oh...just me: January 2008 Archives

from Earthseed (Parable of the Sower):

God is Power --
Infinite,
Irresistible,
Inexorable,
Indifferent.
And yet, God is Pliable --
Trickster,
Teacher,
Chaos,
Clay.
God exists to be shaped.
God is Change.

I met David in the department computer lab yesterday. "So, you don't believe in authenticity, do you?"

Nice to meet you, too! :-)

Of course I do. Authenticity is, for me, an experience not a label, a lived moment of phenomenological alignment when the energies that compose "me" merge in concordance with the energies of a situation and other involved persons, ideas - the context. I think of "peak experiences" and the experience of "flow."

My authentic moments usually won't match anyone else's, in substance or in timing - everyone will experience their own authenticity distinctly. This is why shared moments are so powerful (hmmm, which is why I am so interested in them as events with the potential to change reality - see problematic moments - and so drawn to them personally as a source of incredible nurturance. I want more!)

As I muse on this, I think there may be two "categories" of phenomenological authenticity, one that is dialectically structured and one that is dialogically intentional. The former is reactive to social structure (see a negative example of coming into alignment based on a valence (intra/interpersonal attractive force) to soak up a certain strand of environmental and communicative dynamic interaction) and the latter is empowered, coming from a deliberate and conscious turning or utilization of recognized valences into a force that acts back on the dialectical conditioning.

(btw - I'm in a thick swamp attempting to distinguish dialogical from dialectical. Neither process has control over the outcome, but to subsume "dialogue" under "dialect" is to accept a singular structuration for all of human society. No, thanks.)

After Dachau, Daniel Quinn
A Child’s Christmas in Wales, Dylan Thomas
Museum of Islamic Art, State Museums of Berlin Prussian Cultural Property
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
How to Think about Weird Things, Theodore Schick, Jr & Lewis Vaugn
The Singing Life of Birds, Donald Kroodsma
Memory is the Other Language of Light, Rax Rinnekangas
Cities in Flight, James Blish
The Voice of the Earth, Theodore Roszak
A Wrinkle in Time, A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, Many Waters, Madeline L’Engle
Honky, Dalton Conley
Crazy Horse and Custer, Stephen E. Ambrose
Letters to a Portuguese Nun, Myriam Cyr
Dzelarhons, Anne Cameron
Child of Her People, Anne Cameron
The Sacred Hoop, Paula Gunn Allen
Zami: A New Spelling of my Name, Audre Lorde
Playing in the Dark, Toni Morrison
Aquarium Fish, DK Publishing
A Call to Conscience: The Landmark Speeches of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr
Snow, Orhan Pamuk
Writing Down the Bones, Natalie Goldberg
Aloft, Chang Rae Lee
Soldier, June Jordan
Vasistha’s Yoga, Swami Venkatesananda (assigned by Enoch Page)
Jayber Crow, Wendell Berry
Eleanor Roosevelt, Vol 2, Blanche Wiesen Cook
Atatürk: The Rebirth of a Nation, Patrick Kinross
The Secret Life of Saeed, Emile Habiby
Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom, Christiane Northrup
Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now, Maya Angelou
Hawks in Flight, Pete Dunne, David Sibley & Clay Sutton
Loose Woman, Sandra Cisneros (autographed by the author)
The Skull Measurer’s Mistake, Sven Lindqvist
Origami Bridges, Diane Ackerman
The Carnivorous Carnival, Lemony Snicket
Comstock Women, Ronald M. James & Elizabeth Raymond (editors)
Wounds of Passion, bell hooks
The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse, Louise Erdrich
The Hour of the Star, Clarice Lispector
In the Wilderness: Coming of Age in Unknown Country, Kim Barnes
Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen (analyzed by Zizek)
Lifting Belly, Gertrude Stein
Cloudstreet, Tim Winton
American Indian Myths and Legends, Richard Erdoes & Alfonso Ortiz (editors) (critiqued by Hymes)
Small Wonder, Barbara Kingsolver (Prodigal Summer)
In the Presence of Fear, Wendell Berry
Native Family, Edward S. Curtis
King Arthur in the East Riding, Simon Armitage
The Me in the Mirror, Connie Panzarino
Angel’s Town, Ralph Cintron
Women without Class, Julie Bettie
Purchasing Power, Elizabeth Chin
Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich
The War on the Poor, Randy Albelda, Nancy Folbre & The Center for Popular Economics
Freaks of Nature, John Callahan
Do What He Says! He’s Crazy!!! John Callahan
Half and Half, Claudine Chiawei O’Hearn (editor)
Notes of a Native Son, James Baldwin
Indian Killer, Sherman Alexie
A Window Across the River, Brian Morton
Illywhacker, Peter Carey
All About Love, bell hooks

Music: shantel – inside

We went for a walkie-talkie along the Norwottuck Rail Trail...that is, we slipped and slid along the icy path in order to build our endurance for risk-taking and learn to better appreciate the stretches of life when we're not either numb or in pain. (Relaxxx!) The complaining game got started early, but only as a reality check on my propensity to plunge too deeply, a necessary caution as I commit moreself (that's, uh, myself and more combined, he he) to "a different kind of chess."

After ten minutes of philosophizing, we arrived at a juncture with a (back, dirt) road. My companion opted for the road more traveled. We carried on until finding another woody path without ice, and ventured along several short routes.





We continued on, eventually coming to the point of decision - continue deeper into uncertainty (as in, the inability to pinpoint precisely our location, while maintaining a general trust in the destination) or retrace the path (having accomplished half the duration of exercise set as a goal). We agreed to return. Enough, already, for today! :-) Once we hit the icy part again, ouch, someone's neck got tweaked. :-( Personally, I think its because someone was setting the standard for an academic paper Way Too High, as in St Peter being the only reader - a metaphor which to me indicates equating each act on earth with the ultimate judgment. Not so, I learned. If St. Peter is the only reader, then what is written, howsoever it is read, matters not at all. From complete and total accountability to absolute irrelevance in one metaphor! No wonder someone was so relieved to see that lumberyard signalling the end of the trail!





And, just in case I'd forgotten that I am not, really, always paying attention, he had to go and make a comment about the hood of my car. Hmmph!

Driving to the supermarket, he then tried to convince me that he had not enjoyed himself at all. He was not emulating the Jerry Seinfeld whining game. To accept this, I would have to recast our entire conversation in the same way this recut re-presents Mary Poppins as Scary Mary.

_____
ps - Hillary is looking good, and she and Barack both remind me of Dr. Martin Luther King: Remaining Awake Through a Revolution.

I learned about Paul Erdös today. A mathematician, he was "famously eccentric" and worked "with hundreds of collaborators," who generated a humorous tribute to him: a measure of collaborate distance.

There's no way I'll be in the running as any kind of eccentric, nor will I beat his record, but I wouldn't mind a vast range of collaborations. :-) Was just imagining work with Sangria Girl regarding turtles ... (!), not to mention exciting projects gathering steam in other parts of the globe and cyberspace... the headiness of possibility is an energy I'll have to monitor.

Of course, the God of Destruction and Regeneration will help keep me in check!

(not that I have time for pleasure reading these days)