Frustration

We have survived a critical election. Why are we spawning attacks on people who have
 contirbuted so much to our well being as a nation?  Are we saying that pants before
country are more important? What of the years of commitment and loyalty? What are we
so willing to throw away and why? I am not too French, but I am willing to question the
why of it all.

What is co-opting our reality? What sense of morality interupts our ability to see beyond
the trees and experience the forest? And why do we feel it so easy to dispose of those
whose majority contributions have been significant to our movement as a nation to a
better and safer place.

I just don't get  it. What do we achieve in the in the swamps of self indulgent non critical
thinking?

I am awash.....

I look for the hope without feeling its possibilities.

I am in the mire.

Where are you?

R

"dying""

I've been thinking a lot about it lately. This morning as I lie awake
in the pre-dawn moments before the light begins to shed its glow into
my room, I had a newer realisation about dying.

My Mom is rapidly approaching her 98th birthday and I have become
aware of a change in her being. She is physically well and in a religious
way - spiritually all right, but her spirit of continuing is flagging. Something
is becoming different. And like most offspring, I am probably late in
noticing this apparent change. We see what we want to see only too often.
There is an ebbing of life and involvement in the present and certainly
the future that is quite different.

This is most likely very normal, but it is disarming to this care-giver and
son. The question arises - how do I work with this? And in recognizing this,
how do I find a newer way of being supporting that is different from that
which I am already doing? Letting go and letting just be is very difficult.
We seek to seem always in control, but we are never in control. It is an illusion
that makes it all seem somehow easier,

How much do we look way ahead to our own latter days and moments? And
how will we - if aware - contend with it all? And who will be at hand to
help and guide us through that uncontrollable time?

It is a paradox.....And one I am just beginning to acknowledge and seek
meaning and response.


R

Olympics Opening Ceremony

What is it about this gathering of nations every four years that captivates
us so?  Is it our inner hope that we can come together and celebrate a
oneness amidst our differences in the pureness of competition? So much
is put forward in the name of nationalism, but it seems to me that this is put
aside by the individual participants who see something greater in this
competition, Is there a message we choose not to see?

I am in awe of the parade of participants marching in such joy behind their
flag of nation. It is not about the hope of winning but only the chance of
participation and representing the homeland. So often we miss this in
the miasma of the expectation of national accomplishment. In this we
miss the reason for such games.

If we lose the promise and reason for gathering for this event, then we lose
the hope and wonder of this kind of gathering. Perhaps we need to  put aside
the winning and re-look at why we come together to do this in the first
place.

I will hold this in the center of my thoughts as I tune into the competitions.


R.

Der Ring - Some Thoughts

What is it about this 19 hour epic opera over four evenings that
holds us in such wonder and questioning? I find that hearing some tidbit
opens new thoughts, continues to challenge me and renews something
deep within my soul. Every new production finds something new to explore
and say - even when we disagree with the director's concept, It is indeed
very rich and like most great classic stage works, continually opens new
possibilities and new interpretations and ways to open new meaning.

My quick reference is to the yearly cycle of the church looking at
Holy Week and its events. We re-live them each year and often find
new and deeper meaning and also often just re-hear the story and find
unfulfilled wonder. So it is with the Ring.

It is because myth is so human and invites us to participate in the saga. Story
can be very powerful and redemption lies in our ability to be open and yet
again truly open. Story can transcend time and music more than assist us
in this endeavor.

And so I live into the characters' story. Their feelings are our feelings and the
true response in ourselves is what makes the universality of it allow our response
to be one  based in our own reality. I could discuss the things individually in the
saga that make me feel this way, but the road is one of personal discovery and all
I can ask is that you enter these possibilities for yourself and your own journey. It
is a road worth taking. Time is relative, so the choice is to begin now or perhaps
a little later. With great art, it is being present in the moment that that creates
the possibility.

Begin.

Experience.

And be open to new realizations and possibilities.

It is a lifelong journey without regret.


R

My Marsh Egrets

Funny how that which is beautiful and that we observe becomes a possession.
I live in an auspicious place. I am nestled on two sides by the salt water marsh
and the fresh water marsh. Wildlife abounds, especially the birds. I awake
to a symphony of sound filled with bird calls and chatter. My home affords
the view of the rising sun from my bedside. I take full advantage of this gift.

But the ownership of which I speak is of certain bird life which adorns my
marsh. My spiritual harbinger of spring lies in the arrival of ducks and most
especially of the white egrets. In another post I have spoken of the ducks and
their raising of their young - swimming lessons and survival awareness.

But the egrets hold a very special place in my heart and soul. I feel Godde is
present and beckoning to me when they are present. I love to watch them as
they feed, as they fly in and out, as they pose watchfully and observe all there
is to see. In this we share an unspoken affinity.

Today was somewhat different. Through the growing and ever masking
marsh grass, I spied a white presence. I rushed to my upper floor porch with
binoculars in hand and found one of "my" egrets on a feeding mission in
the still waters. Then my eye spotted something white in a tree several yards
from my feeding friend. To date I had never seen one of "my" egrets perched
in  tree, but today, one was perched on high preening itself in all its beautiful
glory. I could only sigh and watch.

My feeding egret was soon spooked and drawn to flight. Later I spotted it too,
in the same tree as the other egret. On the wall of my family room hangs
a wonderful watercolor painting by my dear sister-in-law of several
marsh egrets, some in the water, some on the sidelines and other in the
trees. So today's life imitated this artist's inspiration.

I felt a spirtual moment in which all came together in a newer way. It was
fleeting as most spiritual moments are, but deeply realized and in some
way present in a sustaining way.

As the seasons come and go - so do my egrets. It is as wonder filled as the
color changes of autumn, ever changing, ever new and ever cloaked in a
glory of wonder.

Ah...................


R

Spiritual Ruminations

Two of my dearest friends are on pilgrimage in Israel. My hope is that the depth
of experience I felt when I was there on pilgrimage in 1994 will be theirs as well.
It may well be more, but it is of an interior realization. The images and landscapes
are still a deeply felt part of my being - life long present and ever re-newing in
their personal journeying and awakening.

Funny that this would be part of a different journey here. I was invited to be a
part of another dear friend's granddaughter's Bat Mitzvah recently. The grounds
were similar. The roots of spiritual experience had common experience. I had
a personal draw of mutually experienced spiritual self knowledge.

Perhaps it was the beloved psalms all our traditions share and the beauty of hearing
them chanted along with prayer. I felt I was in a continuum of shared worship and
liturgical wonder, I belonged in both. The mutuality of it all was both a comfort
and also something new - something trying to define itself in the core of my very
being. It was the oneness I felt, both home and not at home.

Then the reason we were there to be witnesses, a young person was declaring their
citizenship in the temple, the taking on of the adult responsibilities to the community
of faith and the expression that their study and proclamation of faith demanded that
their presence and willingness to enter a higher responsibility be noticed and accepted.

Christian confirmation should do the same thing, but it does not. The community
of faith and tradition in the temple and the support it gives from both family and wider
community is, in a trite way of expression, almost overwhelming to the witness
of yours truly. The assumption and taking on of responsibility in the place of faith
realized is what this ceremony is about. And it is bigger than the casual observer
generally notices or comprehends.

So, true this is to the pilgrim, walking the ancient steps and digging deep to realize
their own place in the bigger picture.

My wonder blooms. My appreciation for rites and their possibilities grows. And
my faith journey tugs my soul into the realm of re-discovery.

R

The Quartet

I recently attending a very good friend's granddaughter's Bat Mitzvah in North
Carolina. It was a truly spiritual experience for me in many ways. But ultimately
it was the people who dominated the blessing I felt.

My dear friend and I could be a duet - endlessly and continually creating new
tunes, reprising old ones and always developing new themes and creating new
textures and melodies. Into this duet a trio reconstituted itself returning to beloved
music and favorite songs. But the trio was emboldened into a quartet with the presence
of the trio's third person's marriage partner who brought new depth and melody
to the music we created in our intertwined relationships. With four songs inter playing,
the possibilities seemed endless until the final denouement.

Others joined this basic quartet as the events unfolded in ceremony and celebration. And
a new symphony of delight and mutuality of expression made its presence known. Life
can be music when ears are opened and hearts freely express their true feelings.

And this is a mitzvah - a blessing - so deeply experienced that the core of one's
being is forever altered.


R