“When we look at the world around us 

— our immediate world and the bigger world beyond —

 we see a lot of difficulty and dysfunction.

 The news we hear is mostly bad news, and that makes us afraid.

 It can be quite discouraging.

Yet we could actually derive inspiration for our warriorship, for our bodhisattva path,

 from these dire circumstances.

 We could recognize the fact, and proclaim the fact, that we are needed.”

Pema Chodron

 

Born to Run

I was a child of the Vietnam-era America,

of the Kennedy, King and Malcolm X assassinations.

The country no longer felt like the innocent place it was said to be

in the Eisenhower fifties.

Political murder, economic injustice, and institutionalized racism

were all powerfully and beautifully present.

These were issues that had previously been relegated to the margins of American life.

Dread, the sense that things might not work out,

that the moral high ground had been swept out from underneath us, 

that the dream we had of ourselves had somehow been tainted,

and the future would forever be uninsured, was in the air.

This was the new lay of the land,

and if I was going to put my characters out on that highway,

I was going to have to put all of those things in the car with them.

That's what was due, what the times demanded.

Bruce Springsteen

Trombone Christmas

My favorite holiday tradition.

20 brass trombones, cold December night, mulled wine, friends,

Christmas arrangements laced with soul, whimsy and heart.

A truly joyful event,

 one that I walked to with the glowing orb of the moon,

 hanging low on the ridge next to The Observatory,

as my flashlight.

Dust and Holiday Cheer

Amidst the dust and dirt from a much needed mini-renovation,

a tree has been selected and firmly screwed into the stand.

After noisy days of construction, and a house full of workmen 

stillness returns at night illuminated by the glow of Christmas lights. 

Lauren

Mr. Monkey

Book group pick.

Interconnected characters, associated with, some tangentially,

a cheesy children's musical about a monkey who is adopted by an American family.

Prose's writing is insightful and  thoughtful, but in the end the narrative fell apart.

English Rose