Thank God It’s Global Warming

Posted on July 16, 2015 by wordpills

“Baby with the Bathwater” by Gina Freschet. More info about Gina’s art at freschet.com

I thank God for Global Warming. Without Global Warming, where would we be? We’d still be looking behind potted plants for Communists, or recording everyone’s cell phone conversations to make sure they’re not allied with ISIS. (“But I’ve owned this movie theater for fifty years! We show vintage movies, honest! It’s always been called The Isis!”)

It’s always around, like a friend, communicating to us all the time through the backs of our minds. Guiding our hand as we rethink throwing old pool Chlorine down the toilet. Then something big happens like a hurricane or the Giants win the World Series and it dances to the front page and we don’t have to think about racism or religious wars any more. It’s so big that even the free market and the dollar are affected. It’s even bigger than corporations (and you thought nothing was bigger than that!). You can run, but you cannot hide.

As far as each individual is concerned, we turn the heat down two degrees (well maybe one) and bring our batteries to the recycling dump. But really isn’t the world just too big for anyone to make a difference against the onslaught of us?

No.

Global Warming is cause and effect. Who do you think made the cause in the first place? It wasn’t Barney the Dinosaur. It wasn’t Fred Flintstone, it wasn’t Betsy Ross or George Washington for that matter. It was my right foot. (On the gas pedal.) It was my index finger. (On the thermostat.)

It is a little known fact that George Washington is the Father of Global Warming (if his initials aren’t enough to convince you, don’t forget that incident with the cherry tree), George W. Bush is the Son, and We are the Holy Ghost.

Is it my fault? No! Google should use less coal in its search engine. It’s just that Global Warming used to be six degrees of separation between the cause I made and the effect ( I didn’t know that burning old tires made smoke, who would have guessed? It was sure fun to watch them melt though). Now it’s three degrees of separation and diminishing fast. (The latest model cars have actually been developed with a Siri voice that says “Ouch” when you push the gas pedal. That’s what I’m talking about.)

Let’s face it, we need more common enemies and Global Warming fits the bill perfectly. And, believe it or not, Global Warming comes from the same place that the trash island as big as the state of Texas in the middle of the Pacific comes from; even ISIS has roots in it–our arrogance. We are a proud country, we are a country that has brought the idea of individual freedom to a pinnacle, we are a country that is so intelligently modern that we have gone soft. (Pass the Doritos please, my thumb is on the Wii trigger, and can you put them in my mouth while I play?)

But I’m not here to cast aspersions. This is really all about me. They go to the trouble of making those fluorescent twisty bulbs to save the world, so why do I throw them in the garbage when I know that somewhere in the back of my news-reading mind they should be disposed of in some other way. And why, when I read the packaging that it comes in, is there no mention of how to dispose of them, but when I read the headlines in my newspaper they say they are filled with Mercury. Why do I drive to the drug store when it is 6 blocks away? For that matter, why do I drive to my yoga class one mile away, spewing carbon into the atmosphere just so I can stay healthy? Who programmed me to stand at the refrigerator trying to think of what to eat, while this intelligent machine loses as little of its refrigeration to the atmosphere as possible, which is still too much. And why, when it no longer serves me, do I put the fridge on the curb without taking the Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) from it. Does anyone know how to do that? Why are we taught the math that is the foundation of our planet without being taught about our planet?

Oh well, wait a year or two. Global Warming will take care of it. It will take that smile off my face, when it attacks like Godzilla and destroys homes, gyms and the food supply. And then we will start the retraining. Then our children will learn new lessons. And they won’t be grammar lessons or how to edit video to put your film on youtube. They’ll be the lessons that the Native Americans taught their young when the land was sacred and the teepee was the only housing stock on its face; when the rivers ran pure because they belonged to all of us, not just General Electric. We’ll live simpler and smarter because Global Warming will have us by the short hairs. And we’ll rediscover our happiness and our sense of appreciation and the joy that comes from contemplating soil. We’ll spend the next century reverse engineering our planet so that cows give milk, caterpillars turn to butterflies, and there’s still a little time left over to play Grand Theft Auto.

So let’s get started. Put your hands together for Global Warming. It’s Nature’s way of saying, “Stop already.” And frankly, It’s the best thing that ever happened to us

The Devil King of the Sixth Heaven Explained

Posted on May 8, 2015 by wordpills

Monkey God by Gina Freschet. More art at Freschet.com

The Devil King of the Sixth Heaven. This is a Buddhist phrase or principle. A way of reminding ourselves just how our human is natured.

Let’s start with Heaven. This is where you live. This is where you find yourself. Picture it without the angels, the harps, the clouds, the need for perfection, St. Peter, or gates that lock. Think more of a staging ground for your life; an off season county fair ground waiting to come alive. Bring your best to it and suddenly it’s open, enlightened. Ride the Ferris Wheel. Have a good time. Your Heaven is what you put into it.

And why the 6th Heaven, not the Fifth or Fourth? Because the Sixth Heaven is the intersection of your five senses. The heart’s brain. The place that is supposed to make sense of all the input coming in to you and then suggest action.

And the Devil King? He’s your doubt, your poison, your karmic shadow. And He’s all yours. No one else can claim Him. He is specific to you. You can scale the sheer walls, you can invent a single coptered flying machine powered by bicycle pedals, but if you listen to Him telling you you can’t, you won’t. When you make His voice King, you’re one fucked monkey.

In fact, He may be talking to you right now: “Why are you reading this? Do you buy this load of crap? Monkey schmunkey. Get off your ass and get a job you worthless piece of shit. And stop eating those Cheetos you obese douche bag, you’re getting orange grease on your PhD. Your friends are crap, your life is crap, you are crap.” So that’s Him. The Devil King of the Sixth Heaven. And just imagine what kind of action you’ll take when His voice reigns — the lottery could make me a millionaire, my nose is too big, why can’t I win an Oscar? Any Faustian bargain you care to make for money, youth, beauty, fame is the product of the Devil King of the Sixth Heaven. And He is so familiarly personal. He is part of you and me because we are human. In fact, He’s at least 9 of the 7 Deadly Sins. His nickname is Freely Enjoying the Fruits of Others Efforts. (His doppelgangers are Freely Complaining about Others Without Understanding that it Takes Two to Tango, and Freely Judging Others without Taking Steps to Improve Your Own Damn Self.)

Hey I want to enjoy the fruits of others efforts as much as the next guy. Why not? Italian silk ties made in Bangladesh on sale at TJ Maxx for $3.99? Throwing away good food by the truckload because it’s not to my liking right now. And what about Donald Trump? He doesn’t deserve all that money.

But the more I chant, the more I realize that Donald Trump, despite his bad hair, knows more about money than I will ever know. In fact, his father was a wealthy real estate magnate. So he studied money and real estate at the foot of his mentor/dad. And, in fact, he probably suffers the disease of knowing money so intimately. Yes, he could beat me at Monopoly. But the treasures of his heart’s life only he can know. I can’t know his treasures, I can only know mine. End of story.

How do you get to know your treasures? You have to see the Man. Because He stands between you and them. And since He’s all yours; He’s so much a part of who you are; He’s the king of your obstacles, always telling you why you can’t do things…well, since He’s yours, anyway, you might as well own Him. Put Him to work. Harness your Devil King.

Here’s the list of why you’re not happy right now. A_____ B_____ C_____ and D_____ E_____ F_____ and more. Let’s be honest. He’s behind every single one of them. Narcissus drowned, don’t forget That’s right. Know how to identify Him. The more you put him to work for you, the happier you’ll be–understanding that He’s negative, understanding that He’s gonna look for the easiest way out, understanding that He has forces of sugar and salt, sex and drugs, mindless music and mindless video techno game pastimes arrayed behind Him–understanding this you are stronger, happier. And when your family doesn’t invite you to Easter dinner because they hate your girlfriend, you show up with cake and a smile and tell them your girlfriend had to be with her family. Because though the Devil King may think differently, you love your family. You want them to be happy, you want to be happy with them, see them succeed, stand strong with them as they take on every difficult adventure.

Besides do you take even one moment each day to appreciate what you already have? Ah ha! If you do, then you can defeat the Devil King of the Sixth Heaven at his own game–today. Tomorrow you’ll have to do it again. You’ve got to be consistent. Keep meeting Him, eye to eye, and saying no. No, stop talking in my head and telling me I’m not fit to sell corn dogs at the Ritz; no, I don’t look as foolish today as you say, besides I like the tie with the blue diamonds; no, I won’t put up with people who have learned to sadistically victimize me because I try to be a nice person; no, my friends may be odd but who are you to judge because they’re my friends; no, I won’t allow a lower standard for my dreams, my dreams are too important to allow laziness, tiredness, fuzzy brain, life of this moment’s needs, bad hair cuts, relatives who think they know me better than I know myself, or stale pistachios that cracked my teeth and gave me astronomical dental bills, to stop me.

Take that Devil! And I’ll be here tomorrow too. And I’ll be awake too. And I’ll look Him in the eye. And together we’ll understand that He could be my greatest asset. That even He has an enlightened side. That He could help me look for, understand and control my obstacles. That we’re a team. That there’s nothing we can’t do together, day by day. Each day. That together we can enter the 7th, 8th and 9th consciousnesses without talk of devils. Just us. Just interconnectivity. Just the music of the spheres. Just the beautiful humans squeezed so tightly on this subway car that I can’t exhale, and yet one girl in a nice red coat is actually doing her make up, running a Q-tip along her eyelid while the train jolts forward. Yikes.

And then we’ll be in. Today. Because the Devil King of the Sixth Heaven is the GATEKEEPER of the 7th 8th and 9th consciousnesses. And once you reach those, you could be so calm, so happy that the Devils and the Heavens are left behind and you’re flying at a low altitude but high enough to see the peaks and valleys and you’re firmly at the controls keeping an eye out for Him in your rear-view mirror. Don’t hit the peaks, don’t fall into the valleys. You want to be connected to your past, to THE past, to your family’s past, to your ethnic origin’s past, and the presents and the futures. You want the happiness of the flight, and the knowledge that all you have to do is just lift the joystick up one inch to get over the obstacles, not be down there like bumper cars getting turned around by every little obstacle you bump into. Obstacle after obstacle. You want to fly toward the consciousnesses that can’t be written, because they must be experienced. Seven, Eight and Nine aren’t heavens in the true sense because Heaven is an invention of the human mind and they are not an invention of any mind.To say that they are love is to limit them. They are chance. This chance that we are living, appreciating, acknowledging, aspiring with…and that we know where our Devil is.

Television

Posted on February 13, 2015 by wordpills

‘Tele’ — from the ancient greek, meaning I can hear you all the way over here, and ‘vision’ — Middle English for a trance-like state where you think Jennifer Anniston is funny. Copernicus was the first inventor of television. Other inventors were Galileo, John Coltrane and Bette Midler. Each had an instrument that allowed them to see from a distance (or in Bette’s case to sing “From a Distance”).

But does television exist any more? Probably not. You want to see Jennifer Anniston, go to Netflix. Not to be confused with Netscape. Which is something like Firefox. Not to be confused with Fios. But closer to Safari. Not to be confused with Amazon. Unless you’re wearing a pith helmet.

You see what I mean? You don’t need tele-vision for that. What you need is a degree from MIT.

With television, the challenge was all in snack preparation. But once you had your bowl of chips and Squirt the instructions were simple. 1. Sit on couch. 2. Turn on TV. 3. Fall asleep.

Today, no one has tele-visions, what they have instead are explicit blood-spattered nightmares, tasteless but titillating sexual inn-u-endo (as well as the actual endo itself when the Inn fills up and the ends spill out into the lobby), and amoral capitalistic rampages. Just take a gander at some of the new programs that will be on this year.

Monkey Go Home Homeless monkeys read Beowulf on the streets of New York while begging for spare change. With their Malaysian habitat destroyed by logging corporations, the monkeys hop a plane to the big city and the hijinks begin. The first episode ends with the monkeys getting wise and catching pedestrians unawares with the old banana peel trick, then taking their victims’ wallets and house keys–proving once again that you can never go home.

McDonald’s Copter Gunship McDonald’s corporate PR firm decides that a helicopter gunship is just the thing to sell more hamburgers but the pilot can’t get the obese thing off the helipad. With a final 1,2,3 they lift it several feet in the air only to be foiled by a ketchup salesman from DesMoines who gets caught in the blades. Stars Bill Murray as Willy Loman, the ketchup salesman who Hunts for Red October.

Knit for Gnat Reality TV show about which insects are the best knitters. The spiders win legs down.

Sing for Your Supper Reality show with celebrity chefs about giving free gourmet food to people who make $9 an hour working at fast food restaurants, but only after they have been made to sing songs that are personally humiliating.

Grandbaby Guignol Quentin Tarantino, Martin Scorsese and the ghost of Sam Peckinipah are put into a pre-school nursery where they must eat strawberries and read Barney to three year olds. The one who signs an agreement to disavow violent imagery and become the new Mister Rogers first, is the winner.

The Original Channel A whole channel devoted to series’ by clever young writers and TV serialists who think they are making great new original TV series. What they don’t know is that their mothers sprinkled old videotapes on their Fruit Loops when they were kids. The results, while perhaps being original to them, are hardly original…

Seinfold – A quartet of cranky origami artists always seem to let the folds get the best of them.
House of Farts – Political intrigue and high-flying ambitions at a nursing home.
The Tenors – The mob makes patsy’s sing on a lower note.
Spar Check – When the USS Enterprise loses its main boom, Dr. Spock sets off on an adventure through the Whole Mast Catalog. When they send him rocket parts instead of the spars he ordered, he gives birth to a whole new Enterprise.
Al in the Family – A bigot named Al, who is a penniless pauper, happens to knock on a working class, single mother family’s door one night, and is taken in by the family when they realize that they don’t have a bigoted father figure at their center.
Gomer Pyle CSI – Gomer and Aunt Bee track down Opie in the crack houses of Miami’s South Beach to investigate the death of innocence. Gollee!
The Gilligan Files – Agents Mulder and Scully investigate an island crash site where alien life forms are mixing martinis and putting on skits.

The National Fireside Dims

It was that moment I’d been waiting for. The big event. When together, as a family, we could share at the national fireside, (the TV) something we could all experience–our family and one billion others.

I’m not really a football fan or a Super Bowl fan, but there are so few public moments we share together. In my youth that’s all there was. Gathered around the television with Ma and Pa, drinking Diet Rite Cola and eating bags and bags of barbecued potato chips, we experienced something like national unity, night after night. “That’s the way it is, ” said Walter Cronkite each night, signing off.

That’s the way it was.

So now my teenaged children, who don’t get many chances to sit at the national fireside to experience this kind of family unity, would at the very least, if they’re not football fans, which they’re not, watch Katy Perry and Lenny Kravitz for the half time show. At least we would have that.

“It’s on,” I yelled as Katy entered on an enormous mechanical tiger singing, “Eye of the Tiger.”

“Look at that! Wow girls. Look at that Hunger Games-style fire dress! Girls! You’re gonna miss it!”

Nothing.

“Whoa now she’s dancing with silver chess pieces doing backflips! Girls!!?”

“Oh my God, she changed into a beach dress in 5 seconds and she’s dancing with sharks and palm trees. Come down and watch!”

“Okay, in a minute!” I finally heard from one.

“But it’s on now! It’s gonna be over!”

“Okay!”

Katy jumped around a stuffed dancing palm tree and my heart sank. They’re gonna miss it. This moment. What iPhone video game, what FaceTime phone conversation, what Instagram photo share could possible be more important than this? I started to feel the blood rush to my face. They’re missing it.

I ran upstairs to my 17 year old daughter’s room. She was watching “Being Human” on my laptop.

“I hate Katy Perry,” she said, “She doesn’t stand for anything except crass American commercialism.”

“But this isn’t just Katy Perry, this is a global moment! The technology, the dancers, the pure bubble gum poppiness of it all. It may be popular culture at its crassest, but it’s worth seeing!”

“Not interested,” she monotoned.

I held my tongue and ran downstairs to ferret out my 13 year old daughter. She. Surely she would share this moment. She was on her iPhone with her friend.

“Don’t you want to see what all your school mates will be talking about tomorrow in the halls at school,” I ask.

“Not really. If I have to I’ll Youtube it on my iPhone later.”

“But you have to,” I demand.

“What?”

Stumped and stymied I blurt out, “Come down to see the end with us or I’ll give you a consequence!”

She looks at me quizzically, shrugs her shoulders. “Alright Dad.”

“It’s on now,”I emphasize.

“I’ll be down.”

I return to the family TV, Katy is rapping about pedicures with Missy Elliott…but the joy has gone out of it.

“It’s almost over,” I yell. “You’re missing the best part,” I exclaim knowing that in this five minute tech orgy there really can be no best part.

Finally my 13 year old appears. Looks. Katy has silver eyeliner on and is flying around the stadium on a star crane with sparks coming out of every possible stadium orifice.

My 13 year old shrugs her shoulders. “Is there any cake left in the kitchen?”

So much for national fireside. Not Obama, disasters, moon landings, wars, peace, or as it turns out, Katy Perry being flown around a football stadium, can bring it back.

Apps for 2015

Posted on January 8, 2015 by wordpills

New Year, New Apps. Well, it’s one way to think you control the world.

Habitual Light App My older European friends still behave like they live in a world with candles. Stand outside their homes at night and you can always tell which room they’re in. When they walk into a new room, they turn out the light in the old room. They have this strange, old-fashioned notion that light exists to illuminate the darkness. So this app makes you faux European. As you travel from kitchen to bedroom it automatically turns the lights out in the room you were just inhabiting. Simple, right? Go ahead, run through the house. It’s a light show all by itself. And, with the plus version you can add fans, TVs, computers, electronic meters, even plug in toys. Imagine the planetary savings, all for power you frankly aren’t really around to get the benefit of. If your chandeliers and power fans are playing to an empty room, this app is for you.

Saha App Points out negativity around you that you might have become inured to but which affects you nonetheless. For an extra $1.99, the Super Saha App points out the basic human fear behind each negativity so you can (1) ignore it if you’re a wallflower prone to depression, (2) do something about it if you are in a transformational stage and want to change your karma, (3) point it out to the source of negativity if you’re ready for a good old fashioned confrontation, or (4) pray for the negative source to change and recognize how human the fear is that the negative source is dealing with.

Anti-Saha app When you need to be entertained, and you’re willing to admit that negativity, though it is all around you, is rather entertaining, particularly in other people; turns off the Saha App so you can have a good laugh.

Seed Plant App Remember Johnny Appleseed? This app re-seeds the bottom of your shoe soles with seeds on a daily basis. That way whenever and wherever you walk, you’re greening the planet! (Turn off app in suburban malls, movie theaters and performing arts auditoriums, car washes and for that matter in any auto at all, as it will inhibit operation of a motor vehicle. Or you could just tie your shoes on the door handles of your car as it drives and re-seed major highway shoulders and interchanges.) Climate specific seeds are perfect for your neighborhood! Choose from grass, marijuana, bird, sunflower and pomegranate.

Micro Macro This app sends a signal to your brain when your world balance tips too micro. This could be while studying any body part, or doctor’s report about a body part, looking in the mirror for longer than 60 seconds or feeling a complaint coming on. Automatically projects an image of the horse head galaxy, Milky Way (not the candy bar), Martin Luther raising his eyebrows, or other religious icon of your choice onto the Imax screen of your brain. Reminds you that the macrocosm is the Whole Earth Catalog and you are just the cat on the log (usually in mid-lake). Don’t jump to conclusions, just wait it out and watch the moon rise. Sooner or later the log will float close enough to shore so you can jump off without getting your feet wet. It just takes time. Pretty good for an app, right?

Goodbye Kiss Repeater Isn’t that goodbye kiss nearly always the sweetest? Even if you’ve been fighting, even if you’re dying to get out of the house. There’s something about the goodbye kiss that packs all the joys of the love, the parting, the bittersweet nature of life, etc. into one special moment. Don’t you wish it could go on forever? Now it can. Tap this app and any kiss can turn into a goodbye kiss. Fools you into thinking that you’re going on a long trip (maybe permanently) so that you can enjoy the moment that much more.

Facebook App No, not the one you have already. This is the new and improved one. It intuits your mood and suggests books you might want to read. In other words it’s time to face books. Remember them? Believe it or not there’s good therapy in them pages. Trouble with Mom? How about facing Joan Crawford instead? Mommy Dearest is still a pretty awesome reality check for Mom problems. This app doesn’t mess around, it gets you right to the point that will make you think your mom is Mother Teresa. Thinking of enlisting? Suddenly your Facebook app has plunged you deep into the heart, guts and sarcasm of Catch 22. Troubled by your parents divorce? Let Hamlet soothe your pain as he screams at his mother not to sleep with his uncle. Thinking about retiring? Don Quixote should put that need to rest. Want to be part of the 1%? Time to face The Great Gatsby. No matter what the personal problem or ambition, there’s a book to face that will cure it. This app is worth it’s weight in pixels.

Claptrap App Turns words you string together into something with actual meaning, no matter how inebriated you are. Go ahead, turn it on at a party and watch the reactions. You may go home newly accepted to Harvard. Click it as you read this…and it turns this blog into the Declaration of Independence.

In-the-Kingdom-of-the-Blind-the-One-Eyed-Man-is-King App Finds better glasses.

13 App When your formerly loving child is dissing relatives and giving you the finger both literally and subliminally, allows you to muster the fun and energy to be their bff, making fart jokes and bouncing soccer balls off kitchen walls until the microwave breaks. Turn on this app and it makes you think like a 13 year old. WARNING: For use ONLY by parents of 13 year olds! Dangerous in any other context!!

Worst Year Ever App Works for pessimists of all stripes. Fast forwards to next year so the worst year ever is always in the past.

Brake for Poetry

Posted on November 21, 2014 by wordpills

A boy and his Dog by Gina Freschet. More info on Gina’s work at http://www.freschet.com

Brake for Poetry
I never brake for poetry,
Too dense,
And it often makes no sense
Like a math problem
Where you don’t know the formula.

Besides poets fling random words together
Just hoping they’ll rub up meaning.
I mean, really, I have places to go
And mostly, if I don’t get focused
I’ll barely get my teeth brushed.

Poetry could end the world as I know it,
Which is the problem.
Sometimes the smallest phrase
Will leap at me,
Like hitchhikers jumping in my back seat
Unasked at a traffic light,
And won’t let go.

I have to ride the quatrain
Breathe the metaphor,
Rhythm the meter
And usually get thrown out
At a rest stop in Cleveland,
Utterly poetry jacked.

Captured

Freed
From petty laps and petting on demand
They streamed from their doorways
A conference of canines
Meeting, sniffing, barking
Raising a leg here and there in celebration
But most of all trotting to roam.

They ran down Main Street
Turned left on Franklin
Barking their rough liberties to the traffic signals.

Some of them could be seen
Getting haircuts in the big barber’s chair
At Minton’s.
They would have all gotten in
If the door had been opened just a wee bit more.

But the little ones squeaked through
And squealed, yapping at each other
From one barber chair to the next.

They all felt the day.
How important it was.
And the opportunities
To bark politics and sniff genitals.

This day.
This very day.

Captured.

Canine Nature

Talk about the weather
I wag my tail on sunny days
Rainy ones can be a drag.

As for food
I’d rather have my master
Feed me than get it myself
I’m no chef and I’m not much
Of a shopper either.

I do like TV.
Unusual in a dog, I know
But this is a golden age
I hate to miss even one Modern Family.
In fact, I’m religious about it.

Other things: The sex is good when it’s there,
And you can’t beat napping in the sunshine.
Once in awhile I’ll have to perform
But mostly they leave me be.

I’m an animal on an animal planet
That’s the way it should be
What could be better?

The top dogs worry and war
And wade into the mud to their knees to catch fowl,
I’m happiest asleep and dreaming
Of better times and places
Simple pleasures are best
Not brain surgery.

Spring Dialogue

I don’t remember.

Feel the air.

No. Too cold.

Not as cold.

I don’t want to.

Baby steps. Come on.

Let me sleep. I really need to sleep.

Remember last year?

No.

You don’t remember last year?

No.

You were verdant, alive, glorious. You met each day, rain or shine, singing. You waved in the wind and made food from the sun. It was absolutely heavenly.

Was it?

Yes it was. There were so many of you I was completely clothed. Kingly. But I can’t do it alone.

You need me?

I do. I really, really do.

What do I have to do again?

Just feel the warmth. The promise of warmth. The warmth that will be there soon. The rest will take of itself.

I’ll think about it.

Baby steps.

If I want to.

Think about the sun. That’s all.

It’s out today.

I know.

It’s been awhile.

I know.

The wind is cold.

Only for a moment.

Then the sun?

That’s right.

What happened last year?

You were brave. You held your heads up and greened the world. I’m gonna be honest with you, you had a lifetime of challenge every day, but it was worth it. You were intrepid.

Pretty?

Beautiful.

Will it be too hard?

No, you’ll grow to meet it.

I’m one size bigger than I was yesterday.

You see? How do you feel?

Better. Pretty good.

You’re making food from the sun and you don’t even know it.

I am?

Yes. Don’t you feel it?

Kind of.

You and I.

Really?

I feel it flowing.

Awesome. What’s it feel like?

Great. I feel strong and great.

You do?

Thanks to you. Your beginnings.

You’re welcome.

Disconnected

Telephone Poles
Must get lonely
Standing as they do
Amidst their still living brethren,
Feeling the sap rise
In their phantom branches
When Spring arrives,
The Magnolia bursting with the color of life
Maple, Chestnut, Dogwood.

Tarred and drubbed and splintery
They stand, sometimes the taller corpse
Looking down at the budding world,
Disconnected.

NRA

Posted on September 6, 2014 by wordpills

by Gina Freschet More artwork at freshet.com

“Fantastic Voyage” by Gina Freschet
More of Gina’s amazing artwork at freschet.com

Now that I am kissing close to senior citizenship, I have decided to join the NRA. Not Racing Anymore. That’s right. I’ve gone conservative.

But this one change has been extremely difficult to bring about. It is a constant war between my older self and my younger self, between my primitive side and my modern side, between my iPhone and my I.

This morning I decided, as my pool has been closed for two weeks for maintenance, to drive to the pool across the river that is nearer to the train I take to work each morning. I jumped into the unfamiliar pool to do my familiar laps. But they seem to be more obsessed with time in Tarrytown than in Nyack. Each wall has a nice big clock staring down that is hard to miss, even without glasses. So my breast stroke, back stroke, side stroke have a ticking clock as their motif.

Fine. I can attempt to ignore that. But my clever brain knows the exact time each train leaves for the city and how early or late each train gets me to work. So in my Zen swim time, instead of dreaming of daisies and mackinaws, my mind is doing calculations: 20 minutes more swimming, shower, drive to park car, walk, make this train, or don’t make that train.

I can’t help myself. I pull my goggles down and swim laps. That’ll show those clocks!! I will not fall for that time shit. NRA. I will take the time it takes to have a good swim, have a good long shower, have a good walk to the train smelling the poison ivy on the way. I will completely ignore time!

No wonder those stress marks are showing all over my little almost senior citizen body. Little physical cracks that my modern mind thinks can only be remedied with modern medicines, modern doctor’s visits, modern psychological patronization of the human spirit.

Buddhism says, “Never seek enlightenment outside of yourself,” and I know that goes for time as well. If you are in the flow of the universe, the time will be there to do what needs to be done, gloriously. You don’t have to race. You miss this train, you weren’t meant to take it; take the next one. But be in and with yourself. There is no time. Time is yours.

I know that. I don’t need a lecture. But my brain won’t shut up. Why? Because I’ve finished swimming and the clock on the dashboard tells me there’s still a chance I can make the train that will get me to work on time. I don’t care about on time. I work too hard to show up at exactly the right time. Twenty minutes late once in awhile is okay. I’m my own boss. Yet my body is quickening, my pace is speeding up. I can make it. I can still make it!

When I realize this is happening, I slow myself down. I will miss this train to make a point to myself. I will smell the poison ivy. (Turns out it doesn’t smell like much.) I am not really trying to miss the train. I am trying to experience this walk to the train fully. Fully alive. In the present moment. Now.

Tarrytown has a dry cleaners called the Clothes Doctor. How interesting. And look, that lady is walking down what could be a shortcut. She is dressed like she works in the city. I never realized that, but if I follow her this way, I might not have to cross the tracks twice. Hmm. Cute butt.

I will miss the train. I will miss this train. I don’t care if I miss this train.

It’s a fight to the death between the me that won’t slow down and the one who will still accomplish great things at no matter what pace he goes. I know that. But my monkey mind is winning.

Time is not linear, it is circular. This path is well-known, that one less so. Less well known paths generate karmic retribution. In other words, the unfamiliarity of the path, upsets the attachments and arouses doubts. This is good. There’s walking meditation, eating meditation. As soon as you empty your mind, your five senses fill it up again. No wonder the toes in my shoes feel like they’re glued together. Have you ever thought –in these narrow, stylish shoes– that you could spread your toes and walk on this earth with unfettered power?

No. Too stylish.

There’s rhythm and pattern in daily life. That’s not bad by itself. But so often that R & P lulls us to sleep. “Upset your attachments and arouse doubt?” Kick sleeping dogs? Why in the hell would you do that?

Because.

So you can experience life again.

The tracks are empty. Did the train come yet? Already gone?

A businessman dressed guy in a red shirt, tie and tan coat is drinking a very tall coffee. That’s one way. A burst of flavor, a burst of caffeine. Eyes wide open. What does it take to upset the apple cart? Any sleeping dogs lying around here? Miss the train. Miss the train. It doesn’t matter. It just doesn’t matter.

Who knows what fantastic voyage — heaven or hell awaits. But it will rival any quest that Bilbo Baggins ever took. It’s that mythic, it’s that epic. It’s now.

Wow. That lady is on to something. There are the stairs on this side of the tracks. Up and then down on the other side.

Train whistle.

That’s it. That’s right. Clocks have mechanical hands that point every which way. What do they know. I don’t need clocks. I need me. Me!

The train pulls up as if it were waiting for Me to arrive. I’m in rhythm with the universe. And it’s also, amazingly enough, the train that gets me to work on time.

I slowed down. I smelled the ivy. I changed my path. I took a chance. I didn’t care. I cared too much. I made the train.

NRA. NRA.

Think I’ll take a nap.

OBSTACLE COURSE

Posted on July 18, 2014 by wordpills

Cowgirl by Gina Freschet, 2006. Watercolor, ink, collage on paper. More at freschet.com

It’s blocking your way! It’s keeping you from your desired dreams! It’s really pissing you off! Relax, it’s just an obstacle.

They’re everywhere. They could be anything: rakes, people, diseases, rogue fence posts. Identifying them is half the battle. It could be worse. Some people can’t even identify when they are encountering obstacles until it’s too late.

Initially, Noah thought it was just a rainy month. President GW Bush declared the war was over. And has Lindsay Lohan hit ten rehab visits yet? Too many sunny days in a row without crab-like aliens landing and forcing you to eat egg foo yung at laser point can be dangerous.

Humans are lulled. Don’t be lulled. Never be lulled. Be aware. Be awake. Be on your guard. Take your obstacles seriously. Take your obstacle spectacles from the spectacle receptacle and put them on. And keep them on. What do you see? If your spectacles are working correctly, it should look like a meteor shower of all kinds of shit coming at you. Like Sandra Bullock in Gravity. Dangerous; but strangely satisfying.

Because when you really draw out the picture of your days, weeks, years — let’s face it, obstacles are everyday occurrences. You live in a permanent meteor shower, my friend. It’s just that human nature is such that once they’re past us, we forget they ever happened, and when they are in our face, more often than not, we are shocked and surprised that they’re there. Something in our make up wants to identify them as foreign, alien objects flying at light speed towards us, attacking our normal state, but they are not. They are as normal as breathing.

For instance, when you don’t vacuum your room for six weeks and the dust bunnies tower over your head while you’re trying to read Crime and Punishment, and you curse them for making you sneeze and try to ignore them but they’re throwing shadows on Raskolnikov, then you have manifested an obstacle.

Why don’t you just vacuum? This is not someone else’s obstacle. This is all yours. Maybe because your parents told you to clean your room and you’re not gonna! Or because there are no parents to tell you, so you eat pizza on the sofa and use the crusts, bent once in the middle, as boomerangs to try and knock the vase on the mantle into the empty six-pack case below.

I know the dust bunnies appear to be outside you, but let me tell you something. They’re inside. Why would I argue that? Because the solution to solve them is inside you. Go find the vacuum and clean. Done. Obstacle resolved. Nothing to do but finish reading Dostoevsky and wait for the next obstacle to rear it’s pretty head. And yet something HAS changed. The challenge of man-eating dust bunnies has brought you to a new place. You have a new sense of accomplishment, a lighter step, a better view of yourself. You are now known amongst your friends as the Bunny Terminator. Get new business cards printed.

How to Turn Everyday Obstacles into Something to Really Cry About

So often no one sees your obstacles but you. This can be very dispiriting. Here are five rules to magnify your obstacles to such a size that anyone around you can see them.

1) Drama. This is a necessity. Without drama the world will never notice that you are going through a crisis, goddamnit! And the key to good drama is exaggeration. (Dust bunnies!? Don’t you see what I’m dealing with here? Manatee-sized dust bunnies!?)

2) Blame. A froth of finger-pointing is important to deflect any blame, if blame there be, from the affected party–you! Besides, it’s not your fault. It’s THEIR fault!

3) Negativity. Go crazy. Dig deep. Knock yourself out. This is the moment to release all that negativity you’ve been trying to hold back. Why do it now when you were being so positive? See 1 and 2.

4) Miscommunication. Blurt out half truths and innuendos that could be taken any number of ways. Maximizing miscommunication is the key to magnifying a good obstacle.

5) Screaming. This is crucial and it works every time, as it goes directly to the nerve impulses of the people around you, bypassing reason, and therefore is guaranteed to get you the attention you so desperately seek. It worked when you were two, why not when you’re 32? (Caution: Learn to deal with negative attention before starting.)

Follow these important rules and you can often turn one mundane little obstacle into several hundred. Nice going. You’re unlikely to reach your true comfort zone in this lifetime.

When You Like Obstacles Too Much Because They Give You the Reason to Complain

Obviously this a self-fulfilling prophesy. You are stuck my friend. You ain’t moving forward one inch, because you have designed the perfect system for not moving forward. Life didn’t do that. You’re clever brain did. But how to get out of this cage? My only advice for you is to take an action. Any action, really. It just needs to be something to get you out of the bubble you’re in. Go ahead, take the Greyhound bus to Dayton, Ohio. Somewhere on that long trip, you’ll start to reason with yourself. “Why the hell am I going to Dayton, Ohio!? I can just as well buy gummy bears in Albany.” And you’ll take action to change course. It’s not the course, but the ACTION that will bring you to a new place. You may meet your soul mate on the bus and re-start life as a pool cleaner in Albany. Have new business cards printed.

When Obstacles are People

Ok. This happens all the time. Even though you are as shocked and surprised by these as you are by your karmic dust bunnies.

One sure sign that this is happening is when you feel your buttons being pushed.

“Back up Bertram!”

Oh wait. Bertram is my boss. If I tell him to back up, I may get fired. But why is he pushing my buttons? Doesn’t he understand that only abusive fathers are allowed to do that? He’s not my eff-ing father.

“Back up Bertram!”

Shit. I’m on probation.

My shrink says I have a deep-seated hatred of authority based on my father’s need to have me scrub inside bathroom drains with a mustache comb. I tell him Bertram has no facial hair whatsoever. He asks if any other figure of authority other than my father ever pushed my buttons. I tell him only about 250 of them, my whole life. He tells me it’s not about Bertram, it’s about the obstacle of Bertram as he represents my past karmic relationship to my father. I tell him Bertram’s a shit stick and should have his nose hairs plucked until he screams “Mama.” He tells me that after the authority issue we’ll start on facial hair, and that the answer to dealing with this obstacle is not outside, it’s inside me. I’ve heard this somewhere before so I’m instantly suspicious of it, but have to admit that the other 250 authority figures I had problems with were shit sticks as well. And if I hadn’t allowed them to push my father karmic buttons I’d be better off than I am today.

Next day I bring Bertram a box of chocolates with Tabasco sauce centers. It turns out he doesn’t eat chocolate and neither do I. We have fun dropping them from his third story window and talk about my father’s nose hairs. It turns out he’s an orphan.

Love Your Obstacle

It is yours. All yours. Other people have obstacles that may be similar, but no one has obstacles like you do. Show some pride. Take responsibility. Those are some fine looking obstacles you have Mr. Jones.

Besides, ownership is the first step to awakening.

If you don’t claim them, you will all always be buffeted by them. It will be like playing dodge ball in a ping pong ball testing zone, blindfolded. “No sir. Those are not my obstacles. I never saw them before in my life. My obstacles wear condoms.”

The Upside

If you get used to not just obstacles, but the everyday flow of obstacles, you can relax. You can take off the Freddy hockey mask, rubber knee covers, umpire vest, ear plugs, nose plugs, protective eyewear, athletic cup (no, on second thought, better leave that on) steel toed shoes, and deflective ladle. Re-lax. Let them come. Bring them on. “Oh really world, is THAT the best obstacle you can throw at me today?” Money flows in and out of your life, why not obstacles?

In fact, the more you grit your teeth, hold your breath and become a paranoid Polly, the more you hold onto obstacles. The more you hold on, the more you internalize…pretty soon you’ve got health problems. You swallowed your obstacle and you won’t spit it out. While you were doing all those things you wanted to do with your life if those obstacles would just leave you alone, you have become your obstacles.

Conclusion

Without obstacles you are nothing. A beached jellyfish. A couch potato on Soma. Your obstacles are your life–study them, treasure them, struggle, yes struggle, to understand why they’re in your life and not someone else’s, dialogue with them, spread them like mayonnaise on the ham sandwich of your soul. They are the yang to your ying. The pearl for your swine.

So treat them well. Take them for long walks on the beach. Introduce them to your friends. Treasure them as challenges, appreciate them as motivators, study them as ways to get from there to here, and finally get beyond them. Then set sail on that open sea of possibilities…where guess what? You’ll be saying hello to your new obstacles.

Aloan

Posted on May 30, 2014 by wordpills

Kid Millions by Gina Freschet

This blog is being recorded for quality assurance.

I needed a loan. I’m entitled. I’m an American. I had bankrolled a few too many of my children’s summer camps on my credit card. “No” has always been a difficult word for me when faced with potentially life-changing educational adventures for my children.

One of my credit cards I’d cut up into little pieces, the other one felt the whisper of the guillotine blade before it was finally spared. Hey I’ve got to have SOME backup. Big mistake.

“Let them eat cake.”

So, I walked down to my neighborhood banking conglomerate branchlet to see what I could see. My bank has been on the same corner since I moved to this town fifteen years ago. It has the same lovely drive-up teller windows, the same vault, the same bank of safety deposit boxes, even some of the same tellers. But the bank’s name on the big sign in front has changed three times in the last five years.

I sat down with Justin who walked me through the possibilities. He was very helpful. He got Cheryl involved. Between the two of them, my head was spinning when I walked out. It turns out there are more ways than I imagined to encourage debt.

I talked it over with my wife, resolved that a $30,000 line of credit on my house was going to save me money over the long run from what I was giving to those other conglomerates — the credit card companies — and applied. And, through the miracle of good banking and questionable credit, we were accepted.

That’s where the fun started. Justin and Cheryl can’t close a loan. We had to talk to “the underwriter”.

“Isn’t the bank the underwriter,” I asked. “Weren’t they representatives of said bank?”

Guess not. They gave me a 1-800 number to call and talk to Randy.

“Hi Randy,” I said, his actual phone number readout said “Phoenix, Arizona” on my phone.

“How’s Phoenix,” I asked.

“I’m in Pennsylvania. Are you ready to close on your loan sir?”

Randy was a flatliner. He laid out the terms that were many percentage points of interest higher than Justin had laid out.

“Woe pardner (I was still stuck in Phoenix) what happened here?”

He proceeded to give me the opportunity of a lifetime to open a new account at the bank that would do everything including shine my shoes. He also said that if I wanted to pay the closing costs of the loan that would also bring the interest rate down.

“What are the closing costs,” I asked.

“$565.65.”

“Let me think about it, Randy.”

“Get back to me as soon as possible so I can speak with the underwriter.”

“I thought YOU were the underwriter?

“No.”

“Well maybe I should talk to the underwriter. Who is this mystery man?”

“$565.65.”

“I heard you the first time Randy.”

“Get back to me as soon as possible.”

“Okay Randy, I will.”

When I went to my local bank the next Saturday to ask who the Underwriter was, Justin wasn’t there.

“He’s out for training today.”

“When will he be back?”

“Six weeks.”

“Well is Cheryl here?”

“She’s not in yet. But I can help. My name is Edwidge.”

“Alright Edwidge, who’s the underwriter?”

“What?”

“Never mind. I’ll come back when I can talk to Cheryl.”

Awash in well-trained Customer Service Reps who can only be trusted to divulge 1-800 numbers of other well-trained Customer Service Reps, I left the office in search of a human being. I bumped into Cheryl in front of the frozen yogurt store.

“Yeah, they can be tough,” she admitted. “I tried to get them to waive a late fee on my account, and they wouldn’t do it.”

“But don’t you work for the bank,” I asked.

She blushed and winked. “I think we all work for the bank,” she said.

Despite this I felt I was getting somewhere. Cheryl stood right in front of me. There was no doubt she was a human. She even had a daughter who wanted to go into banking.

“Who’s the underwriter, Cheryl?”

“I don’t know, but let me call Gloria for you,” she said.

So now I’m on the phone to Gloria. “You don’t need a $30,000 loan,” says Gloria, “you need one for $90,000. It’s no real extra for you and you’ll always have it.”

But Gloria, I don’t want a $90,000 line of credit. I couldn’t be trusted with a credit card that had $7,000 on it and stupidly paid for summer camps with money I don’t have. Now you’re going to give me $90,000 to spend even though it’s not mine? I don’t think so.”

“Suit yourself,”she said, “but if you take $90,000, your interest rate will be lower.”

“How much lower?”

“4%. Exactly what you asked for.”

“Be careful what you ask for Gloria.” I rang off. How stupid would I have to be? I am not taking $90,000 that is not mine. That would get spent in a New York minute.

Wow. 4%. Pretty good rate.

I was getting nowhere. I called Randy back and left another voice mail. He was never at the extension he gave. And when he called me back, first the phone ID read “Miami,” and later he’d been transferred to “Dubai.” He got around, that Randy.

After phone prompt shenanigans of the worst kind, we finally hooked up.

“Are you ready to close,” he fairly chirped. This after the last malevolent message he’d left me said the entire loan would be withdrawn if I didn’t close soon.

“Yes, give me terms Randy.”

“Alright.”

He went through the terms and ended with the closing costs of $1,350.

“Wait? What happened to $565.65?”

“Where’d you get that figure,” asked Randy.

“YOU gave it to me.”

He consulted his computer. Hmmm.

Seventy minutes later. He still couldn’t explain. “Your closing costs are $1,350, Mr. Jones.” He had no bedside manner.

“These phone conversations are recorded, aren’t they Randy?”

“That’s right sir.”

“Alright, I’ll wait here while you play back last week’s conversation when you told me it was $565.65.”

“I can’t do that sir.”

“You’d better talk to the Underwriter, Randy, and straighten this out.”

I rang off. I was getting angry. This is not good. On the other hand, being angry at the bank seemed like an appropriate response to denying my own stupidity. But it didn’t feel very fun. It wasn’t the rush I had thought it would be.

I was alone on this loan. I had no one I could turn to. Maybe I should call Gloria. We’d had some laughs, some good times. She had a little more bend in her voice than Randy, at any rate. Randy was a two by four, at least Gloria was plywood. I was a sapling.

Gloria agreed with everything I said. “What is wrong with those, people,” she exclaimed. “Let me see if I can reach the Underwriter.” Gloria was ALL bedside manner. “We’ve got to take care of our customers better, Mr. Jones.”

“If you reach the Underwriter,” I emoted to Gloria, “tell him that the cause he has to hate me is based only on my poverty, not on my spirit. Tell him my spirit is strong and can’t be deflated by three penny nails.”

“I’ll do my best, Mr. Jones,” Gloria said and rang off.

I let it go. I decided to wait until I heard from someone…anyone. Clearly I was out of my depth here amongst the sharks of finance: I was a schlump with a job and enough conscience, ignorance and decorum not to stiff a phantom bank.

That’s when I realized I was not alone. My wife who’d been following the action decided to call Randy and leave him a nice message about how he should expect a call from the Attorney General who liked to ride steeds in Arizona with young boys named Randy.

Suddenly I got a call from Randy. “We’re ready to deal, Mr. Jones.”

“Oh wow, Randy. So glad to hear from you.”

“We prize ourselves on customer service and we’re ready to close this loan, with a closing cost of $1350. Are you ready?”

“Look Randy. All I want is what you promised me — a $30,000 line of credit and a closing cost of $565.65.”

“No. We’re looking at a $90,000 line of credit. It says right here.”

“I don’t care what it says, I’m saying to you that I never asked for a $90,000 loan.” That goddamned Gloria must be a double agent.

“Oh, well in that case your closing costs will be $565.65.”

“Do you believe in God Randy?”

“I’d have to ask the Underwriter, sir.”

“I know the Underwriter personally, Randy. And he said this loan is A-okay with him. So tell him I’m walking into my bank branchlet this Saturday morning and if they don’t have a loan for me to sign, I’m going to give the teller a polite note asking to hand over $30,000, capiche?”

“I think so sir. You’re telling me the Underwriter has passed on the loan.”

“That’s right, son. And once that happens, I can withdraw into my shell and he can bundle up the loan with a lot of others and sell it to a Berlin banking conglomerate who can separate us by credit scores and re-sell me and the other lower credit scores to a Gypsy hookah consortium with an interest in Ethiopian arms manufacturing and Arabic prisons. That way the monthly payment I’m sending you can bring the maximum level of pain, sorrow, death and destruction into the world at large. Except in Pennsylvania. I think you’re safe Randy.”

“Thanks sir. Now, please stay on the line to take our customer satisfaction survey.”

Disaster Relief

Posted on March 27, 2014 by wordpills

Thrills by Gina Freschet, water color and pencil on paper. http://www.freschet.com

Another natural disaster and we gather together, not as individuals but as a race, to work for Disaster Relief. Rock stars Rock for Disaster Aid, TV and movie stars move mountains of red tape to do Visions of a Better Tomorrow Telethons, recording stars record songs with children – “We are the world, we are consumers, buy us a donut.”

It is the positive actions that each of us take in the face of these enormous calamities that spell success for our race on this planet. People acting out their hearts, pitching in to rebuild, making communities strong and by extension the nation and the world.

But why are we only knee jerk, Good Samaritans after something terrible has happened? Like we can’t help our neighbors every day, but when their dog dies we’ll throw them a bone? Maybe we shouldn’t call it Disaster Relief. After all, how much relief can you get when Mother Nature chooses to turn your house into a permanent parking lot and your neighbor says he’ll help you out by parking his car there. Maybe we should just cut the Good Samaritan act and call it Disaster RELEASE.

That’s a better description of what we need. Parties really; orgies, why not! To be released from the fears we’ve had, that our planet is angry with us; that it’s okay we didn’t recycle, didn’t treat our slaves better, didn’t pick up our garbage but sent it to Pago Pago on a barge instead—that the Industrial Revolution was actually a bit of a nightmare—planet-wise. It’s okay. Let’s move on from here. But only after we get some kegs and add a few more used condoms to shore up the beach front. Let’s Party! We need the release.

On the other hand if we call it Disaster Release Mother Nature might get the wrong idea and release yet another disaster on our poor heads. When do we pay for the party? When does the bill come due? When you wake up Sunday morning with a hell of a hangover do you seek for something deeper? Something more satisfying than another beer? Maybe we should be searching for that deeper thing. Maybe the action we need is MASTER Release.

Yes. Large televised judicial proceedings where we expunge our master complex and finally cede full control back to Mother Nature. We were just kidding. No really. Really!

We gather together around bon fires afterwards and chant it loud enough for Her to hear. We’re not the master. Never were. Okay for a while there we thought we were pretty good. I mean string theory is pretty advanced for cavemen, but really, you de boss. Next to the Grand Canyon and black holes, string theory is pretty silly, really. And that Bible thing. We’re really very sorry. Adam and Eve were supposed to have dominion WITH the animals in Eden, not OVER the animals. Oops. Typo. That’s what I’m saying, we took a left turn. We’re not as arrogant as we seem. We’re sorry. Honest. And we promise to give any dolphins left first crack at the new iPads, more fine wines for the winged creatures, and good wookie for any creature around that we haven’t already turned to BBQ.

On the other hand, once we’ve released our inner master complex with nothing else to replace it, not far down the road we’ll just be in this same predicament again. Plus, if we truly release our inner masters, gun sales will plummet. That’s not good for the economy. Alright. Forget about Master Release, we should call it Master BELIEF.

We must build our spiritual selves. We have too many people committing suicide because minimum wage workers forgot to put pickles on their Big Macs. Come on people. Stop using your heads. The brain is a drunken money. It is the heart that is important. A spiritual practice connects you to past, present and future. We’ve released our inner master back to God but that doesn’t mean we are just another animal on the hoof. We’re ready for the mirrors.

Our hearts are in the right place when we erect huge mirrors and line up and stand in front of them to look into our black and grievous souls and admit what Pogo knew fifty years ago and that that’s okay. The enemy may be us, but we are the world, we are the people, we like donuts.

The faster we believe our humble but mighty place in the universe, the better. If you believe, there’s no end to what we can accomplish. No longer in need of relief from Mother Nature’s hand, we realize we are Her, a part of Her universe. We have met the enemy and She is us. We belong in a universe we can care deeply about because it’s where we live. And as my mother used to say, “You don’t shit where you eat.”

The things that feel good—ocean, sun on skin, hiking, commuter rail, Seinfeld reruns… are a natural function of our love. But perhaps we shouldn’t call it Master Belief. Yes we have to master it, but in this day and age it takes advertising to get the word out. Besides everything is faster today. If our mission is to master our belief in the universe we’ve been given as fast as possible and not fuck it up, then we’d better call it FASTER Belief.

That’s right. Because we have to master it faster if we’re going to save ourselves. Faith is the key, humility is the action and now that we’re gonna master a belief system let’s talk about what we really need. Faster Belief. Let’s face it, there isn’t a lot of time left. It’s got to be deep. It’s got to be real, and I think MacDonald’s can teach us something. Let’s get on the stick before the next hurricane hits. Fast Faith. Drive through even.

Because Faster Belief leads to Faster RELIEF. We’re proactive here. Let’s raise money now for research on how to power our electric grid with orange seeds and pickles. It’s not perfect but goddamn it, that’s why research is needed. Would you rather raise a billion dollars to research fusion energy from dill pickle slices or on bandaids and plywood to rebuild after the next hurricane? Because frankly forget about Disaster Relief, without Faster Master Release Belief, just like the ruins in Greece, all that will be left of our world and its people will be an ALABASTER Relief.

The Skeptic

Posted on March 11, 2014 by wordpills

I’m skeptical about everything. So when it comes to religion my brain has a field day. The media aids and abets. Every abusive priest, every soldier who kills in the name of his God. Let’s put it this way. I’m old and I’ve seen too much. I know how easily God is twisted to the purposes of men. It is soma. It is control. It is a tool of dictators and power fools.

So when someone suggested I needed more personal faith, I laughed. I scoffed. I was, in a word, superior. The fact that it was a pretty girl who I was dating at the time made no difference. My religion was certain. It was of my own making. It included leaves and trees and the other obvious signs of Mother Nature. I got that the Earth was ours to ruin and we were doing a pretty good job. I believed that Native American drumming and other practices before white people polluted the land were probably pretty spiritual. I believed in signs — the croaking raven, etc. Looking back, my religion was basically a positive, media- driven, pollyana for a day and depression for a week, panoply of the senses that deserted me in crowded malls and during the evening news, and flourished during long hikes and days when my personal star rose. Kind of a patched together, now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t sort of religion.

I had this health problem — nothing fatal — but something kind of scary and inexplicable that I was freaking out about. My girlfriend told me to chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. I told her I hated salmon-colored robes and finger cymbals and to leave me alone. She persisted. She made me get a pen and write the words down. When I got off the phone I tried it once. It was ridiculous. It was everything I hated in religion: a stupid mindless magic bullet that was supposed to make me feel like a happy gummy bear. I might just as well chant “Mary had a little lamb.”

So I did.

“Mary had a little lamb. Mary had a little lamb. Mary had a little lamb…” Ok. This wasn’t particularly revelatory. After two minutes of chanting, I didn’t give two shits about Mary, and I wished the worst for her pet (lamb chops and a sweater). So I tried my girlfriend’s chant. Equally ridiculous. What does it mean? It’s simply gobbledy gook some Asian person who can’t speak English came up with to make himself feel better about having a bad day. It probably translates as “Mary had a little lamb.” Enough of that.

Fast forward. Despite my misgivings about her religious counsel, I married my girlfriend and that’s when the real fun began. Sometimes I would come home from work and she’d be light as a feather and other days she’d be heavy as Hell itself. On the feather days I figured she’d gotten good news or something else that made her spirit light. But come to find the only actual difference between a feather and Hell was that she had chanted the feather days, and hadn’t gotten around to it on the Hell days. How could saying gobbledygook make that big a difference? This was problem that required study.

Moreover when I walked into the house and she was chanting, her body was posessed, or more truthfully just anchored at its deepest source. My wife is fun-loving, Italian, expressive, girlish at times, free-spirited, playful — her voice is sexy, sweet, and so honestly open that at first I fell in love with her voice in those early years as I talked with her on the phone from Boston. What it isn’t, is anchored, solemn, from the gut, resonant, bass, focussed. But when she chanted, her voice was all these things. It was like this beautiful girl was suddenly possessed with a priestly James Earl Jones.

Being a Buddhist she would have other Buddhists over to the house to chant or she would drag me to a meeting somewhere and I would experience the transformation of a bunch of knuckleheads into serious, resonant, instruments of God.

It was a feeling my brain couldn’t wrap around. But okay. I got it. There was more to this than met the eye. But really, I was too deep in my need to control my surroundings and my image to fall for it. I, my career, my life was just way more important than being the flying Buddhist nun. Sally Fields and the Dalai Lama could have it.

Besides, I’m a mind person. You have to appeal to my mind to get my respect. So my wife gave me a Buddhist book by Daisaku Ikeda called “My Dear Friends in America.”

It was good. A little Japanesy for my pioneer American mindset, but still I would agree with almost all the things he said. On top of that, he had some great metaphors and some great examples. He spent a little too much time telling people he didn’t know how great they were, but whatever. It was a good book. Since it appealed to my brain, unbeknownst to me and against my better judgment, my brain started a dialogue with my heart. I started to feel this chanting thing and it was hard to deny the results. Overall this was pretty good shit.

My natural shyness that can turn anything into a punchline held me back though. Take away a barrier and I’ll erect three more. At meetings at our house I would hover around the edges. Stall. Stand. Chant a little. Go do dishes. Use putting my children to bed as an excuse not to participate. Someone has to do it! I was a busy father for christ sake! Who has time for this!

But in those moments, days, weeks that we’ll call depression (doesn’t everyone count his toes while staring down from great heights and admiring just how far the drop really is?) it was my heart that spoke the loudest–trying to reason with my brain about actual tools that might keep me from this ledge a few less times. What did I have to lose, except my life, my depression, my superiority…except my life. Besides marriage was proving to be a hiccup and a half from my logical, ivy-league mind’s point-of-view. It followed no pattern I could follow from math class. Just when I thought that x equalled the square root of four, I’d have a fight about finger nail clippings in the sink. Holy shit. Really? It turned out there was no square route. You couldn’t get there from here. So I broke down. (I admit it fellow superior beings, so sue me already!) I chanted.

It makes no sense at all to a Vulcan, but damned if I didn’t start to feel better. Sometimes I’d look back three months and couldn’t remember the last time I’d counted toes from a high angle.

But it was my secret. No one must know. What if my friends in the Atheist’s Club found out? My membership card would be spirited out of my pocket and burnt at the stake.

But then, month by month, the atheists themselves began to fade from my life. Really, they were so stuck in their ways: demanding that life had no spiritual component whatsoever; that there is nothing outside of their little selves that mattered. No wonder so many also belonged to self-help groups and Hemlock societies. If I don’t act like myself, kill me. I’m in control damnit.

No you won’t, Atheistas! What you is, is beautiful, irreplaceable human beings who’ve lost the instruction manual. Look the Tin Woodsman in the eye and tell me you have no heart.

Today, I can’t even spell ‘skaptic’. Because a ‘skaptoc’ is someone who doubts, and doubt is the lack of faith, and I know enough, when my toes start itching for the ledge, to chant. It’s an everyday tool. It’s a practice. A mindless activity. Literally. My skeptical mind is along for the ride, but basically it’s just humming at the curb, waiting for instructions from my heart wisdom.

Mary was a beautiful soul who will never come again. When the lamb touched her life, together they became as white as snow.

grey scale

Balancing the dark…with the light

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