I have not been around the stream much lately. I simply have not had the time (or the brainpower) required to “do the rounds”, much less for writing any serious posts. The truth of it is I am preoccupied with many things recently, and most of my free-time has been spent either in a reclined and snoring position or taking care of my very ill wife.

If it sounds like I am making excuses, I am.

To tell the truth, I have been a walking example of the old saying “life gets in the way” of late. When I do find myself with a few moments of repose my brain seems to go into “sleep” mode and nary a sensible sentence is produced. When one loves stringing words together as much as I this is a terrible predicament to find oneself in.  

I’ve not felt very poetic lately. Nor have I felt very introspective. Anyone who is even a little familiar with the things I write can understand that a non-poetic, non-introspective “wayfarer” is a very non-productive “wayfarer”. Even writing this simple “catch up” post is proving to be well nigh impossible.

But anyway, that’s enough belly aching (whining just doesn’t become me.) Just to let you all know that all is relatively well and flowing smoothly here at the “Hovel” I thought I’d share some recent photos of our two ambassadors of good will, Jesse and Skeeter W. Pug, Esqs:

Jesse

Skeeter

Hopefully, I will be back in full in a few days, but until then thank you to all who have been checking in! Please think a good thought for Mrs. w, she really has not been feeling well of late and I’m sure she would appreciate the good thoughts.

Now, let’s see if I can get around to some blogs...

peace, wayf

p/s:

Upon posting this message, I found that Taylor has left me some instructions in my comments to go around and tell my favorite bloggers how much I appreciate them. To be honest, if I were to attempt to go around to every blogger I admired and respected, I'd be on the internet until next week some time. The way I see it, everyone of you are a unique and sparkling jewel who deserves all the accolades one could possibly get.

I love you all, and that's real.

Beauty: Is it confined to sunsets and budding flowers; to majestic, panoramic vistas of nature’s glory? Is beauty only in the vivid colors and flowing words of art and poetry?  Could you find beauty in destruction; in the symbols of the finitude of all that you see? In the barren landscape of a dry desert?  Could you find beauty in a bleached white skull whose black, empty eye sockets reflect back upon you the abyss that you know your own life will ultimately reach?

Even in the most beautiful of creatures there is a bit of ugliness, ravenousness, savagery. Even the plant has the capacity to do harm to those who would harm it. The sky itself, at times visiting upon us magical and awe inspiring scenes, must occasionally bring down upon the earth the most terrible and vicious of calamities.

There is no beauty without ugliness, no ugliness without beauty.

Sunsets bring on darkness.

Budding flowers are but the first stages of a dying life.

Art and poetry are only the skeletons of a reality that they will never touch.

The barren desert at sunset presents you with the most splendid array of colors you have ever seen.

The grotesque skull’s vacuous eyes serve as a reminder to us that we are—every one of us—essentially the same below the surface.

And, in all of this, there lies an unspoiled, perfect beauty which is unsurpassed by any thing we can feebly call “beautiful”. In this, there is the wisdom that our intellects can never touch; a level of mercy that our own good will can never reach. This is the “that” which we constantly contrive to fit our definitions, and which constantly foils our plans. You may not see it. You may doubt it. You may laugh at me for saying it is so. This, too, is part of that beauty.

What business is it of mine whether you think me a fool or a sage? I know I am neither; I am merely a speck within this universal beauty.

peace, wayf

“If the doors of perception were cleansed, said Blake, everything would appear to man as it is—Infinite. But the doors of perception are hung with the cobwebs of thought; prejudice, cowardice, sloth. Eternity is with us, inviting our contemplation perpetually, but we are too frightened, lazy, and suspicious to respond: too arrogant to still our thought, and let divine sensation have its way. It needs industry and goodwill if we would make that transition: for the process involves a veritable spring-cleaning of the soul, a turning-out and rearrangement of our mental furniture, a wide opening of closed windows, that the notes of the wild birds beyond our garden may come to us fully charged with wonder and freshness, and drown with their music the noise of the gramophone within.

Those who do this discover that they have lived in a stuffy world, whilst their inheritance was a world of morning-glory; where every tit-mouse is a celestial messenger, and every thrusting bud is charged with the full significance of life.”

-Evelyn Underhill, “Practical Mysticism”

peace, wayf

Having recently started a new job, I have had the occasion to once again observe that which I feel is the most interesting of subjects—human nature. Was I so frivolous in my youth as the young ones of today? Did I spend so many hours engaged in menial and mind-numbing diversions? Was I as boastful and arrogant in my youth as these young men I find myself surrounded by now on a nightly basis? Sadly, the answer is yes, I was.

Time has a way of catching up to us, and soon, we all forget that we were once young enough to think that the world needed and depended upon us. Once upon a time, we all felt as if the proper way to assert our value was to shout it out at the top of our lungs to deaf ears. I now find myself in the position of those older than I that had the misfortune of working around me when I was young; shaking my head in utter disbelief that someone who does so little could actually find cause to be so belligerently conceited. The irony and humor of an eighteen year old expounding on the requirements of manhood does not escape me in the least. And I nod my head, bite my tongue, and continue to do my job to the best of my ability. “It will catch up to you one day, young man,” I think, “it certainly has caught me.”

I don’t wish to send the wrong impression; I am not looking down my nose at these young men I find myself working with. They are all hard workers, indeed. But I cannot help but chuckle a little under my breath when I hear them speak so proudly of their hard work and I think of the things that I have endured. I do not blow my own horn when it comes to such matters, but you must believe me when I tell you that to say I have went “above and beyond” for the companies I have worked for in the past is the height of understatement. I am good at what I do, and I take great pride in a job well done. My point here is that these young fellows have not yet had the opportunity to test their mettle—to run the “gauntlet”—in the way I have. The arrogance of youth, however, will not allow their eyes to see this. In my youth, I know I was the very same as these fellows. I am thankful for the experience and “hard knocks” education I have received in my years as a member of the work-force, for it allows me to see the innocence in their boisterousness.

I see myself in my co-workers. I think back to my days in an ice-cream warehouse, throwing cases of ice-cream at break-neck speed in sub-zero temperatures. We worked hard and long in those days. Our joints prematurely arthritic from the constant exposure to twenty below zero temperatures. As hard as the guys I work with now work, I do not believe that they could pass muster in the freezer game. It is not for the light-hearted. Your hands stay frost-bitten, your knees constantly ache, the summer sun makes you feel as if you will vomit when it hits you after having spent two solid hours in the bitter cold of that vault. That’s hard knocks. You constantly push yourself in a test of endurance to beat the “quota”. First, 200 cases in an hour, then 250, 300, 400—your bones ache, your head hurts, your face is frozen in a grimace from the arctic climate, and, yet, you push yourself further. It’s not a world for the weak, it is a world in which only the strongest (or craziest) survive. I spent forty to sixty hours a week for thirteen years in that freezer. I was good. I thought I was better than I was, and I voiced my opinion on that every chance I got. Now I know what the older guys were thinking. Now, I am standing in their shoes.

I learned a great deal in those days. Chief among the things I learned is that I do not want to work in an ice cream warehouse again except as a last resort. The second thing I learned is that the company doesn’t really care about anything except having a warm body to move their product (and that this fact is a universal one.) For forty hours a week, you sell your time to your employer. By all means, you do the best job you can, but boasting and high opinions of one’s self tend to pave the way out of the door. If your opinion of yourself begins to exceed the amount of work you actually do the company finds a new, warmer, body to take your place. One of my supervisors once told me: “You don’t get paid to think; you get paid to react.” Ah! But the glories of youth prevented me from seeing just how true that was. I see it all too plainly now.

The group of fellows I work with now are all very nice. They’re a good bunch of guys with good heads on their shoulders. My wish is that they shall never have to run the gauntlet that I have in my life. I hope that they all find nice office jobs that pay well and that do not beat their bodies into submission to premature aging. I hope that they will not have the permanently sore back and aching joints that I have now. I wish these young men only the best that life has to offer. But, tonight, when the bragging starts, I’ll be smiling a small, ironical smile, thinking of that cold, forbidding ice cream vault and remembering fondly my own youthful exuberance.

peace, wayf

"Zero=infinity, infinity=zero."-D.T. Suzuki

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Poised at the gate of eternity

With a head full of useless thoughts

The universe embraces me

Freedom found in being caught

Nothing can explain

No words can justice do

This reality without a name

This light through and through

So I stand feeble and weak

At the gateway of a new dawning

In my frailty, courage not to speak

The void, before me, widely yawning

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

peace, wayf