bailing rowboat bicycling roads

I couldn't imagine why I would buy a gun. Nor even a knife. Protection? I couldn't imagine shooting or stabbing someone if threatened. So I didn't and don't.

There's nothing to protect. I have too many shirts. They hang on clothesline behind bookshed after washing machine. I have too many pants. They hang behind door of my room. I have too many books. They reside everywhere; calling to me -- Come, read!

There's also this almost childlike focus on the moment, the joy of the present alone: Is that really all there is to happiness? What about happy memories? What about the happy thought that tomorrow is another day to do something good and exciting? 

You may, instead, agree with the Tagesspruch (maxim for the day) that the owner of a hotel on the Baltic coast wrote some months ago on the breakfast menu for his guests: "Die wesentlichen Dinge, um in diesem Leben Glück zu erlangen, sind: Etwas zu vollbringen, jemanden zu lieben, und auf etwas zu hoffen." Approximately: "The essential things that make you happy in life are: to accomplish something, to love someone, and to hope for something." That’s not Goethe; but it's a happy thought. 

(--from, Philosophy for the privileged and the intellectual By Dr. Toad on March 5, 2010, reviewing The Present Alone is Our Happiness: Conversations with Jeannie Carlier and Arnold I. Davidson (Cultural Memory in the Present) Paperback – December 23, 2008, by Pierre Hadot, Amazon, https://www.amazon.com/Present-Alone-Our-Happiness-Conversations/dp/0804748365/ref=sr_1_10?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1468355805&sr=1-10&keywords=pierre+hadot

 Some think a Bald Eagle (or the large snapping turtle)  took the Loon youngsters from Hosmer Pond, a 54 acre body of freshwater 3+ miles outside of town. There was much joy when the two little ones showed up in late June swimming with mom and pop Loon. Then, no show. The wondering has turned to disappointment. So geht das Leben!

Rather a black sweatshirt and pair of black sweatshorts. That's what I ordered yesterday.

And cycled 10 miles today.

After reading from book on Robert Lax and jotting poetry in yurt for quiet afternoon.

I'm thinking of nothing these days.

What is the relation of 'attention' to 'being'

It began as a mere response to why the killings of black men by police seems so noteworthy these current weeks (and years).

The Friday morning conversation in prison often is a springboard through insight.

One man mentioned technology, the filming of incidents.

Then it was said, "Attention is being given to it."

And all of a sudden, as part of the earlier question asking about the compassion equivalent to intelligence, the thought occurs: attention is being given to it.

And we ponder this. Is attention "being"? And is attention compassion?

And is attention, being, given, to "this?"

Are we stumbling into something here?

Friday morning beads

No more professional armies to battle each other on a recognized battleground like some chessboard using approved legitimate rules of engagement.

Now everyone and every place at any time with no rules no restrictions no exclusion of women and children and no identified goal -- polymorphously perverse killing destruction.

It is a logical extension of rifle, carpet bombing, Thompson machine guns, ak47s, drones, fighter jets, hydrogen bomb, stiletto knife, brass knuckles, choke holds, baseball bats, pushing off roofs.

Now, an 18 wheeler in a crowded street during celebratory gathering.

This is our future previewing on screens of uncomprehending consciousness.

But we've never been aficionados of logical extensions.

So we stare.

Wondering whether and to whom we might pray.

If there is a God, then where would one look to see God

Beneath

It

All;

Beyond

And

Between

Everything

if only we could see what is under appearance

What is Christ

Is Christ what is

Coming to be

Intimately unveiled 

After what has been

Is now departing

Unseen

are you religious

What if wisdom is a being of intimate awareness?

What if the "fear of the lord" was about what the lord feared, not that the lord is to be feared? (Does the lord fear our unwillingness to see things whole and act with conscious integrity for all beings?)

What if salvation means liberation from barrier and ignorance?

Would religion, then, be the most vital inquiry of any?

monday morning

Yes

Today Benedict of Nursia is celebrated, called the father of western monasticism.

Hosmer pond watchers are looking for two baby loons. No reports of sightings in past three days.

Photo arises from black lives matter Louisiana that sums up the mood of these times. 

JONATHAN BACHMAN/REUTERS

Is this the new iconic image of what America struggles to comprehend?

no eyes no ears no object of mind

I worry that criminals have stolen the country from so-called ordinary people.

Not petty criminals. Powerful criminals.

In two months it will be the 15th anniversary of a new century of criminal terrorism.

So many among us do not have the slightest suspicion as to who the real terrorists are.

Tonight, on my cushion, I listened to rain.

There’s a lot to hear.