More Trees Please!

Good news. Lately that seems rare. The trends have not been good. I'm thinking especially on the national, and the global stage. Personally, things are okay. I spend lots of time in my own head. Just my imagination...

Anyway, yesterday, in one day, Ethiopia planted 350 million trees.

"About 350m trees have been planted in a single day in Ethiopia, according to a government minister.

The planting is part of a national “green legacy” initiative to grow 4bn trees in the country this summer by encouraging every citizen to plant at least 40 seedlings. Public offices have reportedly been shut down in order for civil servants to take part.

The project aims to tackle the effects of deforestation and climate change in the drought-prone country. According to the UN, Ethiopia’s forest coverage was just 4% in the 2000s, down from 35% a century earlier."

Thank you Ethiopia. More of this Humans! PLEASE!

Feelings... Maybe Both!

I just want to riff this morning...

Feelings. Are they everything? Not what we do but what we feel about what we do? It doesn't sound right to me.

What we do is important. Alternatively, if we are not aligned with what we do, we are in crisis. Unaligned with our own actions.

I feel better about saying that we should aim to align heart, head & spirit. When they are aligned, I think what we do can be phenomenal, we can move mountains, achieve amazing things.

But I'm torn, not sure. Yes, feelings are sometimes arbitrary, ephemeral, changeable, they easily evaporate and reconstitute. Still, my feelings are damn important to me, maybe they are everything to me,even if they are fleeting, even if I can't really hang onto any of them.

Sometimes I think feelings are like germs. They are invisible, powerful and they can make you giddy or sick. So what do I feel about the primacy of my feelings? I'm ambivalent, confused, unsure. Feelings = everything or nothing? Maybe both?!

Not in $!

It pays...
not in $ mind you...

to live
to say yes
to have an open heart
to have a sharp wit
to be strong-minded
to be disciplined
to take your time
to walk
to drink coffee
to smell the roses
to laugh at funny things
to cry often
to change your mind
to try new things
to walk backwards
to listen to music every day
to play your guitar
to sit in a room with other musicians and ride the vibe

Better to Live with Rats than to BE ONE!

Not sure if anyone could do better than this Baltimore Sun editorial. Our current President is a total disgrace, a racist, a very stupid and corrupt man. Love how the Sun chooses just the right words... epic...

Better to live with rats than to BE ONE...

- Baltimore Sun Editorial Board

We are the TV Zombies...

Yes. Reading & writing has kept me sane. I don't watch cable news. It immediately gives me a freaking headache. Every damn story is hyped beyond belief. One long, ranting, hyperbolic show.

I don't watch network television either, I cannot stand laugh-tracks, or commercials, except, of course, I do watch the NFL, usually with the sound off. I provide my own soundtrack, either music or my own guitar strumming. Turns out having the NFL (all that concentrated mayhem), streaming across my eyeballs is good for coming up with new riffs.

It seems our whole culture is now just another branch of the Entertainment/Celebrity Conglomerate. TV is the worst. It reduces everything to the SHOW. So yes, tragedy, political conflagrations, the daily grind of life, is all just grist for the mill.

How does it play?

So, in my own way, I am living in another time and place. I read. I contemplate. I spend lots of time in the analog world. I listen to CDs on the stereo, sometimes vinyl too.  I still own a flip-phone. My main source of information is the radio or the newspaper. We do love to stream Netflix, or Amazon Prime. We are hooked on the long-form narrative thing.  That is probably our most "of the moment" exception.

But I always have a book handy. I am always poring over text. I am always living in my head, in my imagination. I think it's important. I think it has kept me sane, or insane in my own comfortable way.

Marshall McLuhan was right: "The medium is the message.... the medium (the channel through which a message is transmitted) is more important than the meaning or content of the message."

TV (video screens of all kinds) has rotted us, hollowed us out. Images wash over our eyeballs. We have become the TV zombies. We really have. If we stop watching, to listen, to read, we are deprogramming ourselves. That's a good thing. An essential thing.

We Like to Watch...

Yes... it's true... I usually refer to George Orwell and "1984," as the template for our modern dystopia, but it's actually Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World," that we more closely resemble, especially here in good, old, USA. Don't get me wrong, we really are the children of Winston Smith, but Huxley's notion that we will "voluntarily sacrifice our rights," we will willingly give up our data, we will gladly submit to the surveilance state just for the ability to shop more efficiently is right on the mark.

Also Huxley is spot on with the idea that "people will medicate themselves into bliss." So many of us rely on the pharmaceuticals to get us to a bliss state. It's seems like a certain madness. How many folks do you know who have that glassy-eyed look? They are legion. There are the mood enhancers, the pain-killers, how many drugs do we have to load up on to face the reality of the day? There is a whole contingent of Pharma-Stepford-Folks!

How do we take Joseph Campbell's advice to "follow our bliss," when it's a manufactured state of our daily chemical cocktail? Purple Haze, baby. Can we face the day stone-cold sober? Can we find bliss then? Might be a bit more hard-earned, but probably more worthwhile. Just a thought.

We don't freaking read anymore. We just like to watch. Let the images fly over our eyeballs.  You know there's that famous Neil Postman book: "Amusing Ourselves to Death." Roger Waters made a record inspired by that book too.

"Postman asserts the presentation of television news is a form of entertainment programming; arguing that the inclusion of theme music, the interruption of commercials, and "talking hairdos" bear witness that televised news cannot readily be taken seriously. Postman further examines the differences between written speech, which he argues reached its prime in the early to mid-nineteenth century, and the forms of televisual communication, which rely mostly on visual images to "sell" lifestyles. He argues that, owing to this change in public discourse, politics has ceased to be about a candidate's ideas and solutions, but whether he comes across favorably on television."

Yes. Well. Not a new idea. We are living in a Reality TV World. What is on the screen is reflected in what's happening in our neighborhoods. So yeah, no one "reads the fucking report," everyone just watches the TV show... and it's all about how did the show go.

You actually end up with a Reality TV Buffoon running the fucking Government... what the fuck! Wake up, folks! This is not a show. It is your freaking life! 

It Pays to Keep Your Mice Straight.

My friend thought it was the "other mouse."

You know, not the DJ with the mouse head (Deadmau5), no, she thought Karen O. from the Yeah, Yeah,Yeahs (not the punk rocker Wendy O. from the Plasmatics) made an album with Modest Mouse that feisty outfit from Portland, which definitely perked my ears up. I mean, we LOVE Modest Mouse. Some of their records come across as overflowing, over-stuffed, masterpieces. I'm thinking especially: "The Lonesome Crowded West," "The Moon & Antartica," and "We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank."

Karen O. and Modest Mouse. That would be interesting...

No. This collaboration is between Karen O. and Danger Mouse. They have recorded a cool new album called "Lux Prima." Quite nice. A bit dreamy. Lush. It's playing on the box right now. Definitely a keeper. Danger Mouse is Brian Burton, a guy who has made cool albums with lots of folks: Beck, Gorillaz, Black Keys, Norah Jones.

Anyway, it pays to keep your mice straight. Your O. s too.

Traces...

Castles Made of Sand...

"and so castles made of sand,

fall in the sea

eventually..."

Jimi Hendrix floating in the air this morning.  When I think of Jimi, I think of the impermanence of our existence. A beautiful, brilliant, fabulous, unusual shooting star, flaming out before our eyes.

He left some amazing grooves, shimmering, lightening-like vibrations. Those vibrations have a life, long after Jimi is just a flash in the eye.

This morning, those castles are just beach. If you pay attention you can feel the sand shifting beneath our feet. Everything is alive. Moving. Changing. Morphing. Disintegrating. Even the center of the earth, the solid planet we walk around on has a bubbling, molten core.

What is solid? What endures? Traces...

Morning of Dislocation.

I just don't really know...

That's about right. I have no clue what's going on. It's been that way pretty much since the beginning. Probably will be that way til the end.

I have had a few flashes of insight, just little flashes in the pan. Those flashes have no staying power. They look illusory with a bit of distance. I've often singed myself by getting too close to the flame. Just when I think I have a handle on things, I lose my grip, or fly off the handle.

Watch the harpoons. They usually come from close range. Unexpected. Strike deep. And you probably won't know why.  Van the Man tells us: "there ain't no why, it just is.."

It pays to be humble. To figure you know nothing. Back to Zero... 0... maybe that really is the secret touchstone, the Holy Grail. It's hard to grip. You can't grip it. You can't hold onto anything.

That's a bit of hard-won wisdom there. This morning, feeling pretty sketchy. Listening to Mercury Rev's "Deserter's Songs." An odd duck of a record. Sounds like a movie-soundtrack from an unmade movie from long-ago. Out of time. Out of range.

Perfect for this morning of dislocation.

That's the Assignment, Grasshopper!

They like to depict the Wise Man on the mountaintop. Sitting in the lotus position. Contemplating his navel, or eyes closed, communing with nature. Alone. Above the fray. Dislocated from the Hurly-Burly, away from the daily tumult of living with people, on "retreat" from the human world.

You know, Jean Paul Satre - "Hell is other people."

Can you be wise, can you find transcendence, can you find peace in the middle of the maelstrom? Can you be the calm center in the eye of the hurricane? How about on the train? How about in a crowd? How about on the streets, riding the bus, at the local sports bar?

Can you be in conversation at the local coffeshop, in the midst of the daily litany of woe, and find your calm center, let the words, the emotions, the anger, the misery, the incomprehension just roll off your back?

Can you play the Sage in the midst of the madness? Since this little blue planet continues to get more and more crowded, filled with the teeming masses, needing, wanting, grasping... can you tune it all out and ride the waves of ecstasy?

That's the assignment, Grasshopper!

Greater Minds than Mine...

I know greater minds than mine have grappled with these questions (see previous two posts). I feel like I'm a blindman stumbling in a dark closet. I have a few brain cells to burn, but I am sure that at best I'm really, really good at misunderstanding the most important, subtle things. Welcome to my reality.

This morning I'm stuck on ZERO. The number ZERO: the arithmetical symbol 0 or 0̸ denoting the absence of all magnitude or quantity.

That's not a bad conception of what we are talking about, when we speak of "God." Void, or absence of all magnitude or quantity. A mystery.

When Hawking tells us that all matter and energy in the Universe is matched with anti-matter and negative energy and it all ZEROES OUT, I take it as an affirmation. Not a scientific nihilism, but mysterious validation of everything in the Universe.

Zero is also a circle: 0... an infinite circle... what is Zero in the Tarot Deck? The Fool...

"We begin with the Zero. This is the un-manifest where everything exists in potential. The Zero neither contains nor is contained by any number. It exists outside of any cycle. When the Zero is added to any number it symbolises a perfection of that number’s meaning, a completion if you like. Although 1 is the root of 10, 10 is not strictly synonymous with 1. This is because the addition of the Zero signifies a perfecting of the 1 influence, in effect moving out of the cycle of 1 through 9 and into a higher order—10 through 19. When Zero is added to a number it tends to bring a universal responsibility to its root number. It is out of this formless perfection that some-thing appears."

Yes. Zero is a heavy thing. My little brain is grappling... but it's a happy grappling...

The Cosmic Giggle!

One of my meditation teachers taught that you can "blow the picture," sometimes, you come across some info, or have an experience, or hear a story, read a poem, hear a song, or flash on an insight that just totally alters you. Opens your head, your eyes, you feel it in your cells. What you thought you knew, the way you saw things, what you see in the world, the picture in your head, is altered, exploded, falls away to reveal something new. It  can be a major thing, or, a minor thing. Might lead to a new philosphy for life, or can just bring you a big belly laugh.

Stephen Hawking's idea of the Universe as the Ultimate Free Lunch (see previous post), is that kind of thing. I had one of those fabulous, little epiphanies yesterday. I mean, I am not saying I totally understand Hawking, mathematics is not my thing, scientific egg-heads are usually talking over my head, but in my own way, I can misunderstand with the best of them. Give me a little bit of information that ignites my imagination and I can run for miles and miles.

So yes, the Universe, Something, for Nothing. What does that do to your head?

The Universe is a Gift with No Giver. A lark, a jaunt, a kick, a goof, a giggle, a laugh, a shout, a vacation, a bonus, free money, a treasure.

It's not a job, a task, a test, a punishment or reward.

We are here. Somehow, someway. We are free. To do what we want, for the reasons we make up on our own. There is no Daddy looking down judging. It's all up to us.

And there's Postive and Negative. Space & No Space. Light & Shadow. Bright Beauty, Dark Ugliness. Life (which we don't understand) and Death (which we don't understand). Ultimately everything is matched with it's opposite. It all zeroes out. Zero isn't good or bad, it is the mystery. Space vs. Negative Space. It's a big, Universal Dance. We are here. And then we are not. Or we are here and there, and not here and not there. Or something nonsensical like that. Our deepest understanding, our most fundamental knowledge is a bit nonsensical. Beyond Human.

And since we are Human, we struggle to understand, we do our best to see. That is probably what we are here for, to observe, to wonder, to try to skull it out. To marvel at the beauty. To try to stretch our minds, our understanding, to follow the mathematics. But it's a big complicated place, the Universe, bigger than our heads, bigger than our understanding. We are left to lean to the light, and try to cultivate intelligence and a sense of wonder!

The Cosmic Giggle!

The Universe is the Ultimate Free Lunch!

You love "Brain Pickings" because it's a blog devoted to the finest stuff.

Where else can you read a post entitled "Is There A God? Stephen Hawking Gives the Definitive Answer to the Eternal Question."  You know Hawking is a famous smart guy, up there with Einstein, Da Vinci, Copernicus, Socrates, think GENIUS!

I highly recommend you read the whole post.

I will cut to the chase. Here are the highlights for me.

A Personal God? Nope.

An Afterlife? Not the one you are dreaming of.

A Creator of the Universe? Nope. God is redundant. Everything in the Universe was created out of nothing!

But maybe you can think that The Laws of Nature are the "Mind of God!" So E=MC2 (the increased relativistic mass (m) of a body times the speed of light squared (c2) is equal to the kinetic energy (E) of that body.) is maybe a glimpse of a God-like thing, a little God-Let!

You know God would be an equation, algorithym, primordial energy, the first proton, the aftermath of the Big Bang. Postive Energy and Negative Energy Cancelling each other out!

The Universe is the Ultimate FREE LUNCH. Remember when those hard-headed conservatives told us there was "no such things as a free lunch?" Guess what? Surprise, surprise. They were wrong! The Universe itself is a complete and total FREE LUNCH. Digest that Pilgrim!

Hawking: "I’ll admit that, unless mathematics is your thing, this is hard to grasp, but it’s true. The endless web of billions upon billions of galaxies, each pulling on each other by the force of gravity, acts like a giant storage device. The universe is like an enormous battery storing negative energy. The positive side of things — the mass and energy we see today — is like the hill. The corresponding hole, or negative side of things, is spread throughout space. So what does this mean in our quest to find out if there is a God? It means that if the universe adds up to nothing, then you don’t need a God to create it. The universe is the ultimate free lunch."

"The laws of nature itself tell us that not only could the universe have popped into existence without any assistance, like a proton, and have required nothing in terms of energy, but also that it is possible that nothing caused the Big Bang. Nothing."

Everything in the Universe is Energy & Mass, and Everything is matched by the same amount of Negative Energy & Negative Space. Everything in the Universe is Matched by it's Negative. It all sums out to ZERO. Yes. Think of it. We are all running around doing our thing but everything ultimately zeros out. Funny. For some reason that sounds fabulous. A free lunch. You can have your cake and your not-cake too. It really is like one of those Yin/Yang things. Brain-warping. Mind-bending. World-changing. Consciousness-expanding. That's the kind of morning read I enjoy!

None of this bums me out. All of it astonishes me, and fills me with hope and wonder. The Universe really is mysterious. We may have figured out some of the Laws of Nature, but it's all so amazing. Energy, Mass & Space and the Negative too.

We no longer get "Presidential Speeches," we now get "The Daily Hate." George Orwell our nation turns it's lonely eyes to you...

Storms. Humidity. Rain. Extreme Heat.

My country is aflame. The President is whipping up the HATE. This is a new thing. At least in my lifetime. No. Not the hate. I suppose that has always been there. But the hate has usually been cloaked in flowery language, soothing rhetoric. Hate speech that pretends to not be hate speech.

This President has no problem whipping up the HATE directly. And there are plenty of folks in the heartland who cheer the HATE. Reminds me of George Orwell's "daily hate." That is pretty much a typical speech from our President. The daily hate.

Chilling. Scary. Once you unleash the HATE, it can manifest in so many deadly ways. The President is a supremely bad man, his policies, his past, a very vulgar, corrupt human being. We are in the midst of a deep, horrific phase of our country. What happens in the face of the HATE?

We cannot turn away. We cannot let this succeed. We cannot let this stand. What can we do? Speak up. Protest. March. Vote for Progresssive Democrats. Everywhere.

Just Less...

I have a pudgy friend who is always dieting. He has tried every diet imaginable. Still, I think if my friend could discover his Utopia it would be sinking into a comfy couch with a large Pizza with everything on it, and a cold 12-pack of beer.

So "pudgy" is just his state of equilibrium. Nothing wrong with that, except of course, you wonder about his arteries, and heart and intestines, and all that internal stuff. We are what we eat, what we consume. At the same time all that stuff consumes us too.

It's funny. He wants to be thinner, buffer, less puffy and pudgy, but that couch and pizza and beer is always calling. As Oscar Wilde once said: "I can resist everything, but temptation."

Yes. We all have to live, the way we want to live. Live and let live.

My friend has also coined a name for a diet he invented, his own diet, one that he rarely follows, one that lately I have adopted. It is the ELF diet. You may wonder what exactly the ELF diet is? Do you imagine a small person with big ears and a goofy grin? No, not that. The ELF diet is the Eat Less Food diet.

Yes, lately, ELF diet for me. Also speak less. Think less. Lots of silent contemplation for me. Less consuming. All around. Less. Just less.

A bilious human ball of bullshit.

"Racist in Chief." 

The man in the White House is a stone-cold racist. At least he doesn't hide it. The folks who back him, look away, pretend not to know, are spineless enablers.

Of course, unless we are Native Americans, we are all immigrants, or sons and daughters of immigrants, or grandsons/granddaughters of immigrants, etc.

Our President is not okay. His comments are not American. They are anti-democratic. Racist. Hate Speech. I do think the rhetoric will continue to get worse. He is a drowning man, shouting to the heavens unleashing his hate-filled shite upon all of us.

He truly is the embodiment of all our worst qualities. A bilious human ball of bullshit.

"A Man Who Knows He's Going Under..." - J. Baldwin

"This country was founded on the ideas of justice, of liberty, of the pursuit of happiness. But these core beliefs are under threat. Each and every day. We are under threat by an administration that would rather cage children than pass comprehensive immigration reform." - Congresswoman Ilhan Omar

What if you are a "powerful" man, in a "powerful" office, but no one fears you? Instead, everyone knows you are a fool, an idiot, a coward, a disgrace, a hollow-bully, a big baby, a bloated narcissist, an incompetent, racist, corrupt fraud. How do you make it from day to day? How do you look at your self in the mirror?

I mean, what happens when even your fans/followers know in their hearts that you are a complete bust. They know it, they just don't have the heart, the courage, the smarts to admit it. They can't admit they were conned, that they fell for the toxic, carnival barker selling the "big con," and they are just too dim, small-minded and weaselly to admit it.

We have entered a new phase of this complete debacle. FUBAR! The time when folks start calling out the bully. There is nothing to fear. This powerful man is melting, disintegrating, falling to pieces right before our eyes.

Representatvie Ilhan Omar quoting James Baldwin:

“There are few things more dreadful than dealing with a man who knows he is going under, in his own eyes, and in the eyes of others. Nothing can help that man. What is left of that man flees from what is left of human attention.” ~James Baldwin

Mixed-Up Confusion!

Swimming in uncertainty.

Thinking about feelings & judgement. What is important? What is puffery?  Is it true that "all that matters is what you feel?" Are our feelings everything, nothing? Obviously my feelings are pretty important to me, but are they really important at all in the grand scheme? Is even asking the question silly? Is there a grand scheme? Is that more puffery?

Does what one feel over-rule what one knows? When we say we know something, is it that we "feel" we know something? Is it all connected, and silly to try to it pull apart? Pollock famously told De Kooning: "You know more, I feel more."

Are we living in a hall of mirrors? Everything we see a mirror, reflecting back at us? What we feel we project onto the Universe, the Universe reflecting back our feelings?

And what of judgement? Judging ourselves, and the world? What's up with that? Is it a dead-end, a sideshow, irrelevant, or everything?

Yikes. I feel like a blindman, stumbling about in a dark closet. I don't really know if I know a damn thing. How does that make me feel? Confused!

I am a long-time meditator. When I meditate I can see my feelings come and go, sort of like clouds, I can see my "judgements," fade and disappear, lose their sting, their meaning. What is left when we drop attachment to our feelings and judgements? What's that silent state, that silent observing state? Is that really the only thing that is real? Is that just another hall of mirrors?

Are we more than our feelings, more than our judgments, more than what we know, more than our bodies? This morning I am full of questions, not so full of answers, I suppose that has been my go-to mode most of my life. It's a bit disorienting. Something tells me my feelings are important, but they are arbitrary, fleeting, insubstantial, same with my judgements. What else do we have? Welcome to my world of Mixed-Up Confusion! 

Eat more Broccoli!

What message did I get last night while I lay in bed sleeping?

"Broccoli is your special friend."

Hunh? Broccoli? Not Jesus?

I go to the Great Google: Why is Broccoli good for me?

"Broccoli is a nutritional powerhouse full of vitamins, minerals, fiber and antioxidants."

This got me thinking, you know, we think of broccoli, of vegetables, as a lower life-form than humans, but what if that's wrong? What if broccoli and other vegetables are actually a higher life-form than us? Most of my problems have been with humans, humans, just like me. Vegetables?  No problems.

Ok. I get it. I can judge the broccoli, but the broccoli won't judge me. It's a Vegetable. Good. Raw or cooked, steamed or sautéed. 

I mean, it's simple, the message is crystal-clear: Eat more Broccoli!

"When You Find What Matters is What You Feel..." - J. Farrar

Loved seeing Son Volt (for the first time), last night at a fabulous music room, SPACE in Evanston, IL. My friend and I stood right at the foot of the band, over on the right hand side of the stage. SPACE was pretty much packed, capacity 250 when there's no tables or chairs, all standing room. The room is perfect for music, all wood floors, wood ceiling and rafters, sound buffers on the brick walls. A large stage, superb sound system, cool lighting effects. The sound tech knows the room, a perfect mix. Loud, warm, sound, a r&r mix, vocals prominent but sitting nicely within the instrumentation.

Son Volt is one of the great American bands. They have one stone-cold classic album, their first "Trace," but I will hazard the guess that everything they have done is worthy of a listen. We own three of Son Volt's records: "Trace," (1995), " "Staightaways," (1997) & "The Search" (2007). I picked up "The Search" not long ago, in a bargain bin, and it's a total knockout.

The band has changed, morphed, fallen apart, disbanded, reformed. The only constant has been Jay Farrar, lead singer, guitarist, songwriter. It's his band. Completely. His voice is a powerful, distinctive, thing, so American, dare I say, a Midwestern instrument: a plain-spoken, tough as nails, truth-telling voice. Jay wore dark shades throughout the set, you wonder could he see a thing when he looked out into the audience? The current lineup is truly great. Powerful, layered, stomping, shimmering, American r&r. A tight, exuberant set. Mark Spencer on steel guitar, keyboards, guitar is the not-so-secret weapon.

I was fascinated by all the guitar choreography on stage. Jay was playing various Gretsch guitars, a couple electric hollow-bodies, and an acoustic. There was an elaborate dance between Jay and his guitar tech, changing guitars, the tech tuning them up off stage, bringing them to him, plugging and unplugging, all done expertly and seamlessly. A bit of stage business that was pretty damn impressive.

They opened with new songs from their latest release, "Union." First listen to these songs, I'd say Son Volt still brings it, songs of the moment, songs from the heart and heartland, songs about loss, dissolution, songs about the 99%, you know, the left behind. Funny they were playing these songs on the North Shore where many of the 1% reside.

Later in the set they played songs from "Trace" and everyone in the audience was thrilled, captivated, we all knew these songs. The songs stand as American classics. They did one encore. The last song they played was a cover of The Stones "Monkey Man." It was thrilling, fabulous. Perfect. Genius cover. Great band, great show.

Paging Karl Marx!

I scan the headlines and I just can't take it. Yikes. The rich folks are out of control, freaking crazy, way too full of themselves. They think they defy gravity, that they don't have to play by the rules that all of us working stiffs live by, and really, they are right, the rich do play by their own rules, beyond ethics, beyond morality, beyond good and evil. Ugly shit. $ trumps everything else. And those $$$ are turning everything to dust, mowing down all life-forms. Maybe having a society with a small group of folks with most of  the wealth, and the rest of the folks with so much less is not so healthy. Paging Doctor Karl Marx!

"Don't Be Late." - Jimi Hendrix

"Music is my religion." - Jimi Hendrix

I slept in a bit this morning. Awakened by blasting light flooding through the window shades. So bright, like a new world had just birthed, I knew I had slept in a bit, which felt good, but it doesn't happen often. I went to bed with a raging headache, was it the barometric pressure? I seem to be getting more and more sensitive to pretty much everything as I get older. I am not hardening, I'm getting softer, more permeable. Not sure if that's good or bad. Still, the long sleep seemed necessary, refreshing and healing. Recharged!

What is the first thing I remembered this morning? I had a visitation. I was visited last night by a mythic figure. No, it wasn't Zeus or Buddha, not Jesus or Jack Kerouac, I was visited by Jimi Hendrix. Hah, so odd, unexpected. Why Jimi?

Great American r&r guitarist. He died young, at the age of 27 in 1970. The words from one of his songs, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)," was circulating through my head, Jimi was speaking directly to me:

"I want to say one more last thing

I didn't mean to take up all your sweet time

I'll give it right back to ya one of these days, hahah

I said, I didn't mean to take up all your sweet time

I'll give it right back one of these days, oh yeah

If I don't meet you no more in this world

Then I'll meet you in the next one

And don't be late

Don't be late"

Right. I don't know. I think I will take my sweet time Jimi. But yeah, the next one, right, don't worry, I'll be there, just working on some stuff right now...

Plutocratic Rot!

We sometimes think we live in a Democracy, but of course, for anyone with eyes, we all can see that we live in a Plutocracy -  "government by the wealthy, a controlling class of the wealthy." It's just the truth. Yes, most of us have the right to vote, but usually we are choosing between wealthy folks who promise to be benevolent to the little people vs the wealthy folks who promise to take care of other wealthy folks first.

You would think the little people would always vote for the supposedly benevolent ones, but of course, we don't, and it turns out that lots of the benevolent ones aren't really all that benevolent anyway. Lots of talk of "trickle down," for the little people, but not so much trickle down. Mainly the wealthy like to just piss on us for entertainment.

Anyway, this Jeffery Epstein story is pretty interesting. Super-rich guy running an elaborate sex trafficking ring for years. Oh yeah, looks like he specialized in very young girls. So ugly. And so many rich folks may be drawn into the mess. "Plutocratic Rot." Yes, I like that phrase. Could be the name for our current American Era. The Plutocratic Rot Era. 

You hope maybe things are so bad, the corruption has reached such a fever pitch that maybe the whole edifice comes crashing down. It happened last century, and led to FDR's NEW DEAL. Maybe we are due for a major course correction? That would be nice.

Eat the Rich. Er... no... the rot... don't forget the rot... did anyone say super-hefty Wealth Tax?!

Naive, Innocent, Good...

Can we afford to be naive, innocent, good? A perpetual goody-two shoes?  Is it lame? Is it a lie? Is it silly or absurd? Isn't it inevitable that living in the world knocks some hard-earned sense into us? Jades us? Makes us cynical, wary, doubtful, cautious, suspicious, untrusting? Isn't that what life teaches us?

What happens to us when we find that people are disappointing, manipulative, domineering, bullying, willing to explore the darkness at all costs. Willing to exploit the young, the weak, the innocent. How far down will folks go? How dark can they get? Really, really dark.

It does make you want re-think everything. To do some kind of ritual cleansing. Human, oh so human, but maybe clinging to some bone-deep innocence is essential? Sort of a spiritual re-birth every morning. Wonder what good can be found today? Wonder how we can make today a better day than yesterday?

How do we cultivate a smart naivety? An experienced innocence? An un-jaded, un-cynical knowingness? Maybe it's a Yin/Yang thing... light in the darkness, darkness in the light...

A Battle Between Good & Evil!

Dark. How dark can we go? Humans. Read the news. Every day. Dark. Very, very dark. Darker than you can imagine. How does that happen? What wakes up the demons inside of us?

We are all creatures of light and dark. There is a battle, a dance, a balancing act going on inside of us at all times. Think of the worst things, think of the best things. Humans are capable of both.

How does that little burbling infant in diapers end up on death row? Or on the battlefield committing atrocities? Playing games of dominance and submission? How does that little burbling baby become a bully, a terrorist, a sexual predator?

It's sort of like that cartoon, right? An angel on one shoulder, a devil on the other. Whispering in our ears. Those are the two extremes. We seem to be caught between the two at all times.

Are some of us more inclined to lean to the light, some to lean to the dark? Are we truly born one way or the other? Or are we pushed that way by the things we encounter in our lives? Nature or nurture?

Hard to know how it happens. Some of us lean to the light, even in the midst of the deepest darkness. Sort of seems naive, innocent, psychically inept. Innocently optimistic.

Some of us lean to the dark. So dark it points to a bleak, black, dead-end nihilism. I guess we are talking Evil.  There is some deep existential battle going on in us. The Battle of Good & Evil.

It's a real battle. Probably good not to forget. I mean, we forget at our own peril. Lately I have been obsessed with Dylan's "Gospel Years," you know... "You Gotta Serve Somebody." Be forewarned Pilgrim.

We Turn to Kimchi!

What to do? Turn to kimchi. We ordered "take-out" yesterday, why cook? Nothing quite like spicy, fermented vegetables. The scientists tell us that kimchi is good for our microbiomes.

"Both inside and out, our bodies harbour a huge array of micro-organisms. While bacteria are the biggest players, we also host single-celled organisms known as archaea, as well as fungi, viruses and other microbes – including viruses that attack bacteria. Together these are dubbed the human microbiota. Your body’s microbiome is all the genes your microbiota contains, however colloquially the two terms are often used interchangeably."

Remember: Food Is Medicine. We aren't just eating for ourselves, we are eating for a village, the big and small things inside of us. Anyway, the kimchi was delicious. I find that eating light and healthy is just the best. The less food I eat, the better it tastes. Is that weird? I think not. Just another example of "less is more."

Dark Things.

Last night. Reminded me of Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." A totally different yarn. Fireworks blowing up around us. Three of us sitting in the backyard, on chairs in the dark; one doing most of  the talking, two of us listening.

Dark things. The conversation took a very strange, dark turn. The little black box of secrets opened up, and the dark, terrible things spilled out in a rush. A long, rambling monologue. Risky behavior. Mad adventures. Dark turns. Freudian murmurings. Drugs. Sex. Deep sickness & pain. Suffering.

A sad, disturbing tale. A hint of yawning madness, a hint of deep sickness. The two listeners realized they didn't know anything. What they thought they knew was shallow, and off the mark. The soundtrack was complete mayhem, fireworks, loud explosions, building to a frenetic crescendo.

The darkness, the sound & fury. Signifying less than nothing. The smell of gunpowder lingered in the steamy night air. The conversation faded into the black. Yes, a heart of darkness. A blackness, a void, a deep, deadly, dead-end.

The two of us, trying to process everything we just heard; we both sort of recoiled. Who is fit to judge another person's behavior? We both wanted to take a shower, perform some kind of ritual cleanse. What of the light? What of heart, soul, love? There is the long, sordid litany of the stark human needs, the yawning pit: needing, wanting, grasping, twisted desires, Meat Puppets stumbling in the dark. We were reminded of the Jean Paul Sartre idea: Hell is Other People. Do we choose between darkness & light? Or are we chosen? Do we choose a death-trip, or a life-trip? Or do both choose us?

We parted, said our goodbyes to the narrator, then a long, rambling walk and conversation in the darkness. We tried to explain to each other how that litany of dark things wasn't our way. What was the meaning of it all? We hit the pillow dreaming of a better day, a better way.  This morning wake up to light streaming through the window. Dark clouds, dark murmurings just a sad, bleak residue. A hangover of darkness.

Mysteries...

The mystery of life.

The mystery of death.

The mystery of the moment.

Right. We are stuck in the middle of mysteries. We just live with them. We need to get our heads around the mysterious realities of our very human situation. It seems like a life-time thing.

We just found out someone we know died in her sleep yesterday. So shocking, devastating, sad. Inexplicable. She was relatively young, under 50. We hadn't seen her in awhile, but when we did see her she was always vivacious, funny, lively.

We were aware that she had gone through some tough times. She lost her father a few years back, and that seemed to send her into a long & deep tail-spin, led to a lingering illness, the doctors were not helpful.

It's hard to reconcile, hard to process the news that she is gone. I mean, we have all lost folks close to us. The well of sadness is bottomless. The losses add up, the sadnesses multiply. That is what life is right? A multiplication of loss & sadness. But still...

We talk about heart, spirit, soul, energy, life, death. We don't know. Mysteries.

Give that Man a Pulitzer!

This cartoon got Canadian cartoonist Michael de Adder fired from his job. Of course, instead, he probably deserved a promotion, a raise and the Pulitzer Prize for an excellent political cartooning. It perfectly encapsulates the horrors of our current political, cultural, social moment. Yes. It's gruesome, but perfect too. We need a rethink folks. We are definitely on the wrong track... something is gravely wrong...

No One is in Charge...

"No one is in charge."

That's the truth they don't want you to know. Some preach about a Big Daddy sitting on a throne in the clouds. Big Daddy looking over your shoulder, rooting for you, rooting you on, caring about every little thing you do. Some point to powerful, rich men, pulling invisible strings. Some talk about cosmic forces, demons, spirits, little people.We like to hear stories about grand trajectories of history: inevitable movements, breakthroughs, evolutionary imperatives. We like to think about the power and granduer, we dream of being swept along, swept away, by forces bigger than us. We like to think about how it's all being worked out in some grand symphony of meaning and purpose.

"No on is in charge."

Does that thought wake you up in the middle of the night? Do you feel a twinge of panic rising in your chest?

"No one is in charge." That's the truth they don't want you to know.

Less is More!

OK. Turns out the key to happiness is to "lower expectations," (see previous 2 posts), and now if you are looking to cultivate joy in your life, you should, "do less!"

Sean Illing over at Vox (by the way Sean is a major go-to resource, I recommend you check in with him often), "A new book by Danish philosopher Svend Brinkmann, The Joy of Missing Out, offers some useful advice: Let it go. Stop trying to do everything and instead do less. In fact, sometimes it’s best to be left behind, to enjoy where you are right now."

I think this is great advice. Not just a "digital detox," but a broader cultural detox too. I find that "fun" has never really lived up to expectations. Looking for the "heart of Saturday night," always seemed like a fool's quest. Turns out going for a walk, sitting in a chair meditating, reading a book, listening to one album all the way through, eating a quiet meal with a friend, playing acoustic guitar in the kitchen, doing less, avidly, and intently, can be maximally rewarding.

The Way of the Hermit. Follow your inner light. You can't see that inner light if your phone is always on. I know, its kind of like that salmon swimming against the stream, and maybe at first you will feel like you are missing something, that you are going the wrong way. But, really, probably not! Yes, in some ways, "everything we know is wrong." The messages we get every day from the multi-headed mass culture beast is to always want more, do more, buy more, consume more motherfuckers!

That's a road to madness, unhappiness, a joyless needing, wanting, grasping. Bad for our mental health, and bad for the planet too. Living within our means in all ways. Tend your garden!  Less is more!

It's Not All About Us!

Thinking about that "happiness equation," (see previous post), I get the idea that we should keep expectations low, best to meet the day half-way, don't judge too harshly, be open, accepting, be sure to protect ourselves, but at the same time be willing to risk a bit too. I think it's okay to dream big dreams, it's okay to have wild imaginings, it's okay to entertain ourselves in our heads.

Keep things simple & true in the "real world." Keep our egos in check. Realize it's not all about us, we are just here for the ride. Life can be complicated, but we don't need to be complicated. We can't transform the world, but we can transform ourselves. Can we work on ourselves without being self-absorbed? I think our best tools: sense of humor, humility, silence, meditation, contemplation. We need a bit of courage to hope for a better day, but the day we have is the one we have, and that's got to be enough.

The Happiness Equation!

Mo Gawdat wrote a book, "Solve for Happy." He was on the fast track of success, cool job at Google, bought two Rolls Royces on-line on a whim. Still, unsatisfied, unhappy. Also his son died and turned his world upside down.

He came up with an equation for happiness: "The equation says that happiness is greater than, or equal to, your perception of the events in your life minus your expectation of how life should be."

Yeah. The old "expectation game" can be a soul-killer, a wet-blanket for happiness. It's funny, our crazed, rampant, over-stuffed capitalist consumer culture teases us to always be needing, wanting, grasping for the next newest thing. Probably works against our well-being & ultimate happiness.

Also, how about this? Maybe we should stop listening to the voices inside our heads?

"We have a set of illusions. One of them is that we associate so strongly with the voice in our head when the reality is that it is just a biological function; it is exactly like your heart pumping blood around your body. It’s your brain’s way of delivering survival functions to you – its job is to scan the world around it using sensory input and then coordinate your muscle responses and take action so that you survive.

Thoughts have truly propelled our civilisation, and we think of the voice inside our heads as us. But that isn’t remotely true once you realise that you don’t have to obey your thoughts – I can accept them, I can reject them, I can ask the brain to go and get me a better one. You can do what people do in meetings: you ask me a question, I give you an answer, but you can say to me: “Mo, can you get me a better answer?”, and I go back to my brain and I say, give me a better answer. Treat your brain as a biological function and understand he is not the boss – you are the boss."

So much wisdom from Mo: "Yet we never give ourselves the luxury of living in now; instead, we are constantly living inside our heads looking in the past and the future, and as you do that you constantly suffer."

Right. Be here now. Cultivate happiness. Lower your expectations and thrive!

Let's Make America More Beautiful!

Back to politics...

I am optimistic. I think we are at the end of something, that Trump, and all he represents, all the horror, the hate, the idiocy, the corruption, etc. is a breaking point. It is not the beginning of a new movement, it is the end-point, a car-crash, the inevitable result of a bankrupt political party, a last-gasp "fuck you" to a new, progressive, "Blue Wave" movement. 2016 was the car-crash. 2018 was the wakeup call. 2020 will be an opening to a new progressive, inclusive, diverse, multi-cultural renaissance.

Those Red states are not going anywhere, those "left-behind" folks will cling to their guns, their racism, their backward ways, their fears of "the other," fear of change, fear of irrelevance, but they will be more and more irrelevant, their clinging to some weird concept of the past just makes them less able to participate in the renewal. It's just demographics and a change of consciousness. The GOP is a hollow-husk of a political party: predominantly old, rich, white folks clinging to their cash & power. It's a dead-end. Nihilistic. Un-democratic. Un-American.

The new America really is a multicultural melting pot, young, vibrant, colorful, open, diverse. Beautiful. The tide is turning. A new day is coming. I am optimistic. Things look so bleak, because we have crashed into the ditch, but we will arise, dust ourselves off, and see with new eyes! I do believe. Let's make America More Beautiful!

Upgrade Your Life - Oat Milk!

I am not a "product endorser." I make no $ from products I write about on my blog. If I write about something, it's just because I got a bee in my bonnet in the A.M. and started typing. I never plan blog posts, I always write whatever comes off the top of my head. I like to keep my "writing muscle" working, and limber. So yes, you can probably tell, just by reading my posts, I am always all over the map.  I write what I want write, when I want to write it. Mostly I guess I write about politics, music, pop culture, and whatever the hell is going on in my warring head.

Surprisingly, folks do read this blog, I am always amazed to find out that I do have some followers/readers. I am not trying to cater to you. I just do my thing. Thanks for your patience and attention. It sort of feels like I'm not alone, even though I usually write these posts when I am totally alone, in the early A.M. sipping coffee, listening to music on the BOSE Wave system cd player (not a product endorsement - but man do I love my BOSE CD player/Radio, I purchased a used one on Ebay, and it changed the sonic palette in the kitchen distinctly for the better!) This morning I am listening to the Jeff Beck Group, "Truth," the early edition with Rod Stewart on vocals. Great stuff.

Thanks to my lovely companion, I am drinking coffee cut with "oat milk," instead of cow's milk. What a revelation. Love it. Highly recommend it. Healthier for you. Better for the planet too. Instead of feeding oats to cows, and milking the cows, just use the oats to make milk. Creamy. Satisfying. It's made by a Swedish company, Oatly, they seem like a pretty cool company, love this from their mission statement: "We promise to be a good company which means that our drive to help people upgrade their lives always comes before the reckless pursuit of profit."

How to transform your life? One baby step at a time. Listening to good music, sipping a good coffee brew, adding a bit of oat milk to the mix, everything counts, every little thing.

Forget the News! Cheap Guitars!

Old habits die hard. Oldest habits die hardest. I always wake up, head to the kitchen, and first thing, click the radio on. Tuned to NPR. Then I brew my coffee, empty the dishwasher, put the clean dishes and cups away.

I get a quick news fix.

The fix is getting shorter and shorter. My attention span for the daily news is really dwindling. Is that how the evil-doers win? The news is so bad, so disheartening, so disgusting & disappointing that sentient, caring folks are compelled to just freaking tune-out! Everything, I mean, everything seems supremely fucked up. Seems we are now running Concentration Camps on the Border, little children are dying, the blood is on all of our hands, also, another woman has come forward to accuse our President of rape, the Republicans are hiding, totally abdicating any ideas of morality, any sense of honor or  decency, pretending everything is just fine, while the Democrats are fretting, always fretting, whether they should even think of "Impeaching the Motherfucker."

I hope it all works out.

Lately, I have been quick on the trigger-finger, switching from the radio to the Bose CD player. Fabulous sound by the way. How does Bose do it? The clarity, the fullness, the bass-response all coming out of a plastic, weird-looking, wedge-shaped, white-slab. Makes all these CDs sound so good. This morning I put on Alabama Shakes' 2016 album, "Sound and Color." Soul-stirring. Thrilling. Fun. Love this band. Brittany Howard has a classic soul-voice, full of grit, power and sweet emotion. Plus those guitars! My lovely companion tells me she wants me to recreate that big, tough, gritty guitar sound for our band. I immediately started looking for a used Gibson SG or ES 335... probably need to find a "copy," I mean those guitars are quite pricey, maybe I can find a cheaper Japanese or Korean knockoff?  Forget the news of the day, it will destroy any sense of well-being you  may harbor. On to the next thing. Cheap guitars!

The Secret Life of Plants!

I do love those mornings when I rise early. Sip my coffee, check out the news, listen to music. This morning it's an album I have never listened to before, Stevie Wonder's "The Secret Life of Plants "-(1979). Weird. Different. Not what I expected. Sounds like a soundtrack to a movie that was never made, (but it's actually the soundtrack to a documentary that was made, called, not surprisingly "The Secret Life of Plants"). Hah! Who knew?! Certainly Stevie Wonder is some kind of musical genius. Seems he's exploring the outer reaches of his musical inspiration. I like it. Perfect for this morning. The day hasn't revealed itself yet. Wonder what's up with the plants. What secrets may they reveal?

Magic Carpet Ride!

Yesterday morning, walking to our neighborhood coffee house, the true neighborhood hub, connecting folks from all walks of life, looking for my daily coffee fix, I was tricked out in my summer-wear: faded, purple bandana and bright green shirt. Passing a neighbor, one of the "lit up ones," (and when I say "lit up ones," I mean this particular human seems to be either transmitting or receiving signals from a distant galaxy),  he takes one look at me and blurts out: "Magic Carpet Ride!"  That works!

Alive on a Nice Summer Day!

Some days you ramble, you wander, you meander, you kick down the cobblestones with no clear idea where you are going, you just go; lazily, easily, almost unconsciously, you just walk around on this little spinning globe without a fear, without a worry, without a plan, without any grand ideas bubbling around in your head.

Aimless.

There are little surprises all the way, everything is sort of surprise, because you really don't expect anything. So the sun shining down is a surprise. The little dove swooping down and walking around in front of you is a surprise. Sipping a ginger beer is an amazingly satisfyingly, thirst-quenching surprise. You don't do anything you thought you were gonna do. You just drop all that and go with the moment.

So sitting quietly in the fading sun, leaves of the trees rattling above you, lots of silence and laughter just spills out for no good reason. There is no reason and no reason to worry about any reason. You are alive on a nice summer day.

Every Day Is A Battle!

Every day is a battle.

Bodies vs. Anti-bodies. Positive thoughts vs. Negative thoughts. Optimism vs.  Pessimism. Belief vs. Unbelief. Good vs. Bad. Gods vs. Devils. Right vs. Wrong. Right vs. Left. Reasons to be Cheerful vs. Reasons to be Bummed Out, Love vs. Hate, Peace vs. War.

Our bodies, our heads, our spirits are battlefields. The battle spills out across the canvas of our lives. Cooler Heads tell us to chill out, to stop with the game of duality, to do less judging, and more sitting in silence observing, but even sitting in silence is a choice in opposition to jumping deep into the fray.

Winning vs. Losing. Success Vs. Failure.

Whatever, right? We have a warring mind, a million thoughts crashing against each other.  So what? Notice the battle. Observe the grand spectacle of life, within and without.

Stillness vs. Action. Yep.

The Search...

Son Volt: "It's the search not the find." What are we searching for? Excitement, drama, inspiration, meaning, purpose, love, understanding, fun, adventure. I mean, what have you got?

Is the "search" inside, or out there somewhere? Let the Buddhas and wise guys fight it out.

As per Dylan we are not "looking for" ourselves, we are creating ourselves, daily. What will we be up to today? Early morning is usually a hopeful time, the coffee is flowing, music too.

I hear a war may be brewing, a very unsteady, indecisive, unreliable, narcissistic, neurotic, supremely damaged and ignorant man is debating the pros and cons of another conflict. On the other side you have a bunch of black-robed Ayatollahs. Yikes. Crazy that the world is in the hands, subject to the whims, of such misguided, under-prepared, unworthy fools. Such is the way of the human thing.

Disturbing? Yes. Very. Still, we must carry on. Do the things we do, the things we must do, just because we must. It's sort of a Samuel Beckett thing. Oh so human, doing human things. Despite the idiocy, despite all the little absurdities, despite the fear of failure and futility.  Meaning, purpose, inspiration, creativity, we want to hang on to a few solid ideas, even if we are making them up as we go. Damn the torpedoes.

Yo-Yo!

High one day low the next. That's the way it goes. You wonder if there is some law: You will fly high, and then you will fly low, all in proportion. As high as you fly, that is how low you will go.

Makes you think those stone Buddhas have a point. Impassive. Grounded. Not going anywhere. Of course, they are stone. Statues. Not flesh and blood. Do we try to emulate a stone statue? Is that a good idea? Stone-like?

Or is it better to be a human yo-yo? You know, oh so human. Frail, changeable. Who knows? Yesterday was a dark day. It followed a day of light. One came right after the other.  No good reason. Nothing you could put your finger on. That's just the way it goes. That's life, right?

Appearing and Fading Away!

Even as the day was rolling out, you could feel it evaporating, disappearing into the mists of time. The moment appearing & fading away. You wanted to hold the day close, but could feel it slipping away moment by moment. The sun setting in the West. Large green trees looming. A golden light suffusing everything. The two of you singing Hank Williams' songs to each other.

You could both feel it. A bond, a happiness, a love, laced with sadness, both of you knowing this moment was dying away even as it was happening. You actually said: "It doesn't get better than this..." You both knew it was true, and you thought of all the people you knew who were already long gone. Then you parted. Went your separate ways. Hoping you could have more good days together, knowing there are no guarantees.

Father's Day R&R Show!

We played a r&r show on Sunday afternoon, Father's Day 2019. Our lead singer dedicated the show to "all the fathers past and present," as well as to "peace and love." It was a heavy thing to do. Lots of energy to take on in that little r&r haven. It definitely brought a focus to our performance. We were playing in front of some folks we knew, and a whole contingent of folks we didn't. Lots of strangers in the crowd.

We were loud. The sound-tech at that place likes to blast music at maximum volume. Maybe best to cut through the small-talk, the bar-talk, the alcoholic haze. We thought it probably killed a bit of the nuance in our band dynamics, but at the same time it was a bit cathartic to just overwhelm the room with our sonic vibration.

We had a few "sound issues" the stage monitors didn't seem to be working correctly on the first few songs, I couldn't hear my guitar very well, didn't know what was happening, couldn't tell if I was in tune or out, but by the 4th song everything was working & clicking.

We played a full set, over an hour of original music, and by the end, we were one solid unit playing our heart's out for all to hear. I nearly spontaneously combusted on stage. I always run hot, but this time my whole body just went up in flames. I felt like I was sacrificing my body to a higher cause. Afterwards I was totally drained, spent, I felt like a hollow husk, drenched in sweat, totally exhausted.

As we were leaving, two beefy "door guys," dressed like bikers, long hair, denim, boots, tattoos, cigarettes in hand, told us we "sounded great." Hah! That was unexpected. Can't think of a better token of validation for the whole mad little adventure! R&R!

The Secret Thread Embedded in America's Creative DNA!

I am not sure I can convey how excited I was to find that this film from Martin Scorsese dropped recently on Netflix. I have lately been on a major Bob Dylan kick. I mean, I pretty much have been for my whole life. My mom turned me onto Dylan when I was a wee lad, and over the years I have always come back to the man and his work. Paraphrasing Joan Baez: Not everyone "gets" Dylan, but if you do, if you fall under his spell, there is no-one better. You fall hard for the work and there is nothing else that comes close. 

There are so many Dylans that I love: The Young Woody Guthrie Inspired Folk Troubadour, The Wild Mercury Mouthed, Cowboy Junkie Stream of Consciousness, Wild-Haired Rock and Roller, The Basement Sage, The Countrified Gent, The Rolling Thunder, White-Faced Prophet, The Born-Again, Fire & Brimstone, Apocalypse is Coming Preacher Dylan, The Burned Out Rocker, The Ancient Sage, The Old Man of Letters and the Nobel Prize, etc.

That's the exciting thing, Dylan is always changing, morphing, evolving, creating. Paraphrasing him from the film: Life is not a journey to find ourselves, it is an adventure where we create our selves. He not busy creating is busy dying!

It is amazing to see and hear Dylan in 1976 - in fine voice, passionate, committed, with an unlikely, overstuffed caravan of co-conspirators. Dylan's music is the secret thread weaved into the foundation of American Music. The key thread in American culture's unique DNA from the 60's onward. Dylan is the connecting line from poets: Whitman, Ginsberg, Kerouac, Waldeman, Patti Smith, all the various Visionary Poets & Beats; folk/blues contingent: Rambling Jack Eliot, Woody Guthrie, Robert Johnson, Blind Willie McTell, all the rock and roll outlaws, the Beatles, the Byrds, The Band, The Stones, all the various forms of Americana. Plus don't forget Sam Shepard the great, surreal American playwright who makes an appearance. Also Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, T-Bone Burnett, Mick Ronson, Ronee Blakely, Chief Rolling Thunder. What a collection of unique creative souls!

Growing up I was always a big Beatles fan, they were the first to introduce me to Pop Culture and r&r, but early on, even as a little kid, I was struck that while the love-able Mop Tops were conquering the world singing "I Want to Hold Your Hand," Dylan was writing and singing epic and classic folk songs like "Blowing in the Wind," "Masters of War," "The Times are A Changing" and "A Hard Rain is Gonna Fall." The Beatles may have been more exuberant, looked like they were having more fun, Dylan hit you right between the eyes with his amazing imagery delivered by his razor-sharp vocals, lyrics seared deep into your consciousness and dreams. Not  much later, Dylan too, picked up an electric guitar and took everything to another level, think "Bringing It All Back Home," "Highway 61 Revisted," and "Blonde on Blonde." A fantastic phantasmagoria of roar and thunder!
Kicky r&r exuberance, the sound of electric Fender guitars, married to surreal images & stream of consciousness genius.

All of my major influences, the core of my creative consciousness, my awaking to another reality, show up in this movie. To watch it is to see the great American creative revolution in music, in culture, roll out right before your eyes. Astonishing. Beautiful. Inspiring. Essential viewing.

Power/Powerlessness!

Is this true?

You don't really understand power, it's uses, it's limits, until you experience powerlessness? Maybe our need to feel powerful needs to be undone. We see time, and time again, that absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Our whole crazy, capitalist, consumer culture is the perpetual motion machine selling us some weird, corrupted, seriously misguided idea of power. Power over nature, power over women, power over other men. Power over death. A conception of Power that tries to sell us eternal life.

All total b.s. Lies. All flattering lies trying to build us up, when what we really need is to deconstruct, to take ourselves apart piece by piece, to find the vulnerability of a life of powerlessness. To discover the "holes in our souls." We need to face the reality that we are really, truly, madly deeply powerless in face of the most important things in our life.

Birth. Death. Aging. Love. Hate. Here we are: Powerless in the immensity of the Universe. And it's okay. In fact, it's kind of wondrous and beautiful, even if pain and suffering are embedded into the world and the fabric of our bodies.

The Saboteur!

Saboteur. 

"A saboteur is a person who makes a mess of a situation on purpose. You might call your little brother a saboteur for letting the air out of your bicycle tires, but you could be a saboteur in return by filling his shoes with cold spaghetti. Saboteur is a noun that is fairly new to the English language; it was first used in the early 1900s, and it refers to a person who deliberately destroys or obstructs something. It comes from the French word, saboter, which really and truly means to kick something with an old-fashioned wooden shoe. We can only hope that one day the word Nikeur might enter the English language to mean a person who kicks something with a sneaker."

And what if you kick yourself with that old wooden shoe? You'd be a "self-saboteur." How much of our lives can be explained by self sabotage? Is this all some kind of test of character?  How much was luck, fate, wrong place wrong time, or right place, right time? Who knows?

You are left to ponder. Or not. You hope the future is truly unwritten, and maybe there are new lines to write. You hope that wooden shoe doesn't appear out of the foggy mist to kick you in the shins. Look in the mirror dude... what do you see?

Best Music in 2019, So Far...

Best Music so far in 2019.

Ok, well, to be truthful, for me, the most significant record released this year is the one my band recorded, "The Alternate Boot: Vols 1&2." A long time coming, a labor of love. We released it, got some nice reviews, t-shirt sales, cd sales and streams, a fantastic string of shows, including a transcendent release party in February, growing our band sound, and fan base, show by show; progress has been slow, but steady. Our sound evolving, morphing, live shows getting more fully-realized. One of the most significant projects I have ever worked on. Our band of musicians are an inspiring creative outfit dedicated to the vibe. You can purchase your own copy on Amazon here!

What else?

Two releases have captivated me this year.

One is the 2 cd set: The Bootleg Series Vol 13: Trouble  No More 1979-1981  This is full-on Jew for Jesus, Evangelical Bob Dylan. I was one of those Dylan fans horrified when Bob turned up "born again." This album is a mind-changer. Listening to these live cuts many years later is a revelation. One of Dylan's most fertile, creative periods. One of his greatest live bands, he is in superb voice, singing with passion, conviction. It's a stunning collection. Jim Keltner on drums, Spooner Oldman keys, Tim Drummond bass, Fred Tackett on guitar, Carlos Santana guests on a track. And quartet of backup singers (Mary Elizabeth Bridges, Carolyn Dennis, Gwen Evans, Clydie King, Regina McCrary, Regina Peebles, Helena Springs, Mona Lisa Young) is breathtakingly good. Spiritual renewal. I have lived with and loved these songs for a couple months now. Great gospel music. Some of the best ever written and performed. Really. That good.  It is such a pleasure to hear Dylan singing his heart out, to us, and to the Lord.

The other record I "discovered" this year, and have not stopped spinning, is a record that was actually released in 1998, Billy Bragg & Wilco Mermaid Avenue. I read Jeff Tweedy's book and I fell in love with Tweedy's solo album, "Warm" (2018), a major work, Tweedy at his soulful, beautiful, very revealing best , and fell into a major Wilco vortex. I own every Wilco album except their first. Wilco's discography from "Being There" (1996) - "Schmilco" (2016), and every record in between, is absolutely magnificent. I can put any Wilco record on and find new things to love and be inspired by. If you pressed me, I'd have say to that Wilco is my favorite band of the moment. No doubt. Great band. By the way, I think, in order to really "get," to understand the secret code, to reveal the DNA of the band, be sure to check out their live album, recorded at the Vic Theater in Chicago, "Kicking Television," (2005), and watch the DVD, "Ashes of American Flags" (2009), (I have seen it many, many times, and always find it thrilling), a band working at it's absolute peak. We are now talking the current band, a much different musical animal than the Mermaid Ave. crew, the lineup from "Sky Blue Sky,"(2007) til today features the incomparable Nels Cline on guitar and Glenn Kotche on drums. I'd also say Jeff Tweedy is one of the few songwriters I'd even consider in the same sentence as Dylan. Yes, I do think he's quite brilliant in his own quirky way.

I was aware of "Mermaid Ave." for years, but resisted buying it, thinking it was just a gimmick, a marketing ploy. Bragg and Wilco taking Woody Guthrie lyrics and conjuring up songs? For some reason it just didn't appeal to me. One day in early 2019 a friend asked me if I ever heard the record, and recommended it. I was so enamored with all things Tweedy, so I snagged a used copy at my local record store. Boy was I ever wrong. Mermaid Avenue is a complete joy, a stunner, a fantastic labor of love, pure sonic gold. Wilco has never sounded looser, more fun and more creative.  Tweedy and Bragg really bring a passion to Guthrie's amazing, touching, funny, superb lyrics. There isn't one false step.  A great, joyful, inspiring, spine-tingling, record. I think Jeff Tweedy was sort of liberated singing someone else's lyrics. It's fantastic to hear Jay Bennet on guitar and piano and Ken Commer on drums, the original lineup of Wilco, tearing it up with not a care in the world. I mean the band sounds loose, powerful, sloppy, r&r perfect. Another completely breathtaking album. Who knew?!

This is where my head, my ears have been at this year...  playing songs from our latest record with my phenomenal band, and time-tripping to the distant past, listening to music so powerful, so lively, so inspiring, so of the moment. Doesn't matter when it was recorded. Kind of surprising, lost in time, and enjoying every last moment. Wow.

Will We All Be Sucked Into the Vortex of Stupidity?

King Idiot. It's best to ignore him. To tune him out. To not read his idiotic tweets, to not listen to his blabbering on the radio, to not watch his dementia-like, fat-carcass, slobbering performances on TV. Listening to the Idiot King will only make you much stupider than you already are. Plus, he will piss you off. You will be outraged, shamed to know that this man supposedly speaks for you and your beloved country.

Last night I guess King Idiot was on the TV telling the world, that yes, indeed, he would cheat to win an election. He did it the first time, and well, hell, he'd do it again. Seems like a terrible thing to admit. But there it is. I mean King Idiot is too stupid to realize he just admitted to everything he was accused of in terms of "colluding" with Russia. You shake your head and think to yourself: "What a fucking Idiot!"

And you wonder what can be done. Does supreme mendacious, corrupt idiocy trump everything else? Don't forget King Idiot has his rabid followers who will never admit this man is a plague and a blight on our teetering democracy, they blindly cling to King Idiot's billowing trousers mouths open craving their own taste of idiocy. The rest of us, are left to ponder the black void of idiocy at the heart of the land.

Will we all be sucked into the vortex of abject idiocy? Shite!

Energy... Of Course...

Energy. We all know what it is, right? I mean we all talk about it, quantify it. We act like we understand it. We can explain how a machine uses energy to "run." There are many forms of energy. Many uses of energy. Energy animates all of our machines and technology. It also powers all the pretty creatures on the planet, including us. There is the material of energy, the molecules. Oil, coal, solar, food, are just types of fuel that powers everything.

There is also the invisible energy that surrounds us. You can feel the energy of a room. The energy of the person sitting next to you. I think when we are talking about the aura of a person, we are picking up an energy field surrounding someone.

Play music in a tightly packed room. Feel the energy surge and feedback in a loop. It can be so powerful, transcendent. Feeds us. It feels a bit magical, spiritual. Maybe spirit itself is just a form of energy? 

Alternatively, when we see something dead, lifeless, we realize that the energy has dissipated, evaporated, or transformed in some other way. We wake up in the morning after a long sleep, feeling refreshed, and are surprised to find that energy surges thru our bodies, surrounds and overwhelms us.  

As William Blake once wrote: "Energy is Eternal Delight!"

"Don't Worry... Just... Be..."

Yeah. Over here we met the day half-way. Didn't push, flowed. I do recommend it. Not always easy to do. Living easy. Riding the wave. Didn't make anything happen, the day just rolled out like a beautifully complex oriental carpet.

Made me think of that aborted paraphrase of that great, and slightly annoying Bobby McFerrin song: "Don't worry... just... be..." Yes. Glory be. There was glory in the being. Sunshine, warmth, shimmering blue water, people everywhere you turned. Couldn't avoid anything, anyone. Better to just let it all come down.

A long, fulfilling day. Nothing happened. Everything unfolded. Maybe that's how you do it.

Weird Energy Void...

Weird. This morning feels like a total "energy void." Almost like the day is just standing still. Expectant. Waiting. Like the world is taking a breather. No spin. Freeze-frame. Pinned to the canvas.

I wonder if I should "try to make something happen?" But I don't think that's how it works. Something will happen, pretty sure, whether I do something or not. What is this feeling of "void-ness?" Is it me? Or is it the world? Hard to tell.

I think I will have a bit more coffee and see what turns up...

A Very Good Omen!

A person died.
They cleared out her apartment.
A lifetime of stuff.
Someone dug up her lily.
Put it in a plastic bag.
Why?
Just because.

Weeks passed.
My friend had taken the plastic bag
and brought it home. It sat on the
back porch like a corpse.
She mourned the dead person,
mourned the dead lily plant.

My friend decided to replant the lily.
She has a flower garden in the back yard.
Maybe the lily was just dormant?
Maybe it could somehow come back to life?

Maybe?
She had no real hope. She just did the re-planting.

Time passed. Days. Weeks.
One morning, green shoots pushed thru the dark earth.
The lily was alive. Resurrected.
The rest of the garden thrived too.
Beautiful flowers and greenery in a small
plot of land in the back yard.

One day a small, baby dove appeared.
The baby dove decided to make the garden
her home. She was there all day, every day.
Overseeing the flowers, the greenery, the
resurrected lily plant.

My friend put seeds and bread out for the baby dove.
The baby dove was a new friend, a new spirit in the garden.

My friend and I decided it was all a very good omen.

Like Water or Serpent!

Yes. The best laid plans some times just crumble like a cookie. Vanish in smoke right before your eyes. What to do? Be nimble, quick on your feet, willing to have a re-think. Why not? No worries. You loved an idea? Oh well, try another one. Closed door? Instead of beating your head against it, you can alter your course, find another opening somewhere else. Yes. Be like water. Or be like a serpent. "Serpentine! Serpentine!" Move on. Move forward, backward, sideways too. Whatever.

Why Worry?!

Listening to the news from around the globe. Checking the headlines. The big question: "What could possibly go wrong?!"

I mean, hell, the corn is good. Alfred E. Neumann answers that ponderous question with another pithy question: "What, me worry?"

This Seems Important.

This seems important. 

I think the murder and dismemberment of a Washington Post correspondent is one of those stories that will not just disappear. And it shouldn't. There is something rotten in the body politic.

There are folks in Washington D.C. who have some explaining to do... I wonder if we will ever get to the bottom of the matter?

As they say, "Democracy Dies in Darkness." We need to shine a light...

Avoid, Evade, Defuse...

Don't match crazy with crazy. Don't match anger with anger. Don't match cynicism with cynicism. It's a losing game. You just feed the craziness, the anger and the cynicism.

The first impulse is to match the energy with the same energy. But all it does is heighten and multiply the thing you actually want to avoid, evade or defuse.  "Serpentine, Serpentine!"

"How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb!"  Not a question, an instruction, a "how-to!"

Bono and U2 were on the case in 2004. We all need to be in the business of dismantling, defusing, repurposing.

The Tao tells us to "be like water." You know, be soft, pliable, permeable, flowing, transparent. Who are we to argue with Ancient Chinese Wisdom?

Breathe. Think. Be silent. Set your intention on the positive. When you act, make it an act of affirmation. We can remake the world. What are the best tools? Humility. Love. Grace. Silence. Humor. Compassion. Empathy. All these "soft" qualities are our greatest strengths.

"A change of consciousness can happen in an instant." "Instant Karma!"

Fill My Life Up with Light!

I am at sea this morning. Casting about for meaning and purpose. My dreams were clogged up with airports and passenger lines, and the most mundane of human things. Late for flights, late for meetings, lost and unsure where I was going next. Dreams of flailing about!

I wake up looking to make a pot of coffee.  Kickapoo coffee beans. I do know that Kickapoo was a Native American Indian tribe. I run thru all the Indian tribe names I can think of off the top of my head: Crow, Shoshone, Comanche, Cherokee, Navajo, Cheyanne. I think of Dee Brown and his great book "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee." If I were to name books that "changed my life," Brown's book would be up at the top of the list for sure.

I can mark my life by key texts at every time in my life, again, just off the top of my head: The King James Bible, Treasure Island, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Slaughter House Five, Catch 22, On the Road, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Cat's Cradle, Breakfast of Champions, The Great Plains, On the Rez, Erections, Ejaculations and Other Tales of Ordinary Madness, Lolita, Speak Memory, Desolation Angels, The Sheltering Sky, Infinite Jest, In the Spirit of Crazy Horse, Moby Dick, The World According to Garp, Dog Soldiers, Dispatches, A Bright Shining Lie, The Snow Leopard, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Zen and the Art of Archery.

I turn to the Flaming Lips this morning for my soundtrack. Can't go wrong with their stone-cold masterpiece, "The Soft Bulletin." Never fails to give me a swift kick of adrenaline. I would run down the key albums of my life, but then, this post would basically take up the whole morning. Figure lots of Dylan, The Band, Beatles, Leonard Cohen, Stones, Nick Drake, Steve Wonder, Jimi Hendrix, Patti Smith, Lucinda Williams, Nick Cave, Sly & the Family Stone, Who, Kinks, Miles Davis, Robert Plant, Led Zeppelin, Gillian Welch, Fairport Convention, Richard & Linda Thompson, Sinead O' Connor, Allman Brothers, Van Morrison, Grateful Dead, etc. Oh yes, Flaming Lips, Radiohead, The National, Wilco, Drive By Truckers... the list is long & endless...

How to fight that listless, lost and flailing about feeling? Music, Art, Poetry, Love... I fill my life up with light, sound & thunder!

False Starts this A.M.

I had a couple of "false starts" this morning. I started typing and then deleted what I typed. A rare indecision. What to write about?

The first words I heard on the radio this morning: "Vile & Ridiculous." I know who they are talking about, don't even need to ask. Fuck that guy. He doesn't represent me. He is a plague, a scourge, a blight on the land, a man who conjures a certain toxic mind pollution.

While making the coffee this morning, I was reflecting on a heavy-duty conversation I had yesterday. I am such a lousy worrier. Death, taxes, financial stability. These topics very rarely pop into my consciousness. I spend so much time thinking about lunch, and how I am gonna occupy myself. No time for those big-time worries. Of course, I do worry about the planet, the fate of my species, whether good will conquer evil, when will Americans stop shooting each other, but those big time worries are just standard operating procedure.

Those topics always intrude. My little bubble of blue-sky happiness can be punctured at a moment's notice. Still, I am very good at putting my intention and attention in other places.

I'm spinning Dylan discs on the box, listening to Dylan right now, I have been on a major Dylan kick the last few weeks. What's that line sticking with me this morning? "I'm not going to hell for anybody."

I mean, yes Bob, exactly!

Human Beings Being Human!

What is our job? You know as Human Beings? To try to rescue a little meaning from the abyss of meaninglessness, to skull out a bit of order in the yawning vortex of disorder? Are we here to experience what we experience when we experience it? Is that all there is?

Is life a job, a mission, a lark, a song, a cry, a tear, a rainstorm, an earthquake, a mad quest? Or all of those things? Yes, I will probably go with "all of the above." We are subject to the jeopardy of living in bodies and we open ourselves to the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, daily, yes, every single day.

We hold chaos in our hands. We juggle balls of darkness and light. We live in the world, and create it one breath at time too. We are not gods, or god-like, just simple, humble human beings. Human Beings Being Human!

Morning Conundrum!

Not sure.

Sadly, sweetly optimistic, or unhappily, positively pessimistic? I wrestle with my own psyche this A.M. There are so many levels to this conundrum. It seems important and inconsequential simultaneously. I am a mystery wrapped in an enigma, even to myself. Best not to self-absorb. Best to look outward, but not too far-ranging. Rainy day, Dylan on the stereo, "I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to..."

I'm reading about Beto O'Rouke's presidential quest. Looks like his fate will rest on how he comes across on TV. "To have any chance, he must turn to television, where empathy, careful listening, and voracious curiosity are not the coin of the realm."

Faintly ridiculous. If you aren't a hit on TV you aren't a hit. And TV is the great leveler. The fish-eye medium that really does turn everything to shit. Aye, there's the rub...