i felt tired and somewhat overwhelmed this afternoon/evening... when i get this way, the best thing is to go with it, and get some rest. i usually regroup in the wee hours of the morning (or i try to), and have either an action plan to address my worries, or some platitude/philosophical outlook to help me accept circumstances...
we are living in hard times. i am an insular individual, but in my heart, i try to reach out and help others. oftentimes, i feel ineffectual to change the circumstances around me, but i believe in the effort, the constant unrelenting effort. i take some small comfort in hearing the words of people actively engaged in helping others. this afternoon, on this npr show called "human kind" (i think), there was a segment about some guy who has been involved in helping out his community (sorry, can't be more specific). he mentioned something i thought was so true: "you can't keep people from doing wrong, and you can't make people do right." on the one hand, this can be a statement of despair. you essentially can't change anything substantial in the world. but he continued by saying that "you just have to continue spreading the seeds..."
***
i am thinking of ways to help some of the students i worked with today... my mentor teacher is excellent, btw; very systematic, very caring... i hope i can fulfill my duties as effectively...
***
i had an idea to start selling my book, and having the proceeds go to various charities/events, perhaps by month, but 1) i think it would be perceived as self aggrandizement, and 2) nobody buys it anyway... but if i could, it would give me a way to monetarily contribute to some of the things/people i believe in. example, shari tamashiro's chimagukuru (sp?) event, coming up in october... or mililani ike's fundraising shortfalls...
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
there is a strange tapping coming from the rain drainage gutters on the house. it sounds like some animal is tapping in its sleep or something. occasionally, a nightbird squeaks in its dreams, hidden somewhere in the shadowed bower of a tree.
i am awake, but tired, anxious about yet another tomorrow. there is always so much to do.
i once wrote that, in the primordial situation, man, represented by sisyphus, confronts the boulder of the world, and is essentially equal to it. he in other words has as much sense as the boulder, resisting the inertia of it with his own being, and then helpless to counter its momentum as it rolls down the hill. with the advent of the word, man creates imbalance, and thereby asserts his own existence: the word is the lever that allows man to separate the primordial border from mother earth. the word, in essence, makes man "bolder" than the boulder. it frees the boulder, and it frees man for other things...
but there are other dangers, dangers beyond falling back into the smothering non-existence of primordial sisyphian existence. the modern dilemma is the nano-machine repetition of that original act of separating the boulder from its housing... the boulder, transfigured by the word, fragments repetitively, into successively grainier detail, until man no longer makes contact, or is even able to make contact with the world. words fall apart, over and over and over again...
the task of an individual trying to change the world is similar. the world resists, certainly, by its very inertia, like the primordial boulder... but there is an equal danger in man's "divisive" labors, his language, his organizing mind, his midas touch... the world and its tasks repeatedly fall apart right before his eyes, and right beneath his fingertips... the end, which once seemed conceptually so simple, withdraws, turns corners, dizzyingly disappearing, until man no longer knows who he is, or what his purpose was...
there is a reason why taoism favors the yin, and the simple. to follow the way of the world is to instantly fall apart into the ten thousand things... true taoists look stupid, but it is only because they understand that the only way to stay together is to follow simplicity, to hold to the origin via a second return to innocence...
***
i want a dream again. i want to feel my life, my waking life, to be like the flat thing it is, afloat upon a monstrous surge, upon the back of some leviathan mistaken for a wave. an unthinking thing, without purpose, but filled to bursting with the plenitude of the abyss and the depths... ALIVE.
i dream of the sea and the waters in all its incarnations. last night i dreamt of crossing the ocean on a decaying bridge with my father... someday, in my dreams, i will walk on water, unafraid and alone.
or else, i will become the waters themselves.
i am awake, but tired, anxious about yet another tomorrow. there is always so much to do.
i once wrote that, in the primordial situation, man, represented by sisyphus, confronts the boulder of the world, and is essentially equal to it. he in other words has as much sense as the boulder, resisting the inertia of it with his own being, and then helpless to counter its momentum as it rolls down the hill. with the advent of the word, man creates imbalance, and thereby asserts his own existence: the word is the lever that allows man to separate the primordial border from mother earth. the word, in essence, makes man "bolder" than the boulder. it frees the boulder, and it frees man for other things...
but there are other dangers, dangers beyond falling back into the smothering non-existence of primordial sisyphian existence. the modern dilemma is the nano-machine repetition of that original act of separating the boulder from its housing... the boulder, transfigured by the word, fragments repetitively, into successively grainier detail, until man no longer makes contact, or is even able to make contact with the world. words fall apart, over and over and over again...
the task of an individual trying to change the world is similar. the world resists, certainly, by its very inertia, like the primordial boulder... but there is an equal danger in man's "divisive" labors, his language, his organizing mind, his midas touch... the world and its tasks repeatedly fall apart right before his eyes, and right beneath his fingertips... the end, which once seemed conceptually so simple, withdraws, turns corners, dizzyingly disappearing, until man no longer knows who he is, or what his purpose was...
there is a reason why taoism favors the yin, and the simple. to follow the way of the world is to instantly fall apart into the ten thousand things... true taoists look stupid, but it is only because they understand that the only way to stay together is to follow simplicity, to hold to the origin via a second return to innocence...
***
i want a dream again. i want to feel my life, my waking life, to be like the flat thing it is, afloat upon a monstrous surge, upon the back of some leviathan mistaken for a wave. an unthinking thing, without purpose, but filled to bursting with the plenitude of the abyss and the depths... ALIVE.
i dream of the sea and the waters in all its incarnations. last night i dreamt of crossing the ocean on a decaying bridge with my father... someday, in my dreams, i will walk on water, unafraid and alone.
or else, i will become the waters themselves.
Monday, September 14, 2009
red dawn dream
this red morning, i woke up from a dream... apparently, i had won some sort of strange contest after writing/drawing stories for some book. i was to train in a pagoda of some sort. the pagoda had to be reached by crossing an old bridge across a very busy harbor/sea. the bridge consisted of ropes and wooden planks. i was with my father. we proceeded halfway across the bridge, when my father noted how old some of the planks were- and lo and behold, as we were walking on it, the bridge seemed to dissolve before my very eyes! not only were the planks old, there were some portions where there were no planks at all! eventually, we found ourselves holding on to one railing rope and essentially tightrope walking across the roiling busy harbor. and then, my father suggested i let go and hold on to him, something about how our combined volume would make the trip easier. i begged to differ, but dream logic doesn't seem to work that way. so i held on to my father. suddenly, the wind picked up, and it actually blew us upwards into the sky, holding the rope of the bridge as a kind of tether. i could see the pagoda and the waters of the sea hover below us, wavering madly. after that, we decided to give up, and find another way...
back on the other side, we discovered that the only way to gain access across the bridge was to meet with the tulku (he looked like a buddhist abbott) named kuul. "cool!" my grandfather cried (for suddenly, he was with us as well, bouncing up and down, and looking and acting just like aiden). we waited as another party paid proper respects to kuul and his elderly family (apparently his whole family joined him on these meetings). my grandfather jumped ahead excitedly, shouting "cool!", and i had to hold him back...
that was the end of the dream...
behind it, there was a feeling of expectation... as though i had to do something...
in any case, the whole adventure with my father was the coolest... hanging onto the bridge for dear life, i had no fear of death- it was just my dad and i, laughing like kites.
oh yes, there is also a fragment about some great violin performance that was to take place in the tenth floor auditorium... and i took my daughter and son (and someone else) to go see it, only we were in an adjacent building. sounds strange, but we went up to the tenth floor of our building, and through the windows (giant and clear), we could see the violinists in the next building as though we were right next to them... i do remember that part...
back on the other side, we discovered that the only way to gain access across the bridge was to meet with the tulku (he looked like a buddhist abbott) named kuul. "cool!" my grandfather cried (for suddenly, he was with us as well, bouncing up and down, and looking and acting just like aiden). we waited as another party paid proper respects to kuul and his elderly family (apparently his whole family joined him on these meetings). my grandfather jumped ahead excitedly, shouting "cool!", and i had to hold him back...
that was the end of the dream...
behind it, there was a feeling of expectation... as though i had to do something...
in any case, the whole adventure with my father was the coolest... hanging onto the bridge for dear life, i had no fear of death- it was just my dad and i, laughing like kites.
oh yes, there is also a fragment about some great violin performance that was to take place in the tenth floor auditorium... and i took my daughter and son (and someone else) to go see it, only we were in an adjacent building. sounds strange, but we went up to the tenth floor of our building, and through the windows (giant and clear), we could see the violinists in the next building as though we were right next to them... i do remember that part...
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
seasonal entrapment
i think people are trapped in specific seasons, even in seasonless hawaii. some people view the winter of things, preferring to feel the still and the quiet, and the way everything settles to its death and rest and quiescence. other people are perpetually in spring, seeing in each moment and in each passing stranger a bud of hope and opportunity just waiting to blossom. others are in autumn, a strange mixture of meditative solemnity and the giddiness of the harvest moon. and some, as the season is presently, prefer the lazy sexuality of summer.
myself, i'm a winter person. sleepy, perpetually being mistaken for a sadsack, or chronically depressed... in all the other seasons, and confronted with all other possibilities, the winter personality perceives the ultimate ending, the consequence, the path of settling. the skeletal web of time, frozen in a visible pattern of frost.
no other season, i think, values life more than the season of death. to understand how fragile all the seemingly virile expressions of life truly are, how tomorrow will take, gradually or suddenly, irretrievably away. it is to know life for what it is, just a season, and just a moment, a flash of light refracted in a single aspect of a snowflake...
***
i am trying to remember what it felt like to be alive.
the past is a stranger to me. i know what must have happened, because somehow i have arrived here, and i have a scrambled resume and a box of photographs and letters, but it seems to all have happened to someone else, someone who passed away a long long time ago, without a word.
hope, love, fear, sadness. i know these things now. but i also knew them before (i must have!), all of these things, wearing different faces, different masks. how could i have distanced myself, exploded so far away from who i used to be, to confront the artifacts and remnants of yesterday, as though an archaeologist, unearthing an alien civilization?
... there is a pulse quality in chinese medicine denoted as "scattered." in kiiko matsumoto's style, it goes by the somewhat more awkward description of a pulse lacking in stomach qi. in any case, the pulse in chinese medicine is palpated at the radial artery at the wrist, and is felt (on each side) in three positions, the cun, the guan, and the chi. in otherwise normal pulses, a consistent wave can be felt pushing through each of these positions, like a tsunami lifting and settling equidistant buoys successively. in a scattered pulse, however, there is no sense of continuity between the positions. as it is so eloquently described, the scattered pulse feels like "three birds pecking."
my life is like a scattered pulse. i am the third bird, the triplet to the wind-up bird, and the mejiro that taps at the morning reflection. i am pecking away at the circumstances of my reality, at the core of my understanding... but i am hopelessly trapped within my own moment, even with these wings with which i could fly (icarus style). i am scattered.
like a leaf without a wind.
***
am i hunting myself in the dream? or is the dream hunting me?
myself, i'm a winter person. sleepy, perpetually being mistaken for a sadsack, or chronically depressed... in all the other seasons, and confronted with all other possibilities, the winter personality perceives the ultimate ending, the consequence, the path of settling. the skeletal web of time, frozen in a visible pattern of frost.
no other season, i think, values life more than the season of death. to understand how fragile all the seemingly virile expressions of life truly are, how tomorrow will take, gradually or suddenly, irretrievably away. it is to know life for what it is, just a season, and just a moment, a flash of light refracted in a single aspect of a snowflake...
***
i am trying to remember what it felt like to be alive.
the past is a stranger to me. i know what must have happened, because somehow i have arrived here, and i have a scrambled resume and a box of photographs and letters, but it seems to all have happened to someone else, someone who passed away a long long time ago, without a word.
hope, love, fear, sadness. i know these things now. but i also knew them before (i must have!), all of these things, wearing different faces, different masks. how could i have distanced myself, exploded so far away from who i used to be, to confront the artifacts and remnants of yesterday, as though an archaeologist, unearthing an alien civilization?
... there is a pulse quality in chinese medicine denoted as "scattered." in kiiko matsumoto's style, it goes by the somewhat more awkward description of a pulse lacking in stomach qi. in any case, the pulse in chinese medicine is palpated at the radial artery at the wrist, and is felt (on each side) in three positions, the cun, the guan, and the chi. in otherwise normal pulses, a consistent wave can be felt pushing through each of these positions, like a tsunami lifting and settling equidistant buoys successively. in a scattered pulse, however, there is no sense of continuity between the positions. as it is so eloquently described, the scattered pulse feels like "three birds pecking."
my life is like a scattered pulse. i am the third bird, the triplet to the wind-up bird, and the mejiro that taps at the morning reflection. i am pecking away at the circumstances of my reality, at the core of my understanding... but i am hopelessly trapped within my own moment, even with these wings with which i could fly (icarus style). i am scattered.
like a leaf without a wind.
***
am i hunting myself in the dream? or is the dream hunting me?
Friday, July 3, 2009
two birds
we have strange animals in our neighborhood.
every night, at around 1 or 2 in the morning, there is a raucous night bird which i have called the "wind up bird." i originally began hearing it not long after my grandmother died, when i would stay up long into the night, contemplating nothing and everything... this bird would start singing loudly in the valley behind our house, apparently completely unaware that it was supposed to be sleeping and dreaming. it actually has a large repertoire of songs, but the one it keeps returning to (and the reason i call it the "wind up bird") are a three tone question: "are [middle] you [low] awake [high]?" it sings this over and over and over again, as though trying to echo-locate its lost partner, its nightowl paramour...
every morning, at around 7 or 8 in the morning, there is a tapping on our downstairs bathroom window. this window has a light reflective tint on it, so if you are on the outside, it will look like you are seeing a dull reflection of yourself. anyway, there's a mejiro (japanese rice eye, a small green bird with a bit of yellow at its throat and a white underbelly, and characteristic white rings around its eyes) that is convinced that it is seeing another mejiro, and repeatedly tap tap taps against the window, as though trying to kiss it, or perhaps free it from its wall of glass...
strange. two different birds at two different times of the day, but both seem to follow the same pattern: lonely, calling out, tapping the unresponsive walls for some kind of response. reminds me of soul asylum lyrics:
"cuz i want somebody to shove
i need somebody to shove
i want somebody to shove me."
if only they could somehow find each other. but they are different species, living on different bus schedules...
every night, at around 1 or 2 in the morning, there is a raucous night bird which i have called the "wind up bird." i originally began hearing it not long after my grandmother died, when i would stay up long into the night, contemplating nothing and everything... this bird would start singing loudly in the valley behind our house, apparently completely unaware that it was supposed to be sleeping and dreaming. it actually has a large repertoire of songs, but the one it keeps returning to (and the reason i call it the "wind up bird") are a three tone question: "are [middle] you [low] awake [high]?" it sings this over and over and over again, as though trying to echo-locate its lost partner, its nightowl paramour...
every morning, at around 7 or 8 in the morning, there is a tapping on our downstairs bathroom window. this window has a light reflective tint on it, so if you are on the outside, it will look like you are seeing a dull reflection of yourself. anyway, there's a mejiro (japanese rice eye, a small green bird with a bit of yellow at its throat and a white underbelly, and characteristic white rings around its eyes) that is convinced that it is seeing another mejiro, and repeatedly tap tap taps against the window, as though trying to kiss it, or perhaps free it from its wall of glass...
strange. two different birds at two different times of the day, but both seem to follow the same pattern: lonely, calling out, tapping the unresponsive walls for some kind of response. reminds me of soul asylum lyrics:
"cuz i want somebody to shove
i need somebody to shove
i want somebody to shove me."
if only they could somehow find each other. but they are different species, living on different bus schedules...
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
"the family"
"the family" or "the foundation..."
i listened to an interesting interview on "fresh air" today about a "secret" religious organization called "the family." it is a very influential christian political organization. unlike most evangelical organizations, it does not cater to the masses, and, since about 1960 or so, has kept a very low profile. "the family" is meant to provide spiritual guidance to the wealthy and powerful, the elites. "the family" believes that god chooses powerful individuals, that His will is made manifest through the whims of the powerful. originally, it appears to have been founded to provide religious justification and support for anti-union efforts (presumably, the wealthy leaders of business were god's chosen ones, who paternalistically did what was best for their workers). today, it largely coincides with aspects of the republican agenda, notably the staunch belief in free (unregulated) markets.
mark sanford is a member of the "family." interestingly, despite all of his apologizing, despite all of his recent concessions for "crossing the line" of marital fidelity, he refuses to step down as governor. one of his justifications is the biblical figure of king david. for those of you who (like me) are not really up on the bible: king david was the same david from the david and goliath story. in his later years, he was both an adulterer and a murderer. his one redeeming quality (if you can call it this) is the fact that he was "chosen" by god. supposedly, according to "family principles," if you are chosen by god (i.e., if you have a position of power or authority), then you are somehow above morality. thus, governor sanborn should remain governor because he was chosen by god.
this sort of argument is old. it's hard to believe that there are still idiots who buy into it. i suppose if you are in power, it's a comforting fairy tale to tell yourself that you are where you are because you are "chosen." it removes all the complicating variables, like fairness, or struggle, or justice.
this is the mentality of some of our figures in power. it would be interesting to expose all those who have some affiliation with "the family." i'm sure it would be fodder for those across the partisan divide; but it would also be shocking to christians in general, to see how their religion is misappropriated and misinterpreted to support fundamentally immoral activities. (note: the "family" was also a big supporter of suharto, the dictator who supposedly was responsible for the death of 1 million "communists." a far cry from christian compassion, wouldn't you say?).
i definitely don't mean this entry to be anti-christian or anti-religion in any way. i am saddened and angered that there are those who can mutilate messages of peace and love and turn them to their own ends, furtherance of self-centered interests...
i listened to an interesting interview on "fresh air" today about a "secret" religious organization called "the family." it is a very influential christian political organization. unlike most evangelical organizations, it does not cater to the masses, and, since about 1960 or so, has kept a very low profile. "the family" is meant to provide spiritual guidance to the wealthy and powerful, the elites. "the family" believes that god chooses powerful individuals, that His will is made manifest through the whims of the powerful. originally, it appears to have been founded to provide religious justification and support for anti-union efforts (presumably, the wealthy leaders of business were god's chosen ones, who paternalistically did what was best for their workers). today, it largely coincides with aspects of the republican agenda, notably the staunch belief in free (unregulated) markets.
mark sanford is a member of the "family." interestingly, despite all of his apologizing, despite all of his recent concessions for "crossing the line" of marital fidelity, he refuses to step down as governor. one of his justifications is the biblical figure of king david. for those of you who (like me) are not really up on the bible: king david was the same david from the david and goliath story. in his later years, he was both an adulterer and a murderer. his one redeeming quality (if you can call it this) is the fact that he was "chosen" by god. supposedly, according to "family principles," if you are chosen by god (i.e., if you have a position of power or authority), then you are somehow above morality. thus, governor sanborn should remain governor because he was chosen by god.
this sort of argument is old. it's hard to believe that there are still idiots who buy into it. i suppose if you are in power, it's a comforting fairy tale to tell yourself that you are where you are because you are "chosen." it removes all the complicating variables, like fairness, or struggle, or justice.
this is the mentality of some of our figures in power. it would be interesting to expose all those who have some affiliation with "the family." i'm sure it would be fodder for those across the partisan divide; but it would also be shocking to christians in general, to see how their religion is misappropriated and misinterpreted to support fundamentally immoral activities. (note: the "family" was also a big supporter of suharto, the dictator who supposedly was responsible for the death of 1 million "communists." a far cry from christian compassion, wouldn't you say?).
i definitely don't mean this entry to be anti-christian or anti-religion in any way. i am saddened and angered that there are those who can mutilate messages of peace and love and turn them to their own ends, furtherance of self-centered interests...
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