Celestial freighter

Jill’s stepdad died peacefully yesterday at 90. A retired merchant marine officer, Ed Jorosik was also a devout Catholic, who attended mass regularly. Whatever his full and actual acceptance of church doctrine and belief, his daily prayers, best wishes for all, and warm inner being  made him a delightful person to be around–not to mention the infectiousness women noted in his twinkling blue eyes. He was a loving and devoted husband to Jill’s late mom Shireen, a favorite uncle, and friend to many.

Ed passed in the wee morning hours. At 10:30 that night, while driving home to New Bedford from Marion, I crossed the New Bedford-Fairhaven Bridge and saw a freighter tied up at State Pier. It was lit up, as was much of our famed fishing fleet. I could not help think in a spiritual sort of way that a celestial freighter was there to take on Ed’s soul, weigh anchor, and cruise the cosmos.

What’s in a name?

I just heard yesterday of an important governmental name change in New Bedford, or as I call it, Whale Town.

The long time New Bedford Harbor Development Commission is now the New Bedford Port Authority. It is a better name and more inclusive of what goes on, not just waterway improvement like dredging or building docks, but the bigger picture of more freighter traffic, more cruise ships, more pleasure boats, and jurisdiction over tugs, barges, dock fees, bridge, and so on.

At least, this is how I see it. Think of the New York-New Jersey Port Authority with its management of bridges, tunnels, transit lines, and bus terminal. It is not the Hudson River Commission!

The name change is another sign of Whale Town moving up every day into the regional, even national, economic and cultural spotlight.

Art rules the soul

Sometimes we think, overthink, then think some more,

And write dense tracts to impress, but in the end bore;

Simplicity is the key that unlocks the spirit and soul,

Revealing the true Tao is the goal.

Forgive my own bad poetry above, but I want to make a point about the practice and attainment of Tao. It requires quoting parts of Daily Meditation #63 (the 63rd day of the year), from the book Tao Daily Meditations, by Deng Ming-Dao (Harper SanFrancisco, 1992):

Knowledge of Tao lodges in the same part of the mind as poetry. That is why the ancients expressed themselves in verse: There is the same quick perception.

When we are in touch with Tao, it is not our academic learning that is speaking, but the spirit of Tao itself . . . .That is why there is such a vast difference between the words of scholars and the words of a practitioner, just as the words of academics differ from the words of poets. . . . Followers of Tao frequently use writing, art, and even poetry as tools for self-discovery. . . .it helps them to understand the stages they are going through.

Once they can do this, it satisfies and neutralizes their rational minds. The process clears away intellectualism and leaves the true Tao, which is not subject to words or images.

The glass is half full

Steven Pinker, Harvard professor, cognitive psychologist, and prolific writer, tells us that things are pretty good around the world. His new book, Enlightenment Now, shares the optimistic news that life spans are longer, disease is down, and the world is more democratic. It sure does not seem like it, though.

Glance at newspapers (the few still alive and read), watch television news for a few minutes on all the omnipresent screens, or listen to the rants on talk radio, and one would conclude the earth is coming to an end or at least man’s place on it. It is easy to get down, blue, and depressed with news of bombings, shootings, violent weather, nasty human behavior on something as pleasant as a cruise ship or airplane, and vindictive finger pointing and acts of revenge. These are not the acts of advanced human beings.

However, I agree with Pinker. Put down the papers, turn off the news, mute Facebook and Twitter, and look around with a keen objective eye. Things generally are positive. Despite stalemate in Washington, the U.S. still has the most vibrant representative government in the world, young people flock to college to learn, disease is down in Africa, tourism is up as baby boomers retire and travel around the world, more people than ever are experiencing other cultures. All this progress can be quantified and cited, but something more is needed.

That something is optimism or–dare I say it–faith. There, I said it. Some see the word as outdated, a relic of a superstitious, religious world dazzled by the hocus pocus of saints, shamans, and sufis. But you know what? At least they look up to the heavens and within themselves, not down, blinded by the hocus pocus of screens. At least they strive to better themselves morally and ethically by setting a high bar–a very high bar. What is wrong with being society-centered?

Being society-centered, committed to improving life in a practical, utilitarian, secular, progressive sort of way is good. I support it. But there is something too cold, bloodless, and lab science-ish about it, as though we are lab mice and guinea pigs being put through mazes and prompted to push the right buttons to get a reward. Worse, though, there is no high bar standard, just some group’s view of what is right for the world.

Keep the high bar in place. No matter what you might think of priests, ministers, rabbis, concepts of heaven and hell, and religious hierarchy, keep the big picture in mind. The next time you pass a church, do not rant that its steeple and stained glass is an affront to atheistic views and a blot on a secular community, but see it as man’s continuing faith in something bigger than ourselves, a high standard to reach.

 

Ideals Go To Washington

I almost had nothing to write at 11:30 p.m., on this Friday, my regular deadline for the Whale Town blog; nothing, that is, until I watched the film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. That fine old 1939, black-and-white, iconic film about virtue and honesty made me feel better than I have all week.

Briefly, in the film James Stewart plays a clean-living, idealistic young man who is appointed by party bosses to fill a U.S. Senate seat, thinking that he will naively follow along and obey their wishes. He does not do so when he finds out that his pet project of building a boys camp in the wilderness conflicts with bosses’ plans to build a dam on the same spot. They nearly crush him, but goodness wins out–after all, it is a 1939 film, with a Hollywood ending. Not like real life.

One can take real life for just so long, however. News out of Congress, the White House, the FBI; news about Russian and Chinese meddling in U.S. affairs; news of sex scandals, school shootings, and terrorism get to us after awhile, and we yearn for something sweet and honest. Finger pointing, poking fun at others’ religion, revenge, petty vindictiveness, and grandstanding, are just plain nauseating. And you know what? It causes one big headache, the wish to tell everyone to shut up, and a desire to be alone listening to classical music or the sound of nature.

Words fail me

Much stupid news lately,

Everywhere I look;

It causes my thoughts,

my words and ideas–

boxcars of wisdom–

to derail in heaps.

 

 

Stick to the agenda

Channel surfing last night, about 8:30 or so, I came upon C-SPAN’s live coverage of an energy and climate change lecture, at George Washington University, in Washington, D.C. I put down the remote to watch for awhile; it is an important subject, after all. A few moments later though I grew disgusted and angry at what I saw and heard.

First, out onto the stage danced a black chorus from Howard University, dressed like gospel singers, to sing and clap their way through a plea for less fossil fuel, renewable energy, and environmental justice. Okay, I thought, music never hurts a cause and it galvanized the audience. Then the emcee introduced a guest speaker–Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. The college students went nuts–cheering and clapping for the progressive legislator and candidate for the presidential nomination. Okay, I thought, he fights for the environment and clean energy. He’s a hero to the young. However, he went too far.

Senator Sanders strayed from the subject of the environment to the whole litany of progressive politics that he touted in the presidential campaign: free universal health care, free public college tuition, equal pay, fifteen-dollar minimum wage. What did that have to do with an energy and climate change lecture?

Next up came the founder of the Hip Hop Caucus, Rev. Lennox Yearwood, in tandem with Bill McKibben, environmental activist, journalist and author.  It was when they flashed a picture of Donald Trump on a screen behind them, which inspired a spate of boos and hisses from the audience, that I wondered who sponsored this lecture. Come to find out, it was 350.org, McKibben’s anti-carbon campaign group. Yearwood’s goal is to inspire the hip hop generation to get involved in the political and government process to free us from fossil fuel, make the world a clean place, and protect us from climate change.

That is as far as I watched. Try as I might, because I do care about clean energy, I could not stomach what I saw as the irresponsible divisiveness that the left does so well. Less dependence on oil and coal, more renewable energy, and awareness of how to limit the effects of climate change–no matter what the cause, man-made or natural–are worthy topics of serious, scientific, policy talk, but nasty comments and scapegoating is a cheap shot. The left should stick to the agenda and try to convince opponents of the correctness of their cause.

Frederick Douglass Anniversary

Big doings in New Bedford–my Whale Town–this year. It is the 200th anniversary of the birth in slavery of Frederick Douglass. The town has lined up numerous events to celebrate the occasion, in addition to the annual reading of The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass.

Douglass escaped captivity in Maryland and made his way north to the safety of New Bedford where he lived with a local couple, worked on the docks, and befriended many in the Quaker community.

As many know from history, Frederick Douglass became a powerful abolitionist speaker in New England, gained the respect of many in government, and late in his career was named ambassador to Haiti.

The color wheel

Spin the color wheel. Where she stops nobody knows.

Artists, decorators, and photographers are familiar with the color wheel. It is a circular arrangement of colors to make visual pairing and mixing of color easier. For instance, primary red, blue, and yellow, are illustrated alongside their combined  complementary colors of purple, green, and orange. Next to them are combined tertiary colors (primary plus complementary) of red-purple, and yellow-green, for instance.

Black and white are not illustrated on the wheel, but here is the interesting thing: spin the wheel fast and all the colors will blur. We know too that all colors of light combine to form white (white light refracts in a prism to form a rainbow of color), and that absence of white light is black.

The idea here is two-fold. First,  just as Buddhists spin a prayer wheel and chant, spin a color wheel and meditate on the fact that color is illusory and unimportant. It all combines in the great game of life. Second, consider that black is the objective, non-judgmental absence of color; in other words, black is universal and unbiased.

My thesis here is to avoid and ignore the distracting polarization of whites and blacks in the U.S. It is a phony, manufactured crisis by politicians and agenda-driven activists. Instead, spread the liberating and uniting concept that whites contain all color, therefore must be for everyone, and spread the even more liberating and uniting concept that blacks are the universal lack of any prejudicial color.

People are people.

The color black

I like the color black. It is my favorite color, so please do not politicize it.

Black furnishings, décor, and especially clothing, for me is meditative and soothing. In some Asian cultures it represents life, not death, and wisdom. Oddly, it is also for me the exciting theatrical color of stage hands, choreographers, dancers, and formal-dressed, tuxedo-ed opening nighters. Not least of all, it makes me look slim.

The next time I wear black to teach my writing and public speaking courses, I do not want people to think I am making a political statement in favor of Black Lives Matter or the MeToo women’s protest, no matter what I think of those activist movements.

When Democratic members of the U.S. House wear black at this month’s State of the Union Address, in sympathy with sexually harassed and abused women, it will be for purely political reasons, not an emblem of calm, spiritual wisdom and learning.