Shit expert

I’m out hiking with my dog Andy. At the first sign of critters ..the aroma of shit ..Andy’s got his nose to the ground. He signals me by sticking his tail out and cocking his left leg up. Can’t be just any piece of shit though. It’s gotta be fresh .. meaning less than a 15 minutes old. And it’s gotta’ be a critter like possum or rabbit (not just another dog or cat). Now Andy’s whining and it looks like he’s got the shakes so I go over and ask him what’s wrong. He looks at me like he’s just seen (or smelt) a ghost. I look at today’s droppings. Way too big for a raccoon but a bit too small for a deer. That leaves ..Bobcat! Andy looks at me like ‘BINGO’ ..and we haul ass outta’ there. I don’t underestimate his sense of smell. It’s been ‘genetically tuned’ to pick up the scent of shit left by critters he hunts ..as well as critters that may be hunting us. Sure enough, the first person we run into tells us that there’s been a bobcat sighting in the area.

Peer-mediated buzz

   James Fowler, a professor of psychology at UCSD, found that messages from our peers are more likely to initiate action than messages delivered by a political committee [ link ]. Last year, Obama’s reelection committee learned the same thing. They developed a system that leverages database technology and social-media to deliver their messages. In an instant, this system allows them to:

1. mobilize grassroots support for White House concerns 
2. provide White House support for local concerns

Apparently they took an extra step, conducted surveys ..and learned that nothing energizes participation better than ‘reciprocity’. Brilliant use of technology combined with Obama’s experience as a community organizer. Politically I’m independent and pretty damn naïve ..but I can see why this might give Republicans cause for alarm.

well of souls

Serena Devi Aum

Healer at  Aum Love

Highway 1

 

Big Sur Sunset 

Photo by Linda Sonrisa

way home

Come down off your throne and leave your body alone / Somebody must change / You are the reason I've been waiting so long / Somebody holds the key / Well I'm near the end and I just thank God for time / And I'm wasted and I can't find my way home          ~   Blind Faith

Decision making

Decisions are mostly intuitive, logical explanations
catch-up milliseconds later ~ Robert Sapolsky [ link ]

driftwood villager

I follow her into a cove ..through tide pools crystal clear .. into a village made of driftwood huts ..where women pit-bake shellfish and men spearfish in the waters of a lagoon. And I realize that I’ve always been cursed ..trying to imagine what life must have been like on planet earth ..before I came along.

Cultural para-stimuli

I’m looking for a better definition of the term ‘cultural para-stimuli’. I have only the vaguest idea that it’s some kind of mysterious force that transmits culture. I start out with the prefix ‘para’ ..which means to impart a subsidiary role to a word or agent. Paramedic for instance. Another meaning of ‘para’ is to impart an altered role to a word or agent. Parasail for instance. I think that’s the one I’m looking for. Para-stimuli are stimuli that go beyond the action of a stimulus on the nervous system. Usually it’s an alteration that results from repeated exposure. For example, ‘sugar’ produces an immediate sensation of sweet that becomes sickening after repeated exposure. Put it together and what it says is that ‘cultural para-stimuli’ are stimuli resulting from social observations that produce alterations in the nervous system that go beyond their immediate reaction. Why do need a better definition of this ..? Perhaps because of what it says about the fashion industry and why we so often choose style over substance. Perhaps because of what it says about my choice of partners. I don’t know. What I do know is what neuroscientists tell me. Repeated exposure to ‘what’s cool’ in a peer group lowers tolerance for ‘what’s appropriate’ in the amygdala. I know the word ‘amygdala’ sounds foreign ..like something from outer space. It refers to a part of the brain that sets thresholds for impulses ..or ‘impulse-control’. Without an amygdala, animals veer helplessly from one inappropriate feeling or action to another. Boredom where there should be fear .. sexual arousal where there is no provocation. What they’ve seen is that animals with an intact amygdala respond just like animals without an amygdala merely by observing or being in the same vicinity. It may be due to sight, sound, smell, whatever ..but exposure to one group serves as cultural para-stimuli to the other group. Repeated exposure to ‘what’s cool’ can actually lower discrimination for things that may otherwise be considered shocking. I’m thinking of things like lewd conduct in public that could be considered something along the lines of a ‘sex offense’. Something that could easily be done at considerably less risk in the privacy of one’s own home. Another thing that comes to mind is ‘mob mentality’ ..the predatory behavior I sometimes see at soccer matches or in crowds celebrating the Rose Parade in California. Makes ‘cultural para-stimuli’ sound like ‘zona rosa’ for communal decadence, which, I don’t know ..may say a little something about my own behavior at rock festivals.

Josie Hyde

Lately I’ve been noticing how things that come to mind are usually the most likely, useful or routine things ..definitely not the ‘world of possibilities’ I would like to see. Walking along State Street today, I watch a woman in full burka enter a fashion boutique with her husband and child. “They’ll be out in a flash” I suspect. What happens ..? They walk out ten minutes later carrying packages. Farther down the road, I hear what sounds like a Mozart piano concerto. Must be coming from Bloomingdale’s or a coffee shop. Turns out to be a waif sitting on the sidewalk playing an electronic keyboard. I sit and listen. When she’s done I tell her it sounds like she’s ‘classically trained’. I mean it as a compliment. “No, I play by ear.” She says “You mean you learned to play like that by listening to CDs  ..?” I ask. “Also by channeling” she replies. She tells me she’s been playing this way since she was four years old. Tonight I’m attending a multi-media performance by Josie Hyde describing her experience at an ‘ayahuasca’ ceremony in the Andes. However, this is not just about her experience ..this is the experience itself !   I feel intoxicated. Like a hole has been punched through the night sky and I catch a glimpse of a  universe of possibilities.

California moon

moon through the eucalyptus over my deck last night

Cartel grows

This story is more about my capacity for self-delusion.

DEA agents investigating Cartels  growing marijuana on California forestland turned up beer kegs, propane stoves, poachers and fieldworkers living in tents. Many of them weren’t even sure where the hell they were ( “Texas ..?” ). Turns out it wasn’t the Cartels after all. Mostly itinerant farmers all the way from Michoacan who were trying to avoid the Cartels and move closer to market. When I heard this I went “I could have told them that ..it’s well-known that Cartels are more into smuggling than farming” and “Michoacan farmers are the ones with the know-how and perseverance to set up camp and live in the woods like that.” Fact is ..I could have told them nothing of the sort. I’d been following this story and I too believed that Mexican Cartels were infiltrating California. I could of only told them otherwise after they’d already told me. Armed with this new information ..I quickly went back and revised my memory for things I knew before. Kind of like revisionist history ..giving me a false sense that ‘I knew it all along’ ..arrogant asshole that I am.

highway one

 

There is a road / no simple highway / Between the dawn and the dark of night / And if you go /  no one may follow / That path is for your steps alone.

The Jabberwock

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

   The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

   The frumious Bandersnatch!”

Day 19:  Whenever I’m practicing progressive relaxation or sitting meditation ..an image of the Jabberwock comes to mind. I frequently remind myself to unclench my jaw and loosen my grip. Noticing change and allowing things to pass without grasping, biting or otherwise judging them as they go. Principles of Vipassana meditation I picked up at a workshop many years ago [link].

Doomsday

In 19th Century China, one man claiming to be the brother of Jesus Christ started the Taiping Rebellion ..a bloody civil war, which led to the fall of the last Chinese dynasty. More recently, a fellow by the name of Zhao Weishan founded a movement known as The Eastern Light, which has evolved into a group called The Almighty God. They have over 1 million members and prophesize the end of the world on December 21, 2012. Because China has no established religion, people tend to believe in wild rumors. Sales of survival pods have been brisk. Last Friday, one of their members ran through a schoolyard and slashed 23 schoolchildren with a machete. They attribute this act to someone “ ..under the influence of doomsday beliefs.”  I guess delusion knows no boundary.

See Paris in winter

This is the end / Beautiful friend / The end / This is the end /  Of our elaborate plans / The end / Of everything that stands / The end

narrative of cultures

“Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we grow up hearing only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding"

winter coast

The sun is shining 
I step into high tide 
below Shoreline Park 
to see a pod of dolphins 
playing out in the kelp 
and it’s moments like these 
when I don’t believe things 
can get  a lot better than this

Beatrix Kiddo

I take a pleasant 4-mile trek from my house to the Martial Arts and Family Fitness Center where I’ve come to see Jen D take her test for the black belt in Hapkido. I arrive and take a seat beside a mat that covers an entire floor of a large industrial-looking room. About halfway through the adult program .. Jen takes a blow to the solar plexus while sparring that staggers her. She taps-out and leaves the mat where she quickly recovers and returns for the next drill. After an hour and a half of takedown drills and spinning kicks designed to disarm her opponent ..her final feat is a flying sidekick, which you have to be there to believe. She takes a running start to gain forward momentum .. goes airborne over three barrels ..and kicks a board that’s three inches thick with the sole of her right foot .. breaking it in half with a resounding crack. It’s not like she has feet made of steel or anything ..but she’s learned to deliver ‘energy’ - created by her weight and momentum - to the soles of her feet at the exact moment of impact. She passes with flying colors. Her Grandmaster tells her to drop the red belt she’s wearing and then he ceremoniously wraps a black belt around her. Now, Jen conveys feelings mostly through her face, which at this moment is beaming red with ecstasy and a smile so large it lights up the room.

Jen D aka Beatrix Kiddo

Ricardo

I think Ricardo mistook the phrase “lets do coffee ..”  for  “..lets do it tomorrow.”   He’s accusing the guy of being a flake because he didn’t show. He goes on to tell me that he’s learned to text blindfolded so he can do it while hiding the cell phone in the pocket of his jacket during class. It almost sounds like he’s backpedaling when he says his friends have a real problem ..they can’t stop texting even when they’re talking to him at lunch. What do I make of this ..? I think he wants to impress me with his cleverness but at the same time make sure I don’t get the wrong idea ..he’s not like the other kids his age. It sounds that way because I don’t have a stereotype of other kids his age. I figure it feels to him like he’s talking to one of his parents when he’s talking to me because he’s still in high school and everything. Not sure I can level the playing field.  Too tired to try really. Oh well, doesn't make that much difference.

Konstanz

am Bodensee

The path

to Haskells

Freedom

to do naked bong hits
photo courtesy of Coral Reefer

Rapture

Diane pays homage to the power of the pumpkin

record collector

The Santa Ynez Valley

 /  But my blue eyes cannot see  / That their real hue's probably green / I should keep records of these things   /  And I'll know what yesterday brings

proprioceptive entry

Cleansing my palate by sucking on a lemony-flavored ricola and washing it down with warm water. Asking myself what’s worth writing about ..weighing the alternatives like I usually do ..obsessing about what others might think. What sounds cool is the big question. Like the characters in a Tom Wolfe novel ..constantly imagining the impression I leave with others ..and like those characters ..getting it wrong most of the time. When I think I look cool I probably come across more like an egotistical jerk. Now I’m reminding myself to behave in a more yielding manner, which is a topic for another time. Stop. Now I’m struggling with a short list of topics to write about ..rehab ..people of interest to me ..my own ‘explanatory style’ ..what do I mean by explanatory style ..? Looking at the narrative I use to explain what’s been happening in my life. Like when I blow off practice or a social event ..is it because I’m lazy, timid, neurotic? Slack by nature? Are these the reasons I have this gnawing feeling of discontentment ..? And are these the reasons I’ll be forever doomed to feelings of discontentment ..?

Proprioceptive writing is a practice I learned at an Esalen workshop~> [ link ]