Pristine Pings

That's what I heard as I was watching the Boston Symphony's 4th of July concert on the esplanade. It happened during their annual and traditional presentation of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture (starting at 38 seconds), the end of which coincides with canon fire and the beginning of the fireworks display.

There was crescendo, frenzy, canon fire and there was build up. During the build up, the quickening, the ping from the triangle in the percussion section, could be heard. It was solitary, it was simple, it was just there, it helped to complete the rest of the world. It was expressing itself without fanfare and without attachment to how long it would last. It expressed itself without regard to whether anyone heard it or not. There was no self consciousness.

It's a great mystery, to me, how those notes come about when they come from a person. I've had moments when I have "spoken my truth" and on reflection they could be called pristine pings. Sometimes I remember them and sometimes I don't.

When I was out walking the other morning, a man came up to me and introduced himself and then thanked me for giving his son back to him. We talked back and forth for a while and then he said: "One thing always stood out during that conversation about my son. You said 'he was a good kid and he basically only needed a few wins' and that's how it turned out." I don't remember saying that, but he did. I guess that may be a ping that is expressed and has an impact. It took on a life of it's own.

I came across another ping when I read Ember's manifesto on her blog Kindred of the Quiet Way. She wrote on simplicity which she refers to as "Simplicity Testimony" The quote:

it's about choosing to live simply, according to one's own conscience & what feels manageable at the moment, stepping aside from consumer lifestyle to focus instead on what is non-competitive, natural & free. In choosing an occupation, asking ‘what did I come here to do?’ – and by all means travelling most speedily towards that place. It's about avoiding debt & high-maintenance, complex lifestyles that make it difficult to change course when life offers challenges & opportunities: choosing (in one's home, leisure activities, clothing, possessions & occupation) what is simple, plain, quiet, humble & modest, avoiding whatever brags or intimidates or makes others feel jealous or inadequate or ashamed. Understanding that we live in troubled times, it's about fashioning a life accordingly, ensuring that one is as free, as flexible, as prepared & as easy to satisfy as possible; so that when hardship & scarcity come to us, we already understand how to live frugally & simply & walk lightly, passing through turbulence with our light held steady.

That is pristine. That ping resonates in me. Maybe that's the purpose of a "ping," to offer those who would quiet down, those who are not rushing, those who are open to new and free information available in the environment, an opportunity to resonate. And with that resonance, they can take in new energy or reconfirm what they already have known, and then to take their opportunity to make their own notes.

A Few Thoughts About Quality Of Life

Let me get right into it: we have been defined in the economic image of consumerism. Of course there are other parts of the definition; we are a generous nation, we love our freedoms, we tend to be fast moving, we have a spiritual sense, etc. But beneath it all there has been a cloning of the "gotta get money" gene into our social DNA.

Thankfully that gene isn't in our original stem cells, but if those who want to be even bigger fat cats could, they would insert it into every corn flake in every supermarket in every state, city, town, village, and hamlet in America. In fact they would want that desire to be added to the basic instincts such that everyone would have three basic instincts: survival, procreation, and "gotta get money."

And having been defined that way, we grow so accustomed to define and appraise others with the same financial yardstick that we come to think of it as the natural way of things. But I don't think that is the way it has been all along. There has, I suspect, always been throughout history an awareness of how well one person is doing vis a vis their neighbors. That is understandable since we are hardwired to live and travel in packs. If their pack is doing better than our pack, then we want what they have, etc. It's a survival thing.

In the really old days those comparisons might mean do they have more food than we do, and are their hunting grounds better than ours? Have they been able to stay warm during the winter months? Do they have a means to keep their fires going?

Nowadays the comparisons are much more superficial. We don't need twenty questions to assess how others are doing. I was going to say we don't need twenty questions to assess how we are doing...but I'm thinking that we really have to do our financial self-assement in comparison to the "well-being" of others. More on that later, but for now, because the self worth part is determined on getting more and then that is coupled at some mythic time in the future when we will have enough and then we can live the really good life and never have to worry any more about having enough of - you got it - moola.

Let's see, what are the basic dozen questions we need answered to see how we are doing in comparison to others? Some are resolved in "conversation" and others are driven by visuals.

Where do you live?
What do you do for a living?
How far do you travel?
How do you travel?
What clothes do your wear?
Who is your mate (and all of the same questions about the mate)?
Where have you gone for vacations?
How successful do you appear?
How well do you express yourself?
Do you seem confident?
How good do your teeth appear?

Hmmm, I don't know that we will need the dozenth question, or even the baker's dozen question.

For right now, I'll stop. Perhaps you could add a few more. And I'll expand on this later, I promise, because to stop there is to just put us into a nasty despondency based on shallowness. And expand we must; expecially in these troubled financial waters we are observing.

Later.

Ann Arbor Kaleidoscope

My wife and I are visiting our daughter and her boyfriend in Michigan.

In no particular order:

** Me: (To the front desk clerk) "Why is it called Ann Arbor?"

Other: "The first name of one of the founders of the city was Ann. The middle name of the wife of the other founder was also Ann. And because of all the trees."

I wasn't particularly interested in the names of the founders so it didn't go any further. Mission accomplished. But shouldn't it have been called: Anns' Arbor?

I'll have to find out more about "all the trees" because it doesn't seem that there are all that many trees here. Maybe if you were coming from Oklahoma it would seem that way. Maybe I should find out where the founders came from originally.

** Passing an older gentleman at the Briarwood Mall; he's in the slow lane and me in the passing lane, during my morning walk. On the back of his gray t-shirt there is an orange triangle, like one used on road construction sites, with the words "Caution, slow moving vehicle" under the triangle.

Me: "(laughing)...slow moving vehicle."

Guy: "Hey, I'm still moving."

Me: "Chew got dat right, mon"

** Passing two women in comfortable chairs in the mall. I didn't look closely but one was the designated listener and the other was speaking with ... something...I'm not quite sure how to describe it, but I thought that she may have been post-stroke from years ago.

Speaker: "If you were the normalist person in the whole world, would you..."

She stopped there and waited for me to pass. It was like she was saying this is a private conversation. I wonder if she knew I was "listening in" even though I was eyes forward and moving fast? What was the vibe she picked up on or was it just coming from a sense of "hey, even though I'm talking loudly, this is private."

** The busses here (the system is collectively referred to as 'The Ride') have a gizmo on the frontend of each bus where people can place their bicycles. Great idea!

** On line at Starbucks at the mall. I pick up a New York Times. Waiting in line. I hold the paper up in front of the man along side me.

Man: "Did you want me to see something in particular?"

Me: "No, (playfully) there's nothing really of much value there anyway."

Man: "It's a bit much to the Left for me. But it balances out the cricks."

Me: "Yes. We need that balancing. This past election was an important one in doing that."

Man: "In what way do you mean that?"

Me: "The overwhelming majority of the American public spoke with their votes to balance away from the consolidation of brute force power practised by the Bush administration. The country, in my opinion, was headed towards 1984 in our world of comfort trappings. I don't hold out any positive expectations for the Democrats to do any better...but the trend was stopped dead in its tracks."

Man: "Yes, gridlock is the best outcome."

Me: "I don't know if that's the best outcome but it's better than where it was headed."

** The main reading room - I will call it 'the Great Reading Room' in the Horace Racham building at the University of Michigan is nothing short of spectacular. Walls were, I roughly estimate, about 60 feet high, 80 or 90 feet wide and about 150 feet long. Wood paneling. Windows along one wall were 35 feet high and about 13 feet wide, long deep red drapes with tie ropes pulling them to the side half way down. Heavy wooden chairs and long wooden tables aligned down the center line of the room, and they were punctuated by easy chairs up against the walls. You could hear a pin drop; maybe you couldn't since it was almost so cavernous that the slight sound would be lost in the size of it all. Many other pleasing rooms in the building. By the way, Racham was the attorney who wrote the articles of incorporation for a guy with a hair-brained idea to replace horses with something called a horseless carriage. But Mr. Racham saw something in the idea and went to a bank and borrowed (?) $5,000 to put into the business as a shareholder. Oh, the guy was Henry Ford. The rest is history.

At the other end of the campus is a somewhat similar building, housing the Law Library. The reading room there is similar but nowhere as elegant. The exterior is, however, a spectacular example of Gothic architecture and the only thing missing was chairs outside the library so you could sit and slowly inhale the beauty of it.

** At some point you have to visit Zingermann's Jewish Deli and Bakery. Maybe twice. It would be worth more visits but you'd go broke.

** Best meal so far was Rush Street restaurant. Go there Monday through Friday between 4 and 6 and all the meals and drinks are 1/2 price. Excellent food. I had plain old spaghetti and tomato sauce with lots of herbs and shrimp. It just got better and better.

** If you're into movies, check out the Michigan theater. It is an old movie theater which has had a ton of restoration work done. On the outside you would walk by it without giving it a second thought. Inside is a totally different story.

We saw a German movie: "The Lives of Others." It was a riveting political thriller about life in East Germany in 1984 under the Stasi (State Secret Police) and tight / taught human drama of how the spirit can survive even under those conditions and how risky it was for anyone who wanted to keep their spirit alive under terribly oppressive conditions. Not a pleasant movie but you know afterwards that you were outside the bubble of "isn't everything just so wonderful."

I'm Curious About That Speech Last Night and "The Unthinkable"

Yes, I am curious about the President's speech last night.

We all know that for a speech to be effective the attention of the audience has to be led in certain directions and away from other directions. Starting with that premise, and recognizing that discussion is vitally important, I am mulling over the following questions:

1. Just what are the mistakes which the President is taking responsibility for? If we knew what they were, then at least we would know what he is talking about and then the country could compare notes and know if he is referencing the same mistakes which undoubtedly led to certain consequences at the November elections.

2. What are the consequences which are so "unthinkable" that he doesn't make reference to? To my way of understanding the only thing which is unthinkable is something which is not real, something which you can't imagine. By his saying that those consequences would be unthinkable leads people to too quickly say, "uh-oh, we better not think about that / those things which are so unthinkable that we can't even begin to think about what they are." Huh? And, anyway, on the most basic of levels, hasn't a majority of the whole country been thinking about not "staying (that) course?" So it must be something else that is so unthinkable. Well what is that? Let's get that out on the table so we can then take appropriate steps based on that unthinkable thought.

I heard of a research project years ago where a speaker asked the audience what their most horrible fear of dying was. He then asked them to write it down briefly, and not sign it. The papers were collected and to make the story short, he then later gave the papers to a group of mental health professionals along with another group of papers which were written by people suffering from anxiety disorders. The task of the professionals was to distinguish which diagnostic group had written the fearful (unthinkable) thoughts which would then show that it was a reflection of their diagnostic group. (The papers were anonymous, but they were also marked in such a way that the researchers knew which group the responses were coming from, i.e., from the audience of "normals" or from one of the diagnostic groupings. Since the evaluators did not know which group was which, they were "blinded" in a research sense.)

Guess what: the worst fears were worst with all groups. The evaluators couldn't distinguish "normals" from "people with a formal diagnosis" on the basis of their fears! We all have these unthinkable thoughts. To me, even knowing that we all have them, even though mine will be different from yours, is somehow comforting.

(N.B. I heard this story many years ago. I remember thinking afterwards that I would like to have seen the original research study but have never been able to track it down, but in honesty I haven't really tried all that hard. Nevertheless, in this context I believe it speaks to a vitally important issue.)

If it is so unthinkable, it must be so really terrible that we as a nation would be willing to continue contributing to the chaos over there. What is the titular head of this country saying that we have to avoid ... here ... at all costs?

Is it the consequences of peak oil that we can't talk about? Or of peak debt and the consequences of that? Or of rampant diabetes? Or of not being able to go to pixel heaven and buy the next bigger sized plasma TV?

3. I am curious about which "American interests" he is referring to in his speech. I presume he is talking about oil, oil, oil, but maybe he's referring to other interests. As a curious person I really am curious about what those interests are. I am not saying that as a country, a great country, we shouldn't have national interests, but since he was speaking and appealing to the country directly, I feel I would like to have more clear statements so we can make better informed decisions .

Well, I had been wanting to get back to writing about trance induction and television, and about the importance of the food chain and the importance of an unrushed lifestyle, but they will have to come later.

Perhaps I should also end this posting by saying that maybe there should be no comments added to this post since unthinkable things which many are already thinking anyway might be said and then who knows what that would do to the (un)balanced way of life we don't have.

Turning off the TV and not rushing has helped me to think these thoughts. Is that unthinkable for me to have done those two things?

Struggling vs. developing my voice in these blog entries

When I look at my last post I know what I am saying but it also seems too complicated. When I'm talking with someone directly I am more to the point. I'm ok dealing with complex issues, in fact, I really enjoy them but only if I can find a simple design contained within the complexity. But when complexity becomes complicated, well, yuck!

Writing for my blog is a new process for me. It's like I'm still finding my "voice" and my primary drum beats. It's ok that I don't have it all together already in the sense that this is just the way it is. Trying to get it right - right away - misses the reality that this process develops over time. Grappling with something is fine and actually fun for me. Struggling, a habit I know too well, is self defeating. Struggling ultimately reinforces the trying, not the learning. Struggling puts more energy into the struggle and it is all an energy game.

The strategy which makes sense to me is to catch myself as soon as I can in the struggle, and then acknowledge the struggle, watch it for a few moments, then "release it." " How to release," you ask? By letting go, by bringing your attention to your next exhale. Do that for a few moments / minutes / decades and then place your energy on something which draws your attention and which is appealing. That way I / you are not putting more energy into a process which has already stopped being a lively experience. It takes practise but it is a way out of the struggle.

In that way then, the struggle becomes a cue to watch and experience differently. It becomes an opportunity to lighten up and then the struggle is accepted for what it is, a short circuit which blocks further and easy development. A struggle is then just part of the process, like a punctuation point which gives a hint that there is rushing going on, a trying to make it go faster. Better to ease off the throttle and shift gears before getting back on track. Better yet to refresh the compass direction before setting out again.

I feel better now.

And the gift from this is an awareness that the original intent is still there:

• To talk about shifting consciousness from rushing and hurrying to a pace dictated only by the reality of the current situation and not impaled on the demands of the external system, which for sure seldom has my / your best interest at the forefront of their agenda.
• To hear from others about how they came to a shifting point and how they followed through with it.
• To recognize and share information about the perilous times we are in from the point of view of impending changes which will occur to our society as climate change continues and the peak oil process progressively plays out the reality of how utterly dependent we have become on that substance.
• To recognize how we have been ultra conditioned to over-consume and to hand our lives over to specialists and how we give away our life-time to make money to pay for all that.
• To reconnect and rediscover basic skills necessary for self and group sustainability.
• To explore how people form new circles of common interest around the sustainable process.
• To integrate complex issues and to say it in plain english.
• To cultivate our inner sense.
• To clarify our values.
• To live the good life and to be in harmony with our surroundings

I suspect that should keep me busy for a while.

Perilous Times and Choices

About a year ago I started a conversation with a new friend, Ted. We meet once a week and have coffee and talk about life, the world, values, choices, propaganda, and the good life. It sounds like heady stuff but the ongoing conversation is thrilling and we both look forward to it each week.

He and his wife are committed to growing some of their own food organically and living a simple life which moves in the direction of being self-sustaining. Neither of us are much into consumerism these days. Our conversations revolve around those topics and whatever else is on our minds. The conversations are intriguing and interesting to the both of us. Ted sometimes comments that his head is buzzing for hours after I leave, although, at times, I wonder if it's also because of the very strong mud / coffee he prepares for us. For me, it's like these conversations have become compost for my own movement towards a less hurried and more centered, value expressive life style.

Early on he introduced me to the idea of peak oil and we discussed its implications for the individual, the cities, suburbanites, and the world. James Kunstler's book, The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century, became the focal point for our conversations for several weeks.

Kunstler's message is simple: peak oil (the point at which half of all the oil reserves in the ground will be gone) is a fact. It's not exactly clear when it will happen but if it hasn't already, it will in the relatively near future, and when that happens, gradually at first, but with building momentum it will have nothing short of profound implications for our society. That is because we are inextricably wed to abundant and inexpensive oil. Our whole economy over the years was premised on oil being an inexpensive commodity. There was so much of it that we hardly ever gave it a second thought and with that it became more and more ingrained in our whole lifestyle. It was a positive development but we have inadvertently become more dependent on it in ways which we hardly notice. Some have speculated that if the typical office building suddenly hit a magical delete button which removed all the products which are based on petroleum or petroleum products that the building would suddenly become Lilliputian in size. Whatever the consequences for us, they will be even more significant for our children and their children. For myself I have adopted a belief that it will be a whole new ballgame in the not too distant future.

Some will say that this is too alarmist. I would say that it's risky business to keep certain blinders on. That's a good way to get mugged by reality. There is no doubt that we in the United States live in the lap of luxury. The basic needs generally are there - food, shelter and clothing. But let's take a peep behind the veil of abundance. The food on your table: you probably think that it comes from the supermarket a mile or so from your home. I dare say the younger children would say that is where food comes from. Obviously it doesn't. It was transported from other parts of this country and/or from other parts of the world. I've heard that the average piece of food on the shelves in the supermarkets travel, on average, 1500 miles to get there, and then we transport them the final few.

Or take a look at the labels on your clothes. Similar story there, too. My guess is that if I looked at the labels on all of my clothes, I would find that there is not one item that comes from within an hours drive of my home. That covers two parts of the basic trilogy; food, clothing and shelter.

I am not saying that all of this will change in a twinkling, or a moment. But if the premise is correct, and I think it, at the very least, deserves attentive consideration, that the present material abundance is premised and made possible because of accessible and inexpensive oil and petroleum products, then the implications of a reversal over time of that commodity will be, well, profound.

Back to the second part of the title of this little piece: ...and choices. Somehow or other, as individuals we have to become more self sufficient in many different ways. Kunstler's suggestion is to consider forming self sustaining communities. No one person has to do it all themselves and that simply wouldn't work for the overwhelming majority. But the self sustaining community part makes superb sense to me.

In a forum discussion on the pathtofreedom.com website there was a question as to how much land (acreage) was needed for an individual or family to be self sustaining. One person told a story of how when she was a child her family had a large garden and farmyard and they grew much or most of their own food. In that sense, they had some of their own basic needs met, but it gets better. When a neighbor passed by, e.g., coming back from fishing, he would be invited into the garden and encouraged to bring home part of his supper to share with his family. But it gets even better, because after that person left they would find a freshly caught fish for their supper. That's an example of how self sustaining is not just about one family, but of several families, or a community all contributing in non-intrusive ways according to their talents and skills. Sounds good to me. But it also reminds me of how far we have moved from that sense of basic independence and community.