Yesterday we enjoyed a birthday party for our grandson turning five. The theme was Pirates, and there was an array of young pirates at the party, a party of seventy people young and old. The youngest was a smiling, active eight month old, and the oldest, grandson’s great-grandmother, a spry 101.
I’m with the words of Joanna Macy:
The web of life both cradles us and calls us to weave it further.
From Ron Charles today in the Washington Post:
At the opening ceremony of the Frankfurt Book Fair, Turkish-British writer Elif Shafak said, “In a world that remains deeply polarized and bitterly politicized, and torn apart by inequality and wars, and the cruelty we are capable of inflicting on each other and on Earth, our only home, in such a troubled world, what can writers and poets even hope to achieve? What place is there for stories and imagination when tribalism, destruction and othering speak more loudly and boldly?” (I’m quoting from notes that Shafak sent to me.)
Shafak, whose most recent novel is “There Are Rivers in the Sky,” spoke with longing for the 21st century that never arrived — or at least hasn’t yet. She recalled the flutter of international optimism when the Berlin Wall fell, the Soviet empire broke apart, and the internet promised to create a well-informed electorate. In those heady days, for a moment at least, it felt possible to see a bright future for peace and democracy.
“Fast forward, today,” she said, “we are living in a world in which there is way too much information, but little knowledge and even less wisdom.… As we scroll up and down, more out of habit than out of anything else, we have no time to process what we see. No time to absorb or reflect or feel. Hyper-information gives us the illusion of knowledge.”
“For true knowledge to be attained we need to slow down. We need cultural spaces, literary festivals, an open and honest intellectual exchange.”
I continue to read that in reading novels we gain empathy. Focusing, we enter another’s mind and world. We’re exposed to lifestyles, characters, choices and worlds wider and broader than we may personally know.
It’s a challenge to continue to see lies reported as truth. It’s discouraging to know the money that is poured into a race to destroy our democracy, and yet there are books to read and places like the Bay Area Children’s Museum to go and return to joy, creativity, thoughtfulness, and trust.
We’ve been with our almost five-year old grandchild for the last three days.
I sit here now lifted on wings thinking of how a child can run and their feet don’t even touch the ground.
Yesterday we went to the Children’s Discovery Museum on a foggy day. By the water, we saw a huge flag and people gathering in uniforms. It was a memorial/funeral for the line-of-duty death of Lieutenant Brian Kyono, who passed away after succumbing to occupational cancer. Bagpipes played in the fog, and Amazing Grace rang through the air. As the fireboat sprayed water, the sun broke through.
We then went to the Railroad Museum in Tiburon, a 19 year achievement put together by ten men. Grandchild talked on an old-fashioned phone with a man on a cell phone. He loved the adding machine, seeing the numbers print out when he pressed them.
At the ice cream store, grandchild chose fresh orange juice over gelato, and after dinner we sat outside and wished on stars and engaged in a round-robin of questions and raising our hand to answer, and so today, a quiet morning of absorption and missing an exuberant, cuddly, and unique being.
No creature is so tiny that
it lacks isness.
If a caterpillar falls off a tree,
It climbs up a wall in order to preserve its isness.
So noble is isness!
– Meister Eckhart
Trump attempted a coup and without the conscience of Pence would have succeeded. He’s very clear this will be the last election. He’s supported by Elon Musk, who as of October 1, 2024, is the richest person in the world. Musk also is very clear on his support for and need for dictatorship.
I am skeptical of Trump’s supposed two assassination attempts but they lead the way for Trump’s campaign to now request military aircraft for Trump to fly in during the final weeks of the campaign. He wants an array of military vehicles to transport him. The image matters. He’s cultivating the image. How he’s gotten this far without being in jail I don’t understand, and now when he’s so clearly stating he will not honor the results of this election I don’t see how we can hand him military aircraft and vehicles. His only honesty is announcing his plans to takeover the country and rule as a despot, like the group of people he admires.
Vance refuses to acknowledge Trump lost the 2020 election. Trump is showing mental incompetence, so it’s easy to see that Vance will be his replacement when Trump takes over, steps aside, and is pardoned by Vance.
How can we think Trump won’t do what he did before? His campaign has had four years to better prepare, and the coup is beginning now, and yet, we’re acting like endorsements matter, like our vote matters. I hope I’m wrong but this is blatant and over the top. And of course, endorsements matter, and my vote counts.
From Heather Cox Richardson today:
In election news, The Atlantic endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president. This is only the fifth time since its founding in 1857 that The Atlantic has endorsed a presidential candidate. It is the third time it has endorsed Trump’s opponent. It also endorsed Lyndon Baines Johnson in 1964 when he ran against extremist Arizona senator Barry Goldwater. And in 1860 it endorsed Abraham Lincoln.
The Atlantic’s endorsement of Harris echoes its earlier endorsement of Lincoln, not only in its thorough dislike of Trump as “one of the most personally malignant and politically dangerous candidates in American history”—an echo of its 1860 warning that this election “is a turning-point in our history”—but because both endorsements show a new press challenging an older system.
The Atlantic nodded to the free thought on which the magazine was founded in 1857 when it came out strongly for Harris today. It is endorsing Harris, it said, because she “respects the law and the Constitution. She believes in the freedom, equality, and dignity of all Americans. She’s untainted by corruption, let alone a felony record or a history of sexual assault. She doesn’t embarrass her compatriots with her language and behavior, or pit them against one another. She doesn’t curry favor with dictators. She won’t abuse the power of the highest office in order to keep it. She believes in democracy. These, and not any specific policy positions, are the reasons The Atlantic is endorsing her.”
Last night I started reading Nicholas Kristof’s memoir Chasing Hope. It offers an opportunity to learn what journalists risk to bring us the news. I was enticed when a friend told me the story of Kristof’s son’s birthday party in Japan. Kristof set up the game of Musical Chairs.
He writes on his blog: For Gregory’s birthday, we invited his classmates over and taught them to play musical chairs. Disaster! The children, especially the girls, were traumatized by having to push aside others to gain a seat for themselves. What unfolded may have been the most polite, most apologetic, and least competitive game of musical chairs in the history of the world.
Right now we have an election where one side blatantly lies and somehow it’s seen as okay. In my opinion, there are a multitude of reasons to vote for Kamala Harris but there’s one that defines a democracy, health care for all including those with preexisting conditions. We’re in this together, and we each contribute in our way. Just that one issue should decide the presidential election.
Life is not a game. We live on a planet of abundance in a country rich with resources. There’s no reason to leave anyone out. We have enough chairs.
On Thursday I walked with a friend to the beach at Tennessee Valley. It was finally cool enough to be outside during the day and perhaps people didn’t realize it because we were almost the only ones there. What’s stayed with me is three women I watched start down the path. One was conservatively dressed in black, and the other two were completely covered in black burqas with only their eyes exposed.
We passed them more closely on the way back as the trail was narrow, and we all said hello to each other as we passed. Their voices were young and sweet. I had no idea of their age before that but their voices were clearly young.
Even though the weather had cooled, it was still hot, and they were enclosed, and I’m not sure why their voices have stayed with me, but they are here with me this night, with a crescent moon alight in the sky.
Tonight I listened to and watched Anne Lamott and Mirabai Starr speak at Book Passage. Since I can’t see to drive at night these days I watched online. They discussed Mirabai’s new book, Ordinary Mysticism: Your Life as Sacred Ground.
In the discussion, Mirabai, raised Jewish, pointed out we’re in the Days of Awe, the period between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, and yet, my sense of her book is we’re in moments of Awe when we are awake to them.
Anne Lamott ended the evening by reading Rumi’s poem “The Guest House”. It is to honor the guides as they come, and depending where we live, enjoy the moon and meteor showers again tonight.
Yesterday, we celebrated one son’s 47th birthday at the Alpine Inn in Portola Valley. The creek was still running and there was some shade from the heat with the trees. The record-breaking heat has continued for seven days. It’s a wonderful invitation to work with the mind. And now, again, today, sunshine!
I’ve been immersed in a four-day meditation retreat. It’s such a positive, supportive experience that I’m finding it challenging to return to and handle the “news” and integrate openness, clarity, mindfulness, and emptiness with anger, war, and observing the effects of climate change. As I struggle with this for myself, I wonder what I might post, say, or offer.
We have a huge redwood rising up and spreading in our yard. It was about twelve feet tall when we moved in 47 years ago. Now, it towers, and a young redwood has appeared next to the house. I know we should remove it, and yet, I resonate to the words of Jane Hirshfield who understands.
It is foolish to let a young redwood grow next to a house. Even in this one lifetime, you will have to choose. That great calm being, this clutter of soup pots and books. Already, the first branch tips brush at the window. Softly, calmly, immensity taps at your life.
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