Finding The Door

Somewhere in the heart of experience there is an order and a coherence which we might surprise if we were attentive enough, loving enough or patient enough.


Lawrence Durrell

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Hello Margie

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I know there is a meaning behind the words I write and that I keep writing to discover it. An artist draws inspiration from the universal bank of ideas, which is eternal and infinite in its varieties, as numerous as the stars and as vast as the distances between them. What the artist makes of those ideas depends partly on his talent and skill, partly on dedication and hard work and partly on the need to seek and find, and then to expose, or not, the unknown reality of the existence of those ideas, the unheard sounds and unseen colors.



When searching through the universal mind of ideas and creations trying to find the reality of all realities, we artists are poor tailors, cutting out patterns and trying to fashion together something that fits. It never does and that's why we keep trying.



I know that what I write has a greater meaning and a greater purpose that isn't mine. Musicians know that also. There is no end to what can be discovered in music. In a certain way music is what all art is trying to achieve.



But as science is trying to discover the universal law of physics which will explain everything, and medicine is trying for the universal panacea, the door remains not closed and locked but undiscovered. Once the opening is found, and the genius can step out into the unknown, unheard and unseen, art may disappear or take a new form, science may also, but we will know that all of our efforts to find the truth and understand it, from the simple drawing of a flower to a monumental Russian novel were never done in vain.



Durrell is correct. The first important step is to pay attention, to carefully read the words, really listen to the music and really look at the painting, realizing that you are looking "through a glass darkly."



Next comes the love. "The mightiest space in fortune nature brings to join like likes and kiss like native things" says Shakespeare. The courage of honest desire to find the light and share it no matter what it may be is requisite to understand what is written. That honest, humble affection can't help bring a greater coherence into one's experience.



It is the nature of truth to reveal itself, especially to the waiting, expectant mind. But the hidden secret of truth is harder to find because it is so mysterious and so undefinable and yet so simple. The paintings, poems, songs and dances are merely the outward shapes and patterns of the gown. They are invitations for the immortal truth to visit us.



The patient, persistent, unselfish search for the truth behind the truth will never end. It can't.



DB - Vagabond Journeys

Never Give up.

http://vagabondjourneys/blogspot.com

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Getting Up

Hope is a waking dream.

Aristotle
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Hello Barbara
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Wake up. Yawn. Stretch. Get out of that bed. Stand up. Wash your face. Brush your teeth. Make your coffee. Eat your breakfast. Get dressed. Open the door.

Wait a minute, you forgot something. Where;s that dream you were having? It's still back in the bed. Well, that's probably a good place for it. It was an improbable dream anyway. And maybe there were things about it you didn't like. So leave it there.

It's another day, a chance to make a mole hill out of that mountain you left yesterday, a chance to make one more step towards the plans you made last week, a chance to check up on the things you planted in your life last month, a chance to observe and appreciate how much you've grown in the last year as an indication of how much you are going to grow this year. If you don't have things to look forward to you might make the mistake of looking back.

So you've your plans, your ideas, your desires all tucked neatly (or maybe not so neatly) into your agenda, each with its own color. These are the hopes that got you out of bed this morning and every morning whether you know it or not. Each one has its demands on you, demands which you gave them. And those demands involve dreaming up the thing and dreaming up the way to do the thing. It's time. It's also time, armed with desire, courage and hope, to do battle with the bad dream of worry, the nightmare of failure.

What you do is to start at the end, visualizing exactly what you plan to do or be and where. Then holding that dream in mind at all times you go back to the beginning or where you left off, take the next step, take advantage of the things that occur as a result of that step and the previous steps and then accept and rejoice over your accomplishments. Don't be surprised when unexpected benefits arise, for as Shakespeare said "the mightiest space in nature fortune brings to join like likes, and kiss like native things."

Designs are made for unique constructions. Tools get invented to do things there are no tools for. Surfaces are prepared to launch great ideas. Hope becomes gratitude in advance as the dream slowly becomes a reality and life is better.

Then on to the next one. There is always another day to dream.

Dana - The Vagabond
Never give up.
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What Is This Thing Called Love

A love that can last forever takes but a second to come about.

Cuban proverb
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Hello George
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Isn't it amazing how quickly we can fall in love with something or someone. It often only takes a moment in time but it seems like the spinning of a world. There is something that catches a hold of a deep sinew of our mental or emotional being and plants itself there for good.

You may see a work of art, a painting, and there is something special about it that sets it apart from all the other paintings you've seen or maybe are in the same room. You may not be able to describe what it is about the work that makes it special to you but you know in your heart that it is something forever important to you.

It happened to me when I saw the Matisse painting "The Piano Lesson." The Museum of Modern Art in New York City was being renovated. While it was going on they mounted an exhibit in a room off the service elevator. It was of a few of their pieces. I went strolling around in there, everything was hung temporarily on peg board. I turned a corner and there it was. "The Piano Lesson." I spent a long time with it. I knew that among all the millions of art works in the world, most of which I will never see, this was my favorite. A critic might say that it isn't even great Matisse, but for me it's a love affair.

You may one day hear a snatch of music that has the same effect on you and in one instant you become in love with the whole piece. Sure, you will listen to it over and over again just to hear that one passage, but you will have expanded your love to include the entire work.

I became an opera lover at an early age when I heard the wonderful sextet that concludes the first act of "The Barber Of Seville." And when I heard the rich pandemonium that ends the second act of "Die Meistersinger" I became a Wagner lover. I can't get enough of it.

Shakespeare? I have a complete works, poems and plays . I never let it out of my sight. Shakespeare loved all of his characters and so do I.

I know of people who will carry the same novel around in their pockets or hand bags wherever they go because it is so important to them. That one book deeply touches their heart and soul. Jack Kerouac's "On The Road" was my constant companion for many years.

And what about other people? What about love at first sight? It happens. I know of a happily married couple who met each other on the subway. What is it that enables someone to grab your heart so completely all at once? You may meet them once and then you will meet them again because a golden thread has been woven that ties the two of you together. You have been thinking about each other, maybe without even knowing it.

I love that scene in "All In The Family" when the character played by Jean Stapleton says that when she was a girl the boys called her all kinds of fancy names but that somehow the name Ding Bat had an air of permanence about it.

Love is one of the strangest things of all. I have friends I've known for many years. I love them. I also have some new friends of a few years. I love them. But like the Matisse painting and the Wagner operas I don't think I could ever tell you why.

As Diane Ackerman puts it "Everyone admits that love is wonderful and necessary, but no one agrees on just what it is."

If you ever figure it out let me know.

Dana Bate - Vagabond Journeys
Never Give Up
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There Is More

The unseen world hath become seen; the unreal hath become the real.

John Newbrough
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Hello Lily
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"Watchman, tell us of the night."
Blessings are awaiting in the dark.
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Something I like to make note of now and then is the fact that all the physical laws that allow us today to have TV, airplanes, computers and space ships have always been there. We didn't invent the laws. Scientists with vision and imagination are hang glided over the cliffs of new wisdom that is just about to reveal itself, old laws coming into consciousness. It is also true of artists with comparable courage and imagination.

Scientists and artists build on revealed knowledge and proven principles to discover new ways of doing things and in the process new principles, new laws. And yet, since they are discoverable, they are not new at all. They have always been there. The motto of the experimental adventurous thinker is "There is more."

It is recorded that the ancient Hebrew prophets spoke one on one with a voice which they called the "word of God." There was a voice, no doubt, but what was it and where did it come from and how could those prophets be so clear of mind that they actually heard it? Socrates spoke of hearing such a voice, so have many others. Even today it isn't unusual to have the answer to a problem come into your head like a silent voice. It has certainly happened to me, many times. I've come to expect it. I was hiking one day in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. It was a long trail over a mountain range I had never been on before. As I was descending from one of the summits I heard a quiet voice right next to me as clear as if someone was standing there. In fact I looked to the side expecting to see someone. But I was alone. The voice said "You're off the trail." I looked down and saw that, in fact, I was not on the trail. Losing the trail can be dangerous if you aren't an experienced hiker as I wasn't. I looked back up and saw a place where I knew I had been on the trail and hiked back up to it. When I got there I saw the trail took a sharp turn which I had missed.

It can also happen with a vision. Sitting quietly with your eyes closed you may see a sight that tells you what you need to know. For some people that vision can come with eyes open.

Some people go through many ways of trying to get in touch with those voices and visions. They draw circles on the ground, read tea leaves, stare into crystal balls or sit and wait over a Ouija board, for example. They are trying to hear the voice or see the sight. These days there are people doing terrible things because they say God told them to. That's a sad state of delusion. At worst it was the devil, or their conscious or unconscious belief in the devil, that spoke. The devil is very clever at masquerading as God. But the best trick the devil pulls is getting people to believe he's real.

The most important thing is to realize that the laws of being are all still there and have always been there waiting to be discovered. And they will be discovered and put to use by those who watch and listen, who know that it isn't over yet, who say "There is more."

"Impossible be strange attempts to those who weigh their pains in sense," wrote Shakespeare. We can look forward to the unseen becoming seen and the unreal becoming real.

DB - Vagabond Journeys
Never give up.
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