“Keep a quiet heart, sit like a tortoise, walk sprightly like a pigeon and sleep like a dog.” These were the words of advice Li gave to Wu Pei-fu, the warlord, who took Li into his house to learn the secret of extremely long life.
Li maintained that inward calm and peace of mind were the secrets to incredible longevity. His diet after all, was mainly based on rice and wine.
And ice cold vodka.
-Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong.
Life is caught in the tension between order and chaos. If there is too much order, everything becomes the same and there is no room for creativity or anything new. Everything must fit the one pattern. If there is too much chaos nothing can last long enough to create anything useful; everything is just a jumble that destroys everything before it can get started. Between order and chaos is found the Edge of Chaos, the point where there is enough chaos for novelty and creativity, but also enough order for consistency and patterns to endure. This point is a magic point, where new and unimagined properties can emerge.
“Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don’t know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishing.”
- Anais Nin
Friday, June 12, 2009
A few days ago I had a very disturbing dream, and I want to document it for posterity.
Tuesday afternoon I had read a few pages of “Mind of Clear Light” by the Dalai Lama, in which he says we should be careful not to waste a moment of this precious human life. Also, I have been thinking about the fact that I will be 61 in July, and one year from then I will be eligible to collect Social Security, which I am fairly certailn I will, barring any unforseen windfall of U.S. dollars.
In the dream I was sentenced to 13 months on a work-release program for the crime of having wasted 60 years of Precious Human Life. I did not deny my guilt, I embraced it. My work-release job was to be delivering mail in the city, which appeared to be Leominster, a suburb of a large city. I went out to deliver the mail and was completely lost. Just like my real experience with delivering mail, I felt like I didn’t know where to go, and that I was going to run out of time to complete the route.
A kindly gentleman finally came to me and counselled me as to what I should really be doing for my work release job. I was to be a “medical technician”, something to do with surgical instruments. Donna was there briefly, and dispassionately said I was suited for that kind of work. All the while the crime I had committed, wasting my 60 years of human life, told more and more heavily upon me, and I cried loudly, like a baby with a rash, and woke up crying, fully believing I had, indeed, wasted my life.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Coming Through In Waves
Since my last post in July 2009 I have found employment, almost by accident, as a cook at the Brightwood Tavern. I should have kept a journal of my experiences there, people I have met, the Regulars at the Tavern (I call them "The Usual Suspects."). Someone with a normal imagination, some writing skills, and the energy and will could write a great comic/tragic novel revolving around the Tavern, or at least a pilot for a sitcom.
Someday I will write about it, but for now I am here to write about My Life at this moment.
I have been cooking at the Tavern since mid-July when it finally opened. The job pays minimum wage, but the tips more than make up the shortfall, ranging from $25 to $50 a day, which is substantial. It has allowed me to buy insurance and register my car, buy food, art supplies, clothing, one wedding gift, and a round-trip ticket to Baltimore to attend said wedding, and to finally begin to pay rent for this fine studio in which I live.
As good as this may sound versus poverty and unemployment, over time it has reaffirmed my belief that I was never cut out to work for a living, as generally understood in American society (daily toil for money). My only talent is in the arts, and the only arena in which I feel comfortable is the visual arts. Although I have now been chipping away at becoming an "artist" for the better part of two years, I am just beginning to get a sense of what that really means.
Serendipitously, I am also reaching retirement age in the Social Security sense, and have decided to take that plunge in July, when I will be 62 years old. I will receive from SSA about as much as I now get from Toil at the Tavern, but will have all my time free to pursue my post-retirement career as a visual artist. This feels very much like my last Shot At Redemption. I think this is what I was meant to do to leave something behind besides a legacy of mishandled money and broken hearts.
The other large decision I have made recently is to get a puppy. No shit. A puppy.
I have become friends with a couple at the Tavern whose black Lab bitch pooped out a litter last month. The pups will be ready to go in March and I have committed to taking one. I will meet them this week and pick one out.
I have been thinking about getting a dog for a while, since it's an easy way to get a friend and constant companion, which I need. I was going to adopt an old dog from a shelter but decided a puppy will be better. Hopefully he and I (it will be a male) will bond like I did with ol' Spike so many years ago. Spike was a most unruly dog, mainly because I did everything wrong in raising him, but he loved me a lot and I loved him right back. He was My Dog. I want to do that again, but this time do it right, as far as neutering (Spike was never neutered, probably the main reason he was such a wild man), housebreaking, training, etc. I want the dog to grow old with me, rather than get an old dog that I might outlive. I don't need anymore heartbreak, thank you very much, so safety will be a big concern, and that goes right back to training, and getting a good-tempered pup to begin with. I know I have several years in purgatory coming for what I did to Burt, the sweetest dog I ever met. It's my fault he died so young; I won't ever get over that but maybe I can make it up to the cosmos in some way by getting it right with this puppy. I hope so.
So I feel energized for the time being with what's coming: dog, retirement, post-retirement career. Stand by for future posts here about how this all turns out.
For now, Comfortably Numb, Namaste.
Someday I will write about it, but for now I am here to write about My Life at this moment.
I have been cooking at the Tavern since mid-July when it finally opened. The job pays minimum wage, but the tips more than make up the shortfall, ranging from $25 to $50 a day, which is substantial. It has allowed me to buy insurance and register my car, buy food, art supplies, clothing, one wedding gift, and a round-trip ticket to Baltimore to attend said wedding, and to finally begin to pay rent for this fine studio in which I live.
As good as this may sound versus poverty and unemployment, over time it has reaffirmed my belief that I was never cut out to work for a living, as generally understood in American society (daily toil for money). My only talent is in the arts, and the only arena in which I feel comfortable is the visual arts. Although I have now been chipping away at becoming an "artist" for the better part of two years, I am just beginning to get a sense of what that really means.
Serendipitously, I am also reaching retirement age in the Social Security sense, and have decided to take that plunge in July, when I will be 62 years old. I will receive from SSA about as much as I now get from Toil at the Tavern, but will have all my time free to pursue my post-retirement career as a visual artist. This feels very much like my last Shot At Redemption. I think this is what I was meant to do to leave something behind besides a legacy of mishandled money and broken hearts.
The other large decision I have made recently is to get a puppy. No shit. A puppy.
I have become friends with a couple at the Tavern whose black Lab bitch pooped out a litter last month. The pups will be ready to go in March and I have committed to taking one. I will meet them this week and pick one out.
I have been thinking about getting a dog for a while, since it's an easy way to get a friend and constant companion, which I need. I was going to adopt an old dog from a shelter but decided a puppy will be better. Hopefully he and I (it will be a male) will bond like I did with ol' Spike so many years ago. Spike was a most unruly dog, mainly because I did everything wrong in raising him, but he loved me a lot and I loved him right back. He was My Dog. I want to do that again, but this time do it right, as far as neutering (Spike was never neutered, probably the main reason he was such a wild man), housebreaking, training, etc. I want the dog to grow old with me, rather than get an old dog that I might outlive. I don't need anymore heartbreak, thank you very much, so safety will be a big concern, and that goes right back to training, and getting a good-tempered pup to begin with. I know I have several years in purgatory coming for what I did to Burt, the sweetest dog I ever met. It's my fault he died so young; I won't ever get over that but maybe I can make it up to the cosmos in some way by getting it right with this puppy. I hope so.
So I feel energized for the time being with what's coming: dog, retirement, post-retirement career. Stand by for future posts here about how this all turns out.
For now, Comfortably Numb, Namaste.
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