Messiness and Creativity

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If you have a few minutes, this is well worth your time.

"Nobody had ever heard of such a thing…"

I think there was a time when people were much more in tune to the seasons, and adapted their behavior to their environment instead of trying to subdue Mother Nature.

This is an excerpt from Al Smith's autobiography Up To Now, ©1929:

A lost sport to the children of today is sleigh riding.  It is next to impossible now in New York City, except in Central Park, or here and there on the west side of the city.  Prior to 1894, no appropriation was ever made by the city for the removal of snow.  It remained on the streets, just as it does now in the country sections of the state, until the warming suns of spring melted it away.  When Colonel Waring was appointed street-cleaning commissioner by Mayor Strong in 1895, he shocked the whole community by appearing before the Board of Estimate and Apportionment  and asking for two million dollars to remove the snow after a snowstorm.  Nobody had ever heard of such a thing and it created much discussion.  Tobogganing and sleighing on hills was a popular sport.  Dover Street was probably the center of it, because there is a sharp incline from Franklin Square to Walter Street.  I remember one side of Dover Street where there were no buildings and which abutted upon the masonry work of the Brooklyn Bridge, and which, after a night's sleighing, would be left as smooth as glass.  People were not then required by ordinance to remove snow from the sidewalk.

Won't you be my neighbor?

Excerpt from Al Smith's autobiography Up To Now.  Keep in mind that this was written in 1929!

One of the very striking differences between the New York of my boyhood and the New York of today is what I might call the absolute disappearance of neighborhood spirit.  When I was growing up everybody downtown knew his neighbors-- not only the people who were immediate neighbors but everybody in the neighborhood.  Every new arrival in the family was hailed not by the family alone but by the whole neighborhood.  Every funeral and every wake was attended by the whole neighborhood.  Neighborly feelings extended to the exchange of silverware for events in the family that required some extraordinary celebration.  Today on Manhattan Island, people live in large apartment houses and do not know the family living right on the same floor with them.

The lip-print on a half-filled cup of coffee…

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Elvis Costello does heartbreak well.

Full lyrics HERE.

Prayer

Excerpt from Gerda Weissmann Klein's autobiography, All But My Life ©1957:

But later, much later, I thought about my way of praying.  It started in school with a play about ancient Egypt.  Each character uttered a prayer:  the mighty Pharaoh prayed for a victory, his opponent asked for his own success, a sick man begged for health, the doctor asked for people to be ill, and each prayer, clean and swift, like a white bird, shot upward.  In Heaven, it met with the other prayer that had asked for just the contrary.  They turned against each other in bloody battle, and usually both fell back lifeless to the earth.  A large number of girls had taken part in that play.  I thought I had a beautiful role.  I was a poor little boy, the son of a fellah.  My mother told me to pray, but I didn't know how.  I had no wishes, so I just looked at the river that fertilized our field, at the warm sun, at the ripe fruit in our garden, and I said, "Thank you, God, for the warm sun, for the blue Nile, for my father and mother," and my little-boy prayer, like the others, sailed straight up to the throne of God.  Nobody defied my prayer, and nobody else thanked the Maker.  They were all asking Him for things.  He turned his face upon the little barefoot boy…

I was about twelve years old at the time.  From then on I had always thanked God for the gifts He bestowed upon me, and they were many.

I can't quit, I'm a star!

This'll make you happy:

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Full lyrics HERE.

Incense

One of life’s little pleasures is the soft, delicate cone of ash incense leaves behind.

Husband and Wife

Excerpted from Rainbow Roof and Other Poems by Russel Wragg, © 1938.

This was published during Franklin Roosevelt’s second term.  The topics are interesting choices.

"Oh, the mistakes were the very best parts!"

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The Bellamy Brothers paired their latest album with an album of Greatest Hits, and I think that was a mistake.  This album would have stood on its own merits.

(By the way, keep an eye on their website and go see them live if you get a chance.  They put on a great show!)

Values

"Youths are passed through schools that don’t teach, then forced to search for jobs that don’t exist, and finally left stranded in the street to stare at the glamorous lives advertised around them."  ~Huey P. Newton

If a television show said a dirty word or flashed a quick peek at a boobie, their call center would light up from angry parents; apologies would be made, fines would be paid, jobs would be sacrificed.

But when almost 10 minutes of every half-hour is dedicated to preaching the Gospel of Materialism, teaching children that happiness is something you buy and a well-lived life is measured in possessions, all you get is crickets…

Founding Fathers™

I don't like it when people talk about the Founding Fathers™ as if they were divine beings anointed by God with special wisdom and abilities.

They were human beings, just like us, who had a problem.  They came together.  Some had ideas that were rejected, some were accepted; some people won, some people lost.

They cooperated and found a solution-- and that's the part that needs to be taught and remembered.

(extra)Ordinary Moments

Excerpt from “Bowing to Each Other” (Shambhala Sun, November 2015) by Brother Phap Hai:

Recently, a practitioner asked me about the benefits of meditation.  I knew that she was hoping I would talk about dazzling lights, profound insights, or psychic powers.  Perhaps to her disappointment, I shared with her my growing sense of appreciation for the ordinary moments of my life-- a cup of tea in the morning, warm sunshine, laughter.  Before, I had taken these things as a given rather than a gift.  Now as I practice more, my experience of them has become richer, deeper, and more meaningful.

(War) Pigs

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I think what people sometimes miss is that hidden behind the gravelly voice and scary logo lurks absolute joy.

It may be the joy of a pig wallowing in the mud, but it's joy nonetheless.  (Also:  I love it when their songs have a bit of a pounding piano in them.)

Full lyrics HERE.

"I know why."

In this excerpt from A Historical Reader:  The Holocaust, Gerda Weissmann Klein writes of her experience as a Jew being rounded up for deportation by the Nazis in 1942:

We had all assembled.

Why?  Why did we walk like meek sheep to the slaughterhouse?  Why did we not fight back?  What had we to lose?  Nothing but our lives.  Why did we not run away and hide?  We might have had a chance to survive.  Why did we walk deliberately and obediently into their clutches?

I know why.  Because we had faith in humanity.  Because we did not really think that human beings were capable of committing such crimes.

Your are not a prophet. But:

The Mouse and the Camel

by Rumi
Translated by Coleman Barks

A mouse caught hold of a camel’s lead rope
in his two forelegs and walked off with it,
imitating the camel drivers.

The camel went along,
letting the mouse feel heroic.
"Enjoy yourself,"
he thought. "I have something to teach you, presently."

They came to the edge of a great river.
The mouse was dumbfounded.

"What are you waiting for?
Step forward into the river. You are my leader.
Don’t stop here."

"I’m afraid of being drowned."

The camel walked into the water.  "It’s only
just above the knee."

"Your knee!  Your knee
is a hundred times over my head!"

"Well, maybe you shouldn't be
leading a camel.  Stay with those like yourself.
A mouse has nothing really to say to a camel."

"Would you help me get across?"

"Get up on my hump.  I am made to take hundreds like you across."

You are not a prophet, but go humbly on the way of the prophets

and you can arrive where they are.  Don’t try to steer the boat.
Don’t open a shop by yourself.  Listen. Keep silent.
You are not God’s mouthpiece.  Try to be an ear;
and if you do speak, ask for explanations.

The source of your arrogance and anger is your lust
and the rootedness of that is in your habits.

Someone who makes a habit of eating clay
gets mad when you try to keep him from it.
Being a leader can also be a poisonous habit,
so that when someone questions your authority,
you think, "He’s trying to take over."
You may respond courteously, but inside you rage.

Always check your inner state
with the Lord of your Heart.
Copper doesn't know it’s copper,
until it’s changed to gold.

Your loving doesn't know its majesty,
until it knows its helplessness.