I must write about this tune, said the insistent small voice as if a small version of my younger self sat on my shoulder. The Cutting Crew tune came over the radio as I made my way before sunrise to the Geneva Starbucks neighborhood. There is something about this tune, the keyboard runs which…
Thursday, the sun threatens to illuminate which is a hint of a brighter afternoon. Wintertime in the Midwest. How can one resist absorbing the somber, gray, cold of the season? I must resist. Music is a proven tactic for sustaining creativity, the motivation for good work. I finished an essay written by Nietzsche which…
Midweek and I am unsure what to write. Uncertainty is the rule, the rule that overrides all else most of the time. Read a passage translated from Aristotle’s Ethics I 1094b which is famously and often quoted. The philosopher writes that we should measure our judgment to the particular topic at hand. Our expectations…
A quotation captured my imagination this morning. Consider that there are varieties of knowledge. The knowledge that is acquired by learning the proper names of the elements, by learning how they combine to form complex molecules, by learning the mathematics by which molecular chemistry is expressed – are all types of knowledge. Then there…
A new year, turn the page. We prefer predictability do we not? We cannot help ourselves. Each of us is a standard issue mammal, albeit a language enabled one. Like every living thing our bodies seek homeostasis, that delicate balance which makes living easier, an economy of energy exchange. Those undisturbed circumstances, you know…
Japanese: Oshōgatsu is the festival of year’s end and of a new beginning. The holiday is celebrated by gathering with family and friends to eat traditional foods. The feasting is typically preceded by the visit to a local temple where at the stroke of midnight one offers a coin to the deity. The temple…
Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the horizon? –The Gay Science by Friedrich Nietzsche To The Unknown God Once more, before I move on I am directing my gaze forward In loneliness, I am lifting my hands Up to Thee, to whom I flee, To whom I, from the deepest bottom of…
On occasion words come to “set my hair on fire.” It is one of my favorite metaphors to describe a life-changing experience. Poetry is a matter of words used to proper effect, to orient us as a compass needle to our position within the larger scheme of space and time. This poem by Cal…
I accompanied my granddaughter to a story telling event at the public library. The topic was the screech owl and raptors in general. The three story tellers were enthusiastic about their work rehabilitating injured raptors, returning the birds to the wild. I felt humbled in the presence of the birds which were gently removed…
[Sun-messenger] Lynn Xu Sun-messenger call Life to me slowly and all at once criss- crossing in that golden light Snail with your moving shroud Silver tree with your thousand roadways O dream hurry go past me This poem speaks to me and I cannot describe why. These are the shortest days, less…
