It is a new year after all.
Makes me wonder about all those other “new” years. I never felt they were new per se so it wasn’t that I got duped the last decade with the habitual hype at the end of the year. It is just that I couldn’t participate as authentically as I would have liked because I knew better in my bones. But this year is finally new.
new | n(y)oō |
adjective
1. not existing before; made, introduced, or discovered recently or now for the first time
2. already existing but seen, experienced, or acquired recently or now for the first time
3. just beginning and regarded as better than what went ... read more »
Tagged 2012, art, choices, ibn sina, life, non-fiction stories, process of writing, relating
December 18, 2011.
Herman Hesse’s Demian. “Tug on Anything at all…” A fortune-teller who could tell all but one thing.
It’s not easy to leave New York City. A stranger-friend, an Italian Ph.D. student, must return to Italy tomorrow as her yearlong fellowship is finally over. And she is not ready. I don’t think those who come to New York City for anything but an idea can ever leave that idea behind. At worst we carry that idea that is New York City with us wherever we go. At best, we return again. And again.
Love is a hard idea to give up.
What will she miss the most, I asked her? She held back ... read more »
Tagged choices, herman hesse, life, non-fiction stories, nyc, questions, relating, sublime flux
Still Sundays.
October 23rd.
This Sunday I want to share Stillness with another all day long. I’ll take Stillness in any form but it is some fiesta when there is two (or more) to honor the muchness of nothing but together.
When we were growing up and even now when we all gather at our parents’ farmhouse Stillness serves as a blanket as well as a straw. In the hours of the morning everyone sits in the living room to have meaningless conversations—”No one really wears socks that color with a suit!”—to a profound statement thrown into the living-room air like a boomerang: “One can’t truly articulate actual self-realization.”
It’s as if the morning Stillness over ... read more »
Tagged life, non-fiction stories, questions, relating
August 28, 2011.
Perceptions that hula-hoop around reality: social media and beyond. Little boy who wouldn’t stop crying on bus. Walter from Verdi Square knows with certainty…
It’s truly a still Sunday here in New York City this morning. Not a sound from a dog, car, child…neither near nor from afar. Usually in order to capture this temperament of quietude I have to be up around 6:00 a.m. given by 9:00 a.m. the seal of stillness begins to pop, someone crunching a bag of potato chips in an empty hallway.
Yet somehow this is the least still it has ever been because of the tropical storm. The leaves are speaking loudly to the wind. I ... read more »
Tagged life, non-fiction stories, nyc, social media, twitter
August 21, 2011.
Normal is another world phenomenon; Helping the exceptions stand out for all of us in ANY form is art; From the memory box: desert sky and Wilma Rudolph. The foremost task of education.
Stillness is a flower that doesn’t always have a fragrance. Or perhaps the perfume is sans alcohol so one has to be really sober to take it all in. Similar to a real yoga practice, what comes forth is not always bliss but gunk. But if you allow some space and don’t hold on, the gunk slides away, and real bliss doesn’t always feel like happiness but it surely feels like freedom.
Today’s Sunday is some shy rapture. It’s raining ... read more »
Tagged art, choices, education, life, memory box, non-fiction stories, relating, wilma rudolph
