Today Is Your Happy Ever After

( from: mapmaker )

As we all know,

tomorrow is 12 21 2012.

Not a perfect palindrome, but nigh close to one.

And it is, according to interpretations of

ancient Mayan reports,

the End of the World.

I read somewhere, in fact, that 11:00 am is a time

to be wary of.

Now, I'm not certain if that accounts for

New Zealand Time,

Eastern Standard Time,

Lunar Standard Time,

Central Time,

Greenwich Mean Time,

or 

what to do about the 

International Dateline.

But either way, be on your best behavior,

because no one truly knows the hour,

but we do have the date,

and that's tomorrow.

Now, I don't mean to be flippant about this matter.

At a certain point in my blogging career,

I was pretty focused on getting folks to straighten up their acts.

Indeed, I wrote a rather naive entry about 11/11/11,

proposing that everyone should be on their best behavior from then until now,

and maybe, just maybe,

if this truly to be the judgement hour,

the Lord On High would forgive us for our transgressions,

if we were to correct them for a year.

But, judging by the events of the last year, 

no one paid attention.

Indeed, it sometimes appears

that evil has compounded,

reaching heights never imagined before.

I need

not give examples, just

fill in a few for yourself.  There are plenty.

( wikipedia )

Will the world end, though?

Come back on Saturday,

by then we'll know.

In the meantime, remember:

if the end is nigh,

today is the day to say

your goodbyes,

to say your "I'm sorry"s

to tell mom you love her so,

to sit in silence

and listen to snow~

I suspect we won't get off so easy,

we won't disappear in a big bang.

We'll do it to ourselves.

We'll destroy our planet,

we'll kill our children,

we'll refuse to compromise,

we'll perpetuate wars on

unsolvable problems,

we'll go on and on and on,

until someday, slowly, we'll realized 

we're dying,

and no one's coming to save us,

or command us,

or damn us.

Our cruelest judge,

when that time comes,

will be ourselves,

each solitary, self-hating self:

as we look in the mirror of our past deeds,

we'll see,

the evil has existed in you and me.

So, too, does the good.

The attitude I've taken,

and the reason I haven't written here for awhile

(that plus my terrible busy-ness!),

is because I believe

Today

is My Happy Ever After.

Every morning,

I wake up

is the day I've lived all my life to live.

And yes,

I've lived them,

one by one.

You, too.

As you prepare for Apocalypse,

live today as it is

your only day,

your happy ever after,

and every person you encounter

is here for your joy.

And then it won't matter

what happens tomorrow.

Because tomorrow will be

just another day

like today.

Do It Now

( greenprophet )

The simple problem of humanity

is that we've built a world

- our perfect world -

so well, it hides the world

whose very imperfections whisper

the secrets we all seek.

With each inhale,

with each exhale,

with each slumbering purr and fart,

our earth speaks

the mystery of her own creation,

and our creation too.

We fumbling creator creatures,

so self important in our mimicking

of the sublime voice that breathed us into life,

and 

in our petty perfecting of this temporary place

this material space

built with expendable ingredients,

that we don't see the aging mechanisms behind the curtain

on the stage of our pursuits.

( dogugaeshi )

Be brave now,

dear friends,

live simply on our planet home.

Now,

dear friends

Now.

On Purity & Perversity

"'t'will out! 't'will out!" (Othello  V:ii)

*

There is a point where the pure

meets the perverse,

and that is the place

                   of secrecy --

The place of hushed whispers

and slapped hands,

the place of shame

                                      and private penance.

The insiduous shadow of sin

creeps in

when childhood curiosity

meets adult greed, revenge

and guilt.

Come here,

little boy or gilr,

come here.

I know you just discovered

the feelings in that part of you

that no one ever talks

about.

You can talk about it --

             you can show it

                                        to me.

and I'll show you

            what I have, too --

just as someone

once had me do,

              I'll do

                   unto you.

But keep it quiet.

No one will know.

We live in a world,

                                          after all

where we all are led to believe

that only what we see

is true.

There is a point

where the pure

meets the perverse,

and that is the place

                         of secrecy.

* *

( pennstatecentral )

I woke up this morning to this story on the radio:

(click on radio for story - thanks to
NPR Morning Edition)

The recent revelations that a university football coach could abuse a child have yielded more admissions of childhood abuse then the pedophile priests ever did.  More and more men (and women) are coming forward with stories of how they, too, were abused -- by coaches, troop leaders, neighbors, uncles, friends.  Why does this incident spur this wave of admissions when pedophilic priests did not?

NPR claims that having this vice discovered in a college football locker room brings it into a more familiar realm and treads into the domain of what I would call secular manhood -- a sacred domain all its own.  In the USA in particular, the altar of the Sunday Football Game is visited far more regularly than the corner parish, and the communion of beer and chips shared with more reverence and passion than a thin tasteless wafer claiming to be the body of One Who Died For Our Sins.  Instead, the average American male opts to view the carnage of their favorite sport, again and again, sanctified and revitalized by those who live through it, week to week.

The Penn State story tears a hole into the ritual of manhood and carnage we call American Football, and this NPR story seems to suggest that, thanks to this, during those commercial breaks, more men, women, boys and girls are finding words for secrets they've hidden far too long.  In some cases, these secrets may have festered and produced self doubt and castigation, and ultimately created more victimizers, and more victims.  Seeing not only the perpetrator but also other coaches and a university president pay the price for this indiscretion helps the victim see that they were indeed a victim, and that society will sympathize with them.  There is something terrifically refreshing about this, because once a victim can identify his own victimhood, and realize that those who victimized them were indeed wrong, then that individual can take positive steps down the path of healing.

Meanwhile, as the NPR story says, there was little to no retribution in the church.  Pedophile priests were "outed" and for a day or two, they were the talk of the town, but then they were shuffled back behind the sacred veil of secrecy and silence.  Some returned to active congregations.  Some may have been defrocked, but no charges were filed.  Most recently, the Vatican initiated liturgical reforms that some argue reinstate language that takes steps back towards obscuring what is happening in the mass.  Language itself can be a barrier to hide behind: cryptic language makes true understanding and personal interpretation less possible for the average church goer, and restores the power of translation and interpretation to the priests, thus diverting attention away from those nasty little stories about priests and altar boys and replacing it with a reverence for the priest's specialized access to sacred knowledge.

~ ~

( christmasideas )

Meanwhile, a wounding contradiction festers.

At the core of Christianity is the fetishization of innocence
and purity :  the return of the child who can save
the world.  The story
that is so adored
and repeated because it is adored
looks to the Innocent - to a Child - for redemption.

Honestly,
the Christmas story is a beautiful vision,
for only in our children can we find
our better selves.

So why must we maintain this secret place where, even as the innocent is adored,
it can be defiled?  If the great men of football can man up enough to punish those who hurt our children
then why can't the Church?
So much healing could begin, if the cycle of abuse
in that oldest of abusive institutions in the world could be broken.  Both abusers and abused (many of whom may be one in the same person) would benefit from a public confession and atonement.


Notably,
with every new story of abuse that we learn of,
the finger points back to the abuses that have yet to be punished.
The truth will out, for
the secret is tired of being kept --
Every secret ultimately longs
to be told, and

purity is demanding its time again

11/11/11, reprise

Hi.

I have republished one other 

of my earlier entries,

and today I want to do that again.

This one was actually originally written

on 10/6/10,

I think,

but it was written about today,

and I actually had a fantasy when I wrote it,

and still harbor that fantasy,

that it would inspire the world.

Well, maybe not the world,

but maybe you.

Here goes:

( laptopprophets )

So, as we all may know,

there's a growing community of folks

who are a bit worried

about the date

12/21/2012.

Somethin' about

Nostradamus

and

the Mayans,

and

some kind of planetary alignment.

Well, I had a revelation

today, and

it goes like this:

That's not really the date to watch

out for.

Well, ok, so it's true;  the evidence

(if you accept that kind of evidence as evidence)

does suggest

something major,

on

12/21/2012

something/anything

ranging from

major paradigmatic shift

to 

ice age

to

metaphysical awakening

to 

alien encounter

to

total destruction

or

fill in the blank

on 12/21/2012.

( somy35 )

But I had a vision today,

and it was

that the really interesting

palindromic

upcoming

temporal event 

will be:

11:11 on 11/11/11

I think it could be

either

a.m. or p.m.

you choose.

~ ~ ~

Anyway,

I would propose that

11:11 on 11/11/11

should be declared

the deadline time

for the one-ness,

and if we meet that deadline,

and stay in a state

of oneness

until 12/21/2012,

well,

we'll pass whatever

judgement day test

God has in store for us

for

12/21/2012.

Get it?

You see,

the deal is this:

if, 

by some weird

outside

chance,

we are facing Armageddon,

then hey,

what the heck?

Would it really hurt us to try,

for a little over a year

to just be at peace,

to just love each other.

This Is My Request,

My Dare,

To The World:

If everyone would meet that deadline:

11:11 on 11/11/11

a.m.  or p.m.,

you choose,

and then

beginning on that date,

just

STOP

stop all the hate.

Stop all the fighting.

Stop all the bickering.

Stop all the competition,

and hating,

and hurting,

and murdering,

STOP IT ALL!!!!

and just start loving,

loving people

who

you never thought you could love.

Find a place in your heart

where you can see

the thing that makes those people

who anger you, or have hurt you,

or who you don't understand

yes, 

those people,

find the thing that makes them

beautiful.

and love them until

12/21/2012.

Well, actually:

 let's say

the danger zone for

a real,

possible

 Armageddon

or

Apocolypse

or

whatever

is

from

12/20/2012

until

12/23/2012.

Yeah,

that sounds good --

those solstices 

can take awhile,

especially when they involve

a realignment

of the Earth's

magnetic fields.

So, given that,

if we get through

12/23/2012

and we're still here

and the sun

is still shining

and Santa Claus comes

and brings you

all the presents you asked for,

well then,

if we're still here after

12/23/2012,

and we've loved for a year,

and we've communicated honestly for

a whole year

and we've given to the poor for

a whole year

and we've forgiven all our debtors

for a year

and our debtors have forgiven us

for a year

and we've built up Iraq's infrastructure

for a whole year

and gone to tea with the Taliban

for a whole year

and the Taliban has gone to tea

with us

for a whole year

So, let's say

we do all that for

a little over a measly year,

and we get past the 

end of the Mayan Calendar

with no Apocolypse,

no voice from the heavens,

no planetary destruction,

why then,

if that year or so of loving

each other really proved

to be a waste of our time

we can start hating each other again,

and go back to fighting each other again.

That's the deal.

That's the deadline.

11:11 on 11/11/11

begin the one-ness

11/7/11

( in5d )

What I love about

the 11th month

in the 11th year

after the millennium

is that every day

for at least the first week or so

is a palindrome --

it gazes at itself in the mirror,

with little emotion,

but absolute equilibrium,

challenging each of us

to assume

the same composure -

11/1/11

11/2/11

11/3/11

11/4/11

11/5/11

11/6/11

11/7/11

11/8/11

11/9/11

- it's a narrow marching column,

like a count-down,

counting up --

to 

11/11/11

and then the perfect palindrome,

a beautiful balance to aspire to:

11/22/11

 .

( paradigmsearch )

we've lived so well, so long

My palms weigh heavy,

my fingers are aching

to write poetry with wings,

words that fly

into your eyes and make you think

that for a moment you see

some

thing,

even the tiniest thing,

a little more clearly.

My voice too

rattles the cages of my throat

longing

to sing to you.

This, though, will not be one of my finer entries,

only one I feel a need

to say,

rather than be silent

~ ~

The autumn closes on us all,

here in the Northern Domain

and the miserable misery of working

pulls on me like a ball

and chain --

I am not one of the unemployed in America,

nor am I one of the untaxed wealthy.

I am a member of the Working Class, which includes everyone

from garbage collectors to postal deliverers to teachers to engineers to insurance salesmen to nurses

to the retired to the grill-girl at McDonald's.

We are all the ones who pay the taxes and bills, with interest,

on every single living and dying step we take.

We're the ones who keep the company

woops, country

alive.

And now the ghoulish parade of hopeful GOP's

have donned their Halloween masks;

every day a new trick,

with promises of impossible treats.

Today, we discard our masks and return

to drudgery;

for them, the masquerade

has only just begun.

We're doomed to listen to them,

and to be required to believe

actually believe

that one of them,

just one of them,

is more capable than the current one man in office

 of relieving us of the mess we're in,

and restoring us to 1960's prosperity.

No no no no No

On this day, 11/1/11,

I say to you:

no one single American citizen

can turn this mess around.

Only us,

together,

can turn it around.

And we must start by stopping

our bickering,

start by stopping

our partisanship

start by stopping

believing

that we're right

and the other person

is wrong.

Start by listening,

and looking

with both eyes wide open,

and we will see

the Statue of Liberty

sailing away to sea.

We're all right,

and we're all wrong.

We have

lived so well,

so long,

and now

our biggest challenge is

finding a new way to live

well

together --

Are We Just Left Overs?

( tvgasms )

One of the many things I admire about Tom Perrotta's new book,
The Leftovers, is its optimism.  Its initial premise is far from optimistic:
it begins with the idea that a large part of the human population
just disappeared one day -- and an even larger part is left behind.
"Left-over."  The plot begins after the sudden disappearance.
Very few in the book dare call this event The Rapture,
because to do so would be to acknowledge that the Leftovers were
not blessed, were individuals who had done something fundamentally
wrong in their lives.  As Perrotta's book says at the introduction:
"'Something tragic occurred,' the experts repeated over and over.
'It was a Rapture-like phenomenon, but it doesn't appear to have been
the Rapture.'"  It goes on to say: "Interestingly, some of the loudest
voices making this argument belonged to Christians themselves, who
couldn't help noticing that many of the people who'd disappeared
on October 14th--Hindus and Buddhists and Muslims and Jews and
atheists and animists and homosexuals and Eskimos and Mormons
and Zoroastrians, whatever the heck they were--hadn't accepted
Jesus Christ as their personal savior."


The book proceeds to create a world pretty much like the one
we all live in right now, save for the fact that humanity must proceed
under the cloud of feeling that they have missed the bus, so to speak,
and have been left to proceed in a world without something to look forward to.
Good friends, family members, mates and enemies had dematerialized,
and in the wake of that, the remaining characters seek ways to deal with their
feelings of inadequacy and loss.  So some strikingly familiar groups emerge:
The Barefoot People, for one, a bunch of Neo-Hippies who go around barefoot
of course, avoiding baths and smoking marijuana, living communally or
having huge parties with lots of sex, drugs and rock n' roll.


Notably,  something sort of like this has already happened:

from: the website for the Society for Barefoot Living.


Similarly, a large group of people begin following a character called
The Holy Wayne,  a creepy Harold Campingish figure who gains
followers because of his charismatic Healing Hug, but his popularity
ultimately turns him into a perverted power monger.  By the
end of the book, he is put in jail for his transgressions, and
his followers are left more adrift then they were at the beginning
of the novel.

bibliotecapleyades


And the beginning of the novel is full of characters adrift.
The one who sets the tone of the book is Laurie Garvey,
a character raised with no beliefs to speak of.  Pre-Disappearance,
she finds meaning in her family and comfortable suburban existence,
but after the daughter of one of her friends disappears, she begins to lose
her grasp of whatever meaning her life had.  Feeling her life
has been a scam, she joins a very very creepy group called The Watchers,
people who disavow every aspect of their previous life, who spook around town wearing white,
smoke cigarettes, and stalk those citizens of the novel who dare to try to
live a normal life in the Post-Rapture world.  Including Laurie's husband
Kevin, who is left alone with their daughter Jill and Jill's friend Aimee --


What I find most disturbingly authentic about the novel is portrayed through
Jill, who is a late teen.  She ends up engaged in drinking and meaningless
sex, the very pursuits that I, as a college professor, have come to understand
are already central to many of our college-aged youth today.  Jill's loss of her
mom to the Watchers is not all that different from the large number of young
people I have met recently whose parents deserted their families for their own
personal, often selfish pursuits, leaving their children to struggle with the
superficiality and fragility of the illusion of a functioning family.

wikipedia - blackdeath


As I read this book and saw the parallels between the world we live in
today, I even began to wonder if we might be able to say that we are all, already,
Left-Overs.  Perhaps the Rapture has already happened, or perhaps
it is happening as we speak.  I think of earthquakes and hurricanes
and floods and illnesses that have occurred in recent years,
taking away vast numbers of people in one fell swoop,
or the plague of cancer that robs us regularly of our beloved,
at younger ages and in more senseless ways, and I think:
perhaps this is how The Rapture may work -- in very
natural, biological ways, taking large numbers of people
over a relatively short period of time, leaving the rest of us to deal
with the responsibility attached with their loss.


Perhaps, too, in the cycle of life, even End Times come in cycles.
If the end is, ultimately, loss and the adjustment that comes along with it,
we have had countless Raptures over time -- countless
potential End Times -- plagues and wars and other forms of loss --
that have left LeftOvers, real-life human individuals
challenged to deal with the potential meaninglessness
that accompanies great and excessive loss.


Faced with such intense loss,
we could hang our hopes on False Saviors,
be they religious or political,
or we could seek to find,
as I would dare to argue
some of the characters in The Leftovers seek to find
a humane and authentic way to live in the real world,
and by finding a humane and authentic way
to live in the real world, we might even create a new world,
full of happiness for just being alive,
and hope for a peaceful tomorrow.

hongklat