Spring 2011

Spring is here again and even though it is still cold and blustery at times we know that it is here. My soul is feeling the surge again and I am taking aim at getting my deck and garden in shape for the days of sunshine that will follow. It has taken 18 months, one book, and a lot of soul searching to get me to where I am today. I wasn't sure that I would make it but I did. Just as my Cherry Tree and perennial planting have survived the year to bloom again so have I.

The most magical thing about this last bit of time is that is has been timeless. I don't feel that time has really passed but it has. I don't feel the desperate need to capture time anymore because I think that it has captured me. I don't have the insatiable appetite that I used to when it comes to adventure. But after living for as long as I have, I have found that life every day is the adventure, an ancient and eternal one. We are merely notes in the grand scheme, chapters in a complex novel or, if I may, players on a most important stage.

A friend once told me that in order to experience life one needs to wallow in it, to get dirty and to feel it in every way, much like tilling the soil in order to bring forth new growth. To hold back only means that we are delaying the outcome and to run through it too fast means to not savour its sensations completely. The pain and dismay that I have felt this last year has only made me hungry for more of the same, a sweet and a sour cup that must be drunk together. The sweet but volatile pain that penetrates our souls only does so when we truly feel the magnitude of what we are experiencing and embrace it. To feel less would mean that we are not experiencing our life in total. After all can a bird feel the sensation of flight without flying or can a flower feel the sunshine without opening its petals?

Mine has been a wonderful adventure that I look forward to continuing, for a while at least, and in the exploration finding even more fantastic feelings to add to my already full repertoire. What else is there to life if not just the act of living it?

So if I might, I would like to ask you my friends to talk to me about your hopes and dreams, your disappointments and expectations. I would like to get to know you all a little better so that I can better understand myself and in doing so help us all to feel better about our individual life expectations.

May your spring be eternal and may all the other seasons only serve to season your life with even more joy!

Changes

Well it seems that March is showing us its other side this week, cold, windy and robust. I know, I know, everybody is clamouring for the warmth and colors of spring. But wait just a minute, this is the Midwest, land of the hearty farmer and meat butcher; home of the windy politician and sanctuary to people like me who enjoy seasonal delights like the changing of the leaves and abundant snow falls!

What would life be if we were always basking in a luke warm 75 degrees with constant sunshine? It sounds like Miami to me ... boring ...

Give me the challenge of a  blustery winters day with the sun shining through the ominous clouds of an equinotical December, or a crisp and clear autumnal afternoon when the sun gently warms the golden leaves of October. Perhaps a warm and moist summers day in the park lightly sprinkled by a passing July shower. But, most certainly give me diversity if nothing else.

As long as things are in flux I find myself at ease, it is when life comes to a halt that I get nervous. I guess that it makes me feel alive to be apart of change, to be in the mix of Mother Nature's menage and to be witness to its wonder.

So give me your best shot March! Give me all the seasons rolled into one with all the volatility you can muster. Let it snow, and blow, and rain and grow. If we can make it through March Madness than surely April will be a piece of cosmic cake ...

The Tortoise & The Hare

There is a pounding in my head as I round the turn in the road and my vision is blurred by the sweat from my brow. As my breath becomes more labored I focus on my stride and think of other days when life was a little less stressed. Another straight away and the sun is blinding my vision. Is someone gaining on me? Am I in danger of being passed? Another turn and the gravel gives way, I am falling into what seems to be an endless abyss. As my knee hits the earth and my body gives way I lay motionless looking up at a serene blue sky with cotton candy clouds and feel a gentle breeze cooling my broken ego. There is that sound of birds again replacing the pounding of my heart and it seems like I should stay here for a while to rest. But if I do take rest where will I be when I get up again? Does it really matter all that much? Maybe my fall has taught me something. Could it be that I am running from something rather than to it? For if I am in pursuit than I have all the time in the world. But if I am running from than I must know what it is so that I can prepare myself to face it eventually.

Life is like a race but it doesn't have to be, it can also be a gathering. In fact it can be almost anything we want it to be if we want it bad enough. Imagine a time and place where we are all truly a global village, where poverty and hunger no longer exist; a sublime banquet to which all are invited to participate. I know it sounds idealistic but isn't that what makes it all the more possible. Teach a man to work and he will do so but teach a man to dream and he will work with much more tenacity. Teach a man to love and he will love forever because that is the power that drives the universe. The universal equation that begins and ends it all.

I know that I have a long way to go to get where ever it is that I am headed, but I think that I will take more time now to enjoy life. I have been told that I am too accessible but that is something that makes me happy. I have also been told that I work too hard, this is definitely true and I am working on it. Others have said that I play too hard, this is probably true as well. But there is this philosophy in Astrology that I subscribe to and that is; if you can identify your strengths and weaknesses, if you are totally honest with yourself, you can make the Ying and Yang work for you. You can do it, I tell myself at least once a week and will continue to until I have done it.

Will I ever get up and finish the race? You bet I will but like the hare and tortoise, maybe there is more than one way to win it.

	Vangelis - Chariots Of Fire .mp3
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

Metomorphisis

I remember a misty midday morning before time awoke. A pleasured palace of daily delights and moments in the serene sunlight; On a flower filled plain in the clouds a rainbow was framing this already perfect place.

I remember too so many gentle walks through the forests of a childhood spent in self imposed isolation. A time to ponder and play with wistful thoughts conjuring up secret worlds of unending spectacle. A time when man and nature were one and the universe smiled. What has happened to that place in time, that wondrous world before time indeed.

I found it again many years ago on a summers day when the light streaming down from a dappled sky illuminated the person that would give me back my lost childhood and with it the means to be happy again. But time and life are not fair by nature. One must grab for the golden rings when ever possible and hold onto them for the rainy days because there will be many. But if we have enough happiness stored in those secret places they will always be available to conjure and hide away in when need be. We are after all only creatures of the earth who's main objective is to reach the sky. Much like the Butterfly, to shed our mortal baggage and to fly freely on our desires to that special place in the sun.

So let us each make a pact with ourselves that we will take a little time every day to find our paradise lost and play there for a while. Because that I believe it is the key to bringing us back to that misty midday morning before time awoke.

Spring Eternal

As the spring is threatening to make an appearance, it occurred to me that maybe I might have outgrown my life. You may ask how is that possible and I might say just this:

Eventually we all, some time or another, find ourselves in a situation where we are no longer comfortable to just sit and observe life as it marches by.

I have noticed for the last several months that I find myself bored and irritated by life as it exists around me. I find that I have so much more to offer than that which is offered to me. When did this happen? I really don't know but I think that it was when I first met my other half. In that moment real time ceased to exist for me for many years and when I emerged in later life I found that I had more or less time warped myself into another dimension. A place of love and life without restrictions, a place of comfort and warmth, a place called home. So here I am a year and a half after my return to a mundane earth, a place not to my liking but still strangely familiar.

What does one do when a love affair is over? Well first of all it is not and never will be over, but outside of that minor detail I think that the answer must be that you need to relive it again and again. You must live it as many times as need be to keep it alive and well because it is you, it is your soul and it is your substance. It is the things that dreams are made of, and it is your only salvation.

I must confess something in order to make my point. When I was a young man first landed in this metropolis I most definitely was deficient in the ways of life. It took many years and many loves to bring me to where ever it is I am today. Am I happy with the product that was forged from the fires of experience? I think yes. But at the same time it has left me wanting more and on my own terms.

What is life if not the dream of eternal happiness? It is here that I take issue with Buddha, Krishna, Christ and all the rest. Life is meant to be lived with vigor and tenacity. It is meant to be volatile and tumultuous. It is meant to be everything that it can be, because only if it is lived to the fullest will be remembered in the forever.

Come on spring - I'm ready!

Sing Me A Love Song

2021 has entered my life as an intruder might enter one's home, unannounced, unwanted and surely unexpected. Stealthily coming in the form of a new day's morn it has tried to seduce me with the promise of renewal but in fact is exhibiting all the traits of a pending disaster in the making.

There is this feeling that I get from time to time. It is sensation that I am naked and alone standing on the edge of a sheer cliff overlooking a vast empty canyon filled with frozen nothingness. Alone and cold I turn to the warming light of a failing sun and realize that it is all just a dream, or is it?

I wonder on occasion, is it life that creates the reality or is it reality that gives us life?

Would that I could blindly trust, to put my fate into its hands and ride along on the wings of certitude, but having been fooled before I find it difficult to embrace chance again.

Rather this time I think I will stay the road of the doubter ever seeking solace in the arms of suspicion, for to give too much to luck is dangerous. While the believer is happy, the doubter is wise.
Many times I have told myself that what I really desire is the ability to stand alone and breathe the energies of life, but how is it possible to do so if you are not emersed in them? Maybe the answer is in the question.

I believe that as we collectively grow as human entities we must of needs be nourished by that collective consciousness. Granted we are constantly editing our intake but sometimes we become blocked. Perhaps we are taking in too much which will end up making us anxious, or perhaps we are too cautious and therefore being undernourished.

In any event, I have found myself many times on that cliff but never so close to the edge before as this last year. Is it because of my age or maybe my increased awareness of it all, or could it just be the fact that I am ready again for that next plateau. So maybe I am not in fact jumping but instead climbing. All I really know is that every plateau, every decade that I have walked and climbed has made me stronger and wiser than that before. But with all the wisdom and strength mustered from these journeys the thing that I most desire is love for it is in love that all the rest comes to rest, and in its arms becomes fulfilled. Much like sun to the earth or moon to the seas without a pairing there is only the solitude.

So I open myself to the universe one more time in hopes that love and life will rain down on my new plateau so that it will be fertile and blossom. Armed with my new attitude and groomed by seasons of snow and ice I will set out this new age with the courage that comes from knowledge of self, the inner fire which burns brightly in the bonfires of my soul. I will take up the sword of wisdom and with loving remembrance forge a path to another and hopefully better future where exists the means to love again this life that I call mine.

Natures Patch

Day one of count down to reality ... out of nowhere there appears this patch of a cloud making its way across the desert defying the deadly updrafts. It is as if nature decided to add a shape to her already varied repertoire.

The sun is begining to approach the mountain and a hawk takes wing to the south. Sitting by the pool, basking in the afternnon sun I notice a mist over the mountains. There are no clouds persay but there is a mountain mist that looks unworldly. Could it be the mountain spirits again but this time in full day light? I think not, however it must be the evaporation of the snows as they melt in the relentless sunshine of the desert day.

Have I become entranced by this temptress, this sirene of mens souls? Yes, but it is by choice since I have come here to be suduced and swallowed for a time. Too soon must I return to the harsh realities of every day life so why not endulge and enjoy.

Day two ...

As if by wrote the desert gods have dained to give me a desert virus which has laid me low. What a terrible way to end a month in paradise I think. But then it occurs to me that this is just what I need to push me back to reality - or at least this is what I am telling myself.

So, sick but healing I gather together the remains of my stay in the desert and pack them as memories waiting for the next excursion. They will no doubt be a reminder of my 30 days of beauty but will also be a reminder that with beauty comes responsibility. You know, the Ying and Yang thing again. So back to the healing snows of Chicago and my other self.

Let It Snow

A Spring snow welcomed me home today in Chicago. As if it knew what I needed, the March skies sprinkled my city with a fluffy coat of new born snow.

March is a favorite month for me. It is volatile, evanescent and transitory but among its many moods it is also a vehicle for passage from one season to the next. Born and raised a Mid Westerner I have always enjoyed the seasons. They are a means of passage through the many moods of nature itself. They are a way for me to locate my place in time.

The volatility of spring is merely natures way of cleansing the earth and making it ready for renewal, testing the new growth for stamina. Once satisfied the splendor of new life can begin its bloom with a show of color and spectacle unmatched. It is in the spring that I find my new growth as well. After a winter of reflection I too can now trim back the old and make way for the new.

Ever the dreamer I have become familiar with the nuances of nature and life itself. There is a second sense that enters in when one is dealing with the finite, those elements and energies that make us part of the time and space continuum. As if smelling a flower or drinking as glass of wine, unique essences are inhaled into our being. As ones passes through time their vocabulary expands until they finally reach their own plateau, a place at which we are comfortable, at least for the moment.

When the sun and moon trigger these wondrous events, the Equinox and the Solstices, my excitement for life is rekindled and revitalized one more time. I rejoice in the moment now and reflect on moments past because one cannot exist without the other.

So let the snow fall and let the sunshine illuminate it so that it may nourish this new spring, and let me be wise enough to appreciate and understand it all. Let it snow and let us grow.

A tune from one of my favorite groups - Pink Martini. Enjoy!

Seven Dreams

Seven dreams came by last night arriving softly like the desert breeze. The first one came as a child might do with a soft tug on my sleeve. The second was a bit more firm but never the less still gentle. The third came in and sat on my bed more persistant with its demands. With the fifth dream came reasureance but with the sixth there was an anxiousness that made me sad. At the seventh visit I became aware that all had been merely moments in time resurfacing in the desert night, reminding me of past lives. Of times although now gone their memories are still strong, strong enough to be there for me when needed.

As I awoke this morning with the sun burning through the evening clouds I thought to myself how wonder my life has been and how much I don't appreciate it some times in the moment. I walked out in the cold day morning and said my salutation to the sun, thanking it for another day, blessing it for those past, and looking forward to the next venture.

There are in fact seven days left in my desert journey and I believe that I now know how to use them. Each day must be a celebration of the one before and on the seventh day I will rest in the knowledge that I have used them well. I believe that I have become more than just the sum of my parts, I think that now I am their master.