|
|
 7 Dec 2006 @ 11:03
I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble. We have to learn to live happily in the present moment, to touch the peace and joy that are available now.
---Thich Nhat Hanh
To fill the hour---that is happiness; to fill the hour and leave no crevice for a repentance or an approval.
---Ralph Waldo Emerson
The only wisdom we can hope to acquire is the wisdom of humility: Humility is endless.
---T.S. Eliot
It's an unusually full and urgent Thursday for news. I don't know why but so many things are bursting forth on this Pearl Harbor Day. Yes, of course the necessary stories about Iraq, that Russian spy case, recent water on Mars (will some alien be looking for traces of water on Earth someday?), the tragic dad in snowy Oregon, Jennifer Aniston's happiness and all the new movies, poor Tony Blair deserve our attention. But there are a few beneath the surface that don't get headlines this morning and that we might miss---like the startling images that illustrate this message. What are they? The top is surface ocean temperature and the bottom is phytoplankton productivity. So what? Please read on~~~ More >
|
|
|
|
 5 Dec 2006 @ 10:05
Resentment is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die.
---Malachy McCourt
I appreciate people's opinions, but I'm more interested in news. And the best way to get the news is from objective sources. And the most objective sources I have are people on my staff who tell me what's happening in the world.
---George W. Bush
Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried...to practice these principles in all our affairs.
---Twelfth Step of Alcoholics Anonymous
First a word about these quotations. The statement about resentment has become quite popular and a number of people seem to be credited for it, but chief among them is Mr. McCourt, a colorful figure one might have to sum up as a storyteller of some sort. The actual source for the comment apparently is not known. President Bush was talking about the media to FoxNews's Britt Hume at the end of a 2003 interview found here [link] . The official Internet site of AA is www.alcoholics-anonymous.org/ . And while I'm giving credit, the lithograph by George Bellows was published as an illustration for an article in Good Housekeeping explaining Prohibition in 1924. The original currently is housed in the Library of Congress.
Second, let me say I don't know if the President is alcoholic. We have a history of ambivalence about alcohol in this country. We find drunks comical, as we do not so often people experiencing the effects of other substances that may cause dependence or addiction. We tried to prohibit its manufacture and consumption once, but apparently found enforcement too difficult. Most families include or know of someone with a "drinking problem," but addressing the issue with the person is somehow extremely sensitive. There doesn't seem to be a medical test that proves someone actually has what many describe as a "disease." People are sent to Alcoholics Anonymous by courts and various recovery units, but many folks show up having diagnosed themselves just as they previously "medicated" themselves. You don't have to confess to alcoholism to go to any meeting of AA anywhere, as long as you profess an honest desire to stop drinking.
Third, whether George Bush is alcoholic or not should be none of my business. Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of AA, and the main reason for that is not so much secrecy anymore as it is for the purpose of learning humility. It means the member is trying to drop the behaviors of the big shot egomaniac that alcohol obviously encourages and creates. I don't know that the President is NOT in the fellowship of AA, but his biographies say he gave up drinking after a transforming interaction with Billy Graham. Others say Bush's handlers encouraged that story to attract his Evangelical base for his Presidential run. Stories about Bush's drinking in Houston and "disappearance" to Alabama in 1972 [link] and his DWI at the family compound in Maine in 1976 [link] remained secret or of no interest the whole time he was Governor of Texas. (You may notice at the CBC site a quotation from his autobiography in which Bush says he just woke up one morning with a hangover and stopped drinking; there's no mention of any born again conversion.) It may be a run for the Presidency made Bush come up with something about his substance abuse and try to beat the media to the punch (no boozy pun intended). More >
|
|
|
|
 3 Dec 2006 @ 12:01
The world is not to be put in order, the world is order incarnate. It is for us to put ourselves in unison with this order.
---Henry Miller
Lord, the air smells good today,
straight from the mysteries within the inner courts of God.
A grace like new clothes thrown across the garden,
Free medicine for everybody.
The trees in their prayer, the birds in praise.
---Jalal Ad-Din Rumi
On the tips of ten thousand grasses
each and every dewdrop contains the light of the moon.
Since the beginning of time,
not a single droplet has been forgotten.
Although this is so,
some may realize it, and some may not.
---Dogen
A View of the Hudson from West Point
(Robert Walter Weir - 1863)
One month after the start of the Revolution in 1776, the Continental Congress declared a fortress somewhere on the Hudson River to be essential. By 1778 it was clear a sharp turn in the river at a place called West Point was the best position from which to prevent British Redcoats from advancing. General George Washington declared the plateau there to be "the key to the continent" in terms of its strategic location for the War. He sent his trusted officer, a Polish emigre named Thaddeus Kosciuszko, to secure the place and build a fort. The British never attempted an attack on these defenses, and when the plot involving Benedict Arnold to betray West Point was foiled, the internal waterway that united the Northeast remained in American hands.
Remembering the importance of this fort, in 1783 Washington proposed establishment of a military academy there for the training of citizen soldiers. Debate ensued about that idea because of a danger of creating a military elite. Nevertheless in 1790, nearly 2000 acres were purchased there by the government from a private citizen for about $11,000, and on March 16th, 1802, President Thomas Jefferson signed into law an act of Congress establishing West Point Military Academy.
In 2002, Bill Moyers was making a documentary about the importance of the Hudson to the country's history and environment. I don't know if he made the 4 hour PBS program to help celebrate West Point's Bicentennial or if it was a coincidence, but he certainly included a large section about the Academy. [link] Maybe somebody at West Point remembered that recently, and as a result invited him to deliver the 34th annual Sol Feinstone Lecture Series oration. Dr. Feinstone had endowed the Academy with the lecture series, providing the topic always be about the meaning of freedom. I don't think I was alone in surprise when my wife let me know Moyers had been selected, had agreed, and actually gone before all those cadets (and the public) with a speech on November 15th. Nor has my surprise lessened as I've seen this morning copies and excerpts sprouting up all over the Internet! On the Left and on the Right, the address is being hailed as one of the most important for the current time and possibly among the greatest in our history. So far as I know, TomPaine.com was first to post it [link] but on Friday Army Times put it up too [link] . More >
|
|
|
|
 19 Nov 2006 @ 12:06
The greatest sin is to be unconscious.
---Carl Gustav Jung
And so, for the first time in my life perhaps I took the lamp, and went down to my inmost self. But as I moved further and further from the conventional certainties, I became aware that I was losing contact with myself. At each step of the descent a new person was disclosed within me...and when I had to stop my exploration because the path faded, I found a bottomless abyss at my feet, and out of it came---arising I know not whence---the current which I dare to call my life.
---Teilhard de Chardin
You never enjoy the world aright, till the Sea itself flows in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens, and crowned with the stars: and perceive yourself to be the sole heir of the whole world, and more than so, because men are in it who are every one sole heirs as well as you.
---Thomas Traherne
I love words. "Hack" is one that can be both a noun and a verb...but all the noun-y stuff seems more interesting. The verb has a couple variations besides just its main meaning of cutting through the underbrush or something. There's what you do when you're learning to play golf or tennis...or have a bad cough. Or invade a homepage.
But the noun possibilities are vast. It can be a horse...or a taxi. A writer. Or a guy who hangs around offices of political power. The connection seems to be a creature on the verge of begging for favor or money. Not very complimentary to be called such a low functionary.
I suppose I could be called a hack too, with these little essays over the past few years. Around town I've heard a couple comments that I don't seem to be writing anymore since the election's over. To my face, people have said you must be really happy about the new political situation. I barely can hack a smile in response. Why? What's the matter now? More >
|
|
|
|
 15 Nov 2006 @ 10:52
The striking photo of Bush's war cabinet in 2002 is the work of Annie Leibovitz.
All worldly pursuits have but the one unavoidable and inevitable end, which is sorrow: acquisitions end in dispersion; buildings, in destruction; meetings, in separation; births, in death. Knowing this, one should from the very first renounce acquisition and heaping-up, and building and meeting, and...set about realizing the Truth. Life is short, and the time of death is uncertain. So apply yourselves to meditation.
---Milarepa
All of us are apprenticed to the same teacher---reality. It is as hard to get the children herded into the car pool and down the road to the bus as it is to chant sutras in the Buddha-hall on a cold morning. One is not better than the other; each can be quite boring; and they both have the virtuous quality of repetition. Repetition and its good results make the very activities of our life into the path.
---Gary Snyder
The rain has stopped, the clouds drifted away,
the weather is clear again.
If your heart is pure, then all things in your world are pure....
Then the moon and flowers will guide you along the way.
---Ryokan
To the wisdom of these Buddhist poets let me add another piece of downhome advice: He who hesitates is lost. Addison said it I guess, and Oliver Wendell Holmes repeated it for American practicality...but I first heard it from a radio station engineer when I was a little boy. We were riding with my dad in the station van full of equipment up to Chautauqua, New York, for a network broadcast of the symphony. We were speeding toward the Erie railroad crossing just south of Ashville, and our driver could see a train was coming---but it was far enough away still that we could make it across. But our driver lifted his foot off the gas while he decided...and now it was too late. We sat there as the freight rolled by...and 'twas then the proverb got uttered. With all the drama of that moment, I've never forgotten the saying...and I'm thinking it today too.
It's the title of a Leadbelly song that graces this entry...and all this has to do with discussions stirring through the States on what we're going to see out of this new Congress. I'm dizzy with the possibilities...and really only want to point you thisaway and thataway as to what's up. But beware of hesitation! More >
|
|
<< Newer entries Page: 1 ... 18 19 20 21 22 ... 50 Older entries >> |
|
|
This is my News Log, actually the second manifestation of jazzoLOG. I moved the first edition to another site, where those articles still are archived and available for continued comment if you wish. Please copy and paste to access~~~ http://web.archive.org/web/20060315012857/http://www.upsaid.com/jazzolog/ |
| Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Sat | Sun |
|---|
|
|
|
|
1 |
2 |
3 |
| 4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
| 11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
| 18 |
19 |
20 |
21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
| 25 |
26 |
27 |
28 |
29 |
30 |
|
PUBLIC NOTICE PLEASE
Comments made herein are available for view and appreciation to members and the general public. JazzoLOG also is open for comment contribution to all who are willing to identify themselves in the usual ways.
I don't know about you, but sometimes I work a long time, cumulatively for hours, on comments I make on these News Logs. I plan to edit this Log regularly and delete things. Before I do that, I want to assure you, I shall notify each commentator of such an amendment so you may have time to copy anything you wish to save and paste somewhere else. Create your own News Log in your profile. |
|
