November 02-A, 2022

Family Outing 06/24/2011 Oil Paint Rendered — 399 and Cubs, Grand Teton National Park, Jackson, Wyoming
Do you think bears 
think of quitting?
Or, considering their chances
and thinking of folding up?

Checking out?
Because it's just too much?

Or pelicans?

Chipmunks?

Things aren't going their way?
Do you think they ever think 
about things not going their way?

I think they just wake up 
and go meet the day,
every day,
for no reason,
without ever thinking about reasons
for what they do.

They just do what needs to be done.
Every day.

Do you think it is harder to be us
than it is to be an elephant?

Do walruses ever cheer themselves up
by saying, "At least I'm not a human being!"?

–0–

November 01-C, 2022

Two Mallards in Flight 03/29/2013 Oil Paint Rendered — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, North Carolina
What I know of monastic life
consists of chants and prayers,
sitting zazen,
daily chores,
eating and sleeping.

It's pretty much busy-work
to keep their mind off their life
in an "idle hands
are the devil's workshop"
kind of way.

How to fill the time
is every teacher-master's nightmare.

There is only so much to say,
then there is getting it/doing it
in ways that express/exhibit it
while "holding body and soul together."

It is boring beyond bearing.
Beyond imagining.
Beyond belief.

And is only done
for lack of anything better to do.

The monastic life
reminds me of the AA life.
After sobriety, what?
We go to meetings to stay sober
to do what?
Go to more meetings to stay sober.
What are we doing with sobriety?
What are we doing with spirituality?

Self-realization-expression-exhibition.

That is what our life is about.

Self-realization-expression-exhibition.

What are you doing,
regularly,
steadily,
reliably
that falls into the category
of self-realization-expression-exhibition?

That's it!
Keep it up!
Life is the opportunity
for self-realization-expression-exhibition!

–0–

November 01-B, 2022

Black-eyed Susan Oil Paint Rendered
We live our life
finding our life
and living it.

Seeking our life
and settling into it.

Coming to be who we are.

This is the Tao
at work in our life,
getting us together with our life,
over the time left for living.

Teaching us the keys
to balance and harmony,
knowing when we are within
the Zone of Awareness,
At One With Who We Are,
and when we are outside of it,
looking for it,
not clear about what it is
and what it isn't,
seeking the boundaries,
the landmarks,
the lines
separating us from not-us,
living between Yin and Yang,
narrowing the distance,
expanding our horizons,
becoming one with all things
by being just as we are,
with our "just so-ness"
merging with everything's "just so-ness,"
and being at peace at last,
in a "This Too, This Too," 
"Thou Art That," 
"Neti Neti," kind of way.

–0–

November 01-A, 2022

Ramsey Creek 02 11/07/2011 Oil Paint Rendered — Great Smoky Mountain National Park, Greenbriar District, Cosby, Tennessee
We keep hoping to find it,
when it is all a matter of being it.

We bring it forth.
We do not stumble upon it,
dig it out of the ground,
find the buried treasure.

We are the treasure.
The treasure is buried in us!

We have to turn the light around
and get busy living in light 
of a different goal.

The goal of aligning ourselves
with our original/essential nature
and the innate virtues/character
that are ours from conception.

Being who we are!

Listening to our heart,
to our stomach,
to our bones,
to our nighttime dreams--
all of the things arising
from within,
from our own body!
Our own soul!

Bringing those things to life in our life.
Learning to dance
and play,
laugh and sing,
enjoy our lives,
ourselves
and one another.

Just being ourselves just as we are,
alive in our life,
and glad to be here,
doing our thing
as only we can do it,
all our life long.

Living like that
is having it made!

–0–

November, 1st Week, 2022

Flat Branch Greenway 05 20/29/2022 Oil Paint Rendered — Charlotte, North Carolina
It is never any more difficult
than stepping into the day
and doing what needs to be done there.

We clutter things up
with plans
and agendas,
willing this,
wanting that,
wondering "When is it
going to be our turn?"--
waiting for something to happen
that will be like a gift
from some fairy godmother,
not listening,
not looking,
not hearing,
not seeing,
and hating the same old same old
all the way to tomorrow
through all the tomorrows
in our allotment.

The shift happens
when we open ourselves
to the present moment,
see what needs to be done
and do it,
in all of the here/now's in a day.

That's the magical formula
for turning things around,
personally and collectively,
and it is always right there
to see and to do,
transforming our life
and changing the world
for the low, low price
of seeing/doing.

–0–

October 31-B, 2022

Banff Depot 02 09/19/2009 Oil Paint Rendered — Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Banff, Alberta
There have been 
wrongs without reckoning
throughout the history of the species.
Bearing witness to injustice
is all that is left 
to mark the occasions
and call out the offenses 
of all crimes against humanity,
from the beginning until now.

It would take the rest of time,
just naming them.

There needs to be a Wailing Wall
in every hamlet, village, settlement
where people gather
promising to do right by one another,
and do wrong,
where annually read are the names
of the oppressors and the oppressed,
to mark what has happened
for all to remember and mourn.

Mourning is all that is left us
who know what has been done
and refuse to let it die.

We need rituals of remembrance
to call out again
the names of those 
with no shame,
no remorse,
no regret,
damned to be seen
and shown to be who they are
publicly,
year after year
through all the ages of remembering
without forgetting
the appalling, horrendous, abhorrent
and abdominal,
declaring forever,
"We know who you are!
We know what you have done!"

–0–

October 31-A, 2022

Sunrise in the Smokies 11/02/2005 Oil Paint Rendered — The Road to Clingman’s Dome Parking Lot, Great Smoky Mountains National Park,
Cherokee, North Carolina
There is what we do to pay the bills,
and there is what we pay the bills to do.

What do you pay the bills to do?
What do you live to do?
Doing what is life itself for you?

Spending your money in the right ways
is important,
and spending your time in the right ways
is more important.

Spending money cannot off-set
time poorly spent.

If you are not spending enough time
in the service of what you love to do--
in doing the things
that make your little heart sing
and your little toes dance--
you are an enemy
of your own soul and spirit,
and it is time you repented
and redeemed yourself
by doing the things you were born to do
throughout the time left for living.
--0--

October 30-A, 2022

Poppies 01 09/22/2009 oil Paint rendered — The Gardens at Lake Louise, Banff National Park, Alberta
We make the best of it for no reason.
Or, we make up our own reasons,
and make the best of it for that.

Making the best of it
brings forth the best in us,
and that is an excellent reason
for doing it.

For doing the best we can,
and making sure it is really
the best we can do.

Why not give our best effort
at all times?
Why hold anything back?
Why not water the lawn
as though it matters?
Why not do everything we do
as though it matters?

Whether it matters or not?

It matters to the lawn!
Why can't we let that be enough?

Water the lawn 
for the sake of the lawn,
whether anyone notices or not.

Do everything that way.
Wash the dishes that way.
Make up the bed that way.
Etc. throughout the day
every day.

Dust never takes a day off.
What does dust get out of it?

Why not be like dust?

Giving it our best shot every day,
for no reason.

October 29-B, 2022

Atlantic Dawn 10/26/2008 Oil Paint Rendered — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, North Carolina
Oscar Wilde said, 
“A bore is someone who 
deprives you of solitude 
without providing you with company.”

Who talks constantly
without saying anything.

Robert Burns could have
had them in mind 
with his,
“O, wad some Power the giftie gie us. 
To see oursels as ithers see us!"

Seeing ourselves clearly,
accurately,
just as we are,
would likely transform us
just as we are,
and enable us,
finally,
to simply be just as we are.

First, the seeing.

How do people who think they see,
come to see
they don't see at all?

That was Jesus' problem,
how to get people to see
who think they see.

He was reported 
to open the eyes of the blind,
but couldn't do anything
with eyes that see without seeing.

His advice was,
"If they don't receive 
what you have to say
in one town,
go on the the next."

Changing locations
changes audiences,
and people in one place
can see things 
that people in the last place
couldn't fathom.

Meaning, I take it,
that everything depends
on where we come from
and what we do with it
wherever we go.

How far can we go/grow
from where we have been?

How different can we be?

Let's live to see!

–0–

October 29-A, 2022

Queen Anne’s Lace, Blue Sky 07/04/2009 Oil Paint Rendered — Blue Ridge Parkway, Blowing Rock, North Carolina
Our work is that of 
changing our mind about what's important
until we get it right
in each situation as it arises,
and do that,
no matter what,
when, where and how it needs to be done,
letting that be that
as we move on into the next situation.

Not keeping score,
not remembering outcomes,
not planning strategies,
not thinking about winning...

Just being right about what's important,
and living in ways which serve that,
situation by situation,
all our life long.

It may not sound like much,
but everything hangs on it.

Knowing what's important
and serving it,
anyway, nevertheless, even so,
is the most important thing there is ever.

–0–

October 28-B, 2022

Moraine Lake 09/23/2009 Oil Paint Rendered — Banff National Park, Alberta
The sun rises in the east
and sets in the west
with no objections 
regarding the sameness 
of its ritual.

The tides and the seasons 
come and go
as though for the first time
every time.

We whine about the same-old-same-old,
and thirst for the novelty
of the latest thing.

Spare me of us!

I am so tired of the ever-recurring whine
for something new,
something different,
something more!

Life is new every day!

Nothing has ever been done
in THIS day!
In THIS way on THIS day!

The Sisyphean task 
is to give it our best,
as though for the first time,
no matter how many times it has been,
or will be.
And make it a better best
than any best ever!

–0–