Reverence and Otherwise

In the morning my thoughts float around in their zigzag way, and sometimes one lands on my hand. Today it was this:

All my deploring of things people do and the way things are has not helped matters.

This was triggered by morning coffee music with Pete Seeger, which was "Down by the Riverside." The thing about him, he meant it.

Ain't gonna study war no more,
Ain't gonna study war no more...

Now, the illustrious Pete, may his good work never end, meant it, he was against war and tirelessly sang and spoke about it.  And we still have war, don't we.  Oh yes, the bad bad karma of tribalism playing out in unfunny boy games in the Middle East.  God bless them, why don't they just give up their claims on a piece of earth and try to sneak into America like everyone else?

But one thing Pete did accomplish was give people, including me, a way to be in harmony together with our beliefs.  We all sang Guantanamero along with him, rocking a bit from side to side.  We all felt the sadness of the eternal cycle of unnecessary pain, flowers gone to young girls gone to soldiers gone to graveyards.  Gone to flowers.  The community we formed singing was a good thing, an excellent thing. I don't get to feel that much, other than in my women's meditation group, where the warm energy far from war goes round and round.

Last night Tom and I went out for ice cream, like our parents before us, though ice cream has changed since chocolate, vanilla, or strawberry.  Believe me, their toes would curl in alarm at the price of Jeni's Salty Caramel.

We got to talking a little about how as children we occasionally felt something in church I describe as shared reverence. I remember that especially on Easter morning and Christmas Eve.  Now I appreciate the sense of new clothes and spring hats - and white gloves on the ladies, back then - as a way of washing ourselves clean, resurrecting.

Tom went to a small-town Methodist church, and I went to a liberal Congregational church, but they had in common a shared acceptance of the Christian tradition.  In both churches there were those who got that it was not about the tribalism of Are you saved? but about love and unity. Certain stories were emphasized, like the parable of The Good Samaritan. It makes you sad to compare that with what is happening now on the Gaza strip.

I have had many good experiences in my Unitarian church, but have never felt that reverence in these 30-some years, despite our minister's many sermons on love.  I think this is because a percentage of the members there hate the very ideas of belief and mystery.  Atheists have long been vocal in the denomination. In my church, every summer we have a lay service by the Atheists and Skeptics, who affirm their belief only in what can be shown by science, which they revere more than I, who have been the victim of it.  In this service someone may talk about the mystery of life, but it is a head trip, not a spiritual practice, and does not go toward love and compassion. They would snort at the "notion" that Something loves us, and all is well.  They discard mysticism with the term "woo-woo."

I was recently told my group is woo-woo, O-kay, but I, too, have trouble with All shall be well when I watch the evening news.  Still, I enjoy experiencing the mystery and elegance of this great junkheap, even as I deplore the things men do.  For example, I am closely watching our tomato crop, pictured in its entirety here.

And, by way of the miraculous, I figured out how to download photos from my phone to my evil new computer, and then upload them.

You got shackles on your feet? This man has the answer.

Yesterday a great Teacher died. Start the above video playing, and pay attention when it gets to about minute seven.


We had the good fortune to see Pete Seeger in person here in Columbus, Ohio, test city of America. His opening act was a girl group whose name I've forgotten, but I'll never forget them singing a feminist treaty titled, "Show Us Your [obscene slang for penises]." The governor, whose name was Dick, though "dick" was not the word, was there, and you could see him in his box laughing his ass off.

Gosh, that was a long time ago. Around then my brother bragged about how he'd been to a nude beach somewhere exotic. This turned out to be where men and women alike wore bikini bottoms, or Speedos, I suppose, and nobody wore a bikini top. Huh. For one thing, that's not what "nude" means.  More correct to call it a breast-display beach.  For another thing, it didn't seem fair. If women are going to show off their sexual characteristics (as defined by this ridiculous society), you'd think men would, too. My family didn't understand me, but Pete Seeger would have.

I first heard folk music when I was 18 and pregnant. I'd iron my husband's uniform in the basement, playing The Kingston Trio over and over. So, second-hand folk music, better than nothing. Much later I developed a desire to do something I never was fit to do, play folk guitar. And sing. . . . Listen to Pete here~

". . . I fell asleep. When I woke up I had shackles on my feet. That's everybody's history."

By God, that's Zen. Like the man said, these old songs will never die. They are our condition.

At that concert, Pete ended with Guantonamero. He came forward on the stage in this rather intimate hall, just him and his banjo, and we all sang and swayed. Years later I ended a church service with that song.  Everybody uplifted, swaying.  Almost everyone.  Later somebody told me there were too many verses. That's public life for you.

Listen to this one.  In one place he translates, "For the evil one, I do not cultivate thistles.  I cultivate the white rose."  If it sounds like the Dalai Lama, it is.

Oh, Freedom

Events conspired this morning to make me remember the spiritual, "Oh, Freedom." Above is an incomparable singalong during the celebration of Pete Seeger's 90th birthday.  A man we were blessed to have during our time, and I was lucky to see in concert - also saw Bernice Johnson Reagan in concert - all because I married the right man.

This song is to me incomparably dharma - that is, reality as Buddhism teaches it.  And it is that eventually we will die, and that will be a kind of freedom from the troubles of this body.  And that furthermore, we do not need to be slaves, we can rise above the demands of the culture and choose freedom and happiness.

In which we examine the fact that a thing is not just a thing

There. Balanced checkbook, paid Visa, all online. Nice and neat. The socks, though, are still unfolded. I lost focus this morning, putting the second load in the washer. Those white "World's Softest Socks" are supposed to be washed inside out. It sort of makes sense, and I have been proud of myself for doing such a finicky thing until now. Actually, I had forgotten to turn the black socks, too, when I did the first load.

The more you own, the more comes into your house every day, the harder it is to keep it all organized. Closet so full I'd taken the extra plastic hangers out and hung them in the guest room closet. What the closet is full of is clothes I don't like. Some mornings I can't stand a thing I own. Idly shopping last week in a travel store I saw these underpants for travel. You are supposed to take two pair and go around the world. Wear one, wash one. I suppose what makes them worth $14.95 a pair is that they dry quickly. What an appealing idea, to pare down to that. You think it would somehow neaten up your mind, too.

The drawers in my chest are full of things I don't use. Many of them have sentimental value, like oh, hey, an Obama campaign tee-shirt with his face and Springsteen's on it, that says "Born to Run." I love that kind of double meaning and remember the day I joyously bought two of these. We were eating on the patio of a Mexican restaurant on High Street when a van pulled up across the street. Some college-type kids had been waiting there a while. The driver opened the van door, and began pulling out boxes of tee-shirts. Over I went. One for me, one for Tom. He gave his to Cassie last Christmas, I think.

So there is my shirt. I don't like to wear tee-shirts with faces and words on them anymore. Just a matter of preference, but rather strong, since it's my body. Nevertheless, I am very fond of this shirt, which reminds me of the beautiful high of the last days of that campaign, of voting, of the count coming in, of the inauguration ceremony capped by Pete Seeger in a flannel shirt and wool hat leading everyone in "This Land is Your Land."

Those were glorious days around here anyway, for in our close circle there was no disagreement. Now it has just become governance, meetings, discussions, compromises. I was disheartened that we are to continue in Afghanistan, though I admit I don't understand the ins and outs of that problem. I relate to the children of soldiers waiting for Daddy to come home. I relate to Daddy coming home without a leg, with PTSD and addictions.

As for the boring business of governance, The Times columnist David Brooks wrote about this the other day, saying that one of the myths we need to get over is the idea that someone can walk in and solve a problem. The problems are of long-standing, he said, and they've been worked a lot up till now, and the clay has hardened.

But you would think a person could remember to turn the socks inside out. Yes. What a refreshingly simple task. Then again, I am a 67-year-old piece of clay.

People coming together

I have included this video by Illbebackcall, hoping that no one in the world misses seeing and hearing this song at the pre-inauguration ceremonies. In his life and songs, Pete Seeger carries the history of the Movement - all the movements for freedom and unity. I loved him up there in his flannel shirt and hand-knit cap. He was one guy who didn't buy new clothes for the ceremony, God bless him.

I believe in song. That, eating together, sledding, adopting orphaned animals and children . . . these and so many other actions seem so much more useful than thinking.

That isn't what they taught me in school. The academic tradition I labored my way through assumed serious, hard thinking was the very highest human activity. Oh, the philosophy we had to read, all of us back in the day, though I imagine core curricula are looser now. And I did read it and underline things and write papers about ideas. Yet all I remember now is the occasional soundbite, like "I think, therefore I am." (Descartes; I looked it up.) But I've known people who could no longer think; yet still existed. I'm sure I'm missing the subtleties of the argument.

Actually, this whole opening up of communication that is the internet, this giving the air waves to the people, suits me, and a lot of other people, too. We've taken to blogging, then miniblogging, as on twitter and Facebook. We post pictures of our dogs and babies, share our art. I know there's a lot of debate online, in fact, it's as ugly as a grade-school playground sometimes, and no big guy to step in and call time out. I avoid that stuff. I am less and less interested in debate. Ideas separate people.

Ideas, views, beliefs, convictions - all can separate people. I was reminded of this yesterday as we watched the stunning ceremonies in front of the Lincoln Memorial. In the midst of the finale, everyone singing, I imagined my father shaking his head, getting up to leave the room, saying, "I never thought I'd live to see a (obscenity deleted) in the White House." He didn't live to see it, just as well. Yet, while he was proud to be a racist, he and my mother were good friends with an Indian immigrant couple, very dark brown people. The woman wore a sari. That was different. I assume my father didn't share his convictions with them.

The same odd division between mental constructs and actions is true of another favorite elderly relative (who is still alive). He can come out with the kind of racist talk that turns you cold. Yet, he had a long friendship with "a black fellow" who worked with him. This human being was different, you see, than that abstraction in the man's mind. Human beings are.