content

I saw a news segment once concerning what had been found to be the happiest country in the world (that year, anyway). Denmark or Sweden or Iceland or something was the big winner. After some exploration as to possible factors in their :)s, they traced it to the fact that a temperament founded on low expectations seemed to be the norm in this country. Pessimism (realism?) was the seeming cause of their overall contentedness.

Not that they walked around cursing life all day... just that they expected very little from life or from anyone else....

So when life produced anything above dull/drab/sad (none of which were huge let downs), it was a great surprise and a source of joy.

Today was a good day, if only because I expected that it would be much more difficult than it was.

:)

Galileo

Everything falls apart

Everything changes

Everything falls apart

Everything changes

I woke up and the world was spinning

I woke up and it won't stop spinning.

Was it always spinning?

Is it even spinning?

The center did not hold

The weight of it all

Forget what you've been told

And watch it fall

Let it fall.

content

What if this is not a matter of recovery?

Not something to be recovered

Not something runaway

Or misplaced

That might one day be returned by a friend

Or show up unannounced on my doorstep?

What if a cup has tipped

And its contents

Will remain

Forever anywhere

Except back in the cup

in the same way again?

heavy

everything is heavy today. these days do not always announce themselves. terrified of everything. everything.

moments like this

I cry watching American Idol. Every time. As phony as the show may be, they sometimes capture authentic moments when people recognize their own potential.... moments when they see goodness.... when they acknowledge something in themselves that they were afraid to be proud of. It moves me. I have a similar reaction when I watch little nerd teenagers interact with their friends.

In all of this wondering and wanting to analyze and know why, I hope I don't lose appreciation for the ability to feel without justification. The justification is there, usually... but there's no need to bust out a powerpoint in the middle of a moment. ya know?

All the words that were said

I will wait to hear someday

and I'll remember that they are true.

things of dreams, real as us

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

-Elephants romp around this earth freely. There are elephants outside of zoos just doin' their thing at this very moment.

-There are whole communities of animal species that never ever ever come into contact with humans. They are out there or under there or up there doin' their thing at this very moment.

-Huge ram horns, locked in battle for highest ranking amongst females.... the drive to reproduce is FASCINATING. Why? Why is it such an innate desire and need in people and animals to pass on their genes? Where does that come from?

1. Survival... but how is that imbedded in animals who are not able to comprehend that generations and generations will carry on after their own deaths.

2. Intelligent design... implying that the passing on of genes signifies a refinement that is moving toward something... but if so, toward what? are we just a means to an end?

3. Sex drive? huh.

Either way, it's fascinating to me that there are thousands of years of creatures adapting and changing and dying and passing on their genes that would go on just as well without us. interaction with any alien race would inspire no less awe in me than the rainbow belly salamanders or underwater eyeless creatures. real life narnia. things of dreams. real as us.

i don't know

TED Blog: Rev. Tom Honey on TED.com

"In the end, the only thing I could say for sure was, "I don't know." And that might be the most profoundly religious statement of all."

segregate

that is how my morning started.

as i was walking around my first block of the day and noticing that, based on the reading check quiz answers i was seeing, only half of my girls actually had a clue what we'd be talking about, the day seemed like it might continue to get more frustrating.

but as i waited for them to finish their quizzes, i made an 11th hour, day-changing decision.

today i segregated all my classes.

basic lesson (i hope) they learned through the experience: it is not a right to mooch off the work and ideas of others. participating in class discussion is a privilege earned by actually doing the reading and having something thoughtful to contribute when you come to class. amen foreva.

result: from the crowd who spent the class working independently to redo a quiz for half credit that they should have easily passed- annoyed... at themselves. from the group who got to circle up for class discussion- more willingness to contribute... sense of camaraderie... shy girls that i haven't heard much from in months volunteered their thoughts. one in particular (timid as a mouse) made it a point to say hi to me twice in the halls after class.

there are plenty of aspects of life, positive and negative, that we have no control over. that's not an excuse for not taking responsibility for the choices you do make.

sad note: in a significant way, the success of this experiment is only due to the fact that i work in a private school where respect is the norm. in philly, telling the kids that they would miss out on discussion and would have to work independently would have resulted in markers being thrown at my head. seriously. sadly, perhaps inner-city kids would benefit from the core of this lesson the most.

that leap

Regarding the whole “leap of faith” thing-

1. Sometimes faith is distinguished as faith because it concerns something that cannot be seen. In that sense, we act on faith all the time in our day to day lives. Entering my cc number online to purchase something is an act of faith. I cannot see the virtual signals and numbers moving through wirelessness. I know that the end result is a package on my doorstep, but I do not monitor the whole process, and don’t really know the first thing about how technology works in that sense. I don’t need to, either. But I also know that I COULD know how it works if I wanted to find out.
2. In other ways, I guess faith could be belief in something seemingly impossible, or improbable. The first examples that come to my mind seem to be hope rather than faith. Going through a crisis, you might “have faith” that things will work out for the best… but isn’t that really just hope? Wishing? Perhaps I am wrong in even including that in the definition of faith.
3. In the faith sense concerning God, it seems that faith is somewhat of a combination of both. An added factor might be that you can have faith in something reasonably… meaning- even if you haven’t seen it, and it seems rather impossible, you can reason that it is the mostly reasonable explanation and therefore can be taken on faith to be true. If I cannot otherwise explain how the material world came to be, it can logically follow that there exists something outside of the material that brought it into being. If I cannot explain where the order in the universe comes from or is sustained, it could follow that whatever set this universe at work also infused it with order as opposed to chaos. ….

I may be able to stand behind some of that reasoned faith. Maybe. My experience tells me that there are occurrences in my life that seem beyond the realm of scientific perception… patterns noticed, feelings of connectedness, seeming coincidence… but couldn’t all these unexplainable things be due to the fact that, as humans, we’re still relatively ignorant to an in depth understanding of our own species? Couldn’t science at some point discover a perceptible and explainable sixth sense that makes sense of the connectedness and patterns? What then? But even in that, there’s that human element that resists simple scientific rationale. If we are so similar to animals in so many ways, what accounts for the ways in which we are so distinct? Ultimately, why? If I am just one creature- a creature with a birthday moving toward a deathday like every ringworm and prairie dog in existence- why is it that I ask why? Where does this ability to reflect on purpose and meaning come from, and what is to be done with it?

A second level of resistance comes from trying to move the leap of faith into a practice of religion. A rationalized leap of faith might move me toward a belief in God, but where does Jesus Christ factor into all this? I don’t know at what point I will be able to say, “Yes, I believe a man who was also God walked on this earth, died, but then physically rose into heaven and will come again.” I don’t know how I can possibly say I believe in that, and I don’t know how I can believe that without proof, which is where this leap is supposed to bridge the gap, I guess.

“The whole point of faith is that there isn’t proof, that’s why it’s faith.” I make acts of faith like internet purchasing, but only because I am aware that the process is knowable, and that I could understand it if I wanted to. With the idea of dying and rising and being God and man, it is asking me to believe something so very outside of what seems possible, all based on old evidence (?), all of which is supposed to have some deep personal impact on me and also be a huge factor in where I spend an eternity after this lifetime of trying to figure it out. To me, it just doesn’t seem fair. It doesn’t seem fair that our reason sets us apart from animals, but when it comes to religion, it’s only allowed to take us so far.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve whispered into the dark, “Jesus, are you God?”

midsleep

At 2 a.m. the neighbor through the paper thin wall woke me up out of a deep sleep by playing this trying-to-be-sexy song with a horrendous base line. Apparently at some point between fumbling for ear plugs and cursing the stars I scribbled down these lines. Now presenting... straight from my near subconscious....

stay up later

ease into the dayer

if you pleaser

baby cheek squeezer

all the songs from back when i was

don't quite mean as much

all or nothing

and not enough

listening to the base line

DUH! DUH! DUH!

hammering into my sleeping thoughts.

as soon as i'm fully awake

it'll stop.

i read what you wrote and i set it aside.

i read what you wrote and i set it aside.

want to

want to lay on my back facing up and skipskipskip out of this circle

want to tell people i love them without having to call

want to read it and write it and do it and make it

Thoreau lost me toward the middle and end, but I'll go back to the beginning again and again.

A lot of thoughts, but (although there's been time) not time enough to articulate.

Good, though. good.

light like

Dead weight begone! Light like a whole day to myself! Light like no second guessing! Light like letting it be! Light like saying, "We are friends, what is your name?"! Light like calling off work on account of health! Light like a coffee refill at 9p.m. with no consequence! Light like my so called life on hulu! Light like assessing true limits and choosing freedom within them! Light like liking! Light like careful old man steps! Light as I choose to be!

unbearable lightness

simplify

Thoreau said "simplify" and

what is it that you really need?

separate what is just dead weight

from the lightness of your being...

i could not contain my

yes

yes tomorrow i will wake up at the last possible minute

which will still be a minute in a ridiculous hour

and i will drive in my car and consume my calories and cups

just to make it past noon

when i will try to regain the rest i need

so that i can stay awake to

watch with consternation

at hours winding down

as late becomes

later than it should be

again.

there is weight we cannot escape

and there is weight we choose.

thinking of you

thinking of no one

thinking of the weight of a hundred breaking hearts

only one of them my own.