Category: Life

Each moment is different. Here are some of mine.

“The Guest House”

SOMEONE WHO LOVES ME SENT me this poem. I offer it to you in the same spirit.

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
As an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

(By the 13th-century Persian Sufi poet Jalal al-Din Rumi. Coleman Barks is the translator, but the original was written in Truth.)

I Am a Religious Man Unthreatened By Science, Secularity And Reason

I Am a Religious Man Unthreatened By Science, Secularity And Reason • 2011.06.09 • 400 words

(IN FACT, THE WHOLE “REASON” I “am” “religious” in the first place is only due to a direct perception [some might say delusion] that the Universe is, in some essential and indescribable sense, alive and conscious. I can’t help seeing that, feeling a part of it, and celebrating it.)

(Also, as much as I love science [and I do!], I’m even more fascinated by rituals and customs, folkways, folklore, manners, stories, legends, and myths. Continue reading “I Am a Religious Man Unthreatened By Science, Secularity And Reason”

Brian “Farwell” Eaton, A”H (RIP)

Brian Farwell A"H
MY FRIEND BRIAN FARWELL DIED May 25, and as his face was more familiar than his name to the folks in our little Anatevka-among-the-vines I volunteered to post his photo here. (This photo was taken in January 2010, at Congregation Shir Shalom‘s Tu B’Shevat seder; Brian was seated, as usual, next to then-Rabbi Jack Gabriel.) Like many of my friends, Brian faced some difficult challenges but he was a big man with a big heart and an unquenchable thirst for both knowledge and laughter. His funeral will be in Burlingame Hall at 11 a.m., Monday, June 20. May Brian be remembered among those aspiring to righteousness in Israel and the world.

Toward A Topography Of Dreams

THIS IS LESS A POST than an invitation to share hidden landscapes.

Within the past year or so, and due partly to an almost chronic drowsiness, I began noticing that a significant number of my dreams are set in a handful of recurring locations. The dreams themselves are not repetitious; that is, the circumstances within each setting is different, but the settings themselves are the same — lending to the experience a curious sense of permanence or visitation:

– At (a) Renaissance Pleasure Faire, in the large tree-bordered parking lot; the Faire often recedes as I approach, or is over by the time I make it inside
– A bustling airport, to which I arrived via BART, and whose airplanes have couch seating
– Beach resort alongside a straight highway
– “The towns south:” a forested drive through a number of small California towns, eventually leading to a series of Southern California beach resorts
– High rise hotel with a series of terraced balconies; restaurant at the top
– The Endless Cemetery (ornate crypts & sarcophagi)
– An unknown suburb of Sonoma, sometimes on fire
– Back corridors of the world’s biggest shopping mall

Am I the only one with assigned seating? What are your recurring dreamscapes?

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