angelbirdflies

Imagine... A half clothed three-year old, running ahead of you on the trail, his muddy feet and bare legs kicking behind him in the characteristic gait of the very young. He is chasing, with headlong abandon, after an imaginary friend named, "Now". Yep, "Now". All the while, he is yelling after his speedy friend, saying, "Get back here Now. Hey Now, Now, Now! Mommy, Now isn't listening to me!" "NOW get back here!". As far as I could discern, 'Now' was not a friend to stroll alongside, or chat mildly with about the weather or the quickening of spring all around. Rather, to simply keep Now in sight, one needed to maintain a dead run. Sadly, Now eventually disappeared over the horizon and was forgotten. Well, the message wasn't lost. I am forever chasing after something.  In a hurry, I race after the time-piece wielding rabbit who dives as readily into his rabbit hole, out of sight. I have been thinking a lot about busynes...

I have been hearing and reading a lot of art chatter lately and one recurring theme is the theory that art isn't art until it is seen and received by another. The assumption is that art requires a dialogue between the piece and the public, transcending the embryonic sphere of conception and creation, born into the world- seen. I disagree. The theory negates the process and the journey of art. Often I find that creativity is one of the few acts that almost requires the doer to dissolve into the doing and the process becomes primary to the product. Watching the creative process can be more inspiring than the end result. It troubles me that we might define art solely in terms of a product. When a piece of art is born into the public sphere, it begins a new journey, independent of it's union with the artist and takes on a life of its own. That new creation is art, when seen it generates a relationship, uniting subject and object in ongoing dialogue (especially when it has something...

Okay, I know Bodhi is three now and it is time to let go of the binkie (aka mana) even if he uses it just for sleeping, but that doesn't make it any easier. We decided that the best thing to do was to deliver the two remaining mana's to the fairies. We found a special box and Bodhi placed his comforting old friends inside along with a few special notes to the fairies. We went for a hike in the red rock area. Bodhi found a special spot tucked away in a crevice and protected from the wind. He placed his special box there and we said a few blessings. We enjoyed a light picnic and climbed around for a while. When we left Bodhi said good bye again with a spontaneous Namaste. He slept 3 hours last night, crying in my arms. Sometimes the process of growing can be painful.

Life is. Enjoy the dance. Watch this great little Allan Watts clip , for a smile.

"Be the light you, wish to see by."

Bodhi and I built our snowman in the morning and Owen and Shane built theirs in the evening. Check out the mohawk! I realize Bodhi is decked out in a tank top, I was washing dishes and thought he was playing in the back room after his evening bath. When I looked out the window this is what I saw.

Show me the way to the ocean! Break these half-measures, these small containers. All this fantasy and grief. Let my house be drowned in the wave that rose last night in the courtyard hidden in the center of my chest. ---Rumi (Translated by Coleman Barks)

I am interested in gaze-shifting lately...looking for the alternate view. I remember reading a book by Tom Brown Jr. when I was rather young, a certain passage has always stuck with me. I can't quote it, but the gist was about authentic "seeing". In our "label" frenzied world we are fascinated with words, as if words hold a certain power and once something is labeled, it is known. We label things (car, door, pencil, rock, shell, tree, leaf, flower, sand, etc.) and the moment we have labeled it, we stop "seeing" it. We don't look deeply. We label this person, place, thing, feeling or experience with a name or concept and consider it seen and tidily place it in it's appropriate cognitive category. In so doing, we miss the beauty, the mystery, the awe. Tom Brown Jr. was talking about this in terms of sand, how a handful of sand holds a rainbow of color, a history of unimagined proportions, unique and unbelievably beautiful. Few of us stop...

"A great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord; but the Lord was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake: and after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice," (1 Kings 19:11, 12).

I have recently returned from a trip to Portland, Oregon and the shift in climate, geography and responsibilities left me deeply puzzling the notion of perspective . We can't really see our own lives subjectively. We are so caught up in the motion of thinking, feeling, believing, existing, that we fail to step back from the busy edge of identity and truly enjoy the splendor of our own beauty. It is not only the wide vistas that we miss, but also the simple mundane magnificence of the moment by moment splendor of living. I have been pondering this idea of perspective for sometime. In fact my longest standing prayer has been, "Help me to see this differently". I wonder at our human experience and our audacious belief that our subjective truth is reality. I wonder at our rigid adherence to a limited perspective , preferring rightness over risking our own solidified self image. Perhaps we could challenge ourselves to wrestle with our imagined world in...