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Bach Keyboard Music
June 21st, 2009Holocaust Museum Murder Redux
June 11th, 2009My American history in high school: “We are really a nation of brutal vigilantes; there is a tug of war between one faction and another- to extend rights, law and liberty to all, or to limit to the select few”. I think that’s far more evil than detached terror from remote and foreign shores. Things like Bosnia, Uganda and Rwanda are really more American than many would like to think. Murdering neighbors is far worse than murdering strangers, although the victims are equally violated.
Google my pinochle buddy, Ben Stern, who led the charge against Nazi rallies in Skokie, if you want some reality on this.
Some of the worst horrors in all of Europe last century were familiar, familial and treacherous– very up-close. The mechanisms and motives still seethe and roil under the surface.
“Pray for peace, but watch your back!”
Violence Sucks, but…
February 23rd, 2009Just musing here about the absurd amount of violence everywhere, especially some recent incidents in the news and in the [SF] Bay Area. Some pretty scary stuff happening out there. Many of us “decent” people would never even [admit we] dream of raping, stabbing, strangling, beating, pushing off a cliff, etc. Just NOT even remotely what we would consider? WRONG.
It’s really too easy for us “decent” folk to feel smug and superior, to blame the ills of the world on thugs, drug dealers, dictators, religious extremists, klansmen, Nazis, rednecks, Idi Amin and on and on.
Fact is: the world is a very dangerous place for all of us, and there is rampant and insidious violence everywhere.
What? OK– No upbringing of any child in any environment is anywhere near perfect. Find someone whom you totally envy, scratch hard enough, and you are very likely to find some festering wound that they have no tools with which to cope. Sure– there are really very many laudable exceptions, many loving parents, rich poor and in-between in all manner of places who are able to properly nurture their offspring and raise perfectly healthy humans. Sadly, there is too little of that. Some of my evaluation comes from the evolution of social mores over my own lifetime, but we truly have had many exemplars throughout history; our job is to find them laud, them and emulate them. It it NEVER too late to be healthy or to nurture a healthy state in a person who depends upon us.
Oh, dear– my point!
There is inherent in all of us [oh, I think of that poor, deluded chimpanzee] the capacity for extreme violence in the face of potential danger to ourselves or a member of our tribe or family. This is, unfortunately, pretty necessary, even when it proves to be misguided.
But– My main point is that I cannot condemn the folks mentioned in my first paragraph, those who learn violence almost from the cradle, or who are dragged into it when options for a healthy life dim to a dull flame or are extinguished altogether.
Why? Well, we, the “decent” folks, “civilized” folks have ALL in common with these “animals” and have no right to condemn anything but their actions. Think about it. Some of us sit calmly behind our desks and order broad-based strikes against a nation, a tribe, a race, drug users etc. Like Pilate, our hands are clean. Others of us sit back, collecting monstrous pay [for little work, IMNSHO] deciding that so-and-so and so forth are worth far less than us for doing a monstrous amount of work. This is truly VIOLENT. I could go on and on about this, but Rachel Maddow, Barak Obama and friends are trying their best to correct this.
Saddest and worst, and my real point: those of us who doggedly and tirelessly inflict violence, sadness and destruction upon ourselves, our parents, our children and ourselves. We drink, we drug, we are depressed, we abstain from even a fraction of our potential. We suffer in silence that is really a deafening roar to those around us. Our blood, sweat and tears flow in the gutters. Our lives, a sweet gift and holy blessing, melt away in sadness.
We cannot rescue the overt “monsters” and offenders unless and until we rescue ourselves. We must find the marvelous within ourselves, re-plant Gan Eden, and then invite all to share in our bounty.
Shalom
Not a Drop to Drink
February 4th, 2009Folks–
In my mind it’s usually best to try to avert disaster before it strikes, and “take what you need and leave the rest” has always felt good.
In light of the coming water crisis, which actually already is worldwide, I thought of some things I want to do. YMMV.
Even if you do have a low-flow toilet, keep flushing to a minimum. No details, but it really is OK to flush more during asparagus season.
Shower less. B.O. may soon become chic. I usually shower every two to three days (why I have no friends and nobody sits next to me on BART), and don’t really wash my hair that often and it still looks pretty good.
Of course: don’t leave water running when washing faces, washing dishes, shaving, lathering up or waiting for hair conditioner to work. This is harder to do than I would have thought. I intend to do better myself.
You remember those pitchers and wash-stands (often seen in the rooms over the saloon in a western)? I really wish I’d saved one from my great-aunt’s house in Ohio– they bathed weekly, but stayed fresh and clean with PTA baths (pits, tits and ass, if you must).
Try to kiss your grass goodbye. We have a dear friend in Palm Desert, of all places, who will be fined for not watering her lawn. What’s up with that? There are some amazing sericulture lawns even here in provincial El Cerrito. Most of our outdoor plants are succulent (no, we don’t EAT them!). The rest are soak-watered in the evening. We try to put used cooking water on the plants, but forget at times.
Get more mileage out of your clothes. David *hates* it, but I only put stuff in the laundry if it stinks or has visible schmutz on it. And, no, cat and dog hair is NOT dirt; it’s decorative. Not so sure about dog slobber. Socks and underwear, though– wash after one wear, go barefoot or regimental.
Damn, I really wish low usage would gain water credits. Too, I realize that this is totally un-American. And, really, golf should be banned in dry areas. To hell with Phoenix, Scottsdale and Palm Springs. Read a book, learn to knit, have more sex, ride a bike… again, YMMV. Just try to keep it all good ’til the last drop.
Peace, love, Woodstock Nation,
Bill
Green Toilet
February 2nd, 2009Greetings–
We all know that the decades-belated “Green Revolution” is spawning some bizarre and maybe really wasteful shit. Here’s a great one: the Green Toilet™. It will spectrographically analyze the contents of the bowl to decide when and how much to flush!
If it’s just pee, it notes the degree of coloration from clear, with adjustments for water hardness and the presence of Tidy Bowl™. Past a certain point of potential odor production, it will flush with a greater or lesser volume of water. Size of the enclosure and degree of ventilation may also be considered. Of course, it will always flush for poop; I won’t go into details about volume adjustments for all the varieties of stuff we may dump– one must always be at least a bit demure! Turd-Blossoms, however, will prompt a 911 call to the local Hazmat Team.
One may program it for aggregate degree of fastidiousness with regard to toilet paper usage in the household; it is strongly recommended that one cease the use of patterned, colored or quilted TP, as this could lead to excessive waste of water. Adjustment may be made, though, for non-bleached paper; some models will be programmed to play Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi”; if you can’t catch that one, go smoke a joint with your grandmother.
One limitation, however: this toilet should not be installed in households that hold keggers or indulge in excessive consumption of tequila; after all, we must spare our fragile waterways so the salmon won’t swim sideways.
Greenly yours [and let's give Bush a whirly!]
Bill
Population Bomb
January 31st, 2009Oh, mercy!
Everybody with any sense, and even some severely lacking are suddenly jumping onto the Great Green Bandwagon. That’s really great now, isn’t it? Who cares if it’s maybe too late! It’s cool! Buy a hybrid, take your own bags to the store, drive less or use public transit (at least until the price of gas goes down and we can forget again).
I HATE to tell you, but there’s a big, fat stinking elephant in the room. It’s name is US! Yes– I’ve only been alive since 1955, and by how many times has the earth’s population multiplied? When was _The Population Bomb_ written? How long have we had birth control? How many superstitious fools, especially educated ones in the US, the Catholics and Mormons, are still fucking like yard dogs and trying to fill up every nook and cranny on earth? We even have a [my opinion] selfiish and deranged woman in Los Angeles, a single mother even, who now has 14 children at the age of 33! Oh, I suppose I must be nice and charitable, but all of these selfish pseudo-rabbits, IMO, DO NOT have the right to blatantly try to exhaust every last resource on earth.
In short: in all of the Green talk lately that I’ve noticed in mainstream media, there has NOT, IIRC, been one single mention of the obvious– there are too damn many of us. Maybe homosexuality IS evolution’s last and best desperate attempt to save an inhabitable planet for the future.
Bonus, Schmonus
January 31st, 2009To hell with our would-be Lords and Princes, the brokers and investment bankers of Wall Street. They *continue* to gamble away our economy in the name of greed. May they all rot in hell with their mentor, Ronald Reagan. They and many corporate officers have gotten horrible beyond belief.
When I worked for a budding corporation that eventually merged into Coram Healthcare in the late 1980’s I got my first taste of corporate managers and unbridled greed. I was really disgusted by the ego games that corporate types and the Wall Street thugs played among themselves. I realized quickly that bonuses, perks, huge salaries, resort condos, extravagant dinners, private jets, etc., had little or nothing to do with productivity or profitability. The economy was being ruled by a class of people, mostly men, who had this competitive thing with each other to see who could rack up the best bragging rights on the golf course (or other posh venue).
Here’s what’s REALLY been pissing me off the last 20 years or so: “If we don’t reward them with competitive salaries and bonuses they simply won’t work for us.” What a crock! OK, almost all of us could and likely qould retire on what these bozos make in just one year (or less). Oh, and what work do they *really* do, anyway? I imagine that the best of them really do network, review reports, oversee staffing and economic decisions and stand forth as the public face of the company, but I’m damned sure that quite a few are just figureheads; the custodian deserves better pay than many of them.
What about: either pay them what they’re really worth in producticity and utility to the company? If they won’t work for that, there must be thousands of hungry MBA’s out there who would gladly step in.
Fifth Way Visits the Synagogue
January 27th, 2009OK–
Our Synagogue already has a Meditation Minyan, which I will join. I have a plan, inspired by our new Aron Kodesh, to begin to offer meditations that bridge my basic 5th Way training and expand into a formal Jewish setting. The time and place and my state are ripe for this. I may need or ask for some archival help for illustrations, etc., but I really can probably figure this out on my own. Still, I’d like permission to vet anything by anyone who may care.
Planned [so far] ideas:
Breath and the Body of Light, with some mild introduction to the 5 bodies. After all, Moishe melded Israelite, Midianite a Pharaonic magick into a transcendent melange that empowered a dislocated and disembodied uber-god to incarnate at will in a multiplicity of forms and functions.
Certain postures, attitudes and invocations really do have some absolute value and great potency.
Operating as the etheric double and manners of healing or just finding enough peace and stability.
The top of our Aron is a pyramid with a copper top and copper horns at the base: Ain Soph,Kether, Chokmah, Binah, Geburah– input welcome. I also need to look up Yetziratic scale colors.
Da’ath is for me the gateway to and from the higher worlds, but I’m going to find some dampers and cautions on that for beginners. My key inspiration is to to use the Sh’ma to mediate any connections there. It’s very safe and potent. I also have Mellel and Davka writer to use to cut and paste Hebrew.
Tiphareth is smack-dab in the middle. Torah lives there.
At the base we have Netzach, Hod, Malkuth and Grounded Kether at our feet.
Also, I will want to explain the inter penetration for the Etz Hayim in the 4 worlds. I have a pretty good grasp of this and will be trying to find a diagram.
Somewhere in the garage is my copy of The Golden Dawn, but I know there are many sources.
I have many other ideas:
Simple Sh’ma meditations: Sh’ma Israel YHVH Heinously YHVH had [want a rough translation? Hear Israel I am who I am your God I am the Eternal].
In text this is followed by the V’aHavta, which proscribes fringes at the corners of the garments and a device containing the prayer upon the door posts. I guess will will then operate with prayer shawls [tallitot, or tzititim] and head coverings. I really want to get a set of Tefillin, the leather boxes one binds to arms and head, but that’s a little bit fancy-schmancy.
Various God/Goddess name invocations and meditations.
Perhaps, if all goes well, modify and introduce LRP, SRP, Adam Kadmon and other fun things.
Any feedback? Ideas?
Am I nuts?
I can easily see taking this very slowly and gently.
Mr. Bill
Higher Power
January 26th, 2009I love being Jewish. I get to question everything, maybe even have no faith at all!
Anyway, one often hears about “Higher Power”, particularly in Recovery circles. Many have a really negative or uncomfortable reaction to this. I guess it’s like, “how in the hell am I supposed to abase myself to something I can’t see or even verify indirectly?”. Well, I’ll cover that in a different post.
Now, I just want to think about God, Adonai, YHVH, Elohim, ad infinitem.
I’m very happy davening and interacting with that/those guy, guys or entities in Synagogue services. There was always something icky and scary about “God” in Christian services, even in my favorite, the Episcopal Church. He just seemed to want to follow me everywhere and make me feel inferior. Being observant and pious as a Jew, however, feels very comfortable. I maybe wish I could explain that, but I really can’t.
Now, what abut when I feel like I really need a hand on my shoulder, an ear to listen, healing, or someone to mediate and exalt my relationship/s with others and the world around me? Or, when I need to express and release my inner strengths? Who/what do I sense when I meditate?
Two expressions come readily to mind/heart: Shekinah (”Holy Spirit”); Holy Guardian Angel. Shekinah feels to me to be watery/airy, transcendant, pervading, animating and animating all; the aspect of God that is very real, accessible and all but tangible, usually described as feminine. The Holy Guardian Angel seems very similar, but expressed in Western Yoga, i.e. Golden Dawn and other mystical schools, as the closest manifestation of Kether in Malkuth. This is most often, in my experience, described as feminine, too. To me both wear many guises and have infinite names and are as close as breath or heartbeat.
Well, I suppose being Jewish is not at all different from being a Pagan panentheist. YMMV.
Bill
EVOLUTION #1
January 26th, 2009First, I am NOT an academic and this is not meant to be scholarly. I just like to think about things. Some of those things: I’d love to know more about plant evolution, as most of what gets attention in popular press involves animals, Darwin, etc.; I’d also love to know more about parallels between plant and animal evolution, given that there are so many interdependent relationships among and between plants and animals; how does one define “crown of creation”, i.e., “most advanced life form”?
I’ve recently read in National Geographic about recent concepts in evolution in which the interaction between genes and the environment is mediated by proteins that regulate gene expression. It’s fascinating that the exact same gene exists and is expressed in a variety of ways among many species. I wonder how many genes even lie dormant in people? And what biases about what constitutes a different “animal” species are anthropocentric? After all, two snakes may look practically identical and be considered different species, while a Bantu and an Eskimo are just varieties of the same species.
I have ruled out Creationism and Determinism in my consideration of the ongoing development and adaptation of beings on the earth. Just doesn’t cut it, both being, IMO, lazy intellectual shortcuts at best. Still, there are many things going on beyond traditional structural taxonomy, and Mendelian genetics. Back in 1977, when I was somewhat studying biochemistry, there was great excitement over proteins called “histones” that decorated and were somehow interacting with the lovely double helix of DNA. Since then there’s been an explosion of knowledge about many other marvels: glycoproteins on cell membranes that turn genes off or on; mRNA; tRNA; rRNA mDNA; twin studies; etc.
So, I claim to be Sgt. Schultz; “I know nothing”. However, I will be excited and delighted to learn much more as things are revealed.
