic.

The entry was an honest gift, an attempt to clear the air of some of the superstitious and limited thinking about the cosmos we live in and with. There are temptations engendered in some to treat the Bible and other sacred texts as historical documents. As a result there are always delusional people calculating the end of the world, even among the educated and intelligent. Why should this be? What brings a person to such a state of false belief?

The search for the living truth of our existence as items in the universal patterns is a struggle. It is a long voyage toward the ever expanding mental horizon. It seems easier to abandon the task altogether, to leave such matters to the solitary guru on the mountain top. But it also seems impossible so long as words like heaven, hell, judgement day, immortality , mortality and God are flung carelessly around the tables of discussion.

I fact it seems easier to rely on superstition, hearsay and what someone else has to say about any of those things than to face reasoning one's own way through the tangled foliage of misinterpretations. How many Christians believe that "an eye for an eye," and that if you live a virtuous life you will go to heaven when you die, is the word of God? And yet there was a Jewish man called Jesus Christ who came teaching the "glad tidings" of forgiveness, immortality and "the kingdom of heaven is within you." There was a man for whom everything that existed was a symbol, a trope, a parable. He insisted the people look beyond the obvious to learn the reality of it's meaning and when they couldn't do it he got frustrated and yelled at them.

I decided to leave my journal entry up until I got 100 visits, which happened yesterday (Thursday) afternoon. I know it doesn't mean that 100 people read it, but some of them did, and that's what I hoped for. And perhaps a few of them will begin, if they haven't already, to ponder the fact that there is wisdom, hidden, but in plain sight, with every flower, poem, natural law and powerful force of the universe.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
*************************
AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 5 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 192

Vagabondism #192 "You may open your arms wide to embrace the whole human race, but don’t take them all to bed with you."
dbdacoba@aol.com

No End In Sight

A myth is something which is not true on the outside, but is true on the inside.

Anonymous 4 year old girl.
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Hello Sue
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Well, the end of the world has come and gone again and except for another day gone by there is no appreciable change in most of our lives. I'm sure there are one or two young millenniumists waiting for their chance to calculate when the Day of Judgement is coming, the Great Catastrophe, the End of the World, the Rapture and the plummet into Hell of the Unbelievers. Their efforts will be just as futile of Mr Camping's and all the other prophets of doom that have existed throughout the ages.

One can play complex games with mathematics and come up with a precise date for the creation of Adam and end up nowhere. For two reasons. One, mathematics is a human method of calculation and not a divine one. "With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day." (2 Peter) And two, the story of the Garden of Eden is a myth, with it's man made out of mud, it's woman made from a rib, an evil tree and a talking snake. It's the truth inside that myth that's important to understand.

Believers are determined to hold on to the concept of an anthropomorphic god, a superior man who has a judgmental eye on every little thing we do, an all powerful creature whose main purpose is punishment and reward, a whimsical being who answers one man's prayers and not another's. It all comes from the bad habit, which is very hard to break, of reading sacred texts literally. The Bible was written by human beings for human beings and thus the words and images used are in human terms. As they must be. If one argues with this idea he will only be quoting human words to do it. Enlightenment comes to one who one day sees what is inside the words. But that can only happen if one is looking for it.

God did not give Moses an exhaustive and elaborate set of instructions about erecting a tabernacle, designing clothes for it's priests, butchering and sacrificing animals or a myriad of rules and regulations for human behavior. What Moses experienced on the mountain top was a vision, a flash of enlightenment, a kind of big bang of spirituality and he set about to describe in human terms what he experienced.

The Revelation of Saint John was not about candlesticks, men on horses, vials of plagues, a lamb prepared for slaughter, a woman descending from heaven surrounded by stars and a great red dragon. We don't know what he saw. All we know is his attempt to describe it in human terms.

I believe a genuine seer who had the purity of thought and the intense obligation could find the real meanings inside of all those symbols and trace them back to the original vision of Moses on the mountain top or of Saint John on the island. And if he got to that state of enlightenment he would find a God nothing at all like the one most people worship. There would be a God that doesn't reward and punish, that knows nothing of a Day of Judgement and that will not, cannot bring and end to It's creation.

Dan Bate - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 5 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 191

Vagabondism #191 "Be certain to partake of the good things in life, and don’t forget to share them." http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/

The Potters Wheel

The deeper that sorrow carves into your being the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?

Kahlil Gibran
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Hello Frosty
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I have a friend, David, who's a potter. I watched him work one day. I saw him brutally cut off a chunk of clay, thump it on the table and then throw the poor thing on a wheel. Then, while it was spinning within an inch of it's life he wet his hands and started strangling it. He forced it out of it's natural shape and then, as if that wasn't enough, he forced his thumbs into it and then his fingers and tortured it even worse into something round, Then he poked and scraped down into it's sensitive innards with some fiendish instruments, covered it all over with ugly sticky stuff and imprisoned it into an oven that was hotter than hell. When he finally rescued it, it was a beautiful, delicate, gentle bowl asking to be filled with the elixir of life.

I don't know about you, but I have been cut and thumped onto the hard surfaces by the meanness of life, thrown on the wheel and spun into fear, doubt and confusion, strangled with poverty, insecurity and tough times, pushed and squeezed with hard work until I was pulled apart, rebuilt and reformed, poked and scraped by lies and betrayals, glazed over with sweat and tears and baked in the oven of hellish experiences. And when they finally took me out I had a joyous smile on my face, an unquenchable appreciation for life and a sense of humor.
The pampered life is no life. The deep cuts made by the plow into our uncultivated being make the way for the seeds of genuine happiness, which is always much different from the simple lump of clay we start out thinking we are.

DB - The Vagabond
Never Give Up
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 5 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 190

Vagabondism #190 "Old folks are people who have been young longer than young folks."
dbdacoba@aol.com

Sing Along

If you are reluctant to change think of the beauty of autumn.

Unknown
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Hello Beth
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Yes, it's Autumn. Not the Fall. The Gathering. I know my name for it will never catch on, but that won't make me change my song. It's a gathering of crops, of experiences, of ideas. It's gathering up the experiences of Summer: the memories, the photographs, the new friendships. It's harvest time: the pumpkins, the squash, the corn, wood for the stove, hay for the barn. It's the gathering of ideas, of going back to school, of plans for the Winter, of investments of time and money. It's the gathering of friends and family for Thanksgiving, Christmas, Chanukah and other celebrations. It's the gathering up of the leaves in your back yard and sidewalk. As Gino, the down to earth owner of the diner in Northampton, used to joke "Yup. Mother Nature is taking off her clothes."

While the politicians on the Republican side chew each other up and spit each other out Autumn gently and surely progresses into Winter. The only thing that falls in the Fall are leaves and respect for our candidates.

Autumn, like Spring, is also a time of change, significant, graphic change. The kind of change that makes fundamental effects in the lives of real people, not the blue suit buffoonery of Washington and Wall Street. The kind of change that takes a lump of honest thought and vigorous action. The lazy days of summer and the lazy mentality of the super comfortable are over. Cold air is breathing through the cobwebs and an energetic force is announcing itself in the bright night sky. It's the force of , strong, necessary and inevitable. Singing through the bare branches of the trees is a song of freedom, a new freedom, from poverty, disease, oppression and ignorance. Freedom from the tyranny of the unchanged and unchanging. A song that is gathering voices.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
What? Give up? Never.
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 5 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 189

Vagabondism #189 "When life slams the door in your face, stay by the door."
http://tinyurl.com/6xvgzz8

The Flower Of Freedom

The hero is not one who succeeds in a single burst, but rather the one who does not relent.

David Wolpe
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Hello Val
**********************
"The bud may have a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flower."
(William Cowper)

I think it's true to say any venture worth while is usually accompanied by a period of trial and test before success is achieved. Those tests are often difficult and painful. If you launch a ship out into the ocean without knowing where you are going you stand a chance of suffering all sorts of problems. If you start walking in a forest with no destination, it might be a pleasant walk, but you might also get lost. There's no substitute for knowing what you want.

In New Hampshire there is a mountain called Mount Washington. It's the tallest mountain in the northeast (6,288 feet). There are three ways of getting to the summit. You can drive. There's a road. When you get up there you can buy a bumper sticker that says "This car climbed Mt. Washington." You can take the train,. There's a cog railroad that goes from the base to the top. Or you can walk. There are several trials that go up. When I made the trip I took the scenic route. I hiked.

Washington is not the only tall mountain in those parts. Another one is called North Moat and though it's not as tall as Mt. Washington, the trail is steep and very difficult. On the day I hiked it when I finally came out of the timber line and into the open I was exhausted. I sat down, had my lunch and enjoyed the view. All I could see above me was rock. I couldn't see the summit. I though I might as well turn back.

But I had come out to climb the mountain, to reach the summit. So after a few minutes I picked my weary self up and kept going. I was relentless. As it turned out I was only about 15 minutes from the summit, and when I got there the view was magnificent and I felt like I was standing on top of the world.

A lot of politicians are telling us these days what the Founding Fathers wanted. We don't know what they wanted other than what they said. Freedom to farm and ply their trades without interference, freedom to worship the way they wanted to and freedom from an oppressive government. It was a simple thing to declare independence. But they had to fight a war to claim it. Death, destruction, mayhem, injury, misery, loss of property, desperate circumstances were the bitter buds of that freedom. It was enough to make some men turn back. But there were the relentless ones. They had a goal, a result, a summit and they weren't going to stop until they got there.

Are we now enjoying the sweet flower of that freedom, or not?

DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
**************************
AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 5 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 188

Vagabondism #188 "The reason the bag is heavy is because there are too many illusions in it."
http://vagabondjottings.blogspot.com/

With Rose Colored Glasses

He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices in those which he has.

Epictetus
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Hello Lily
****************
I'm just a sweet old man, a happy-go-lucky guy, not a care in life, with the world on a string, seeing things through rose colored glasses. Right?

Wrong. Do you want a list of my pain and perils, my misery and mistakes, my fears and failures, horrors and heartbreaks, dangers and distress, harms and hazards, woes and worries, debts and destructions, agonies and abrasions, ridicules and regrets. idiocies and ignorance? Well, forget it. You will not be receiving that list today.

I amuse myself trying to walk down the street, with uncertain feet, a cane and a painful hip that doesn't work right. "Look at that old fool. It's only 10 a.m. and already he's drunk."

I don't scream with anger at the town I live in even though it has removed all the mail boxes I could comfortably walk to, almost all of the pocket parks where old folks can sit and rest and believes in the natural method of snow removal. Instead I laugh at the silliness of it.

My life is about books, reading, writing, painting and music. I read everything I can even though I have to hold a magnifying glass up to the side of my nose to see the words, or to see what I'm painting. I write in 14 point so I can see it. My CD player stopped working, but I'm glad to have a back up. I get into a fit and scream obscenities at the irrationality of the computer and then laugh at myself for treating it as if it's a rational human being.

All in all my difficult and troubled life has many things I can be joyful about. The best part of my life is the list of fascinating friends I have on the Internet. That kind of friendship, as gossamer as it may be, is the glue of my life. I'm so far behind answering your emails I hope you don't forget me. I'm a geezer who lives alone in a strange town, a vagabond to the world at large and a friend of some interesting people I will probably never meet. What's not to like?

DB - The Vagabond
Never Give Up
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 4 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 187

Vagabondism #187 "No matter how bad life gets, you may weep and rage and feel sorry for yourself, but above all, gain and grasp with all your might an abiding sense of humor."

May I Have This Dance?

Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.

Winston Churchill
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Hello Val
**********************
In the early days of video tape it was wide and think and splicing was impossible. So each full segment of a television program needed to be taped as a whole. Things have improved quite well since then though there are still limitations. A vast amount of lighting is still needed for a scene to look natural and not dim.

Years ago I was involved in the taping of a variety show for TV. The program began with an invisible announcer, then an orchestra began to play. Some dancers came out and did a vigorous dance. Following them the star of the show came out and introduced the guest star, who was a well known film and stage actor and singer. They talked for a bit and then sang a duet. After the duet the star said they would be back after a message from the automobile company that was sponsoring the show. That was the complete first segment.

When the taping started the announcer spoke and the dancers came out and did their dance. The star was late getting into his place so they stopped. They went back to the announcer, the music started again and the dancers did their dance again. The star was in place and did his opening remarks. He introduced the guest. While they were chatting the star flubbed a line. So they went back to the announcer, the music, the dancers, the star coming out and the guest artist. That time they made it to the song but in the song the guest singer forgot on of the lyrics. So they began again with the announcer, the music, the dancers, the star, the guest, the chat, the song and the closing announcement.

The thing that impressed me the most was the spirit of the dancers. It was a very vigorous dance, as those variety shows could often present, and yet the dancers never lost their enthusiasm for doing it, no matter how many times they would have to do it.

I've done films in which I had to do the same simple scene over again more than a half dozen times for one reason or another and it's difficult but you have to deliver the scene at the same quality each time because you don't know which one will end up in the film.

For each successful performance there are scores of failures that end up in the trash bin.

Unfortunately there is usually no trash bin in real life and our failures have a tendency to stick around like doggy poop on a shoe until we get over them and get on with life. That word "enthusiasm" is the key. The joy of any accomplishment is getting it the way you want it. Holding the expectation of that joy in mind can push our efforts along no matter how many times we flop.

It was clear to me those dancers loved what they did, and they had more dancing to do later in the show, but I'm sure they and everyone else sighed with gratitude and relief when the director said "That's a take."

Getting it wrong a few times is usually inevitable. But there is nothing better than to keep going until you get it right.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
****************************
AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 4 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Occupiers 2

"Lord, who is like unto thee, which delivered the poor from him that is too strong for him, yea, the poor and the needy from him that spoileth him?" (Psalms 35) Will the Occupiers be able to stop the tyranny? They better or the financial institutions will come back with a vengeance.

Vagabondism 186

Vagabondism #186 "I was astonished to discover how few people actually reason things out." http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/

Occupy

What am I, a prophet? Thousands are being arrested for defying curfews. Curfews imposed to suppress peaceful dissent. When and where will the tear gas come? Times Square?

The Stream

All things flow, nothing remains the same.

Heraclius
**********************
Hello Ernie
***********************
In ancient times one of the questions that occupied philosophers was about the stream. If you put your foot into a stream and then remove it. Is it the same stream or a different stream when you put your foot back into it? The shape of the stream, its banks and its bottom may be the same but the water is different because it flows. It was finally concluded that it is a different stream.

Every day someone's clock says high noon. But is it the same high noon as it was yesterday? Of course not. It's a new day, a different day.

I think it was John Cage who said that he didn't understand why people were frightened of new ideas, that he was frightened of the old ones.

There are those who expect and anticipate change. (I hope I am always one of those.) We know that things are going to change, that they are in fact changing all the time and that it's constant change that keeps life vigorous and interesting. There are those who know that things change and try to adapt to it even though they may not like the fact. There are those who resent and attempt to ignore the changes going on around them. There are those who adamantly try to prevent any change from happening. But worst of all are those who flagrantly refuse to accept the fact that things have changed. All things flow. The world must progress. If you try to stop it from progressing it will put a ring in your nose, attach a rope and yank you into the future.

There must be some government officials and large corporation officers who are bewildered and astonished at what is going on world wide with the Occupiers. I heard one American politician ask "What do they want?" The fact is if he doesn't know what they want then he has no right to be in a position to ask the question. Bill Moyers said "Sometimes standing up for your country means standing up to your government." John F. Kennedy said "ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country." And that is precisely what Occupy Wall Street is all about.

It took over 100,000 people of all races to convince the muddy minded American Congress to write and pass Equal Rights legislation. How many millions will it take to convince the power holders of the world that the human race means business, that the sordid circumstances of our oppression are no longer acceptable, that new levels must be reached in the ever flowing affairs of the common man and that the world, as we have known it, is changing.

The Occupiers will be killed, beaten, tasered, tear gassed, arrested, tortured, infiltrated, lied to, lied about, scorned and humiliated. But they will keep coming back because "All things flow, nothing remains the same."

DB, Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
**************************

AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 4 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 185

Vagabondism #185 "Curiosity and a sense of wonder are what keep me on the trail through the forest of philosophy."
dbdacoba@aol.com

Occupy

There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.

Elie Weisel
*******************
Hello Sandy
*******************
"Let 'em say what it is they want." "Let 'em run for Congress." "Let 'em eat cake."

Why does it take 100,000 people to wake up one politician?
------------------------------------------------------------
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--Say, Boss, there's a bunch of protestors in the park. About half a dozen.
--Oh yeah. What do they want?
--I don't know. I saw one sign. Something about Wall Street.
--Well, if they're not gone by 5 have them arrested.
--Right Boss.
---------------------------------------------
--Boss we arrested those protestors last night but now there are more of them, about 50.
--Have the cops use pepper spray and get rid of them.
--Sure thing, Boss.
--------------------------------------------
--Boss, there are a few hundred of those protestors now. The cops don't have enough pepper spray.
--Tell 'em to use tear gas.
--We tried that and it cleared out the park but they came back and brought more with them. They're coming in by buses.
--Damn! Do they know what they want.
--Something about jobs.
--Find out who I own at the local TV station and have them do a report making fun of those jerks.
--Right
------------------------------------
--Boss, that TV report backfired. Now people are coming in from all over the country. They've set up tents, and sleeping bags and people are making speeches.
--You know what, this is some Communist inspired Liberal stunt. Have some of the people from my party join in, infiltrate the place, find out who the leaders are so we can round them up.
--OK
----------------------------------------
--Boss, they couldn't find any leaders. It's like they are all leaders. and there are a few thousand of them now.
--All right that's it. Tomorrow morning we clean out that park and send them all packing with their tents and sleeping bags.
------------------------------------------------
--Boss there a petition against closing the park. It's got 250,000 signatures.
--WHAT !
--Yes, and now there are the same protests going on in other cities. Your buddy in the next state is thinking of bringing in the National Guard. But there are movie stars and other famous people, sports stars and all, joining the protest.
--What the hell is wrong with this country? Why don't they leave matters to their elected officials? We know what's best.
--Boss, I think that's exactly what they don't want to do.
--All right, tell them we won't clear the park, but I want a few of them in my office first thing in the morning.
--If you say so.
---------------------------------------
--Boss, they said they don't want to talk to you.
--Oh, really. Well then they will talk to Congress. I'll call my friend in the House and have them convene a special investigation. We'll get to the bottom of this.
------------------------------------
--Boss, I was talking to a few of them yesterday and I think I understand what they want. I'm going to join the demonstrators.
--Get out of here.
--Okay.
*****************************
DB - The Vagabond
Never Give Up
****************************
AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 4 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 184

Vagabondism #184 "Make no mistake; civilization survives only because there are some civilized people."
http://vagabondjottings.blogspot.com/

Autumn

It's Autumn. It's not The Fall, it's The Gathering.

The Awakening

The great awareness comes slowly, piece by piece.

Scott Peck
******************
Hello Ken
******************
One of the sins of my youth, and I suspect almost everyone's, was wanting to know things too fast and therefore too superficially. My problem was that the things I wanted to know tended to be more of an esoteric nature. I wanted to know what the philosophers, mystics, theologians, historians, avant garde artists and experimental scientists did. I tripped a light foxtrot around the idea that everyone really wanted to read poetry and philosophy if they only admitted it to themselves. Years of living dissuaded me from that idea to my own jocularity. That's okay. To each his own.

I became so energized about learning things that I read constantly and when I couldn't understand something I figured it must be explained on the next page, so my reading was rushed, superficial and through incomprehensible paragraphs.

"Awake, awake: Shake thyself from the dust." (Isaiah 52:1) After many years of blowing the dust around I began to see, not what I was looking for, but only the title of what I was looking for: Enlightenment. I learned that some persons had actually achieved a higher level of consciousness, a mental place where the simplest truths became the most revealing and the most complicated ideas became basic building blocks, pieces of a simple temple of thought.

From the day I made that discovery my life gradually changed. Education was no longer a game, or rather it became a holy game. It is still a matter of sifting through the weeds to find the blossoms, but each discovery teaches me more about what I'm looking for and what is looking for me.

I'm just a beggar, sleeping in the dust on the temple steps. But now, at last, I know that and will wake up one day.

DB - A Wayfaring Man
Never Give Up
**********************

AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 4 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 183

Vagabondism #183 "Don’t shun the small, mundane steps that lead to miracles."
http://tinyurl.com/6xvgzz8

Watch Your Mouth

Let no one be willing to speak ill of the absent.

Sextus Propertius
**********************
Hello Geo
***********************
I was in rehearsal for a play and during a break I walked into the Green Room (the actor's lounge). Just as I did one of the actors was talking about someone and he instantly stopped in mid sentence. There were some blushing faces, one person became immediately involved in a magazine, the fellow who had been talking was staring at the floor sheepishly.

I sat down and said "So, I walked into a conversation about myself and now everyone here is embarrassed except for me." There was silence. Then I said "I'm flattered that you think I'm important enough to gossip about." More silence, so I changed the subject and got people talking again.

Over the years I worked with two radio announcers who delighted in making fun of other people. They would tell the most damaging and derogatory jokes about someone or other which they would never repeat to that person's face. Their comments were very funny and people laughed. I wondered if those people would laugh if the joke was about them.

I find that kind of humor despicable. It's degrading, cruel, malignant and ignorant. It's the sort of humor that's rampant on some TV talk shows these days, which is why I won't watch them.

I can laugh at myself, but I don't need to be told what's funny about me, unless it's from a good friend who does it with love and respect. And if someone makes jokes about me behind my back he's not a friend, no matter how friendly he may appear to my face.

One day in New Hampshire a fellow got invited into my home for a day, asked me all sorts of questions about me and my life, seemed to be very impressed and interested and we genuinely had a good time together, I thought. Then I heard from someone else that he went back to the city and was spreading all kinds of rumors about me by twisting around the things I told him. He thinks I have forgotten him and his name. I haven't.

It's a terrible thing to be the victim of a laughing gossiper. It's even worse if you find yourself being one, just to get the laughs.

Those two announcers both got fired because they made the wrong joke, about the wrong person, at the wrong time. But, alas, they took the mouths they couldn't watch with them.

DB - The Vagabond
Never Give Up
*********************
AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 4 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 182

Vagabondism #182 "You are declared interest in nature’s bank account."
http://www.blogger.com/profile/09144446186279708019

Oh, You Human.

Man, the glory, jest and riddle of the world.

Alexander Pope
*********************
Hello Beth
**********************
When is a monarch not a king?

Are you glorious? Of course you are, once you start reaching up to your potential and beyond it with outstretched hope and confidence, when you are standing on some pinnacle of life you never knew you could.

How many actors does it take to change a light bulb?

Are you a jest or a jester? One day you're one, the next day your the other. The greatness of man is the gift of a sense of humor, including the ability to laugh at himself. Humor turns on the lights in the dark places of life.

12 pear were hanging high.
12 men came walking by.
Each took a pear
and left 11 hanging there.

Are you a riddle? You are, to yourself and to the world. If we did not puzzle over ourselves every day, in one way or another, what would be the point of living. "Know thyself" the ancient wise man said. We can reach for the stars, solve problems and laugh, but understanding ourselves is probably the hardest task we poor, tardy, foolish and stubborn humans have to face. "Life's perhaps the only riddle that we shrink from giving up" wrote William Gilbert. Why? Because to give up is to lose, to quit the field before the game is over, to sacrifice our glory, to settle for less than we are.

Never give up.

DB - The Vagabond
**********************

AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 4 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 180

Vagabondism #180 "May you always be blessed with amiable companions."
http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/

Mr. Bush

We expected to see an author, and we find a person.

Blaise Pascal
****************
Hello Marty
***************
An early moment, and perhaps the first, of my intellectual awakening, came in high school. It was an English class taught by a fellow named Bush. (Sorry Mr. Bush, I don't remember your fist name, but I'll never forget you.)

We read a short story by Edgar Allan Poe and during the discussion I asked a question about whether he chose the right words to tell the story. Mr. Bush replied that for Poe they were the right words.

That remark led me to the first step on a long and fascinating path which I am still on today. I wondered what it would be like if some other writer had written the story. What different words would he have chosen? Then I wondered why Poe had written the story. What motivated him and inspired him to choose that particular tale to tell? Already I was beginning to seek the person behind the story.

My mind was then opened up to considering those questions about everything I was reading, including novels and newspaper articles.

Eventually I became an actor and then had the same experience of inquiry doubled up. Why was the character I was playing express himself in those particular words? Why did the playwright give my character those particular words to express himself? In fact, why did the author invent that character in the first place and why did he write that particular play? I realized how important it was to speak the lines exactly as they are written so as to be true to the person behind the play.

The next step on the path was delving into books on psychology and philosophy, trying to understand the human mind and why it does and says what it does. As a result of that study I found I was a more thorough actor.

It wasn't and isn't just a matter of "figuring someone out." When an author approaches the task of writing, many parts of his or her personality are set aside, and the more important parts take over. With a great writer there is a transcendence at work in the process, and the reader receives more enjoyment from the work if the reader is willing to meet the author at the point where that magic takes place.

It has been said that a great novel is a conversation between the author and the reader. I know that's true. And that discussion takes place in a rare and mystical place where two persons meet.

I am on that path of discovery and hope to never leave it. Thank you Mr. Bush.

DB - The Vagabond Journey
Never Give Up
***************************

AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 4 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 179

Vagabondism #179 "We are all still in Elementary School."
http://www.blogger.com/profile/09144446186279708019

In The Sand

When men yield up the privilege of thinking. the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon.

Thomas Paine
*******************
Hello Ken
*******************
I am a difficult man. I insist on thinking for myself and I expect everyone else to do the same. I want people to do the things they can't do and find the thoughts they don't know they have yet. False hopes?

My friend Ernie and I used to play war games. Not out in the back yard with clubs and stones, but huddled respectfully over a paper map, moving little pieces of cardboard around and throwing the dice. One of those games was about tank warfare in the desert. I got to hide tanks in the sand, only noting on a piece of paper their exact location. When he tried to cross the desert a tank would only make it's appearance when one of his pieces came with firing range. Then the fight was on. On the other had he could successfully cross the playing field and never discover any of my tanks. But if I placed my tanks in strategically appropriate places that wasn't likely.

For a year I worked for a theatre company that performed short plays followed by discussions for schools in and around the Washington, DC area. For one of the plays I had written a musical score, which generated a lot of discussion pro and con. After one performance a young fellow came up to me as we were packing up to leave. He told me what he thought the music meant and then said that he was probably wrong because he was a level so-and-so student and couldn't understand those things.

I was enraged. I stepped off the stage, went over to him and told him that his critique of my music was right on the mark and never to let anyone tell him he couldn't understand something. Or, I said, let them tell you but ignore them. Imagine a school in America trying to put a lid on some young person's head by telling him he is incapable of understanding something and thinking for himself. Whoever did that should be arrested and jailed.

"I can't do something." Yes you can, you just don't know it yet.

There is a bottomless well of wisdom already existing in the human mind. Most of the time we are not conscious of it. But when we focus our thinking on a problem or question the thoughts that come up in the ladle are part of that universe of knowledge. We wonder where those thoughts came from. They may take us by surprise, but they were always there, hidden in the sand, waiting to be discovered.

I say dip the bucket into that well everyday and find out what you know. These days it's more than a "privilege," it's an obligation.

Dana Bate
Your Loving Vagabond
Never Give up
**************************

AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 3 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 178

Vagabondism #178 "There are orbits in life, prepared and in place, for things that have not yet appeared."
http://tinyurl.com/6xvgzz8

The Tree

No bomb ever burst shatters the crystal spirit.

George Orwell
********************
Hello Diane
********************
Out in front of the house here there was a tree. It was s small tree which never seemed to get bigger. Every spring it put forth leaves. They were scraggly looking leaves but they felt very firm and healthy. It also dropped a bundle of seeds which turned into a large clump of foliage at the bottom. This past Spring the tree sent forth no leaves at all, so at some point during the Spring the woman on the first floor, who takes care of the flowers in the front, decided the tree was dead and cut it down. Now that clump of foliage is very lush.

But instead of growing out into a full fledged bush as she expected, it's growing up. She expressed her curiosity about that and I just said that it's a tree. It's growing into a tree. A tree is what it was, and that's what it is. No matter how many times you cut it down it will grow back into a tree, because a tree is what it is, and that's that.

A wise person once said that success is getting up one more time than you fall. If failure is not an option then it doesn't matter how many times you fail.

All the oppressive legislation of congresses, all the erroneous decisions of governments and courts, the plundering by banks and corporations, all the damaging influence of inept teachers and parents, all the vicious acts of terrorists and suicide bombers don't mean a thing and accomplish nothing. A lot of property may be destroyed and a lot of people hurt and killed. But under the dirt, down among the crystals, are the roots of the human spirit, and it will grow again. It cannot be destroyed. And that's that.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
*************************

AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 3 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 177

Vagabondism #177 "Loving your enemies means you must forgive them. But it does not mean that you must believe them, trust them or respect them." http://vagabondjottings.blogspot.com/

Dear Brutus

Destiny is but a phrase of the weak human heart - the dark apology for every error.

Edward Bulwer-Lytton
***************************
Hello Rose
***************************
One of the most amazing things about the human race is the intricate and imaginative ways we have of justifying ourselves. If you ask a man what his goal in life is you will probably get an answer, but the answer will most likely have more to do with his purpose in regard to what he does. A life's goal is a deeply held secret thing that is hard, and perhaps impossible, to put into words. It is the unspoken and invisible challenge that motivates but continually frustrates us. It comes from a consciousness we are only occasionally aware of. It is a matter of personal achievement, of finding and filling one's true destiny.

A man can describe himself as a craftsman of some sort. He may say that his goal is to be a better one, a master at his craft, but that brings on the question of why he isn't. And the answer to that question is so elusive it seems to be outside of himself. It's a mystery.

Gradually appearing on the mental horizon comes the nasty four letter word FATE. Yes, there is no doubt in his mind there is something, some unexplainable thing that keeps him from achieving his purpose in life. He has an urgent need to find and understand that thing, that force from beyond him, that keeps him down.

Ancient priests used to sacrifice sheep and read the entrails to find answers. In Asia they would cast the I Ching by reading the lines on the belly of a tortoise. Astronomers could chart the future of men and nations by reading the stars. It is written that the mother of Alexander the Great held off giving birth to him until the court astronomer said the stars were in the exact proper location for greatness. His success was "in the stars." But what does Shakespeare say? "The fault, dear Brutus, in not in our starts but in ourselves that we are underlings."

The search for the mystical truth got more personal with palmistry, gazing into a crystal ball or a circle on the ground, reading tea leaves or coffee grounds. And then there are the cards. The mystic can read your destiny in the cards. Which gives you an ample excuse for failure. If it's "not in our stars" and "not in the cards" where is it?

The emergence of a new kind of religion in the early Middle Ages gave us the answer. It's Satan, Beelzebub, Mephistopheles, the Devil. "The Devil made me fail." That's a good one. It lends itself to all sorts of colorful self justification and ritual confession, sacrifice and cleansing. We all know what the Devil does. Satan is responsible for all tornados, typhoons, hurricanes, earthquakes and tsunamis, for all non Christian religions, for murder (the illegal kind), for illness, insanity and death, for noisy neighbors, disobedient children and snakes, for Communism, Hollywood and the Democratic Party. Or so we have been told by one pastor or another.

If we could just get the Devil out of our lives our destiny would improve, success would be possible and happiness assured.

But wait. The Devil has been replaced. There's a new crystal ball, a new circle on the ground, a new deck of cards, a new zodiac. DNA. Instead of the Devil it was "my DNA made me fail." The modern mystic can chart your destiny by reading the DNA leaves. It provides a solid scientific reason for self justification

How long will it be before they find a way to alter your DNA, before we decide who lives and who doesn't based on their DNA and thus their probability of success or failure, of benevolent or criminal behavior? When will chemistry take the place of ethics?

The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our DNA.

William Jennings Bryan wrote "Destiny is not a matter of chance. It is a matter of choice. It is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved."

Dana Bate - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up.
**********************

AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 3 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 176

Vagabondism #176 "A man who must invent things to fight against cannot compare himself with a true warrior."
http://www.blogger.com/profile/09144446186279708019

Fight The Good Fight

He who wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill.

Edmund Burke
***********************
Hello Val
********************
Every time I step into the ring the warrior who faces me bears a striking resemblance to myself. He has the same gray hair and beard, but there is scorn in his eye and a snarl on his lip. He begins the fight by taunting me with everything he can think of that's wrong with me, hoping I will give up the fight before it starts.

"Look at you, you're a wreck. You stagger down the street with a cane. Your hip is so bad it's painful for you to walk. Stay home."

So I take the cane and walk the 4 long blocks to the store, stopping to rest at the only pocket park on my way. Sometimes it rains on me. I like the rain. It's Nature's christening, giving me a new name of hero to myself. When I return home with the package of good things for myself I climb the 3 flights to my chamber of hope and rest.

"Remember, Winter is coming. You're going to slip and fall and break your neck or worse. You'll be in the hospital before you know what happened."

Yes, I remember last Winter when I slipped and fell once, on the icy sidewalk. So I don my L L Bean winter boots and walk in the street which is plowed. I see the cars and they see me. The winter wind blows through my hair and gives me energy and spirit.

"You're eyesight is so bad you can't see anything. Stop reading. You're going to give yourself a splitting headache."

So I take my magnifying glass and read for hours, philosophy, history, biography, religion, psychology and science. I read with pleasure.

"You're so dense you never got a college education. You don't know anything. Stop trying to be a writer. You just can't do it."

So I sit here at the keyboard for hours and the words flow: 2 novels, a bunch of short stories, 3 published essays and over 1,300 entries on my journal. Having seen into the minds of great thinkers of the past and present, I humbly and gratefully offer my own words, in my native language and in my own uneducated way.

"You're an old man. Go fold up and let younger men take the field."

Men of any age are welcome to take the field but when they do they will find me there, standing as a banner for honest heroes.

"You're 72. You don't have any life left in you. You're heading for the grave."

I'm 72 and very much alive. What's 7 decades to an eternity? It's barely a beginning. I love my life.

Dana Bate - The Vagabond
Never Give Up
*****************************

AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

Only 3 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 175

Vagabondism #175 "Chew your life carefully to enjoy all of its flavors." http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/

100 Feet From The Door

Never do today what you can put off till tomorrow. Delay may give clearer light as to what is best to be done.

Aaron Burr
*********************
Hello Kate
**********************
One Spring evening in New Hampshire I was attacked by a piece of ice. I lived in a nice A frame house in the forest, I had a dirt driveway that led up to the house about 1/5 of a mile long. Driving home one evening I got to within about 100 feet from the house and stopped. My left rear tire was spinning and the car wouldn't go any further.

I took it nice and slow as you are supposed to do when driving on ice. But the wheel kept spinning. I rocked back and forth to get some traction, but it was useless. I was beginning to get irritated. It was ridiculous that I couldn't finish driving the car up to my front door.

I had a shovel in the back of the car so I got it and shoveled all around the tire, making sure that the lip of the shovel tucked under the tire on both sides. I also noted that there was no other ice around. It was a North Country Spring, April, and a lot of melting had happened everywhere except under my tire.

I went into the house and got a large piece of cardboard. I shoved it under the tire as best as I could. No good. The tire spewed the cardboard out the back and kept spinning.

I remembered that in the house I had a rough piece of metal with links that was designed to give a spinning tire some purchase on the ice. I got that and placed it under the tire. The tire didn't even grab hold of it but kept on spinning. Now I was really angry.

I got a large spoon from the house and dug all around the tire hoping to dislodge the ice, but each time I tried to go forward the tire spun.

I tried lifting the rear end of the car and pushing it beyond whatever was holding it, but each time I did that it rolled right back to where it was stuck.

By this time I was raging. I had a jack in the car and I thought of raising the wheel and driving forward but I soon realized I would run over the jack and probably damage it.

Could I have called the wrecker to come and charge me $25 to push me to my front door? Don't think I didn't think of it.

I even considered jacking the car up, taking off the tire, driving to my door on the wheel rim and then reattaching the tire, but I didn't even know that would work.

It seemed that all the leftover ice in New England had congealed into a small, ornery, critical mass under my left rear tire, and that was that.

It got dark and cold. The car was not blocking anything, no one would be driving down my driveway and it wasn't in plain sight of any would be thieves. So, in a fury, I quit. I gathered up all the tools, put them away and went into my house in a state of utter rage and disgust.

When I awoke the next morning the sun was up and some more melting had gone on. I went out, started the car and drove it easily to my front door with no trouble.

The question is why did I put myself through that misery when I could have done what I eventually did, go inside and wait for the ice to melt? The answer is willfulness. I gotta do it now. I gotta have it now. It's gotta be done NOW !! When it doesn't, there's always tomorrow. It will get done.

DB - The Vagabond
*********************
AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

3 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 174

Vagabondism #174 "Do what you love, or love what you’re doing."
http://www.blogger.com/profile/09144446186279708019

On The Hellway

If you're going through hell...keep going.

Winston Churchill
*****************
This is a true story. It happened to me in November of 1960. It is extracted from my autobiographical novel, "Brian On The Road"
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The driver pulled over to the side “Down there is the Highway. It'll take you west.”

“Thank you very much” I said and got out. I looked ahead and saw a ramp that led down to a highway. It took me almost half an hour to walk down to it. I hoped I wouldn't be stopped by any State Troopers as I stepped out on to the edge of the road. I held out my hand to a line of cars that was coming, but none stopped. I started walking. It was quite dark though only around mid afternoon. After about half an hour of walking, I was to face one of the worst episodes of my journey.

At first there were just minor flashes of light in the sky. Softly rumbling thunder followed. Then the rain came down in a sprinkle. I kept walking. I had no choice. I thought that with the rain someone might take pity on me and stop. False hope. Soon there was a full thunder and lightening storm. The rain grew to a major downpour. Great flashes of lightening streaked across the sky making a split second of day light showing me trees, fields and distant hills, but no buildings.. Rain water was flowing from the road into the side where I was walking. It was so heavy that even if someone had wanted to stop for me they probably couldn't see me soon enough. In the distance I could see the lightening touch down, followed almost instantly by a loud crack of thunder. I tried to stay calm but the lightening flashes were coming so frequently that I had a hard time keeping myself from crouching down on the road, covering my head and waiting. Every time a car passed I was splashed with water. And whenever a truck passed, which was often, it was like having a bucket of cold water thrown in my face. The lightening flashes were coming closer and more often. Still the trucks came and each one drenched me with a fierce bath. Then I saw ahead of me two lightening bolts smack down on the road, one after another, with sharp cannon shots of deafening thunder. Now I was frightened. I was so wet from the rain I could be an easy target for a lightening strike. I didn't know what to do, to stand still or keep moving. There was no shelter.

Back when we were crossing New York State Chuck stayed behind the trucks so that the air currents would help pull the motorcycle along and now these same currents were showering me with misery. I wondered if there was some sort of justice in it, some pay back. Even if so, or even if not so, I would have to bear it. One has to live with the circumstances of one’s choices. I was old enough and smart enough to know the truth of that, but it was no help. Every time I saw a truck coming I would just brace myself for the cold, wet crash against my body.

After several hours of this awful baptism I was soaking wet. Then there came a cold wind. It moved the lightening part of the storm to the other side of the highway but it was biting into my face. In one of the flashes of light I saw a bridge ahead. When I finally got there I stood under it hoping to dry off a little bit and get away from the wind. A few minutes later I was relieved to see a Cadillac pull over with a middle age couple in the front seat. But when I got in, the driver looked at me with a frown and said “Oh!”

The woman next to the man said “Oh dear. We thought you were our son. He’s on leave and promised to meet us under one of these bridges.”

“I’m sorry” I said and went to open the door.

“Well, wait” said the man, “we'll drive you to the next bridge. Maybe he’s there.”

It was several miles to the next bridge, but their son wasn't there either. The man stopped the car and I got out wishing them luck finding their son and thanking them for the ride. They drove on. I had dried off a bit in their car so I decided to keep walking and as I did I thought about that surreal experience of mistaken identity. Those people could have been my parents and I could have been their son in some other saga, in some other universe. The characters were interchangeable.

It was getting very late now. A few more trucks and I was just as wet as I had been before, but as night came the splashes were getting colder and the rain grew into a deluge. But I walked on. Everything was wet and cold from my head to my feet. Occasionally a car would honk as it passed me as if to say “Get out of the road, dummy.” But I got used to that insult. It was the trucks that were hard to bear, but I knew it wasn't the drivers’ fault.

I noticed the traffic letting up and getting sparse. It must be late, I thought. I came to another bridge and stood under it for a while. But I moved on when no one stopped for me. I hoped the couple with the Cadillac had found their son. I wanted to be their son, to be on leave, to be relieved, to be in a Cadillac with parents, to be taken home where it is warm and dry, to have something to eat, to sleep in a bed.

The heavy rain bashed at me as the trucks went by. I had walked many miles for many hours. I knew eventually I would find someplace, I was certain of that. It was just a matter of when, how much further and how long I would have to bear this misery.

Gradually, almost invisibly, lights began to emerge through the rain. As I walked on they grew brighter and I could see that they were not the lights of a street lamp or a house. As I got closer I could see it was a bar and restaurant. It was in a group of buildings on the other side of the highway. The bar was the only place open. I struggled across the highway as quickly as I could when there was no traffic coming. I opened the door of the bar and went inside. It was warm and dry.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
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Never give up.
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Vagabondism 172

Vagabondism #172 "We all must sacrifice our lives to something. Freedom is being able to choose what that is."
http://tinyurl.com/6xvgzz8

Lights Up

Life is like playing the violin in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.

Samuel Butler
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Hello Frosty
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I was an actor, first of all. I took some singing lessons but was far from considering myself a singer. I took even fewer dance lessons. I had done a few musicals, but only in small roles. I generally tried to put a distance between myself and any sort of singing audition.

Then one day a director I knew and had worked with offered me the role of Zorba, in the musical version. I tried to explain to him how unqualified I thought I was for the job. But he was insistent and so, even though a fine Greek actor and singer had auditioned for the part, the job was mine.

A friend asked me what I was going to do. "You're not a singer or a dancer. How on earth will you know what you're doing?" I responded by saying "Well, the way I look at it is if you're alone on the stage, the lights go on and the orchestra starts to play what do you do? You sing, even if you don't know the words, or you dance. There's no other choice."

Zorba is a huge role. I used to describe it as like running up a mountain. He is almost never off the stage, has a lot of singing to do and toward the end of the first act has a vigorous solo dance. I used to sit backstage 5 minutes before the show, with a pain in the back of my neck, shaking my head and saying to myself "How are you going to get through this? It's impossible. I can't do it?" I said that before every performance even if I had done it the night before or, maybe, that afternoon.

But the orchestra started to play, the lights went on, I stepped out and began to sing. 2 hours later it was over. For 2 hours I was an energetic Greek man who spoke, laughed, sang and danced.

I can't help observing that performing artists are among those humans who do the impossible all the time. (I don't know how opera singers and ballet dancers do it.) There are no time-outs as there are in sports. Everything we do is under the intense scrutiny of a group of strangers who have paid money to see us. And to sustain a 2 hour, or more, performance, especially if one is not quite sure of what one is doing. is a monstrous task.

I also can't resist seeing the metaphorical aspects of that task. We are thrust into life knowing nothing, then thrust into adulthood thinking that we know a lot, only to start stumbling over all the things we don't know. But life must be lived and, though we may sit shaking our heads and wondering how we are going to do it, eventually the orchestra will begin to play and we'll be on.

On the job training, learn as you go, try not to make mistakes but if you do keep going and try not to make them again. Keep the fiddle turned and rosin on the bow. It's life. Play it, sing it and dance it.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

3 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
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Vagabondism 171

Vagabondism #171 "It’s no use wondering what to do with your life. You’re doing it."
dbdacoba@aol.com

The Hunt

The new creature we artists are hunting for will not "live" so much, as like time itself, "elapse."

Lawrence Durrell
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Hello Bruce
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The hunt goes on. The original thinker paces out and measures out areas of the mind that no one has visited before. It is the challenge of darkness, the always elusive forms, invisible but adjacent to reality.

"Come and find me" says the Creature, but is it my voice I hear? I cannot tread these dangerous paths forever. Or can I? Can't we trust the eternality of truth? I have forgotten, like the rest, what the truth is made of, or rather how to recognize it. What is it that hides behind the headlines? What was it that deformed the light and then said "What light?" The hunt goes on.

I do not want to live in a time or place when children turn against each other and the world. There is no explanation given but the truthless, lightless one. I have almost forgotten, like the rest, that the light was deformed and thus so was reason. I have not forgotten the creature who hides before me, invisible but adjacent to reality. And the hunt goes on.

The hunt goes on in the dangerous places where human thought has not been before, where time and space are inventions, like gravity or the wheel, where the inevitable measure of earth light is used up by children in their special games.

There and then, when everything is lost, everything will be gained, and I, like the rest, will remember. One of us artists will be there as it passes by in it's eternal cycle. The uncertainty of living truth is accepted, acceptable. Will my mnemonics or yours see the creature hidden there before us? Will you, or I, or one of us catch it in the net?

So far so good. The hunt goes on.

DB - Vagabond Journeys (The Original)
Never Give Up
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

3 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
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Wisdom

Wisdom flutters through the mind like a butterfly only to be captured in someone's net and pinned to the wall in the dead form of words.
(Dana Bate)

Vagabondism 170

Vagabondism #170 "The best reason for doing something is the joy of doing it."
http://vagabondjottings.blogspot.com/

The Baffled Right

Reason alone establishes the concept of freedom, and passion collides with it.

Immanuel Kant
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Hello Arlene
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Lately I've been noticing a particular kind of faulty and incongruous thinking on the part of some Conservatives. It seems as if there has been some sort of brainwashing going on to convince people of conditions that are the opposite of what they really are.

Take the case of the woman who erected a flag pole on her front yard and flew an American flag. She was told by a member of the neighborhood organization to remove it. She was shocked. She said she would have expected that if she lived in a liberal neighborhood, but was amazed that it happened the conservative neighborhood she was in. What?

I wanted to tell her that if she were living in a liberal neighborhood no one would be knocking on her door to tell her to take down her flag. That's what liberalism is about, individual rights and freedoms of expression.

Then there's the case of the young boy who killed his neo-Nazi father. The boy is in serious trouble, but the grandmother took the man's other children away and proudly informed the media that they were being cared for in a conservative home. What?

Those children should be in a good liberal home, as far away as possible from conservatism and especially the influence of the extremist conservatives such as the neo-Nazis.

How can two otherwise intelligent people be so confused about things and guilty of such miscalculation unless somewhere along the road they were convinced that both Liberals and Conservatives are something they are not. The problem is those two people and others like them vote.

President Ronald Reagan, whom some Conservatives still consider to have been a great Present in spite of his economic flop, once said "The Liberals have got it wrong again." That remark helped to sew confusion about the reality of the political scene. He should have been President of the United States. Instead he was President of the Republican Party alone.

I may be dreaming, but I hope the day comes soon when both the Liberals and Conservatives have their positions in the country honestly and not misleadingly stated and are spear headed by intelligent and reasonable people who can earnestly present their philosophies to the country without all the emotion and false drama and then let the voters decide.

Some day I may write on how Liberals misunderstand Conservatives.

DB - Vagabond
Never Give Up
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AUTUMN QUESTION

What event over the past year changed your life, a lot or a little?

3 answers so far.

dbdacoba@aol.com

I await your answers.
DB
********************

Vagabondism 169

Vagabondism #169 "Don’t forget that no matter how elegant and sophisticated the wood pile may be there is probably always a snake in it." http://vagabondjourneys.blogspot.com/

Art Exhibit

Ok Vagabond, where have you been?

Well, last night I was at the reception for a big art exhibit in which I had two pieces hanging. I was very impressed with the work there and was a little intimidated by it. But one of the artists came up to me and complimented me very much about one of my paintings and said that on the precious day there had been a lot of discussion about it. That gave me a good feeling.

There was a lot of cheese and cold cuts, some excellent Merlot of which I had too many glasses, a harpist playing in the corner and many people. At one point some of the artists spoke about their work and experiences.

One of them described how art is a language. Whether it's painting, music or literature, it's the artist's specific language, the artist's own observation of life and vision of the world. He noted that each of the approximately 100 pieces of work around the large room were individual expression in an individual language and therefore a vast opportunity for communicating awaiting every person who stopped to look.

The communication is two ways, and that is one of the most interesting things about art. The view, the listener the reader adds something to the work of art to one degree or another. The composer Paul Hindemith referred toit as cocreation.

It was a pleasure for me to show in the exhibit and I am very grateful for the opportunity. When I got back here I was beyond tired so, instead of writing, I went to sleep.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
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