4ozs

2010-08-28T22:18:00.000-07:00

The fluidity and resilience of seaweed. The stability and non-reactivity of bamboo. One teacher spoke about letting the hands arch back gently as though the palms were seedlings opening to the sun. Another speaks of cutting through resistance, like water trickling down through rocks. 'Small movements with big effects.' The vivid analogies are powerful.

The title of this blog comes from the old saying, ‘4 ounces deflects 1000 pounds’.

The human body has so many hidden gifts, abilities to perceive, small moves that extend and expand one's reach and impact.

2010-08-27T22:32:00.000-07:00

2010-08-26T21:11:00.000-07:00

2010-08-25T21:41:00.000-07:00

We're not the only critters with picnic tables...

2010-08-24T21:34:00.000-07:00

Sacagawea's Cemetery
Fort Washakie, Wyoming

There is wild beauty,
and a sense of community,
even in the afterlife.
Pale grasshoppers sail across the dusty paths.
Clouds soften the summer daylight,
and a persistent wind
rattles the leaves
of a break of tall trees,
the whisper of music and dance,
of times not so long past.
The fluttering poetry
of ribbons and flowers
and plastic toys
on mounds of raw earth
bear witness to
bonds among the dead and the living.

2010-08-23T21:58:00.000-07:00

School in Denver:

I’m not the best seamstress, but during my years parenting young kids, I did keep the needle and thread handy, not wanting to toss out clothes just because there was a small tear, or a button missing. Repairing a tear like a knife cut is relatively easy: you just sew the two sides together. But holes in the fabric can be more challenging because you have some missing material. Sometimes a patch does the job. Another technique (darning) is to take the thread and needle in a very relaxed way, and sew back and forth, from side to side, as though the needle were meeting the different numbers on a round clock face. So you take the needle, say, from one to seven to eleven to five to ten to four. You don’t tighten up the thread too much because it will get into an unappealing scrunch. Instead, you make a stitch with a gentle run of the needle from two to eight, and up to twelve, and another, and another and at some point the hole is sealed and healed. The crisscrossing of the threads across the gap creates new fabric of its own.

2010-08-22T22:43:00.000-07:00

From a small bridge on a hike near String Lake, I took a picture of the majestic Tetons. The light wasn't great, but the mountains were, and it's almost obligatory to photograph them. I walked on and stopped, looking down from the bridge. There! This was a photo I really wanted.

Catching light at the right moment can be more satisfying than subject matter. The rock in the water was beautifully lit.

I was leaving Rawlings, Wyoming, packing my stuff into the car. There was one more thing to get from the motel room. My usual tactic is to have the camera with me at all times, but that seemed ridiculous. I was only going upstairs and right back.

But inside the motel, down the hall, the housekeeper’s cart with the white bottles of cleaner and white towels draped on one side, was glowing against the backdrop of the dark passageway. It looked beautiful, as though the housekeeper’s work were noble. I flew down the stairs, got the camera from the parking lot. Just as I stepped back into the hall, a couple dressed like housekeeping staff, a tall, lean, authoritative man and a slender, assertive woman, came out of the room to the cart. They noticed me, and turned aside, becoming shorter, less visible.

The moment had passed.

2010-08-22T00:03:00.000-07:00

Leigh Lake
Grand Tetons National Park

2010-08-21T05:42:00.000-07:00

My tent got skunked below the rear window near sunset at Teton National Forest. I tried to sleep in it, but took it down as the gibbous moon set over the Tetons, and departed in the night to Jackson. I disposed of it near a Snake River tour place. The drive was rather magical, little field mice darting out from the flats before the headlights, the only car on very dark backroads of such a wildly magnificent place. My hands smelled of skunk all day, despite many washings.

Adieu dear little tent.

2010-08-18T21:58:00.000-07:00

"For most of my life I had operated under a simple schematic of winning and losing, but cancer was teaching me a tolerance for ambiguities."

"If children have the ability to ignore all odds and percentages, then maybe we can all learn from them."

Lance Armstrong (It's Not About the Bike: My Journey Back to Life)

2010-08-17T21:22:00.000-07:00

see the man
in the tall chair
across the room
staring staring
we are only
nerve endings
in one great organism
resting state
to firing
not alone
no matter how lonely
chain linked
pause
to impulse
one to the other
originating nothing
creating creating
only through the firing
of one man's eyes
to yours

2010-08-16T20:40:00.000-07:00

pond inhales
mountain's sweet breath
sky's clouded brow -
then exhales reflection

2010-08-14T11:42:00.000-07:00

pushed and pulled and pushed and pulled
among the cars in scorching heat
until you choose
a road less travelled.

2010-08-14T11:08:00.000-07:00

tent art

2010-08-11T21:07:00.000-07:00

road delay pleasures
windows down, engine off
time stretches so softly

2010-08-10T10:13:00.000-07:00

From GUINNESS World Records 2000: Millennium edition

Irus Guarino, who started work as a chorus girl at age 18, was still performing at age 90.

In his 90s, Arthur Cook rode his motorcycle every day.

Charles Ruijter was windsurfing in the lakes of Netherlands in his 80s.

Oscar Swahn won an Olympic silver medal at age 72 in a shooting competition.

Hildegarde Ferrera made a tandem parachute jump at age 99 in Hawaii.

Sylvia Brett parachute jumped solo at age 80.

Eddie Hill was working as a professional sports car racer in his 60s, at speeds over 300 MPH.

Minnie Munro got married at age 102.

William Ivy Baldwin walked a tightrope across South Boulder Canyon, Colorado, on his 82nd birthday. The wire was 320 feet long and the drop was 125 feet.

Baba Joginder Singh won a gold medal for discus at the Indian National Athletics Meet for Veterans in 1998 at age 105. In his teens, he had represented India in discus at an international meet in Germany.

2010-08-08T23:28:00.000-07:00

Dripping Springs Public Library

Satellites. Shooting stars, he said.
Northern lights or screech owls.
Noodles.

2010-08-07T21:03:00.000-07:00

feel the focus and speed
taste the road dust
your heated car
eats the miles

2010-08-06T20:27:00.000-07:00

One chuck-wills-widow was calling, and this is late in the season. The electric company street lights are out in the neighborhood, offering the gift of a dark night sky. A fireball of blue and green gracefully swept down the northwestern horizon to a bank of clouds below. The clouds broke into lightning, as though responding to the meteor's fall.

2010-08-05T18:09:00.000-07:00

Washington Park, Denver, Colorado

The next morning, before dawn, Orion stretched out above the highway, shining brightly, then fading for the day to the rising of the sun.

2010-08-03T23:09:00.000-07:00

In beautiful Colorado...supper with number one son...

Lightning flickers. The car tears down the highway toward the great scorpion. The constellation dims as lightning quivers and branches into sharp light below. A great meteor bursts through Scorpio's stars, arching like an arrow, an early Leonid. The car keeps flying forward, into the happiness of the dark.

2010-08-02T23:39:00.000-07:00

From St. Anne's church:

The ocean was still. Mountains became whale-like rocks, islands reflected by the shimmering water. The smooth-surfaced water stretched out for miles, as far as I could see. Only there was no water, only the sun-bright white salt flats remaining from some prehistoric sea. Only a beautiful, trembling mirage.

2010-08-02T08:26:00.000-07:00

When the raven comes around, be prepared for gifts or mischief, and that sometimes you won't be able to tell the one from the other.

2010-07-31T20:43:00.000-07:00

In the world there is nothing more submissive and weak than water. Yet for attacking that which is hard and strong nothing can surpass it.
— Lao Tzu

2010-07-30T21:53:00.000-07:00

The Greeks tell a story about a poor elderly couple, Baucis and Philemon, who take in two gods dressed as homeless traveling men. While the townfolk bolt their doors, the couple do their very best to make the men comfortable and at ease. The exchange brings out the noble in both the givers and the recipients of such tenderness.

A couple thousand years after Baucis and Philemon, the story comes to mind. There are still fragile people with no place to spend this night, and there are still people who see the god-like soul in every person, and do their best to treat every man and woman as a brother or sister.

The current issue of the local monthly called Street Spirit includes the following poem by Claire J. Baker called 'Found Among the Homeless':

There are many
so magnanimous
they can give any part
of themselves away
and still remain
angels
flowers
star stuff
grain

Claire Baker and Mary Rudge recently published a book of street poems that can be ordered through email:
maryrudgepoet@yahoo.com
or
clairejjbaker@yahoo.com

2010-07-29T21:51:00.000-07:00

There was music this week, two different bands who produced low, tender vocals without theatrics or abrupt dynamics. The men made challenging close harmonies sound effortless. Four selves, four voices, dissolved into one flow, a tranquil balance of love and detachment.

2010-07-28T21:49:00.000-07:00

Even our shadows can sing...

2010-07-27T22:05:00.000-07:00

I write and write.
So what? say the flowers,
flies and bees.
So what? I ask.

2010-07-26T21:48:00.000-07:00

I’m walking walking -
barriers of bruised plastic
line the street
it’s growing late
everything aches
pavement unyielding
a cold wind stirring
in the gray intersection
of the smell of concrete
and impending nightfall -
no fear no self pity
just weary not thinking
when from my heart
I call your name
once twice
again again
and engine singing
there you are
there you are

2010-07-25T22:49:00.000-07:00

These photos were taken earlier this evening on Lake Merritt in Oakland.

2010-07-24T20:58:00.000-07:00

2010-07-23T21:18:00.000-07:00

Bear does handstand
in the clear lake shallows
inviting dreamers to live

2010-07-22T21:10:00.000-07:00

Sunlight slanting
a certain way
I stop to stare at
street flowers
in flaming disarray
burning beacons
of the brevity of shining.

They change my life
or at least my afternoon -
why let errands
run my day?
I turn
and walk the other way -

2010-07-21T22:19:00.000-07:00

The universe is ancient and enduring and goes on just fine whether we understand or not.

Joseph Campbell once offered an explanation of how this one sound contains everything:

Ohmmmm...

2010-07-20T22:21:00.000-07:00

It’s an unusual picture in National Geographic this month. There's a tree in Tanzania, sort of dry looking and umbrella-shaped. A lion is in the crook of the trunk, her mouth open as though roaring or yawning in the direction of the camera. I say her because there is no mane, though perhaps it could be a juvenile lion. Behind her is a dead mammal, like a gazelle, draped on a branch. And high above the lion, there’s a leopard flying over the tree.

Spotted cat stretched out like Superman, blue sky, nothing else.

The story goes that the lion climbed the tree to steal the leopard’s fresh kill, and the leopard is hastily leaving the scene, deciding its dinner isn’t worth fighting for.

2010-07-19T19:53:00.000-07:00

There was something of the AIDS Walk in San Francisco yesterday that reminded me of the Great Trunk Road in India described by Kipling, or the paths described by Chaucer in The Canterbury Tales in England from centuries past. People walking, talking, laughing, with babies and kids and dogs and grandparents, and stuff. A slice of humanity on the Tao, the Way, passing by the bands playing, the food for sale in little huts, a waterfall, some jitterbuggers. The destination yesterday was not so important as the travel together, the shared path because of a shared concern. I like to imagine the four dimensional crazy corkscrew trek we made, traveling forward for a few hours along the timeline, on a path in Golden Gate Park, on a circular spin of the earth, also circling around a star called the sun that is hurtling on a path through the universe. Though we ended up where we started in the park, we ended someplace altogether different in space and time. No doubt, we emerged in a different spot within as well, changed by the physical activity, and the sharing of the same thread with a few thousand others. For a short time, we were a phenomenon, with our many differences, a joining of intention and direction, forging forward on the spiraling way.

Donations toward education, prevention, treatment, and cure of this disease may be made through
aidswalk.net

2010-07-18T21:31:00.000-07:00

Three in three weeks. Each in parks. No Jewish weddings or anything like that. Two were left on picnic tables, and the third. Well. The wind blew the derby off an African American drummer as I approached today, and he flew up to catch it, and there was one on his head. It had been hiding under his hat.

I’m talking bout yarmulkes.

2010-07-17T21:51:00.000-07:00

The first Buddha statue I ever saw was during a Sunday family outing to Avery Island in Louisiana in the late 1960s. It’s housed in a glass pagoda structure on a little island within the gardens there. (Note that neither island is technically a true island, but a slight rise in elevation above the surrounding flat gulf terrain.) The land, the gardens, the Buddha belonged to the McIlhenny family, who produced the now famous Tabasco sauce there.

I’ve been back to Avery Island now and again, home to nutria, egrets, alligators and draping wisteria. Each time, a coolness and serenity seem to surround the statue, an oasis from the heat. The Buddha is reportedly over 800 years old, was shipped from Asia, spoils from a warlord altercation. It seemed sad to me it was so far from its home. But now I think perhaps it’s where it’s supposed to be. For many local visitors to the gardens, this Buddha may be the first and only one they ever see.

Buddha Speaks

Peacefully I rest
Upon this lagoon’s bank
As pale green bamboos
Sway above my throne.
Clouds of blossoms
Soften the sifted light
Falling golden and misty
Through the boughs above.
Long days of travel
Brought me from my home,
Yet I have known no hour of calmer rest
My thoughts are like
The swaying bamboos’ crest
Waved to and fro
Above the rippling stream
Clear and blue
As from a glorious dream

~ E A McIlhenny

The Buddha in the photo above is from my apartment building. Images of the Avery Island Buddha on Flickr and elsewhere can be found by googling ‘Avery Island Buddha’.

2010-07-16T22:25:00.000-07:00

the paradox of meditation, of living with the focus of intent, and unselective awareness...

2010-07-15T21:30:00.000-07:00

As I approached Adeline, walking to BART for a ride to the city, pigeons soared above the street, a great opening in flight. Then, in the count of one second, they landed on a minaret atop a building.

It was as though with a click, their flight collapsed from covering easily a thousand square yards of sky, a great open hand, to landing all at once, a synchronized perching on a small structure, a closing fist.

It felt like watching all the galaxies and star clusters returning to a single point, or watching in reverse the film of an explosion, or collapsing a Bach melody to all the notes played at once. Bam. It seemed like an amazing phenomenon that goes little noticed because it happens every day, a miracle of synchronized intention and movement among separate organisms.

2010-07-14T21:42:00.000-07:00

trumpeter’s
golden notes
drift from an upper window
linger and fade

summer clings
to one musician’s breath,
suspended
in a three-note riff

2010-07-13T22:09:00.000-07:00

The faster an object travels, as it approaches the speed of light, time goes more and more slowly. As the object reaches light speed, time stops.

There's a practice in Shintaido that can involve sprinting (though not quite at light speed!) or just taking a focused step forward, called eiko dai (big glory). Through the projection of the mind and/or body forward like a laser, there can be an inner experience, a sudden burst from speed to expansive stillness.

2010-07-12T21:48:00.000-07:00

James Herriot, the veterinarian and author of the book All Creatures Great and Small (and its many sequels), was a storyteller. He transformed his adventures as a young vet in the 1930s and 40s into entertaining, finely articulated writing that reads like an act of love. The setting in the wild and beautiful Yorkshire Dales of England was as integral to his work as the animals, farmers and pet owners. From lambing in the middle of frigid nights, to racing his jalopy up and down the hills with dogs at his wheels, he makes it sound as though his life was a privilege to live. He's a very human observor without being judgmental. His empathy and understanding of what made his patients (and their owners) tick, his appreciation of their varied personalities and habits, his ability to laugh at himself make him a good companion. He shares the absurd and miraculous. He reflects beyond what would be appropriate fare at high tea, acknowledging the amazing range of behavior in the animal world.

His books taught me a bit about anatomy and medicine, made me laugh, and helped me feel better about the world. He educated millions of us about rumens and sulfa powder. Herriot drank his whiskey with colleagues, and local ale at the pubs. He smoked his pipe, and threw an occasional curse out into the hills. An uplifting writer, he lived his affinity with the C.F. Alexander verse from which he took the titles of his books:

All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
The Lord God made them all.

2010-07-10T23:00:00.000-07:00

I've discovered there exist magical and healing properties in chickens (including sausage in a skillet and banties in a tree), bottled beer, Russian nesting dolls (in fictitious locations), and dark orange tea.

And that's just in my own life the last couple days. Here's an example from South Africa:

(From “Africa’s Future”
Alex Perry
Time magazine
July 19, 2010)

'Perhaps the most remarkable sight of the tournament came on its second day, outside the stadium in tiny, rural Phokeng. In the hours before the England-U.S. game, 44,000 fans stepped off their coaches into a dusty African village, asking if there were anywhere they could have a beer. After a few moments hesitation, the owners of 10 houses and a local shop threw open their doors, set up giant braiis (barbecues) of chicken in their yards and started handing out quarts of cold beer. It was perhaps the most peaceful and gently inebriated meeting of two worlds in history.'

Meanwhile I lost my glasses while I was asleep last night. I don't know how I could do that, but I'm wearing an old pair today and can't see the computer screen so good, thus a lot of squinting and the late post. I need the chickens and bottled beer, nesting dolls and dark orange tea...

I need an ibuprophen for my Saturday karate sore body.

Life is good.

2010-07-09T20:04:00.000-07:00

2010-07-08T19:48:00.000-07:00

peace in the city
peace in the city
sweet soul
peace in the city

2010-07-07T21:01:00.000-07:00

The sound of sheep bleating just filled the coffee shop. Turns out it was part of a song piped in, but the incongruity of sheep in a city café was a moment of funny.

Most humor has some bit of aggression to it, but the humor of the incongruous has less bite.

Of all the many animals in the Earth zoo, the only ones who seem to find anything to laugh about is the human being. Are we the only creatures with the genes for a funny bone?

We ask, is this comedy or tragedy, but sometimes we find the most potent humor from within tragedy. Laughter eases the hurt of funerals and hospitals, double shifts and dull meetings. It offers perspective and hope. Hilarity fixes things. We've been given a terrific gift. The universe with all its clock-like simplicity and elegance, its gravity and light and its dark energy, for some reason also offers us comedy.

2010-07-06T20:21:00.000-07:00

from the Declaration of Independence

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

2010-07-05T21:22:00.000-07:00

You walk to your window just as a rat carries a plum down the sidewalk.

You go outside to follow the mewling of a stray cat and look up just as one meteor, then another, flies through Orion’s belt.

Your children text for help just at the minute you are best situated to help them.

Delicious food falls from the tree when you are hungry, and happiness lands at your feet.

You forget to stage your life. You just flow.

2010-07-04T21:13:00.000-07:00

I spent much of Independence Day within a small fenced area behind the building I live in. I locked myself out. No keys. No cell phone.

Sunny and breezy, the temperature felt rather cold, otherwise the time would have been pleasant. I got to know pretty well a golden Buddha sitting against the fence. I arranged some of the rocks and leaves and sticks and dirt around it. I looked at a fly, a four-winged moth, a chickadee and an ant that showed up. A long-haired cat walked by on the other side of the gate. I did some kicking stretches. I called up to the manager’s open kitchen window, but no response. I meditated. I walked along the sides of the building. I came upon a tiny cherry-colored plum on the ground, fallen from an old tree next door that happens to be the tree outside my apartment window. The plum was plump and unbruised. I was hungry and thirsty. I peeled back a strip of skin and tentatively tasted the drops of juice. They were cool and sweet. The flesh was yellow and fresh. So, I ate the plum, and felt cheered.

After a few hours, the manager returned and came downstairs, and I was freed. I almost sprang through the door. But the time spent in the small fenced area seems minor because of the perfect plum.

2010-07-03T20:02:00.000-07:00

People study martial arts for different reasons, for competition, for the high of sparring, for that marvelous sense of fitness. But there's a core attribute that keeps many people in some form of practice. It doesn’t run dry. You’re always learning, stretching the mind with the skills of the body, applying your body learning to everyday experiences. Martial arts, the skills of war, bring a sense of expansion, bring inner strength and serenity to one’s life. Doesn’t make much sense, does it?

Such a paradox, the learning of skills with the intent of not having to use them.

It's said you come back again and again to the beginning of the circle, only to discover you know nothing, like a new kid. But you know nothing more deeply this time around, and you’re ready to have a another go.

2010-07-02T21:28:00.000-07:00

The bridges of the heart
are real, yes,
circular, funny,
delicate as cobwebs
weighted with dew.

2010-07-01T21:31:00.000-07:00

threads of hectic day
flow toward setting sun
peaceful walk
peaceful city

2010-06-30T22:11:00.000-07:00

dark on the roof-
cold sea wind
wraps around summer legs -
my pen runs dry.

2010-06-29T19:20:00.000-07:00

Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.

Chief Seattle

2010-06-28T22:12:00.000-07:00

Marcus du Sautoy describes prime numbers as ‘the atoms of arithmetic’. He writes of the eerie similarities between the patterns of prime numbers (and yes, they have found a mechanism - Riemann’s Zeta Function – that finally brings prime number patterns to the surface) and energy levels in the nuclei of large atoms.

This connects concepts – prime numbers- that were elegant mental structures without particular value in the physical world, to quantum physics no less. A major link between the purity of math, and physical reality.

An intriguing third connection is to art. In Douglas Adams’s famous work of science fantasy, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything is...42.

Only a few years ago, mathmeticians conjectured that the third number of the Riemann Zeta sequence, after 1 and 2, is likely to be 42.

Du Sautoy presents a marvelous triangle of mental logic, physical reality, and artistic intuition.

From
‘Prime Numbers Get Hitched’
By Marcus du Sautoy
Professor of math at Oxford University
Seed magazine
Feb/Mar 2006

2010-06-27T21:56:00.000-07:00

I spent an hour or so writing about Salvador Dali’s painting The Sacrament of the Last Supper today. Then, while searching for something to post tonight, I came across a photo I took over a year ago of a painting in a shop window. Note the similar hand gestures.

2010-06-26T19:11:00.000-07:00

a medley of voices
sing summer carols
and the blind can see
a hundred doves burst into flight
and we are freed

2010-06-25T15:43:00.000-07:00

What if the ocean was always smooth as glass?
Cheers! - to choppy weather!

2010-06-24T19:58:00.000-07:00

Is there a feeling called thanks?

In the beginning and at the end, face close to the green and pale dry grass, there was thanks. Not happy, not sad, not content, not full nor empty nor peaceful. Just the wonderful feeling thanks.

2010-06-23T20:38:00.000-07:00

touch
the soundless language
a hand settles lightly upon on a shoulder
warm weighted
a friend stands
quiet presence
no one can hurt us
no barbed words, no wants
this moment resounds beyond this moment
as babies we are held
warmly to the chest

2010-06-22T20:17:00.000-07:00

A boy pulled a girl
in a wheeled cart
around the basketball court.
She sat upright and sorrowful,
a skinny princess
with regal bearing
gaze downward in gloom.
The boy suddenly shifted.
He trotted and tilted
and the ride grew wilder.
Her eyes opened wide, awake.
She clung to the sides-
now at attention!
But she bounced out the back anyway,
tumbled to the ground
prostrate.
The playground was silent.
She started to laugh.

2010-06-21T20:44:00.000-07:00

The theme 'softness' kept surfacing today, the contradictions of womanhood, of softness and strength; how friendship softens the sharp edges of life.

2010-06-20T17:21:00.000-07:00

2010-06-19T16:37:00.000-07:00

Though only compatible notes make a chord,
a chord can be built on any note.
There is power through any outlet.
Looking at a synchronicity of light
not lost but found found found.

2010-06-18T18:42:00.000-07:00

It’s one of those days. Lost, and I’m not even on an island. A lot of what I’ve written in the past works well when you’re alone, but when friends or relatives are involved, or you have little children, you can’t just be one with the lostness for very long. Can you?

I can honor it for the moment. Might as well because at this moment I’m lost.
I’ve received hints that I need a GPS but a GPS doesn’t help if I don’t know the address of the destination.

And yes, I can't be lost when God is my friend, but God works in mysterious ways.

The other day I used an old fashioned map to find a publishing house. I did have the address from the phone book. I ended up in a most mysterious neighborhood, new pleasant buildings for offices and such, but surrounded by very tall wrought iron fencing for the full block. No numbers or labels or signs. Other blocks were similarly surrounded by fencing. I parked on the street. It was sunny and breezy in a very chilly way, and I walked around the whole block. A man with a baby in a stroller walked by, looking out of place. I called the publisher with my cell phone, but the woman who answered directed me to go to the website.

I tried to explain, I can find a lot of publishers online, but you’re right here. I’m on your block. I’d like to meet some real people, maybe get a brochure?

She gave me the website address.

Right now, I'm sitting at Jump n Java, the sun in my face. Pleasantly occupied at a pleasant spot. Being in this moment, I see I do know where I am. I'm not lost at all. I'm here, reaching out, reaching out.

2010-06-17T20:42:00.000-07:00

Nature imitating art?

Looks like a little bird feeding a big bird in the water -

Kids are great artists.

2010-06-16T17:12:00.000-07:00

Question: How do you store leftovers in a bowl in the fridge without using plastic wrap?

Answer: Set a plate on top of the bowl.

2010-06-15T20:30:00.000-07:00

During Dwight D. Eisenhower's administration in the 1950s, the U.S. planned and began implementation of a bold idea that perhaps was as influential in connecting the people of our large country as the television. The Interstate Highway project was a magnificent wonder of the continental US. According to Wiki (with supporting documentation), 'as of 2006, the system has a total length of 46,876 miles (75,440 km), making it both the largest highway system in the world and the largest public works project in history.' We take this huge accomplishment for granted because it's been an imbedded part of our lives for decades. But initially, it was a marvel that an individual could drive the width or length of the country, and expect a certain standard of highway construction, limited slowdowns, and services at regular intervals the entire way. The engineering perhaps did not require anything too novel (I don't know about this), but the application of that engineering to such a big vision makes it remarkable.

Could what Eisenhower did for connecting citizens from coast to coast have applications for some of our ecological concerns? Why not create an interstate wilderness highway? Initiate a bold, big vision, the purchase of contiguous lands crisscrossing the country, connecting parks and national forests already in government ownership, acquiring more habitat to adequately support the diversity of plants and creatures across our beautiful country. Not necessarily special lands, but uninterrupted land, providing migratory animals safe thoroughfare, making certain that certain areas are not through our highly valued economic freedoms casually suburban- and urbanized, destroying what our wildlife requires for survival. Animals and plants would be guaranteed connected swaths of land free of artificial chemicals, pesticides, and fast vehicles. Forests and prairies and mountains would once again be connected without barriers. Can you imagine the map of the country, with lines showing the untouched wilderness highways? Instead of waiting for emergencies such as extinctions and ecological disasters, why not a bold proactive project protecting more of our country’s heritage: wildlife, land and water in its natural state from border to border. A source of American pride and thriving life. Imagine.

2010-06-14T19:29:00.000-07:00

The pigeons broke into flight. The same moment, there was the sound of bells near where I sat, as though the birds and the bells were the same.

Walking a street from the other direction is not the same path. The street sign may still read 'Chaucer', but it's a different trip. Traveling cross-country, even if you take the same route, is a very different experience driving east to west than west to east. I'm always surprised to discover that. And driving or walking, it's a different time of day or night, or a different season. The light shines differently. You see buildings from a different angle. Some things are revealed, some hidden. We think we'll show a friend this marvelous place we discovered, but it is never really the same, is it. Sand shifts beneath our feet.

2010-06-13T21:28:00.000-07:00

I got shy about posting the poem
I worked on for tonight
so here I am.
The coffee house has closed.
I'm sitting on a low concrete wall
bordering a garden of fragrant herbs,
still snagging a few minutes more of wireless.
Cars are tooling past,
people walking by.
Venus is a spark of white light
suspended between a couple of power lines.
The fellow across the way
has finished sweeping the sidewalk
and walks away with his broom and dust pan.
A car parked at the curb
blinks its lights.
Venus has ducked now beneath the bottom line,
soon to set,
and growing brighter as the light of dusk fades.
The voices of two guys and a gal
rise and fall across the street.
It's a beautiful night.

2010-06-12T20:14:00.000-07:00

A few days ago, I read a reference to the Antikythera mechanism, a brilliant feat of engineering and elegance. The sea-worn machine [ http://paxarcana.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/antikythera_mechanism.jpg ] was found in 1900 in a vessel near Greece that is believed to have sunk on a voyage from the Island of Rhodes to Rome. The mechanism has been determined to be over 2000 years old. Since it's recovery, it's been greatly studied, and replicas have been created. Described as the earliest known computer, the inside of its wood casing is printed with detailed instructions on its operation. A combination calendar and atlas, it offers accurate mapping of time and space. For example, if you are at these coordinates, at this specifc time, from your perspective, the sun, moon and planets will be in these locations. One can find information on eclipses, and on the dates of the Olympic games of the era. I look at the images of models [ http://www.grand-illusions.com/images/articles/articles/antikythera/mainimage.jpg ], and wonder if the creator didn't in part, using gears, recreate the celestial mechanics of the universe.

2010-06-11T20:27:00.000-07:00

Step across the sunlit empty morning field.
Extend this hand palm up.
Extend that hand palm up.
Offering.
Soft and light.
Here I am, as I am.
Not as others see me or think I should be. Not my expectations for self, nor my disappointments in self.
Ah so simple.
A great peace.
Here I am, as I am.

2010-06-10T22:10:00.000-07:00

with love silence is clearer…

take your intellect out and let it lie down in the mud. It’s no help…

The ailments of love are different from any other. Love is the astrolabe that sights into the mysteries of God.

Earth-love, spirit-love, any love looks into that yonder.

Rumi
Translated by Coleman Barks

2010-06-09T21:00:00.000-07:00

In the martial arts framework of Shintaido, interference comes running at you from in front, behind, above, the side. It makes noise and distractions from the sidelines.

You're taught to open the door and say, Welcome!

Chaos is just blessings in many shapes from many directions.

2010-06-08T17:35:00.000-07:00

Design within the Chaos

2010-06-07T20:30:00.000-07:00

a man sweeps the sidewalk
he hurtles through
the dim lit universe
with the birds and barnacles
the olive trees and skyscrapers
all riding the same Harley through the night

2010-06-06T18:37:00.000-07:00

Nature does not hurry,
yet everything is accomplished.

Lao Tzu

2010-06-05T20:28:00.000-07:00

I didn't plan to wander around an unfamiliar part of Oakland yesterday, but there I was, one mistaken turn and a wealth of novel sunlit beauty stretched out before me. There was nothing there that I would have known to Google or ask about, nothing I would have planned to go visit.

I read that Google's search engine is now programmed to use data from one's history of searches to determine what the user wants to find when typing in a topic. That's great if I'm looking for information. For example, I occasionally look up the lyrics to songs. Now, when I type in a song title, several lyrics links pop up on the first page. Mission accomplished.

It's not so good if I wish to skateboard. Search engine exploration seems so tame of late. Now I know why. I miss the links that took me out of the confines of my expectations and into unknown territories of salivation, mufflers, arrow-making, Josephine Baker, celestinas, unfamiliar parts of Oakland and beyond. I like surprise.

2010-06-04T21:04:00.000-07:00

he presses on
a cane in each hand
taking his own sweet time
but in motion
always in motion
spring sun casts
dappled light
at his feet

she sits on the bench
in the washeteria
legs out in front of her
body quiet
dark eyes bright and observant
her mother checks the clothes in the dryer
and smiles
the washers sing

brother
sisters
the moment passes
the moment holds still,
and doesn't yield.

2010-06-03T21:08:00.000-07:00

if i could find words
like the soaring and wheeling of doves
above shattuck street
as the sunlight retreats across the fading sky,
i would write them for you

2010-06-02T20:16:00.000-07:00

Every moment contains an infinity of options. Hop on a train, turn back, change the landscape, run ahead, freeze, feed the baby raccoons, dig yourself a trench, toss a lightning bolt, take a nap, take an aspirin, stay the course, embrace. Give up. Make a sandwich. Sing a higher note than you've ever sung before.

Take a risk, or stay on the couch. Open the door and take one step out. Chances are it won't result in your funeral, and it won't make you a millionaire, but it will move you forward.

2010-06-01T09:31:00.000-07:00

Being silent for longer than what feels comfortable compels us finally to: hey, LISTEN!

2010-04-30T21:40:00.000-07:00

(sculpture by Judith Skenazy)

4ozs is on break for the month of May, returning June 1. Meanwhile, Happy May Day, Happy Mothers' Day, Happy Graduations, Happy Birthdays!

2010-04-29T21:46:00.000-07:00

To reach high from within -
well done, so proud, beautiful, bravo, magnifique, heroic,
many hands clapping

2010-04-28T23:12:00.000-07:00

the moon hangs like a lantern

2010-04-27T20:52:00.000-07:00

I'll drive less than I did last year.
I'll stop taking home purchases in plastic shopping bags.
I'll stop buying water or soda or milk bottled in plastic.
I'll purchase a vehicle that gets more miles per gallon, or use well-designed public transportation, or walk, or ride my bike for errands.
I'll share ideas with the state or county or companies that could reduce usage.

In this way, I'll decrease the demand for petroleum. I'll be an example for neighbors and family who may be reminded to bring their reusable bags to the store, or reminded of the benefits of drinking water from glass instead of plastic. I'll decrease the likelihood of another petroleum disaster like the one now happening in the Gulf of Mexico. Less oil will be needed next year. I'll make an impact. I'll take better care of the home we all share.

2010-04-26T19:47:00.000-07:00

Shake off disdain, be thankful for love. Look far!

2010-04-25T21:51:00.000-07:00

dragonfly wings
showered sparks of light -
tall grasses swayed and
whispered, peace.

2010-04-24T22:11:00.000-07:00

My own car attacked me tonight. I'm parked on a slope, and when I went to get something out of the trunk, the sharp edge of the trunk lid suddenly slammed down and whacked me along the hairline of my forehead. I have a bit of a gash, and it hurts like the dickens.

But what's odd is that after the initial sharp vibrating pain, and the hour with the ice cubes on the head, and the feeling life is one bungled mishap after another, I feel rather happy. You know, like when you were a kid and skinned your knee outdoors, and then it's nighttime, and the bit of pain seems to be a pleasant reminder that you lived today. Doesn't make sense, does it. Like endorphins are released perhaps to counteract the hurt, but also to reward having ventured outward.

I try to be brave like a kid walking a few new blocks past the familiar boundaries of the street where he lives, or knocking in the dark on a stranger's door for trick or treat.

2010-04-23T22:38:00.000-07:00

Sojourner Truth was a remarkable human being by any measure. Born into slavery in the late 1700s, her early years were characterized by traumatic loss and physical and sexual brutality, the nature of which could easily have broken her. Instead, she found the courage and passion to fight back. She fought and won the retraction of the sale of her son through a lawsuit, and motivated others to support abolition of slavery through her autobiography and through the fiery speeches she gave around the country. She became a Methodist, reporting life changing experiences through her faith. Her stamina and heroic voice created an army of people intent on ending slavery.

I read several biographic articles this evening, and found the one on Wikipedia to be the most thorough and interesting and the best referenced:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sojourner_Truth

Sojourner Truth had been known as Belle (Isabella Baumfree), and, growing up in New York state, spoke only Dutch until approximately age 9. She chose her own name as an adult in her mid-forties.

It's very hard to look at the terrible things that were done to a young child, and that happened in her life as a young adult. Perhaps that's why I am drawn by her decision to name herself, an act of freedom to define herself as something more than the piece of property used by vicious owners. A beautiful action, and a most beautiful name.

2010-04-23T00:12:00.000-07:00

No matter our schooling or experience, some days we have nothing to teach, only a tremendous amount to learn.

2010-04-21T23:35:00.000-07:00

shall we analyze every note,
or enjoy the songbird?

pick apart the threads
or dream beneath the blanket?

2010-04-20T21:57:00.000-07:00

January, 2009

the moon was an awkward melody,
a single note strung
to a bit of ribbon
fluttering on the wind

2010-04-19T21:24:00.000-07:00

To be effective in martial arts, when physically in motion, one must be still within. When physically still, one must be in motion within.

I think this is an old adage, and I don't know the source.

2010-04-18T21:14:00.000-07:00

Liberty ship USS Jeremiah O'Brien:

Waves rise and crash.
Smell the salty paradox:
life and mortality.

2010-04-17T23:08:00.000-07:00

A great blue heron slowly sailed across Valencia a little after two this afternoon.
A pair of brown pelicans appeared at Seal Rock (thought the seals did not) A gull dropped its food from on high, a flock of cedar waxwings perched on 2nd Ave, a pair of starlings flapped in a puddle. House sparrows sang. A pair of pigeons led the way down the sidewalk. A couple of coots and mallards paddled about at the Cliff House. Canadian geese, mallards and a cormorant flew over Lake Temescal this morning.

Wasn't looking for birds today, but there they were in Oakland and San Francisco, living peaceably among humans.

2010-04-16T21:30:00.000-07:00

South San Francisco

2010-04-15T22:38:00.000-07:00

The diversity of garden life in the Bay Area of California is phenomenal. My photos here are not that great, but they show a few specimans I haven't included before.

2010-04-14T21:24:00.000-07:00

Kamiak Butte is an isolated rocky elevation in southeastern Washington surrounded by low rolling wheat fields for miles around. It was quite a contrast to the tall, numerous Colorado Rocky Mountains near where I'd lived before.

It's hard to convey how very dear Kamiak became. It's always windy at the top, the trees gnarled and stunted by the harsh, arid conditions. Yet even at night, it seems bathed in a benevolent light. Because it's the only high point with no structures in view, you can see infinity from its shoulders. Kamiak holds its space in the middle of an unvaried agricultural landscape, a wild serenity.