Only the person who has experienced light and darkness, war and peace, rise and fall; only that person has truly experienced life.
Stefan Zweig
*******************************
How many days must dawn on a troubled life before the mud is dry?
How many hopes must be sacrificed to pay for the sin of desire?
How many sweethearts must be killed before the war is won?
How many painful steps must be taken before the old man can rest?
How many scornful words must be said before the fool is forgotten?
How many nights must be watched before the child is born?
How many times must the gavel thump before the truth is known?
How many tears must be shed before the prayer is heard?
How many children must starve before the help is offered?
How many days must be spent in fear before the door is opened?
How many light bulbs must be changed before the room stays lit?
How many animals must suffer before the sadists are satisfied?
How many curses must be uttered before the people listen?
How many wrecks must there be before the drunks are sober?
How many youngsters must be lost before the predators are found?
How many punches must be delivered before the police arrive?
How many lies must be told before the laws are obeyed?
How many crowds must gather before the wretched poor are fed?
How many lives must be destroyed before revenge is a felony?
How many sermons must be read before the ignorant are saved?
How many hollow weeks must pass before the lonely are visited?
How many hearts must break before we uncover love?
----------------------------------------------------------
How many words must I write before I win my rights?
How many gates must I unlock before I can see my freedom?
How many times must I begin again before I can begin to live?
DB
************************************************
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Yesterday's Yoke 4/29/09
Choose your companions from the best.
Yeats
*************
Hello.
----------------
This quotation from W. B, sure kicks at some old and new wounds. I calculate decades have to be used to measure the time it has taken me to learn that lesson. How ,much time have I wasted listening to the dull, talking with the hard-of-understanding, praising the unworthy and trying to show respect for the disrespectable? "Let me count the ways." No, let me not.
Recently, a dear, long time friend (she knows who she is, one of the best) said to me "Why do you insist upon believing that everyone is as intelligent as you are?" The answer is "Because I want them to be. I want them to be more intelligent so that I can learn something."
One of life's frustrating discoveries is that some people actually make a habit, or even a religion, out of not understanding things. It seems that if it doesn't fit into the circle around their toes and noses, they don't want to know about it. They eschew any knowledge that is on the other side of the fence. And so, as a result, are shocked and offended when something happens that they didn't expect or that doesn't fit a preconception. A wise person said "Those who are easily shocked should be shocked more often."
Your life is run by ideas. That's a fact. And if they aren't your ideas then they are someone else's and whether you agree with them or not it is well to find out what they are. Not doing that caused a lot of people and businesses to go bankrupt recently. But reason is one of the most useful tools in the shed. Why is it buried?
There are other ways in which we can blind ourselves to that which is true. One is to predesign it. If you make up your mind a head of time what is true and what isn't and then try to live that way, you're on the primrose path. Imagine a scientist with a hypothesis that doesn't hold up under experimentation but who goes ahead and publishes it as if it was a true discovery. That has happened unfortunately. It may be your boat, but if it's sinking, get off of it.
Another, even more insidious way to avoid understanding something is envy. If someone seems more intelligent, some people don't want to be around him because they feel intimidated, It's much easier for some people to stiff arm any degree of wisdom than to admit that someone else has more. That kind of egotism keeps people dolts. It protects them from enlightenment. I believe I have lost comrades for that reason.
I hope I don't quit the field and give up the struggle to get myself and others free from these mental mirages we have created for ourselves, and their effects. Wisdom will force the thinking person to find a tool for expressing itself. From the reactive person wisdom will hide. .I think it is vitally important to our future that we don't go on living in clouds and think we will survive. In the meantime and from now on, I hope it's the best companions I can find who will get my time and attention.
DB
********************
Yeats
*************
Hello.
----------------
This quotation from W. B, sure kicks at some old and new wounds. I calculate decades have to be used to measure the time it has taken me to learn that lesson. How ,much time have I wasted listening to the dull, talking with the hard-of-understanding, praising the unworthy and trying to show respect for the disrespectable? "Let me count the ways." No, let me not.
Recently, a dear, long time friend (she knows who she is, one of the best) said to me "Why do you insist upon believing that everyone is as intelligent as you are?" The answer is "Because I want them to be. I want them to be more intelligent so that I can learn something."
One of life's frustrating discoveries is that some people actually make a habit, or even a religion, out of not understanding things. It seems that if it doesn't fit into the circle around their toes and noses, they don't want to know about it. They eschew any knowledge that is on the other side of the fence. And so, as a result, are shocked and offended when something happens that they didn't expect or that doesn't fit a preconception. A wise person said "Those who are easily shocked should be shocked more often."
Your life is run by ideas. That's a fact. And if they aren't your ideas then they are someone else's and whether you agree with them or not it is well to find out what they are. Not doing that caused a lot of people and businesses to go bankrupt recently. But reason is one of the most useful tools in the shed. Why is it buried?
There are other ways in which we can blind ourselves to that which is true. One is to predesign it. If you make up your mind a head of time what is true and what isn't and then try to live that way, you're on the primrose path. Imagine a scientist with a hypothesis that doesn't hold up under experimentation but who goes ahead and publishes it as if it was a true discovery. That has happened unfortunately. It may be your boat, but if it's sinking, get off of it.
Another, even more insidious way to avoid understanding something is envy. If someone seems more intelligent, some people don't want to be around him because they feel intimidated, It's much easier for some people to stiff arm any degree of wisdom than to admit that someone else has more. That kind of egotism keeps people dolts. It protects them from enlightenment. I believe I have lost comrades for that reason.
I hope I don't quit the field and give up the struggle to get myself and others free from these mental mirages we have created for ourselves, and their effects. Wisdom will force the thinking person to find a tool for expressing itself. From the reactive person wisdom will hide. .I think it is vitally important to our future that we don't go on living in clouds and think we will survive. In the meantime and from now on, I hope it's the best companions I can find who will get my time and attention.
DB
********************
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Xenophilic X-rays 4/28/09
To me reading philosophy is like reading a great work of fiction. I love to follow a path of ideas to the ultimate and pleasurable surprise.
DB - The Vagabond
******************
C'mon-a my house-a, my house.
--------------------------------------
When I was a kid I liked classical music, opera, poetry and novels (Yes. I was a strange kid.) But I wouldn't go near philosophy. What could be more boring? Watching the grass grow, perhaps?
My college English teacher, a tiresome, over-categorizing fellow, made us wade through Plato's "Republic" for some odd reason. It was all Greek to me (ha, ha). I had a girl friend who was a Philosophy major. She would often give me quotes to think about: Plato said this, Descartes said that, Aristotle said the other, but then Mill said so and so and Russell replied such and so, and of course Santayana and Rousseau, etc. until my head was spinning.
Years later, I don't remember how, I found a copy of "Leviathan" by Thomas Hobbes sitting on my desk. So I read it. That book showed me three important things. One: it taught me a lot about the machinery of politics and government. Two: it showed me that in the hands and mind of a great thinker, philosophy could be a very interesting read, Three: philosophy isn't a system to tell you what to think, but a system to get you thinking for yourself.
The first actual book of phosophy I bought for myself was by Martin Heidegger. By the time I finished it I was an addict. I soon found the funds to purchase a complete Plato that now sits at my elbow along with my complete Shakespeare and some other favored books. I was blessed to be chosen to record Nietzsche's "Thus Spake Zarathustra" for the Library Of Congress' books for the blind.
Now I'm the owner of a small library of philosophical works: a lot of Aristotle, Kant, Rousseau, Nietzsche, Benthem, Mill, Santayana, Kierkegaard, Bruno, Locke, Whitehead, Neruda, Russell, Sartre, Descartes, Aquinas, Jaspers, Hegel and that's all I can remember without going through my library and it's too hot today to do that. Plus I have several journals on philosophy and the history of ideas.
Aesthetics, ethics, politics, poetics, linguistics, logic, epistemology, metaphysics, semantics, cosmology, spirituality, sociology, virtue; philosophy is the study of the human race, where it came from, and what it's destiny is. It is the hidden art and the divine science.
Through the years philosophers have approached it's topics from every conceivable angle and influence. That they can't agree with each other is what makes it fun. But they all address their subjects with a keen mind. To follow such a mind as it hikes its way through the jungle of thoughts and theories, making discoveries along the way and reaching a destination on top of some mountain of clarity and conclusion, is exciting to me.
You don't have to like philosophy. You don't have to read it. Leave that up to strange kids like me. I just wanted to spend this page of my journal sharing my joy with you.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_____________________
May angels greet you in the morning.
DB - The Vagabond
******************
C'mon-a my house-a, my house.
--------------------------------------
When I was a kid I liked classical music, opera, poetry and novels (Yes. I was a strange kid.) But I wouldn't go near philosophy. What could be more boring? Watching the grass grow, perhaps?
My college English teacher, a tiresome, over-categorizing fellow, made us wade through Plato's "Republic" for some odd reason. It was all Greek to me (ha, ha). I had a girl friend who was a Philosophy major. She would often give me quotes to think about: Plato said this, Descartes said that, Aristotle said the other, but then Mill said so and so and Russell replied such and so, and of course Santayana and Rousseau, etc. until my head was spinning.
Years later, I don't remember how, I found a copy of "Leviathan" by Thomas Hobbes sitting on my desk. So I read it. That book showed me three important things. One: it taught me a lot about the machinery of politics and government. Two: it showed me that in the hands and mind of a great thinker, philosophy could be a very interesting read, Three: philosophy isn't a system to tell you what to think, but a system to get you thinking for yourself.
The first actual book of phosophy I bought for myself was by Martin Heidegger. By the time I finished it I was an addict. I soon found the funds to purchase a complete Plato that now sits at my elbow along with my complete Shakespeare and some other favored books. I was blessed to be chosen to record Nietzsche's "Thus Spake Zarathustra" for the Library Of Congress' books for the blind.
Now I'm the owner of a small library of philosophical works: a lot of Aristotle, Kant, Rousseau, Nietzsche, Benthem, Mill, Santayana, Kierkegaard, Bruno, Locke, Whitehead, Neruda, Russell, Sartre, Descartes, Aquinas, Jaspers, Hegel and that's all I can remember without going through my library and it's too hot today to do that. Plus I have several journals on philosophy and the history of ideas.
Aesthetics, ethics, politics, poetics, linguistics, logic, epistemology, metaphysics, semantics, cosmology, spirituality, sociology, virtue; philosophy is the study of the human race, where it came from, and what it's destiny is. It is the hidden art and the divine science.
Through the years philosophers have approached it's topics from every conceivable angle and influence. That they can't agree with each other is what makes it fun. But they all address their subjects with a keen mind. To follow such a mind as it hikes its way through the jungle of thoughts and theories, making discoveries along the way and reaching a destination on top of some mountain of clarity and conclusion, is exciting to me.
You don't have to like philosophy. You don't have to read it. Leave that up to strange kids like me. I just wanted to spend this page of my journal sharing my joy with you.
DB - Vagabond Journeys
_____________________
May angels greet you in the morning.
Monday, April 27, 2009
FROM A READER
From a reader of "Brian and Christine" on Vagabond Tales.
it does feel like a siege situation. The three of them have formed a family, and outside forces are conspiring to tear them apart. How can they fight these seemingly invincible--and virtually invisible--foes? Can they keep their new family together?
http://db-vagabondtales.blogspot.com/
it does feel like a siege situation. The three of them have formed a family, and outside forces are conspiring to tear them apart. How can they fight these seemingly invincible--and virtually invisible--foes? Can they keep their new family together?
http://db-vagabondtales.blogspot.com/
Wary Wisdom 4/27/09
To go against the dominant thinking of your friends, of most of the people you see every day, is perhaps the most difficult act of heroism you can have.
Theodore White
**************
Ah, back again are you?
------------------
A "difficult act of heroism"? Now why should that be? What's wrong with thinking for yourself, having original ideas and expressing them? Why should that require bravery?
It might be because some people do it in a belligerent fashion. Instead of "I'd like to offer a different opinion." they say "Sorry, buddy, but you're wrong." Ot it may be because a person with a different idea can't express it as easily as someone can who expresses the common opinion armed with all the sayings and sound bites that accompany it. Most likely it is because the ones with the standard, chiseled-in-stone ideas are ready to do verbal battle with anyone who disagrees with them.
I once lost a friend because she found out that I had a political and social opinion that was different from hers. Losing a friend for that reason is an absurd experience, but what was worse is that she acted as if I had been hiding my beliefs from her when in fact the subject of politics had never come up in our conversations.
She just summarily and scornfully dumped me as a friend, and that was that. What a shame.
I knew a man in a small backwoods community, who held very strict political views. They were well known in the town and were known to be extreme. People knew not to bring up the subject of politics with him. If perchance someone disagreed with him the verbal abuse to follow was terrifying. But if one tried to argue the point with him that person's life might literally be in danger.
On the other hand, I knew two men who were the best of friends. They shared a lot of enjoyments and laughs together, and yet they had diametrically opposed views about politics. One was a far left liberal and the other a far right conservative.
One day we were sitting around talking and a mutual friend asked them how, given their differences, they could remain such good friends. One of them said something like: "I'm a bleeding heart, pinko, empty headed liberal and he knows it, and he's a heartless, lock jawed, cement headed conservative and I know it, and on that basis we get along just fine." The other one nodded in assent.
I don't know, but I tend to think maybe the world could breathe more easily with something akin to that style of light hearted bipartisanship.
DB
__________________
Go get some rays.
********************
Theodore White
**************
Ah, back again are you?
------------------
A "difficult act of heroism"? Now why should that be? What's wrong with thinking for yourself, having original ideas and expressing them? Why should that require bravery?
It might be because some people do it in a belligerent fashion. Instead of "I'd like to offer a different opinion." they say "Sorry, buddy, but you're wrong." Ot it may be because a person with a different idea can't express it as easily as someone can who expresses the common opinion armed with all the sayings and sound bites that accompany it. Most likely it is because the ones with the standard, chiseled-in-stone ideas are ready to do verbal battle with anyone who disagrees with them.
I once lost a friend because she found out that I had a political and social opinion that was different from hers. Losing a friend for that reason is an absurd experience, but what was worse is that she acted as if I had been hiding my beliefs from her when in fact the subject of politics had never come up in our conversations.
She just summarily and scornfully dumped me as a friend, and that was that. What a shame.
I knew a man in a small backwoods community, who held very strict political views. They were well known in the town and were known to be extreme. People knew not to bring up the subject of politics with him. If perchance someone disagreed with him the verbal abuse to follow was terrifying. But if one tried to argue the point with him that person's life might literally be in danger.
On the other hand, I knew two men who were the best of friends. They shared a lot of enjoyments and laughs together, and yet they had diametrically opposed views about politics. One was a far left liberal and the other a far right conservative.
One day we were sitting around talking and a mutual friend asked them how, given their differences, they could remain such good friends. One of them said something like: "I'm a bleeding heart, pinko, empty headed liberal and he knows it, and he's a heartless, lock jawed, cement headed conservative and I know it, and on that basis we get along just fine." The other one nodded in assent.
I don't know, but I tend to think maybe the world could breathe more easily with something akin to that style of light hearted bipartisanship.
DB
__________________
Go get some rays.
********************
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Viewed Verisimilitude 4/26/09
Life is a zoo in a jungle.
Peter De Vries
*******************
Happy Sunday.
_____________________
Years ago some friends and I went to a zoo in a large city. After wandering around we got to the primate area. There was a large field with baboons chasing each other around and a building next to it. When we entered the building we were in the gorilla section. There were several glassed in areas. One of them was a small area with rocky walls and ledges. Sitting on the ledge near the window was a young male gorilla watching the people go by. There was a bench nearby, so I sat down.
Within a few seconds that youngster and I were staring at each other. He reached up and brushed his shoulder once. I did the same. Every time he made a gesture I copied him. He seemed interested in that. I held up my hand in the gesture of a greeting. He watched me but didn't do anything. I did it again. After the third time he copied me.
Soon we were making gestures at each other. I always imitated him, which seemed to amuse him. Some of my gestures he imitated, some he didn't. There was a man's voice behind me with a scornful tone that said "Ha. Monkey see, monkey do."
"Ape" I said.
"What?"
"Ape, not monkey."
"Oh, really" the scorn went on. "And what's the difference?"
"Monkeys have tails" I said.
He walked away.
The imitation game went on for a while, back and forth, until the mother gorilla came out to get him. She lifted him up gently. He climbed up onto her shoulder and as they disappeared behind the rocks he looked back at me.
I didn't see that young one again, but I wonder just how much real communication there was between us. There certainly seemed to be thinking going on.
Considering that he was probably born there, under the supervision of the zoo's veterinarian, that he was fed and cared for by the custodians, that he had other young gorillas to frolic with and the adults as companions and that when he wanted some entertainment he could sit on the rocks and watch the silly humans walk by and gawk at him, my final question is: Which one of us is living the more civilized life?
DB - Vagabond Journey
___________________
May the good shine through.
**********************
Check out the Spring Quiz below.
Peter De Vries
*******************
Happy Sunday.
_____________________
Years ago some friends and I went to a zoo in a large city. After wandering around we got to the primate area. There was a large field with baboons chasing each other around and a building next to it. When we entered the building we were in the gorilla section. There were several glassed in areas. One of them was a small area with rocky walls and ledges. Sitting on the ledge near the window was a young male gorilla watching the people go by. There was a bench nearby, so I sat down.
Within a few seconds that youngster and I were staring at each other. He reached up and brushed his shoulder once. I did the same. Every time he made a gesture I copied him. He seemed interested in that. I held up my hand in the gesture of a greeting. He watched me but didn't do anything. I did it again. After the third time he copied me.
Soon we were making gestures at each other. I always imitated him, which seemed to amuse him. Some of my gestures he imitated, some he didn't. There was a man's voice behind me with a scornful tone that said "Ha. Monkey see, monkey do."
"Ape" I said.
"What?"
"Ape, not monkey."
"Oh, really" the scorn went on. "And what's the difference?"
"Monkeys have tails" I said.
He walked away.
The imitation game went on for a while, back and forth, until the mother gorilla came out to get him. She lifted him up gently. He climbed up onto her shoulder and as they disappeared behind the rocks he looked back at me.
I didn't see that young one again, but I wonder just how much real communication there was between us. There certainly seemed to be thinking going on.
Considering that he was probably born there, under the supervision of the zoo's veterinarian, that he was fed and cared for by the custodians, that he had other young gorillas to frolic with and the adults as companions and that when he wanted some entertainment he could sit on the rocks and watch the silly humans walk by and gawk at him, my final question is: Which one of us is living the more civilized life?
DB - Vagabond Journey
___________________
May the good shine through.
**********************
Check out the Spring Quiz below.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Unexpected Uncovering 4/25/09
We have forgotten how to be good guests, how to walk lightly on the earth as other creatures do.
Unknown
*************
Good day, my friend.
-------------------
One of the most memorable experiences I ever had while hiking in a forest happened many years ago in the middle of the night.
The many hours spent in the White Mountain National Forest had given me a great respect for the creatures who live there. I learned to admire how the chipmunks could silently move across the fallen leaves, how the squirrels could charge up a tree at the speed of lightening, how the bats could fly noiselessly as if the were black leaves being blown by the wind,
I admired how the large birds could sail between the thick branches of the trees, how the rustling of leaves on the ground nearby when there was no wind would reveal a snake that had crawled under them to escape being seen and that when I saw the hoof prints on the trail I would know that a moose had passed there recently.
I saw the deer running through the brush, their little white tails bobbing up and down. I heard the splash of the frogs in the water as I approached. When I came to a clearing where there were wild flowers, I saw the insects going about their business. And sometimes I would see something pop up from behind a rock and dip back down again so fast I couldn't catch what it was.
I have written before about my trip down Tremont Mountain, most of which I had to do in the dark because I had mistimed my journey, Near the end of that hike there was a small brook that had to be crossed, It was a very dark night, There was no moon. I knew that on the other side of the brook there was only a short, half hour walk to my car so I decided to sit down by the brook before I crossed it, rest and have a cigarette. I turned off my flashlight and set it down, put down my stick and my back pack, took out my cigarettes and my matches.
I had large, kitchen matches. When I struck one I saw that all around me for as far as I could see there were eyes looking at me: large eyes, small eyes, round eyes, squinty eyes, tiny dots of eyes close together, big droopy eyes far apart. It was as if every creature in the neighborhood had called a truce to whatever hostility they had with each other and all came out to find out what this being was that had invaded their territory. I had absolutely no inkling that there were any animals around, I didn't hear a sound. But they sure heard me.
Of course, as fast as they could they disappeared. I finished my cigarette, got across the brook and made it home with no further contact with wild life. But I won't forget the night when I was the talk of the forest.
Vagabond Journeys
__________________
Spend some 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
===================================================
Unknown
*************
Good day, my friend.
-------------------
One of the most memorable experiences I ever had while hiking in a forest happened many years ago in the middle of the night.
The many hours spent in the White Mountain National Forest had given me a great respect for the creatures who live there. I learned to admire how the chipmunks could silently move across the fallen leaves, how the squirrels could charge up a tree at the speed of lightening, how the bats could fly noiselessly as if the were black leaves being blown by the wind,
I admired how the large birds could sail between the thick branches of the trees, how the rustling of leaves on the ground nearby when there was no wind would reveal a snake that had crawled under them to escape being seen and that when I saw the hoof prints on the trail I would know that a moose had passed there recently.
I saw the deer running through the brush, their little white tails bobbing up and down. I heard the splash of the frogs in the water as I approached. When I came to a clearing where there were wild flowers, I saw the insects going about their business. And sometimes I would see something pop up from behind a rock and dip back down again so fast I couldn't catch what it was.
I have written before about my trip down Tremont Mountain, most of which I had to do in the dark because I had mistimed my journey, Near the end of that hike there was a small brook that had to be crossed, It was a very dark night, There was no moon. I knew that on the other side of the brook there was only a short, half hour walk to my car so I decided to sit down by the brook before I crossed it, rest and have a cigarette. I turned off my flashlight and set it down, put down my stick and my back pack, took out my cigarettes and my matches.
I had large, kitchen matches. When I struck one I saw that all around me for as far as I could see there were eyes looking at me: large eyes, small eyes, round eyes, squinty eyes, tiny dots of eyes close together, big droopy eyes far apart. It was as if every creature in the neighborhood had called a truce to whatever hostility they had with each other and all came out to find out what this being was that had invaded their territory. I had absolutely no inkling that there were any animals around, I didn't hear a sound. But they sure heard me.
Of course, as fast as they could they disappeared. I finished my cigarette, got across the brook and made it home with no further contact with wild life. But I won't forget the night when I was the talk of the forest.
Vagabond Journeys
__________________
Spend some 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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