I just responded to a blog by eccentricsiren.  She is interested in how other people view religion and has seven questions she would like for people to answer. If you have a minute pop over to her site and see if you have an interest in answering the questions. And if you would like to know how your favorite philosophical Taoist answered the questions you can take a peek.

It feels good to be blogging again even though I’m not sure what I want to blog about. I sometimes think that my life is going so well that I don’t have anything to talk about. It would be very pretentious of me to even indicate that the path I took would work for anybody else. And for those of you who know me and have read me for years I have had a very strange journey through life. And as I look back over my many years on the planet I really cannot think of one thing that I would like to change. In retrospect my journey is ending much better than it started and I guess that is what life is all about.

Quote for the day.

Mortals who dwell in vitreous edifices, should not pose as morbid propensities toward anti-disestablishmentarianism.

Keep the faith

david

lotta valdez wrote a blog about the slow death of xanga. http://lotta-valdez.xanga.com/  I have been noticing xangas downward spiral for a couple of years now. For me, a good blog is very time consuming and reading good blogs is also time-consuming. When I read blogs and make blogs I feel very enriched and happy to be in touch with such wonderful people. Finding the time and energy to blog is not something I do very readily anymore. I blog steadily for a while and just fade away for a period of a couple of months or so. But blogging is special for me because it provides a depth framework for self-expression that I can’t find on things like Facebook. I don’t know what the answer is but for today I am once again a blogger. And I have just declared today as be kind to Queenie day. For those of you who know her she is a beautiful free-spirited lass who has been through a rough couple of months. For those of you who don’t know her, check her out on xanga she is very special.

keep the faith

david

 60 things I learned at cornucopia.

A giver cannot be fulfilled without a receiver. I don’t receive well and need to work on that.

T-shirt saying for my friends who imbibe

In wine there is warmth, in beer there is fun, in water there is bacteria.

Merry Christmas everyone.

Lover gave me a DVD for Christmas that completely awakened my love for the philosophies of the 60s and 70s. The video was about how the Kingston Trio brought folk music back to life. As I watched the video I was thinking how much folk music defined my values. My favorites were the Chad Mitchell Trio who sang incredibly powerful songs about lack of consciousness in human rights, Judy Collins, Joan Mitchell, Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, Cynthia Gooding, Peter Paul and Mary, Theodore Bikel, John Denver in his early years, along with the poetry of Robert Bly who is still remembered for his antiwar poetry in the Vietnam area. It also brought to light how cruel the system can be to people who want to change it. A case in point is that there was a program in the late 50s called hootenanny which showcased a lot of the folk music talent. Pete Seeger, The Weavers, Woody Guthrie and others were blacklisted and not allowed to perform because of their reported communist affiliations. In response to that, the Kingston Trio, Peter Paul and Mary, Joan Baez,  and many more singers refused to participate in the program and many of their followers would not watch hootnany for that reason. Very few people remember McCarthyism and the devastating toll his zealousness took on human lives, I remember it well. Anyway, it awakened lots of feelings in me and a pleathoria of wonderful memories. I remember John Denver coming to our campus and singing a song called Jimmy Newman which was about an officer killed in Vietnam but when he signed his contract to go famous he never sang those songs again which we considered a waste and a copout. The popularity of the Chad Mitchell Trio took a nosedive when they started singing explicit songs about people tolerating the intolerable. If you want an example you might find a copy of their album “slightly irreverent”. I treasured those days and the things they taught me.

Keep the faith

60 things I learned at cornucopia

28. When you’re connected to another person by a 3 foot string and spends 72 hours without ever being more than 3 feet apart, you learn a whole lot more about yourself than you ever imagined possible.

T-shirt saying

ran into my ex-put it in reverse and ran into him again.

60 things I learned at cornucopia.

26.  When you are at a growth center/commune and over 300 people commit mass suicide at the Jonestown religious center, your friends and family worry a lot about you.

T-shirt saying

Doesn’t play well with others

60 things I learned at cornucopia.

25. Helping to sandbag a river to save a town gives you a feeling you will remember forever.

T-shirt saying

Where are we going, and why am I in this handbasket.

60 things I learned at cornucopia

24. If you don’t sing you will die with your music still inside of you.

T-shirt saying.

Personal Philosophy-Clothing Optional

60 things I learned at cornucopia.

23. The Trappist monks at Guisemiti Monastery had a vow of silence. Chanting in the chapel made them look angelic, walking back to their quarters it was obvious that they didn’t like each other at all and were not happy campers.

T-shirt slogans.

The higher we soar, the smaller we seem to those who cannot fly.

60 things I learned at cornucopia.

22. As a general rule, people look better with their clothes on.

T-Shirt saying.

Custer was not the brightest general on the planet.

Sixty things I learned at cornucopia.

21. When you listen to Trappist monks chant at four o’clock in the morning when you’ve been on a 48 hour marathon with no sleep, it is easy to have a peak experience, or it was for me anyway.

T-shirt saying