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Elderhood. A Stephen Jenkinson's Book Review.

4/29/2019

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hoto by James Bekkers on Unsplash

Over the last few years, I've been thinking about the lack of elderhood in our US culture.  My interest has led to scattered reading and wondering that has wound through conferences, workshops, encounters with others, and lately coming to reading a book called Come of Age by Stephen Jenkinson. It doesn't prescribe nor explain about Elderhood, as I had assumed, but rather directs me, the reader, to a focus not on the topic at hand so much, but rather on life, my life, and the unfolding of it. For after all, doesn't the accumulated learning and revelations of a lifetime constitute an elder?
 
Yes, and yet, focusing on this accumulation as if contained within a jeweled box we call wisdom takes us away from the heart of the matter. As a person – old or at any age, I am not simply a collection of accumulated experiences and points of view, nor any list - however long - of characteristics and traits. This I that I am - I’ve learned over the years – is far more complex, and encompasses so many more perspectives than can be articulated. The dawn of a clear morning or an incoming mist that shrouds the neighboring hillsides proclaims – if I am aware of it – the temper of my day. How many more effects are there that constitute – really – who I am at any time of the day or night. They are beyond limit.
 
Like so many of my fellow elders, this elder was waiting to be told, to be acknowledged, to be recognized as an elder, which I now take to mean I am growing old waiting to be told I’m an elder. Mr. Jenkinson voices the observation that in these times there are more old people living than ever, and yet with the exception of indigenous peoples, there are very few elders.
 
The traditional means of younger looking to elder for counsel is not in evidence. Old people are just old people. The young think, I can counsel myself, which brings to mind an old saw. He who counsels himself has a fool for counsel. Nevertheless, the trend dominates. Why? Is it a loss of respect for tradition? An arrogance typical and at the same time respected of young minds wishing change? A lack of trust (understandably) for those in command? (old people) A distance between generations so great, virtually no communication is possible? A sign of indifference of the times? These need further exploring.
 
The author – if I may - takes a fairly voluminous book to consider viewing oneself as the basis of Elderhood, for that is the genuine origins of Elderhood. In essence, I assume not my elderhood, but that I am. A life of I am are bits and pieces; basics and decorations, fundamentals and superfluities all lumped together awaiting to be expressed. This attempt at writing, for example, this individual bundling of snippets, along with others’ bundles of snippets, collectively, serve as energies that drive change. Perhaps, it may even serve to help reinstate Elderhood in America.

-----Greg Marquez

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Garden Cooking

4/3/2019

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Foto credit: George Patton.

I volunteer in Throop’s Learning Garden because I love to work with the soil and plants. But I also love to eat and cook, so a great bonus to volunteering is I get lots of fresh produce to experiment with. Of course it’s a pleasure, but I also consider it a duty to taste what I’m feeding to our community. Let me share with you some of my most satisfying recent fresh treats.
 
About a week ago I stir-fried fresh amaranth leaves with malva leaves, both from our garden. The only other ingredients were grape-seed oil and chopped fresh ginger; the results were nothing short of spectacular. Not only was the flavor uniquely delicious, the leaves held their color after about three minutes of simmering, beaming out a contrast of deep burgundy and rich forest green. WOW!
 
As I write this, I’m enjoying a stir-fry of a huge batch of home grown land cress, close cousin of watercress. This time I combined the fresh garden greens with red onion, chopped ginger and red bell pepper, so once again a riot of brilliant primary colors.
 
When it comes to helping your body stave off malignancy, you can’t do much better than fresh, organically grown, colorful veggies. Live long & prosper! And have fun doing it.

          Sign Language
 
The clamor, the voices,
billions shouting to be heard.
Who is listening to the fishes?
 
Trees speak quietly while alive,
thunder when they fall,
fall on distracted ears.
 
The noise of humans
deafens a planet
where beetles squeak for help.
 
Words masquerade as facts.
Scientists scramble over each other
to explain the inexplicable,
while my very best friends
grow sad in my garden
but quietly persist.
 
Thom Hawkins
Copyright March, 2019

Volunteer Hours; Weekends 8:00 AM-2:00 PM. Come taste for yourself and get dirty.
Throop Unitarian Universalist Church, 300 So. Los Robles at Delmar in Pasadena.




----Thom Hawkins


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View from the Piano: Grief (Part 11)

4/2/2019

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I ended by saying there were reasons to be hopeful. Before saying what those reasons might be, I think some review is in order. Here are some important points to keep in mind going forward.
 
1. The vastness of space and time. Humanity occupies such a small part of the physical space. The quantity of time humans that have been around is minuscule.
2. Conservation of Novelty. Something that is new manages to stick around.
3. We are in a predicament.
4. Logic and rational thinking are dead ends. They won't provide answers to our predicament.
 
I find it hopeful to think about the possibilities that come from out side the realm of logic and reason. For example, living things. Biology can be unpredictable. Life is the wild card. Another realm is the appreciation of beauty. Whether it's a particular art form or the incredible beauty and diversity of nature. Then there is the realm of spirituality. Regardless of any particular tradition, there are lots of possibilities.
 
From here, I will be leaving behind the land of logic. A short advisory; this might start to sound wu-wu. Given our predicament, what have you got to lose?
 
And so we come to the idea of miracles. I don't mean events brought by a deity. Rather something that can't be explained from our current perspective. Could it be that we are all miracle workers? The Gnostic thinkers of the1st and 2nd century thought so.
 
We of the modern world have lost touch with a lot of knowledge and past practices that could serve us in this time of predicaments. I'm thinking about an old Gnostic and Hermetic tradition more commonly called Alchemy.
 
Alchemy is popularly thought of as the practice of turning base metals in to the stuff of commerce. Lead into gold and practiced by those with unbalanced minds. This is the be knighted reputation that alchemy has earned in a culture so given over to the logical and material world.
 
Alchemy is actually the practice of redeeming spirit from matter. The alchemical idea that spirit can be redeemed from matter begins to get teeth when you connect the idea of spirit up to the idea of novelty. This is not a common way to view novelty, but novelty is the life of the party and the life of the party is to be high spirited. It's possible that when something new occurs it could be the spirit that came from an object. If all objects have a spirit, then why not call them forth?
 
The emergence in humans, of language, tools, culture and higher ideals like courage, love and self sacrifice. These are not flukes. These are further steps along the way in the process of the great alchemical furnace of being. Heating and casting and dissolving and recasting and purifying alchemical gold.
 
Dark as the hour may appear, in reality we exist in a dimension of greater opportunity, greater freedom, greater possibility than has ever been. The challenge is to not drop the ball. To know this and to act on it and to sluff off all the leeches, weasels, back handlers and crypto fascists.
 
This is what we need to focus on. The thread in the dark labyrinth of the prison of the material world. It can lead us back to the light. The universe is an engine for the production of novelty. It always has been. The answers to our predicament will be found in novelty not from the realm of logic and reason. Next month, one more thing to say.

-----David Cutter

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Book Review: “Climate A New Story” by Charles Eisenstein

4/2/2019

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Photo by Jason Schuller on Unsplash

The LA Times article shows a beautiful super-bloom and mentions folks trampling the flowers, out of ignorance, which seems to describe the general state we humans have evolved to in separating ourselves from nature. We are pretty much unaware of the individual life each organic thing has, and as a result lack respect, and yes reverence we would normally give another organic being like ourselves.
 
Reading the latest book by Charles Eisenstein, "Climate A New Story" I am made sensitive to the view that Eisenstein develops. The old story is that climate change needs to be met with keeping the fuels in the ground, reducing harmful gases, and becoming more involved with hundreds of projects like not using straws, and preserving water that falls from the sky. Important as these may be, they do not address the primary cause of these injuries to our planet. How we deal with that is the new story. 
 
In Eisenstein’s previous book, "The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible", that beautiful world is outlined as the new story. As the chapters unfold, the author invites us to look at our "old ways" of thinking, such as the notion of scarcity, and how that influences decision making.  Or, that growth is necessary. In fact, climate warming started many centuries ago, and our views are desperately in need of change. The resolution is as simple to describe as it is complex and difficult to fulfill. 
 
First, I need to recognize my being as an inter-being, not just an agent, but an actual part, one of many vital organs within this enormously complex cosmic system. How that is done is the hard part. I must look within, and I must be honest. I have to accept as the way - or ways - a lifetime of habits has taken me. Once seen, and the views between old versus new stories are clear, new points of view start unfolding, mercifully, since relying on old ways of thinking are going to produce the same old ways of doing. Each of us homo sapiens possesses a higher intelligence that sees and knows. We need only sweep away the dross of habit and allow it to function.  
 
We - most of us who are not indigenous, and have not been raised to care for nature - lack the teaching and discipline to respect and honor nature as interrelated, as inter-being. The damage done to one part of nature effects all of nature, just as an injured kidney affects the whole body. Also, thankfully, the health administered to one part affects the health of the whole. That is the new story we must take. Be an agent of nature, not simply a participant following prescribed remedies. My individual acts are vital to the whole.
 
I am nature, in every respect as much as a sunflower is, and as the fog is that quenches the thirsty throats of Coastal Redwoods, and blankets hillsides with glorious colors of orange and gold.
 
LA Times article:
https://enewspaper.latimes.com/desktop/latimes/default.aspx?pnum=10&edid=da89cd4c-108a-470f-819c-b5a0c5ebcc86
 
 
-----Greg Marquez

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Lesson Learned

4/2/2019

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Photo by Dana Vollenweider on Unsplash


As a newly licensed teen-age driver, I needed a car of my own. Papa had a car in the garage which smoked a lot, and he was thinking of selling it when I offered to change the piston rings which was causing the smoke. He couldn’t very well refuse, and in the project provided me an experience well suited to a young inquisitive guy and, little did I know, a lesson that endures to this day.
 
Though I had some idea of what to do, I had never done anything major like that before. So, I got a manual (way long before the internet) and following directions, began disassembling the engine. The pistons were exposed, the connections they made with the crankshaft were accessible. I had only to unbolt the rods that connected pistons to the crankshaft. Then, the pistons would be ready for their new rings. But that was not to be, or at least not so easily. One of the pistons was out of position to access the bolts, and so I thought by turning the crankshaft I could bring it into position.
 
Crankshaft brings to mind images of old cars, that in order to start, you had to insert a crank into a slot in the front of the engine. That slot led to the end of a shaft which, as you cranked would turn the shaft that brought the pistons up and down. That would cause a spark plug to fire, and the engine would start. These days batteries – not hand turning - do the cranking. When the ignition switch is turned on, electricity turns a starter motor which turns the crankshaft and after a few turns, the engine starts.
 
To get the piston where I wanted it I simply had to click the ignition switch just a touch or two to move the piston ever so slightly. But instead of moving, the connecting rod bent way out of shape. I had figured wrong, and now I had to get the rod straightened out or buy a new one which was probably not going to be cheap.
 
So, I took it to a repair shop, and as I was walking toward the busy mechanic with the bent rod and piston in hand, he stopped working. Then he stood and looked at me as I approached.
“ Well,” he said looking at the problem in my hands, “Let me tell you what happened.” And he proceeded to describe - practically word for the word - what I had done an hour or so before. It was uncanny. He had probably done this same thing himself, or had seen and heard others do it over the years. He must have enjoyed watching my jaw drop as he accurately recited the steps to my mistake, and he was smiling as he took the bent piece from me saying, “Here, I’ll straighten it out for you. No charge.” Then added, looking at me kindly and with great consideration, “If you’re not making mistakes, you’re not learning.”  Bless his heart for all these years of assurances.
 
-----Greg Marquez


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