Dear Streamers,

I’ve toyed with the idea of closing this blog.

These considerations are due to my inability to find time to post, and my inability to come up with anything worthwhile to write when I do find time. I have decided that it would just be useless to close it out entirely, since I would only be opening it back up when I found something to say. So, the blog will stay, though I may be in absentia for the most part. I will do my best to post at least something once week in the interim.

Mrs. w still is not feeling her best most days, but she feels much better than she did. I find the helplessness that I feel in this situation rather disquieting and it has been a subject of great consternation for me lately. I know that things will work out—that is what “things” do, after all—but I just wish that I could wave a wand or something and all of this would disappear. I do not want her to be ill anymore. Without trials, however, we humans tend to think we have more control over situations than we actually do. I will continue to do the only thing I can for her; love her with every ounce of my being.

I came across a copy of a translation of the Tao Te Ching which I felt I would never find, since it has been out of print since the seventies. It is Lin Yutang’s “The Wisdom of Laotse (Lao Tzu)”, and it is one of the best efforts at a “literal” translation I have ever read. Dr. Lin used Chuang Tzu’s writings as commentary on the Tao Te Ching rather than making his own comments on the text. This works very well for me. Rather than reading the opinion of a philosophy professor, one gets the chance to see how the actual philosophy of Taoism was formed from those two books. Dr. Lin’s textual notes provide a very good historical and linguistic resource that helps one to grasp the meaning behind some of the more difficult passages, as well. This book should still be in print, and I find it odd that no one has attempted to renew the copyright on it.

Also, I have begun writing music again; mostly solo, finger-style guitar instrumentals with a bluesy twist. I have no idea what purpose this will serve me, but it is great fun and it passes the time between work and sleep very nicely, and, I must admit that it feels rather nice to be composing things again. If I can find a way to do it, I will try to get some of them posted here for those of you who are still reading.

In closing, I hope this note finds all of you well and in good spirits. Please forgive me if I do not visit your blogs as often as I once did. It is nothing personal: I just can’t put words together very well of late. Autumn is burgeoning, however, and I feel that once Mrs. w and I are able to get out in the real world this malaise will break. How I anxiously await the beautiful colors of fall! The hills down south will be absolutely beautiful and to witness them will most certainly help to wash away a bit of the world-weariness we currently feel.

Until next time, be good to yourselves and to one another...

peace, wayf

道