Gmar Chatima Tova

So...sundown yesterday to sundown today marked Yom Kippur, the Jewish holiday and Day of Atonement.

You've got to appreciate the social conscience of a faith that emphasizes personal responsibility, accountability, and contrition, not just to some faceless, recherché metaphysical curmudgeon, but to our fellow man. As someone who offends people with all the metered regularity of a clepsydra, I can certainly see the wisdom in owning my shortcomings, and asking forgiveness for the wrongs I have knowingly and unknowingly done.

So that's what I'm doing right now, after a fashion. If you are reading this, chances are that I have wronged you somehow in the last year. I am sorry. I believe that I am a fundamentally good man. I certainly try to be. Sometimes I fail. If I have hurt you in any way, please accept my sincerest apologies.

Good night, happy new year, and bless you all...if that is your thing.

Pssssssst....

Can you keep a secret? You can? Good.

One of this week's PostSecrets is mine. And I'm sure it's not the one you think it is. Or the other one.

The real secret, though? This is not the first time.

A Taoist Parable

This is, as the title indicates, a Taoist parable (to the best of my recollection, one of Chuang-Tze's). I consider it highly topical, advising as it does against struggling with an unmanagable situation simply because you desire a certain outcome. There are situations that I would like to go otherwise, and people I'd wish to behave somewhat differently...but ultimately, I have only the sort of control that Master K'ung has, below.

And as it turns out, that is plenty.

------

One day, an angry and unruly horse was left tied in a narrow but very busy alleyway. A crowd soon gathered, debating the best way to get around the restive beast. Many advocated attempting to simply run past it, but the alley proved too narrow, and they only received kicks for their troubles.

Several people tried to vault over the horse, but it simply reared up and trampled them mercilessly. One brave man even sought to crawl between its legs, but was nearly killed in the attempt.

After many hours, a young girl spotted Master K'ung approaching the alley from a nearby street. She yelled, "Master K'ung approaches! Surely he can help us get around the horse!"

Master K'ung gazed from the crowd to the horse, pausing briefly to consider. He then smiled slightly, and walked down to the next alley to continue on his way.

Hurts Like Burning

It's been done elsewhere, sure, and done better. But I simply can't stop talking about my new ink.

It's like my baby...only I don't have to change its diapers or help to potty-train it, and it hopefully won't sneak out of the house, steal my car, or suddenly move out in a huff at age 18. *fingers crossed* Yet it is that same sort of proprietary delight I suspect one might feel while fondly gazing at, if not perhaps their own children, then at least those of, say, a second cousin.

The Tao, it is said, is like water. It inhabits even the lowest places, and, given time, can affect anything placed in its path. The characters in my tattoo, wu wei, represent the paradoxical Taoist ideal of acting without acting (wei wu wei), or "effortless doing," identifying the Tao of all things, and not striving against it...in other words, flowing like water. It is a concept not dissimilar to the Hindu idea of dharma, or the twinned Taoist concept of te (roughly, "doing virtue"). You, dear reader, might now that I have been working on a translation of the Tao Te Ching, from the Classical Chinese characters, for the last few years. I say this by way of allaying any fear you might have, that I have perhaps had unwittingly had "donkey penis" tattooed on my arm, or been taken in by some elaborate joke.

I can already feel a sort of...I don't know...gentle, philosophical tug from the new ink. Of course, it could just be the sunburnt feeling of a forearm-ful of raw, healing skin. One of those two, anyway....

if you think to yourself, “what should I do now?”
then take the baton, and girl, you better run with it.
there is no point in standing in the past...
cause it’s over and done with.

Almost Nostalgia

I spent a wonderful, uncharacteristically solitary two hours watching the splendid A Prairie Home Companion, earlier this afteroon, a throwback to a time and place that not only was I not a part of, but that is largely fictional. This got me thinking: Can you feel nostalgia, properly speaking, for something you've never experienced?

The answer is yes, of course you can. I've spent the week-and-change doing just that.

Choices I've made, things I've said and done, people I've invited in and people I've expelled from my life...from where I sit, this last week has been dense with import. The pure, distilled impact of my decisions and actions has been uncharacteristic and cathartic. I feel vital. I feel lovely. And I feel alive.

I can see some of those wilting possibilities...shifting, diaphanous forms, like people seen through a revolving door: gone before you can properly focus on them. Mixed in with the bittersweet recollections and pseduo-nostalgia of these weres, these almosts are the verdant, vibrant growths of the maybes, the possibles, the will-bes...the heady perfume of which fills me with an abiding goodwill. Life is beautiful, and I am blessed.

age makes no difference till you open your mouth.
use your time just to work things out.
i know that you can't understand,
when i tell you that this wasn't planned.
and so it saddens me to say,
i'm only happy when I move away.

The Groove

Those of you who have seen the tracklisting for my Spring Mix CD, will notice track 3, Kanye West's eminently dancable "Touch the Sky". Nothing has managed to dampen my love for this song, not a rotation on BBY "Radio," not the fact that its video features Pamela Anderson, not even Kanye sometimes talking like a space alien from the planet Gibberish-431.

I was working in the copy room at SCHARP, yesterday, and listening to my iPod as I scanned documents. When "Touch the Sky" came on, I started busting a move right there. I mean, seriously busting a move. Two minutes or so in, I did a fancy little spin (it was pretty cool...I felt good doing it), and that was when I noticed not one, but four co-workers were standing there, watching me. Meaning, they were doing nothing but standing and watching. They weren't checking their mailboxes. They weren't colating, making copies, or grabbing office supplies. No. Just watching. So, what did I do, you might wonder?

I shrugged, turned back toward the scanner, and just started right back in. You can't kill the groove, man. You can't kill the groove.

Further Evidence....

...that I am in fact not a man at all. Last year, these luscious sandals you see to the left wrapped their delicate tendrils around my heart. Since then, I have thought of little else. Little (nay, virtually no) sleep was to be had; every moment, my waking mind was consumed with desire for them.

These sandals, Keen "Newports," in the "Steel" color, are finally mine. Am I a hippy? Perhaps. Am I slightly womanish? This, likewise, cannot be disputed.

Now, as they wrap my weary feet in their quasi-celestial embrace, I can hear an angelic note...as if crowds of seraphim are delighting in my every step, showering glories from on high, to wake the sons of man to the pleasures of these inestimable sandals.