Tuesday, December 26, 2017

Mandala #28: Family Alchemy




















On December 24, I completed my 28th mandala.  According to my book on Chinese calligraphy, the character at the center of my mandala signifies "family name." My family of origin has had numerous broken places in it for many generations.  Those broken places played out again in my generation and the two generations that follow mine.

My mandala is a vision of my family of origin being healed, resulting in a new family name that reflects the healing of who-knows-how-many generations of brokenness.  At this point, I cannot imagine how that would happen, but I want to see it as possible.

As of today, I deactivated my Facebook page in hopes of alleviating some of the pain that I experience in connection with my family.  I have not posted on Facebook for over a month now and have several other ways to keep in touch with friends and family I am close to, many of whom are not on Facebook.

I am grateful for the healing that I have experienced within in connection with my family of origin, much of it in connection with having a family of choice.  There is much less pain for me than there used to be.  It is a gradual process.  Facebook has not been contributing to healing in my family of origin.

May all families be healed and whole.  May all beings be healed and whole.





















Sunday, December 17, 2017

"... meant to be sung, not read on a page ..." / 1966 and 2017: Through me tell the story / With Addendum

(a cover from "Tempest," released on September 10, 2012, the last collection of songs written and released by Bob Dylan before receiving the Nobel Prize for Literature)
"... When Odysseus in The Odyssey visits the famed warrior Achilles in the underworld – Achilles, who traded a long life full of peace and contentment for a short one full of honor and glory –  tells Odysseus it was all a mistake. "I just died, that's all." There was no honor. No immortality. And that if he could, he would choose to go back and be a lowly slave to a tenant farmer on Earth rather than be what he is – a king in the land of the dead – that whatever his struggles of life were, they were preferable to being here in this dead place. 
That's what songs are too. Our songs are alive in the land of the living. But songs are unlike literature. They're meant to be sung, not read. The words in Shakespeare's plays were meant to be acted on the stage. Just as lyrics in songs are meant to be sung, not read on a page. And I hope some of you get the chance to listen to these lyrics the way they were intended to be heard: in concert or on record or however people are listening to songs these days. I return once again to Homer, who says, "Sing in me, oh Muse, and through me tell the story." (am's italics)
(from the concluding words of Bob Dylan's Nobel Lecture, including the first words of Homer's Odyssey)
From nearly 30 years ago:
The final words of Homer's Odyssey, with the goddess Athena calling for an end to the war:

And now would they have slain them all, and cut them off from returning, had not Athena, daughter of Zeus, who bears the aegis, [530] shouted aloud, and checked all the host, saying: “Refrain, men of Ithaca, from grievous war, that with all speed you may part, and that without bloodshed.” So spoke Athena, and pale fear seized them. Then in their terror the arms flew from their hands [535] and fell one and all to the ground, as the goddess uttered her voice, and they turned toward the city, eager to save their lives. Terribly then shouted the much-enduring, goodly Odysseus, and gathering himself together he swooped upon them like an eagle of lofty flight, and at that moment the son of Cronos cast a flaming thunderbolt, [540] and down it fell before the flashing-eyed daughter of the mighty sire. Then flashing-eyed Athena spoke to Odysseus saying: “Son of Laertes, sprung from Zeus, Odysseus of many devices, stay thy hand, and make the strife of equal war to cease, lest haply the son of Cronos be wroth with thee, even Zeus, whose voice is borne afar.” [545] So spoke Athena, and he obeyed, and was glad at heart. Then for all time to come a solemn covenant betwixt the twain was made by Pallas Athena, daughter of Zeus, who bears the aegis, in the likeness of Mentor both in form and in voice.

This post came about after I read the text of Bob Dylan's Nobel Lecture, which I read while thinking about a drawing I did in the early 1980s from a photograph taken in Vietnam of my R and sent to me by R in 1970.   The drawing was returned under mysterious circumstances a few days ago, December 14, nearly 40 years after I had given it away.  

I was not going to post anything more about my R, feeling that I had told the story too many times already.  However, when my drawing was returned a few days ago on the anniversary of the day I met R in December 1966, there is something new to tell.  Another coincidence? (I had mentioned the first words of Homer's Odyssey on Valentine's Day of this year in connection with a dream visit from R).

"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe." (John Muir)


  









("Self-Portrait Of An Old Friend As A Young Man," chalk pastel on paper, 18 x 24, by am -- returned to me on December 14, 2017)

Addendum:  This morning I found an extraordinary cover of a lesser known Bob Dylan song.

Saturday, December 16, 2017

A song from the early 1980s by Bob Dylan sung in Italian



Included in the English lyrics is this which caught my attention today:

They say that patriotism is the last refuge
To which a scoundrel clings
Steal a little and they throw you in jail
Steal a lot and they make you king

Thursday, December 14, 2017

On the top of my list of books to read / The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia, by Masha Gessen



"Putin and Trump are 'a new generation of monsters' claims journalist, Masha Gessen.  In her new book, she argues the totalitarianism has gripped Russia again and discusses whether something similar could happen in the U.S." (from Channel 4 news on Facebook)

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

Shedding Light



Love the body of water sparkling and the birds singing as Laurie Anderson speaks to us.  Hope you enjoy this as much as I did.

And this:



Still, it is sobering that U.S. voters (given that only a portion of the population chooses to vote) are so evenly divided and polarized.  Life in the balance.  Light alternating with darkness.

Here's what Rachel Barenblat of Velveteen Rabbi wrote:

"Whatever clothing we wear, whatever persona we adopt, it's our job in this world to be human candles.  To shed light in the darkness, wherever we go."

Monday, December 11, 2017

Sweet Potatoes / Haiku / Four Generations / December 8, 2006 and Gratitude


I've been enjoying sweet potatoes on a daily basis for some years now. Currently, I cook several pounds of them for 10 hours in a slow cooker and keep them in the refrigerator until I am ready to slice and heat them in oil in a cast iron skillet.

Yesterday morning I discovered a haiku that I wrote last year on December 10:

December snow mixed with rain
Heart knows the way
One with the ocean



Today I am looking out at an ice fog.  It is 32 degrees outside.
















Yesterday I discovered this, too, written by an unknown person about Monarch butterflies:

These fragile creatures make a journey of thousands of miles, but it takes four generations to complete the trip.  No single butterfly ever flies the full route, yet somehow the species continues to pass on the pattern of migration.  If butterflies can be part of a pattern that they never fully know, I think that the same may be true for us.

My blog began on December 8, 2006, with the name "Old Girl Of The North Country." December 8, 1970, had been the day the man I loved returned from Vietnam, and early that morning I had to face the reality of the devastating consequences of war.  In December 2006, a perceptive woman suggested doing something different on that date that had been a source of emotional pain for the previous 36 years, since I had been 21 years old.  I made the decision to start a blog and post a retrospective of the art work I had done since 1966.  Here is what I posted for the month of December 2006.

Blogging has been a healing experience for me for 11 years now in this community of kindred spirits.  I am grateful to everyone who blogs along with me, no matter what happens, and much has happened in these 11 years.

Thank you!

If butterflies can be part of a pattern that they never fully know, I think that the same may be true for us.