As I write this, several parts of the world are attempting to cope with the aftermath of cyclones, earthquakes, fires, and floods. I usually get my first news of the day from AmericaOnline, but after today, I shall make another page my homepage, and here’s why: The reporting they feature is pretty good, perhaps not the best, but in reading through the most current reports about the situation in China, I found myself scanning the comments they allow to be posted at the end of news articles. I don’t usually read the comments on these articles, having not enjoyed them in the past, but perhaps I was expecting something different this time. I won’t dwell on them, other than to say that the appalling lack of sensitivity in some of them left me stunned. Many, many comments were callous, immature, and completely without any sense of compassion. I rarely allow myself to become this upset about an issue, because I strongly believe that A Very Upset Person is not as much use to the world as a Strong Centered Person. Given this, I had to ask myself what these emotional triggers were about, for me.

I discussed my reactions with a friend, who asked me to think about who it is that posts such comments. My friend reminded me that most of the people in the world are kind, wonderful people, (like the ones that read this blog!), it’s just that those do not get as much press coverage. The people who post comments on news stories are often those who are seeking their five seconds of fame, and think that by shocking the rest of us they will get it.

This is all true enough, and it was good to have that reminder. Once I got beyond my initial anger and sadness, though, I had to ask (because I MUST ask ) what I wanted to to with these emotions now that I was aware of them? I looked; I sought; I pondered. One of my favorite teachers says not to focus on others’ disasters unless you intend to do something physical or tangible to help. And if you do the helpful thing, do it because it feels like the right thing to do, not out of guilt, or because someone else thinks you should. So, for instance, in the situation which has currently become known as “The War”, either I should take some action such as volunteering to obtain and ship supplies to the troops, start a letter campaign to lawmakers, or join up and fight. Otherwise, if I’m not going to do these things, it’s best to stop talking about “The War”, because all I do is become mired, and help to mire others, in angst, anxiety, and fear—and this does not help.

I believe this sincerely, and it’s one of the reasons I often avoid major news outlets, because it seems their very purpose is to mire us in angst, anxiety, and fear. I have given a lot of thought as to the “why” of that. A quote attributed to Gandhi is: “Be the change you wish to see in the world”. I do believe that before I can go around deciding how to “fix society”, some of my time would be well spent in “fixing myself”, as I’d then be of more use and more at peace with the next actions I take. Please understand that I’m NOT saying I’m “broken”, or that any of us are. We are all the perfect “us” at the perfect time. I just believe I am a stronger person when I can let go of some residual fear and unkindness within myself which makes me feel disconnected from you, and from the population of the Universe.

BlogCatalog has declared May 15 as “Blog for Human Rights” Day. I’ve participated in two others of their Bloggers Unite campaigns, and I generally feel good about doing so. In thinking about “Human Rights” in wake of current “Natural Disasters”, what comes to me is one of the more basic human Rights, after the basics such as food, clothing, and shelter (which of course, not everyone has at the moment) is the right to choose ones life path. It seems some repressive regimes, some weather occurrences, and some levels of lack prevent many from having that luxury.

On this day, I look at ways I still act repressively or unkindly in my own life, imagine how much better it would feel it I did it differently, and choose three things I can do now to help allow more joy into parts of the world which demand my attention. I will state that I feel spending time in prayer, if that is ones practice, or meditation, or any other observance that helps connect, is tangible help, and is to be honored. In addition to my own mediation, I have chosen to do the following: Rejoin UNICEF. As a child, I used to participate in “Trick or Treat for UNICEF” on Halloween, and those activities were some of my most satisfying holiday memories. We collected money in little milk cartons, instead of candy in bags, from the homes we visited for “Trick or Treat”. We then had a party with the other children, so we did get some treats, too.

There is a local chapter of UNICEF in southern Arizona which allows me to join the international organization, too. The first thing I saw on their website was the slogan Unite for Children. In addition to them being there for relief in the current situations, they work for children’s rights throughout the world. As I believe children ought to be treated with dignity, respect, and value, this interests me. Another thing I like about UNICEF is that they are “for” many more things than they are “against”. This is a crucial balance for me beacause I believe in the value of positive language.

I’ve also made a donation to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, after making sure that the the Magen David Society of Israel was also a member (using their own symbol, as well as the new “connotation free” symbol the Federation now has). I generally don’t support organzations focused within one particular religious tradition, so their breadth and scope was important to me.

The above actions feel right and good to me. I don’t necessarily recommend them, they are just what has inspired me today. May you find your own peace within your own world. Namasté.

~ ~ ~ On a personal note, I will be out of town attending a conference for the next week. It will be a fun, learning experience in a beautiful place. I’ll be involved in activities from 9 in the morning ’til 9 at night, and in between I’ll be sleeping, eating, taking walks, and trying to catch the occasional nap. So, I probably won’t be posting or checking in much during that time (perhaps a quick update), but please be assured, if you are kind enough to leave comments, that I value them tremendously, and I will answer them–just not quite as quickly as is my usual habit. I’ll have a lot of blog reading to do when I get back, too. Cheers, everyone, and have a wonderful week!

To all of you who are mothers, and/or have mothers, I wish you a wonderful celebratory weekend. So many of us think of Mother’s Day as just another Hallmark moment. I’d like to think of it as more. I neither have parents nor children, presently. (I did have parents at one point; but they’ve passed from this earthly existence. I didn’t want you to think I’d sprung, fully formed, from Pluto, or somewhere. Although there are those that wonder…) I therefore don’t have to deal with which cards and/or gifts to obtain—something I’ve never been very good at, but I can get a bit pensive this time of year. Not because I miss my own mother (I’m not saying I don’t) but because I notice things like all the emotional energy people put into this holiday, and it seems a combination of love and guilt; of joy and thankfulness coupled with vague uneasiness. And why is this?

Let’s face it, many of us have mixed feelings about our mothers. Parenting remains the most important job on the planet (in my opinion) and, at this point in our social evolution, the brunt of that job still falls on the mothers, in most cases. There has never, in the history of our world, been one mother who has dealt perfectly with all her issues before giving birth or adopting. Therefore, the newborn; child; teenager; young adult that’s produced will, of necessity, absorb some maternal angst no matter how good the intentions of the parent. The kind and intensity of the manifestation of this varies from family to family, but there’s a quote I like: “You start to worry about your children from the moment they are born (sometimes before), and the newborn, still so connected to the spirit world picks up on that right away, and tells her/himself that they must have come to a place where worry is important.”

Of course, if it’s a good, loving, family, they come to a place of joy and love and nurturing, too. I think where it gets confusing for both the parent and the child is that mixed up someplace in all this is the notion that “to love is to worry about”. Parents want to protect their children from perceived danger, and in so doing, tend to overlook the apparent fact that the child, if left to her/his own devices, without the burden of the “worry” will make many choices appropriate for her/him.

My belief system includes a doozie: that children come into this world knowing who they are; knowing they have a connection to all that is, and with a full set of expectations about what they’d like to accomplish while here. I know many mothers—and fathers, too, who encourage self-exploration in their children. This is the best kind of parenting, and I salute it.

I saw an old friend a while ago. She was my babysitter when I was five and she was fifteen. We were both rather odd children, felt we didn’t fit in (I know, it’s an old story, but when it’s yours, it’s as if it were told for the first time.) We bonded in many ways; became like siblings instead of babysitter/client. At the time, my parents were working full time in their business, and I was convinced they liked the business more than they liked me. This was true on some level. I felt they needed this babysitter-person to keep me out of the way. I didn’t realize at the time, but my babysitter valued her time with me as much as I did mine with her. She had an older brother, but he was uncommunicative. This new child (me) was cute, inquisitive, and thought the world of her. As time went on our sibling/friendship continued.

She got married when I was ten and she was twenty. I didn’t much like her groom, a person I’d known almost as long as I’d known her. Nevertheless, I was pleased to be asked to participate in the wedding, even though I wasn’t the right age (too old to take on one of the little kid’s roles, not old enough to be in the grown-up lineup). I made friends with the flower girl, a charming cherub that refused to let go my hand during the entire reception. The pictures of this are among my friend’s favorites.

She had a baby when she was twenty-five and I was fifteen. I was asked to be a god-parent—again, not quite the right age for such a venture. We didn’t care. The baby seemed pleased enough. Both of us now have re-evaluated what it means to be a god-parent. Though raised within the same religion, we’ve traveled divergent paths since then. The little girl, my god-daughter, also goes her own way.

She got divorced when she was thirty and I was twenty. I can’t say I was disappointed, for myself, as her husband was my least favorite part of visiting her. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a decent, good person. I just wished for her so much more. My heart went out to her, as she was now something called a “single mother”. She had two more children by then, both boys. The five of them did the divorce dance: lived with the mom, saw the dad on weekends and holidays. Everyone remained cordial, the kids were fine, so far as we know.

She came by to see me a couple of years ago. She lives two states away, and as we’re in the west of the US, it was quite a trip. She travels a surprising amount, now. She’d discovered her birth family, and has a whole new set of cousins. I was shocked to learn that she’d never felt she belonged to her adoptive family, even though she remembered no other. She was raised to think—as I was—that the bonds of love in a created family are strong, and good, and sure. Oh yes, her little girl, my god-child: she was adopted, too. My god-child is being encouraged to find her birth family, if she and they wish this. There is open communication about how there can be many kinds of relationships in our lives. She is loved, and she knows it. She is special, and knows that. Her brothers are not adopted. She has come to terms with that, as have they.

During her visit, my dear lifetime friend told me of how her parents were so afraid of losing her, after waiting years and years to have a child, that they clamped down upon her every activity. She was not allowed to do the usual teenage things. Her engagement, at such a young age, was her bid for freedom—kind of amusing, really, as she married the son of her parent’s best friends—nevertheless, he was there, and willing, and took her to a different place in her life.

As she drove off, to meet more new cousins, I couldn’t help but think of my own first family. How I sometimes was convinced I must be adopted. (Do many of us do that?) My parents, like hers, were much older than the other kids’ parents, and being a sensitive child, this embarrassed me. They were so, well, uncool. They were my natural parents, though, and I spent my childhood in sort of a muddle, as I was the same age as my second cousins, rather than my first. My sister, my only sibling, is a lot older than I am, too; in fact I can’t remember a time we lived together in the same house. Her children are not much younger than I am. So, I really don’t fit in, age-wise, philosophy-wise, religious-wise. I go my own way. But when I reconnect with someone like my former babysitter, I’m glad.

She recently sent me an email, wishing me a happy birthday. Our birthdays are within a month of each other’s, and of course I know exactly how old she is. She now lives in two cities, and her children spend time with each of their parents. They’re very independent, yet know they are cared for. She and I live such different lives. But, we became the persons we are today with each other’s support, and understanding, and love.

The video puts it all into perspective.

But come back, because I have something else to show you.

It’s easy to take this all too seriously…so another perspective lightens it up a bit.

My apologies to you slow-loaders. [I refer here to the speed of your Internet connection; this is not meant to imply anything about your personal capacities]

And, finally, I looked for a quiz that would go with the space vids, and found two. Apparently I’m from Pluto (is it still a planet? do I exist at all?) and I’m set to rule Saturn. I’m ready…

You Are From Pluto

You are a dark, mysterious soul, full of magic and the secrets of the universe. You can get the scoop on anything, but you keep your own secrets locked in your heart. You love change and you use it to your advantage, whether by choice or chance. You don’t like to compromise, to the point of being self-destructive with your stubborness. Live life with love, and your deep powers will open the world to you.

You Should Rule Saturn

Saturn is a mysterious planet that can rarely be seen with the naked eye. You are perfect to rule Saturn because like its rings, you don’t always follow the rules of nature. And like Saturn, to really be able to understand you, someone must delve beyond your appearance. You are not an easy person to befriend. However, once you enter a friendship, you’ll be a friend for life. You think slowly but deeply. You only gain great understanding after a situation has passed.

If you’re at all like me, you have sounds playing in your head all the time. I have little tunes that accompany me wherever I go, and which change depending upon my activity. Did you know that if you walk down the street humming your personal sound, it protects you from dragons?! My personal tunes do not include songs with words, except for one, in Hebrew. As we come to the close of the celebration of Passover for the year, I am reminded of the best known Passover song, Dayenu. This word can’t be translated, but if it could it would be something like “If God (universal life force, or whichever term you like) had given us only this one gift _______(fill in blank), things would be great, but God also gives us more!” I like Dayenu because it’s peppy, has a good beat, and gets me to do things quicker so I can go on to enjoy more of those gifts from the Universe. So, I play that tune in my head when I’m washing dishes, or the car; brushing my teeth (I have to get to the end of the song before I stop) or on the rare occasions I’m tidying up my workspace. So, in my own weird way, I celebrate Passover the whole year long.

There’s my exercise music, as well. If I’m not exercising along with a video, I’ll play the theme from the movie Rocky in my head. I’ll bet lots of us do that.

Another is my walking tune, or what I refer to as The Deck Walking Tune, but is really called Out on the Deck.  This was written by Deirdra Kiai and is one of the many wonderful musical works she included in her great adventure game The Game That Takes Place on a Cruise Ship. I say more about that game here. To get to the music I mean, you have to start up the game and then walk out of Gert’s stateroom, take the elevator up one or more floors, and then walk along the deck. This is important (!) because I’m not referring to the first music you hear on the passenger deck (although I like that too, and it’s related), but to that on the upper decks. This music has refused to get out of my head although I haven’t played the game in a couple of months, and I’ve certainly heard other music since then. It has become “city stroll music”, for when I’m walking in town, looking in shop windows perhaps, or on my way to somewhere but not in a hurry. (I don’t have hiking music. Somehow when I’m in a natural setting, the sounds around me are the music.) I had to do a little bit of analysis to discover why I find this particular tune so compelling. It’s a seemingly innocent little tune when you first hear it, meant to be filler, I guess, for the gamer to get from one adventurous location to the next. But there is an edge behind that innocence.

I played it through on my keyboard, and began to analyze its melodic structure as well as I could given the length of time between my music theory classes and now. Let me say right off that I did not study jazz, and Ms. Kiai uses a lot of jazz motifs in her work. It could be argued that the basic melody line is in natural minor (the “sad” sounding scale, also known as Aeolian mode) with a few jazz changes thrown in to, well, “jazz it up”. From my medieval musical background, however, I rather think it alternates between Aeolian and Locrian modes, which gives it a freshness and exuberance beyond the obvious.

I won’t go into a lot of detail, here, but of the seven modes—or scales—used in most western music, the Locrian is the least used. Look how it’s been defined: “the ‘ugly duckling’ mode; so unstable and unsatisfying that most composers consider it unworkable.” I don’t know if it was intentional or not, but Kiai has taken these tones and made them workable, while at the same time their instability contributes both to the wobbly experience of walking on a ship’s deck, and to the precariousness of the game’s situations. In retrospect, I really believe this has subtly influenced my choice of walking music, as I tend to feel instability in the nature of reality wherever I go. This is not a bad thing. I enjoy watching reality form and re-form itself around me, and it’s good to have appropriate musical accompaniment on the journey.

I’ve participated in a few book memes, and most of them ask for lists of favorite books in categories. I’ve never allowed the book I’m going to discuss here to be on any of those lists, because it’s so special it deserves a post of its own. The book is about spring, rebirth, and coming alive with a garden. I wanted to post this on my birthday because that’s a good day to think of renewal, and the book makes me feel fresh and alive.

It’s also a book about spring, and spring has truly sprung here in the desert this year. We have “good years” and “not as good years” for spring wildflowers, and this year is spectacular! I’m sprinkling a few photos around my post today so you can see what I mean. The desert blooms are not at all like the the cultivated English gardens of Yorkshire featured in the book, but are beautiful just the same.

Even though I know Spring “officially” began in March, I tend to think of April as the “spring month”. Besides, right before the Spring Equinox this year, our desert experienced rain and snow! Spring also reminds me of gardens and growth, and brings to mind an announcement I made at my college graduation ceremony.

I attended a very small liberal arts college in San Francisco, and there were only about 25 people in my graduating class. We were each invited to “say something” at the commencement if we desired to. I chose to take the opportunity to donate a book to the college library, my battered but happy copy of The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. For those of you who have read it, The Secret Garden might seem like a strange choice for a college library—after all, it’s a children’s book, isn’t it? —Well, yes and no. I first read the novel, published in 1911, after acquiring it at a school book sale when I was eight. I was entranced at the time, and it started me along a philosophical path. At my graduation, my announcement contained the words: “…it’s a book about some children coming alive with a garden in the spring, and says a lot about my experience here”—”here” meaning at the college.

I was grateful to have found a college that encouraged and enhanced my philosophical interests, and since The Secret Garden was the most profound metaphysical novel I’d read, I felt it belonged on their shelves. This novel, long before the discoveries of theoretical physics had been popularized, presented a belief system which seemed to me at the time to be logical, consistent, and, most of all hopeful! For various reasons during my childhood, this “hopeful” aspect was key to my development. I needed to know that things could get better, and that, with spiritual support, I had the power to change them from within.

Here are some of my reasons for valuing this book: When we first meet the main character, Mary, she is bored, unpleasant, nasty, and unattractive: “When Mary had a headache, she did her best to see that everyone else had a headache, too.” But, gradually, as the tale unfolds, we see Mary transform, as she finds a garden to nurture, which in turn nurtures her. She meets some remarkable teachers along the way, and is able to use her new transformative power of thought to help others find joy.

Mary and her friends are engaged in a “scientific experiment” which they called “magic”. They felt the magic coursing through their bodies, giving them strength and health. They saw the magic flowing through the flowers they planted, growing them from buds to blooms. And they felt the magic within themselves as they slowly realized they could transform unpleasant thoughts into joyful ones. The “…scientific experiment was quite practical and there was nothing weird about it at all.” Indeed, one reviewer believed the experiment was “…about love. About healing. About bravery, confidence, nature and those secret places in our hearts and our imagination”.

One of my favorite parts of the book comes near the end. It astonished me when I was eight, and I continue to be amazed by it to this day. The author takes a small break from the narration of the story to comment on the nature of reality:

“In each century since the beginning of the world wonderful things have been discovered. In the last century more amazing things were found out than in any century before. In this new century hundreds of things still more astounding will be brought to light. At first people refuse to believe that a strange new thing can be done, then they begin to hope it can be done, then they see it can be done–then it is done and all the world wonders why it was not done centuries ago. One of the new things people began to find out in the last century was that thoughts–just mere thoughts–are as powerful as electric batteries–as good for one as sunlight is, or as bad for one as poison. To let a sad thought or a bad one get into your mind is as dangerous as letting a scarlet fever germ get into your body. If you let it stay there after it has got in you may never get over it as long as you live.”

Wow! This in 1911! This one paragraph is what gave me “hope” throughout my childhood. I hung onto those words until I grew up and was able to investigate such things for myself. To a small child who was not raised at all that way, they were truly magic, real magic.

I have deliberately not said much about the plot, because you really must read it, or reread it if it’s been a while. The novel is exquisitely plotted, and is a delight to read. I hope I have given you a taste of the philosophy behind it. The book also started my lifelong love of beautiful gardens, and planted in me a desire to visit Yorkshire and England. Which I did, ten years after I first read The Secret Garden.

I’m having an attack of typoitis. One of my few remaining faults (I only have four, now ) is persnicketiness. Many books and articles these days leave the editing process with a lot of incorrect word usage. Everything is spelled correctly because it’s been through a spell checker, but as we all know these don’t check whether we’re using the wrong word altogether.

The words that drive me craziest are among the most common: “I don’t know when your going to the store, but don’t forget to take you’re coat.”

“See the frog jumping across it’s lily pond, where its nice and cool and green.”

“Will you go along, to? I don’t know how too get there.”

The first, in this last sentence is more common then the last. (Oops, their went another one! I heard you ask if there going to tell us when we get they’re. They told me it wouldn’t be than, but later.)

You get the idea. What bugs me about why this bugs me is that I don’t give a fig about wordy run-on sentences like this one having very little punctuation making you wonder if it’s ever going to end or go on and on until you don’t want to read the rest of this post. Or fragments such as this. Other grammatical liberties don’t bother me much either, as long as they literately express a consistent tone and quality. An infinitive is a wonderful thing to split!

I tend to see these little usage violations as expressions of my creative style. Punctuation? Forget about it. I put in commas and question marks where I please, and I reserve the right to be inconsistent about how and when I close parentheses, and whether within or without the final punctuation.

I do a flip-flop when it comes to spelling and word usage, though. I judge these things as more illiterate (there’s a phrase for you!) than the other errors I mentioned. We’re told that Shakespeare got to spell any way he pleased, so we should be able to do the same, right? My inner editor says “No! Wrong! Bad!” There is also the issue of typographical errors. These occur when our fingers move quickly over the keyboard (or thoughts move quickly over the mind), and we make some of those “your or you’re” or “to or too” errors even though we know perfectly well what the correct word should be. A common slip is to type “you” when we mean “your” and “and” when we mean “an”. I attribute these last to our fingers choosing to type the word that’s more frequently used. I forgive a limited number of these in casual writing such as blog posts. I even often forgive myself for these, but they still tend to mock me when I notice them later: “Hah, you think you’re so smart going around blogging all day, and then you put too many letters in mee.”

You may have seen this floating around in emails or blogs:

Can you read this? Olny srmat poelpe can!

I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm.

Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? And I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

Obviously, slpeling isn’t ipmorantt, so why am I so annoyed about wrong word usage? Nothing about this bothers me more than when I, myself, use the wrong word, which I did a couple of days ago in a blog comment. I was up late at night, I was “tired but wired” as I often am after a busy and active day, and I made more than one of these errors. The second was in an attempt to correct the first! I felt dorky and illiterate, but fortunately my friend sulz graciously decided to let me know about my first typo, allowing me then to come back and make the second. They turned into a rather humorous couple of comments. They really were typos, and not misspellings! I know which word to use in those situations, honestly! That’s my story and I’m sticking two it.

Disclaimer: I claim no moral, legal or philosophical responsibility for any errors in the above blog post. If such are found they are due to (pick your favorite, I assure you it will be true): a. fatigue; b. the recent full moon; c. alien intervention.

…let alone 5 x 5? This one’s called “Fluff Five”, and I’ll just state, unequivocally, and for the record, that my blog is NOT fluffy! I think the meme is inappropriately named, however, as the answers sought are quite insightful. I love a good meme, unlike some poor souls that get tagged repeatedly (Oh, no, not again!), and am one who believes that being tagged does not put one under ANY obligation to respond. That being said, I will include some taggees I’m genuinely curious about…

Thank you Juan of Bloggin’ Cool for coolly taggin’ me.

5 Things Found In Your Bag (I’ll choose my soft-side briefcase for this)

• Sheet Music (at the moment, classical choral music, and transcriptions of chants from many cultures)
• 7 pencils and 2 pens (this counts as one item because they’re in a case!)
• Organizational banking paraphernalia
• “Ode” magazine
• Non-fiction book of the month? day?

5 Favourite Things In Your Room

• Electronic musical keyboard
• Collection of cymbals, chimes, and flutes
• my beastly Computer and her peripherals
• Bed
• 200 or so books

5 Things You Have Always Wanted To Do

• Sing in the Berkshire summer choral music festival
• Spend time alone exploring Glastonbury; Stonehenge; maybe some crop circles…
• Spend many days in the musea and galleries of Washington D.C.
• Plant and manage a really stunning garden
• Learn Italian

5 Things You Are Currently Into

• Choral singing
• Event planning and publicity
• Arts Management
• Voracious fiction and non-fiction reading
• Sci-fi and alternate reality TV show & computer games

5 People You Want To Tag

• abbydonkrafts
• the bead den
• katm
• trumgottist
• yogini

I’m not kidding about this. The human driver had WWI aviator glasses, a cigar in his mouth, a vest, safari pants, a kerosene lantern slung about his waist, spats or gaiters, and clinging to his back…a full sized parrot! I’ve experienced a lot of interesting people during my time on this wonderful and weird planet, but hadn’t seen quite that combination of features before. As I came up behind him, in the lane to his left, my first thought was he had a green aviator scarf about his neck. As I got closer, it occurred to me that his scarf was rather bird-shaped. Then…”it looks like he’s got a stuffed parrot slung across his shoulders” (cue the “Monty Python” music—was I suddenly in Ipswich? Bolton? Notlob?) As we both stopped at the light, the parrot turned its head and looked at me. The thing moved! It was a not-dead parrot!

The bird seemed completely content, not appearing to desire to go anywhere or do anything other than cling to this strange fellow’s back, and ride. The biker drove slowly, and the parrot could have hopped or flown away any time.

The man and bird continued up the road, while I turned west toward my home in another town. I’d just come from yet another committee meeting. Many people, at this point, might go on home—perhaps shaking their head a little—and discuss it with their friends the next day. They might try “Googling” this interesting pair (I did!) and then put the episode behind them. Being me, however, I had to pay attention to any symbolism this held for me. This man and his parrot might be local eccentrics (every town has them), but I’m the sort of person that believes that if something really commands my attention, it must have a message for me. I’ve only known one or two parrots personally, and found them friendly, intelligent and affectionate. When I lived in Hawaii, I visited a protected park where the parrots would eat out of our hands.

I learned that parrots symbolised various things in different cultures: Bringer of essential rain and seed; heraldry; symbol of wisdom and of good counsel; good luck; known to repeat what they heard; distinguished service; the ability to communicate.

Motorcyclists, at least in my culture, have a bit of a reputation as rebellious free thinkers. I don’t own a cycle, and don’t expect to, but I do have that “born to be wild” side

I arrived home pleased with my day; my week; my life. I felt supported yet free. And my search results? I have not been able to find anyone who knows who this fellow is, but he has been seen around the area. I saw him after dark, and was not completely sure he wasn’t an illusion. I did find this from a fellow blogger, who links to a picture of Biker Bird and Dude in the Daylight. Yep, that’s them alright!

The most remarkable people have come through southern Arizona recently on their way across the universe. I’ve had such an amazing and busy week doing administrative work involving the 8th biennial Consciousness Conference at the University of Arizona, and also with speaking engagements and social events involving leaders from the Institute of Noetic Sciences.

You wouldn’t think southern Arizona would be a hotbed of consciousness studies, but, we are! In addition to the Consciousness Conference, which brings well-respected neuroscientists, behavioral scientists, and researchers to present their latest findings on “what is this thing called us?”, we have the Center for Consciousness Studies and the Laboratory for Advances in Consciousness and Health at the University of Arizona, engaging in expansive research all the time.

Some of the conference lecturers are also directors of the Institute, based in California, so we pressed a couple of them into service speaking to our 600-member IONS Community Group, and hosting an afternoon tea, a party, and a dinner at which (in addition to eating!) they held mini-fora on the latest research findings. More about that in a few days (when I’ve had some sleep—I’ve barely looked at my poor blog, here) but for now, these are the people I’ve had the pleasure to get to know:

James O’Dea, President of IONS (formerly head of SEVA Foundation, and Amnesty International). He facilitated a great discussion about cultural diversity and acceptance, in addition to being the guest speaker at the monthly local IONS meeting.

Marilyn Schlitz, Vice President for Research and Education discussing “Living Deeply”

The third place winners of the short film competition, “One Minute Shift“. (Who knew they lived close by!)?