THERE ARE TWO WAYS YOU may enjoy this pleasant mix of rusty recollections, offbeat observations, friendly particularism, tasty recipes, unpretentious poetry, and wry spirituality: The first is to browse the above links at your leisure, consult the categories below the…
Author: Neal Ross Attinson
Neal Ross Attinson is one of those text-compulsives who feels naked without a keyboard, or at least a a pad and pen. He is unafraid of adverbs, loves astronomy and gastronomy with equally unabashed passion, and lives with/in an eclectic library in Sonoma, California.
First Graf (rather, Line): The Lord of the Rings
OF THE 90% PETER JACKSON got right in his 11-hour and 22-minute adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s best-beloved work – the lush landscapes, the Balrog, Elves, the Nazgul, Sauron, Orcs and Uruk-hai, Gollum, Ents, hobbits (MY GHAWD! THE HOBBITS!!!), the Ring,…
One Letter (Alright, Two)
(If you’re not hot for stretchy, out-on-a-limb Jewish linguistic mysticism, best sit this one out. Otherwise, please enjoy.) IT’S NO SECRET THAT JEWS love words. (After all, Torah begins with “God” speaking the world into being; if you need further…
Silence is the language of God. Everything else is a poor translation.”
— Rumi
Pithyism #0001
IF YOU WANT YOUR NEW and unprecedented Big Event to be a sure-fire failure, bill it as the “First Annual.”
Words to Bring Back (or in this case, Forth): “Wonderpiece”
– Definition: n That creation which evokes awe in the beholder. – Used in a sentence: Have you ever heard Dr. King’s “I Have A Dream” wonderpiece in its entirety? – Why: Though arguably a mere synonym for “art” (at…
Pithyism #5a
OPPOSABLE THUMBS ARE TO HANDS as language is to brains.
Where Are You Most You?
IN CARLOS CASTANEDA’S EPIC FANTASY, The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, his titular shaman Don Juan Matus describes “places of power” — those locations where we can experience deep wisdom and indomitable purpose. No two are…
I’m In (Finally)
IT HAPPENED AS AN ALL-AT-ONCE thunderbolt moment that I wasn’t expecting, but it’s here and I can’t go back: I am now an enthusiastic and sincere convert. Yes, it’s true. Despite my longtime denials and aspersions, the undeniable fact has…
Minute Mitzvah: ALL ONE ALL ONE OK OK!!!
Today’s Task: Know that “God” is One. My dead psychic twin Sputnik, who rediscovered his natal Christian faith around the same time I came back to Judaism, was fond of saying, “Monotheism is not for wimps.” By that he meant…
“Room 101 Amusement Park”
RELAXING IN PUBLIC CAN SOMETIMES bring unexpected consequences. Seated in the Walnut Creek BART station in the spring of 1980, I was reading my well-thumbed copy of 1984. So engrossed was I in Orwell’s pessimistic prose that I didn’t hear…
365 Names of God: “The One Who Spoke and the World Came Into Being”
THE ONE WHO SPOKE AND THE WORLD CAME INTO BEING expresses a pretty profound metaphor, at least to those students of the Torah unbothered by anthropomorphism. Think about the many possible ways to spin a creation myth: divine entities dreaming…