face 

City Fathers

It is now the end of September and the weather is beginning to change here in Southern Utah.
When I was a young man winter did not affect me so adversely. But when I was about 40 years old I spent a winter working on a drilling rig in Wyoming, and got chilled to the very bone, to the very marrow of my bones. And since that time my body and my mind have had an aversion for the winter cold, and for the oilfield and the petroleum industry in general. Why would an artist go to work in the Wyoming oilfield in the middle of winter? Clearing my throat, well, call at midlife crisis, or desperation, whatever it was it was one of those things that if you had to do over again you wouldn't.

It is damp and cold today and has been raining all-night, a slow steady drizzle, the kind of raining that the desert loves.
I went down to my favorite spot by the river again yesterday, it was a cool blustery day with the sun coming and going from behind clouds. It's usually wonderfully quiet their, usually. Yesterday was one of those unusual days which are becoming far too usual these days when the tourists flock into the area with their jeeps, motorcycles and RVs. They swarm like a plague of noxious giant insects, making loud horrible, screaming, roaring noises in the beautiful quiet desert and hills. They are never quiet, when their machines are not making offensive noise their body openings are, they're loud profane talking there ill mannered unruly children, screaming, even their minds make offensive noises.
But the city fathers do everything they can to encourage them to visit here, the police very seldom inforce traffic regulations except against the local people. They want to foster a reputation of friendliness towards all tourists so they wink at all the illegal vehicles with huge monster tires, noisy straight pipes and mufflers, rude noxious behavior and flagrant disregard for the rules of the road. But if your a local you better walk a straight and narrow line because if you don't you'll be paying a nice fat fine. I've never much liked the local politicians, there stupid, disgusting slobs.
That's life in these here United States, and I am surprised that at my age I haven't come to more graciously accept this type of thing. I realize it would be better if I could simply accept the fact that we will never have peace in this world no matter how hard we try unless we can enter that secret spiritual place within, which I have been trying to reach for years. I believe that if we can attain spiritual peace then that grasping for worldly peace will cease. And all those negative feelings towards noisy people will also cease and in their place simply compassionate understanding. But believe me it's much easier to attain to compassionate understanding while sitting here writing in the quiet of my living room than it is while riding my bicycle on a very narrow road while 36 jeeps with huge wheels and extremely large noisy motors are coming up from behind, with only inches between us as they pass.
As for the city fathers and businessmen, I realize we should have compassion even for them.

Post #6

Today was a good day, I received a $300 check in the mail, Federal Express delivered a brand-new 19 in. monitor for my computer and I got to spend some time with my family and friends. I especially love the seven-year-old and a three-year-old we had long talks about many things and we all learned a lot. I felt such love for them that it carried on down with me all the way to the city market where it seemed like all the couples had babies and everybody was happy.
Do you think that if every day was like that, we would just take the love for granted, and it would lose something? As I ponder the question, I come to an opposite conclusion, in fact if every day was like that we would grow in light and love and joy until it would be almost impossible for anything bad to happen.
I have seen days that were so bad they have been etched for ever into my memory, the sight of a mother kneeling on the ground weeping over the bloody body of her dead infant baby, a young girl, maybe 12 unconscious and bleeding in my arms, and I have had bad dreams.
Every day now the war pictures coming from Iraq, can you have good day, when you see pictures like that? No, I didn't see any of those pictures this morning, maybe that's why the day went well.
The older I grow the greater grows my detestation for war and for those who make it and profit from it.

Post #5

It is now the middle of September, the seasons come and the seasons go, and I am reminded of a poem.

AN OLD MAN SEES HIMSELF
BY CONRAD AIKEN


Solitary, before daybreak, in a garden
Dark amid the unchanging snow,
Watching the last star fading in a fountain
Whence melodies of eternal water flow,


Festus, seeing the sky-line burn and brighten
Coldly, far above the hidden sun;
Seeing the golden thread of glory unravelled
Along the wall of mountains run,


Hears in his heart a cry of bewilderment;
And turning, now here, now there --
Like one who pauses a moment before departure --
Partakes of the grace of earth and air,


Drinks of the vast blue splendour of the sky,
The mile on mile of dew-blanched grass,
The cloud-swept trees, the stones, bare cliffs of bronze;
And in the pool, as in a glass,


Ringed round with nodding asters, frosted leaf-tips,
Stoops to see his image; and behold,
How faded is the scarlet of his mantle!
His face, how changed and old! . . .


Sing now the birds; on every bough a bird sings;
Slowly at first, then fast and faster,
Till the walled garden thrills and shrills with music;
The cricket beneath the violet aster


Cries his joy to heaven as the first beam strikes him --
The foxgloves bend beneath a weight of bees;
Praise! Praise! Praise! the chorus rises,
Drowsily, happily, dumbly, sway the trees.



-302-




Fades the star in the mountain, and the sun comes.
How motionless stands Festus there!
A red leaf, falling slowly to meet a red leaf
That rises out of the infinite to the air,


Floats, is turned by the wind about its image . . .
Ah Festus, is this you,
This ruin of man about whom leaves fall coldly
And asters nod their dew? . . .


Pale, phantasmal, swirls the forest of birches,
It is a dance of witch-girls white and slim;
Delicately flash their slender hands in the sunlight!
Cymbals hiss, their eyes are dim


Under the mist of hair they toss above them . . .
But Festus, turning never,
Heeding them not, nor the birds, nor the cricket shrilling,
Stares at the pool for ever,


Seeking in vain to find -- somewhere, somewhere! --
In the pool, himself, the sky? --
The slight, clear, beautiful secret of these marvels,
Of birch, birds, cricket's cry,


Blue sky, blue pool, the red leaf falling and floating,
The wall of mountains, the garden, the snow,
And one old man -- how sinister and bedraggled! --
Cawing there like a crow . . .


Instant the miracle is. He leans bewildered
Over the infinite, to search it through . . .
Loud sing the birds! On every bough a bird sings;
The cricket shrills, the day is blue.

today

Today I rode my bike down to the river. It was a beautiful day almost perfect , the sky was crystal clear and only the very slightest breeze. There is a beautiful spot down their , it's not too far from town but it can be very quiet there, there are times when you don't hear a machine for a long time, and in this world at this present time there are not many places where one can find peace from the internal combustion engine in its thousands of insidious forms.
As I stood there, thinking about a dream I had, a large carp with his huge back sticking out of the water came wallowing and mucking through the mud grubbing for his food. The wind was so still that one could hear all the subtle sounds of the river and the surroundings. That faint swishing sound of the water as it flows by, the birds, the insects, and all the other sounds blending together like a symphony.

today2

Today was crystal clear not a cloud in the skynot even the slightest haze.I rode my bicycle down by the Colorado River, I have a beautiful place their where you can stand and listen and not here a single motorized vehicle for a long time. You might be surprised at what you hear when the sound of the mechanical beast is absent. It is hard to find such a place these days no matter where you go, there's always some kind of damned noisy machine ruining your wilderness experience.
I watched a big carp mucking around in the mud looking for food with its huge humpy back sticking out of the water. The wind was not blowing so all the more subtle sounds could be heard, the water, the insects, the birds and sometimes sounds that you can't quite recognize.
I stood there thinking about a dream I had, it was strange and so powerful that I still feel a glow from it.I was standing in a very old mosque, it was constructed of white smooth translucent stone. It was in the shape of a large dome, Regal in its simple clean form,within upper and lower chamber, both chambers and Windows going around each, the lower chamber seemed more lofty with its Windows higher up, they allowed the light to flood the room but they were higher up than a man is tall.
In the upper chamber where I was standing the windows were lower in one could look out.I was standing there with someone or was young and quite lovely and we were looking out upon a most beautiful scene, it looked like a garden of paradise and all-around pouring in like the sunlight was the most incredibly beautiful music absolutely indescribable something like an enormous chorus or heavenly orchestra, no one can describe such as sound.

today

It is September 14, 2004. The day the wanderer’s logbook begins.

There are those of us, who cannot help but to ponder the course of our life, and surprisingly, there are those who are incapable of pondering anything; they would try to wipe their ass with a work of art if they couldn't find a piece of paper and think very little of it. I am one of those who tend to ponder and reflect upon life's current of events.

“Life is an illusion”, maybe a cliché but one worth meditating upon. What does illusion mean?

1. · An erroneous perception of reality.
2. An erroneous concept or belief.

· The condition of being deceived by a false perception or belief.

What does reality mean?

1. The quality or state of being actual or true.
2. One, such as a person, an entity, or an event, that is actual: “the weight of history and political realities” (Benno C. Schmidt, Jr.).
3. The totality of all things possessing actuality, existence, or essence.
4. That which exists objectively and in fact: Your observations do not seem to be about reality.

Another concept that I hear spoken of much these days is the old Buddhist teaching of the relative importance of time, in that the only actual or real-time is now. It teaches that all things past or future do not exist therefore do not possess actuality, or reality, they are mere illusion. In fact, if in the present your mind is dwelling upon any thoughts of past or future and we are not centered on this moment, then we have an erroneous perception of reality. I wonder if the people I hear so glibly speaking about this concept “there’s nothing but the present moment”, “all that there is, is now” etc. understand what they're talking about?

computer generated