Another encounter

I'm in Boston town, in some restaurant
I got no idea what I want
Well, maybe I do but I'm just really not sure
Waitress comes over
Nobody in the place but me and her

It must be a holiday, there's nobody around
She studies me closely as I sit down
She got a pretty face and long white shiny legs
She says, "What'll it be?"
I say, "I don't know, you got any soft boiled eggs?"

She looks at me, Says "I'd bring you some
but we're out of 'm, you picked the wrong time to come"
Then she says, "I know you're an artist, draw a picture of me!"
I say, "I would if I could, but,
I don't do sketches from memory."

"Well", she says, "I'm right here in front of you, or haven't you looked?"
I say," all right, I know, but I don't have my drawing book!"
She gives me a napkin, she says, "you can do it on that"
I say, "yes I could but,
I don't know where my pencil is at!"

She pulls one out from behind her ear
She says "all right now, go ahead, draw me, I'm standing right here"
I make a few lines, and I show it for her to see
Well she takes a napkin and throws it back
And says "that don't look a thing like me!"

I said, "Oh, kind miss, it most certainly does"
She says, "you must be jokin.'" I say, "I wish I was!"
Then she says, "you don't read women authors, do you?"
Least that's what I think I hear her say,
"Well", I say, "how would you know and what would it matter anyway?"

"Well", she says, "you just don't seem like you do!"
I said, "you're way wrong."
She says, "which ones have you read then?" I say, "I read Erica Jong!"
She goes away for a minute and I slide up out of my chair
I step outside back to the busy street, but nobody's going anywhere

Well my heart's in the Highlands, with the horses and hounds
Way up in the border country, far from the towns
With the twang of the arrow and a snap of the bow
My heart's in the Highlands
Can't see any other way to go

Every day is the same thing out the door
Feel further away then ever before
Some things in life, it gets too late to learn
Well, I'm lost somewhere
I must have made a few bad turns

- Highlands, Bob Dylan

She gets it, they don't

The parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph was in Samaria. Jacob's well was still there.

Jesus came to that place, and his disciples went into the nearby city of Sychar to buy meat.

Weary from the journey, Jesus sat down by the well. A woman came along to draw from the well, and Jesus asked her for a drink.

This piqued her curiosity, because the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans. She asked him, "Why would you, a Jew, ask for water from me, a woman of Samaria?"

Jesus replied, "If you knew the gift of God, and if you knew the one who asked you, you would have asked him for a drink of living water, and he would have given it to you."

"You have nothing to draw with," she said, "and this well is deep. Where will you get that 'living water'?

Do you claim to be greater than our father Jacob who drank from this well himself, and gave the water to his children and cattle?"

"Whoever drinks this water will thirst again. But if someone drinks the water I give her, she will never thirst, for a well will spring up within her that will last forever."

"Then give me this water, so I'll no longer be thirsty or need to come here to draw."

"Go and call your husband, and bring him here with you."

"I don't have a husband."

"Well, that's true; he's not your husband. But you have had five of them."

"I see. So you're a prophet. Tell me this then: Our fathers worshipped on this mountain. Do you say that we should worship in Jerusalem instead?"

"You don't even know what you worship here; at least in Jerusalem we know what we worship. But believe me, the hour is coming, and is here now, when you will no longer need to worship on this mountain or in Jerusalem. For God is Spirit, and is seeking those who worship in spirit and in truth."

"I know that the one who is called Christ is coming, and when he comes, he will tell us all things."

"I am that One."

Just then, his disciples returned, and the woman went away, leaving her waterpot behind. She told many people in the city what had happened, and they returned with her to see him.

Meanwhile, the disciples marvelled that he had been talking with this woman, but no one asked him why. Instead, they offered him some meat.

But he said to them, "I have meat to eat that you don't even know about."

And the disciples said to one another, "Did somebody bring him food already?"

Then Jesus said to them, "My meat is to do the will of the One that sent me, and to finish His work."


- John 4:5-34, retranslated from the King James version

Trying to remember

"While the human spirit cannot be entirely extinguished, it is highly susceptible to environmental factors. For instance, humanity is more easily manipulated than other species. Humanity will work incessantly for peanuts, as they say, or for an idea or goal that may not be in its own best interest.

Do you remember the story of Pinocchio? He very much wanted to become a real boy instead of a wooden toy. Humanity very much wants to become an enlightened species and not an automated puppet race. Pinocchio tried very hard to remember all the wonderful rewards that would be his if he could just remember and keep the promises he had made to himself and to his father, Gepetto. Humanity, individually and collectively is also trying very hard to recall the commitments it has made to itself and to the Divine Purpose, or Father/All That Is that guides it.

Pinocchio had help from a fairy and from a cricket. Humanity also receives assistance from the seen and the unseen, as well as from heaven and earth. Pinocchio was easily deceived. He followed those who had little or no reputation of which to speak, because the promises they made sounded almost too good to be true . . . and they were. The characters in the story could no more keep the promises they made than those who make promises to humanity today can.

Fairy tales are stories about imaginary beings or events that convey or contain a message. They are improbable invented accounts that are told to children, but see how easily they become real life examples? Pinocchio traveled long and far. He experienced hunger, disappointment, deceit, imprisonment, lack, cold, and a variety of other physical and emotional tortures. All the while he was trying to get back home, back to his father, back to the place where it all began. Humanity wants the same. It wants to become real, or self-realized, do you see?

Fairy Tales are sometimes read to children so that they will go to sleep and dream. The intention of these words is to wake you from the long sleep and the dream that has already replayed itself one too many times. This story and the dreamtime that accompanies it has nothing else to teach you and nowhere else to take you. There are many roads and many realities that can take you home now, but you must endeavor to mark this distance by your own choice and by the decisions and steps you now take. Assistance is still yours for the asking."

- Pepper Lewis

Jim Brewer

Back in the early 80's, I used to trek uptown with my college pals to hear Jim Brewer play at the No Exit Cafe. It was a little folkclub coffeehouse that drew some really fine performers out of the Chicago 'hoods. The musicians played for tips. Sitting in the No Exit, I felt like I was listening to music that was real, and important, participating in something that reminded us that we were humans, and that our stories mattered.

The name "No Exit" came from Sartre's one-act existentialist play. I think existentialism basically says, "this is it, savor the moment (or not)".

I wrote an earnest poem about the place for one of my English classes:

Apple Cider
Spearmint Tea
Sorry, we don't have any.
Mocha?
No
Coffee?
No
Exit

Here's a bit of one of Jim's songs, Long Ways From Home.

One of those college pals, Slick, gave me a copy of a JB recording, but it's all one track, 43 minutes long. oops!

Come back baby
Can't we talk it over,
Lord, one more time . . .

Religion

Can't find a church that works for you? This is America, sister -
start your own!

p.s. maybe someone will like it, and join you ;-)

There's no place like Home

What are YOUR ruby slippers?

Stop masturbating, marry a millionaire

Lucky in Love

GW explains

over and over and over again

You say you want a revolution

Dreamscape Cinema presents

War games

"ism": a fundamental belief in some ideology

"terror": extreme fear

So, terrorism is intended to manifest extreme fear. The more people you can make afraid, and the more afraid you can make them, the better.

That would seem to be a likely reason for willfully killing, maiming, threatening and torturing civilians. It seems to me that an "honorable" war would be fought with different intentions.

So some questions to consider would be: Who are the people who are being made afraid, and who's willfully making them afraid? Then you will find out who the ideological terrorists are.

What can we do about it? Offer some sacrament and release our own fears.

Banking information

http://photos23.flickr.com/29551128_f6e02f6712.jpg

Dating information

http://www.defectiveyeti.com/archives/001397.html

Magic powers

The door just opened and the cat walked in. Then the door closed behind her.

Mother Goose

Ride a cock-horse to Banbury Cross,
To see an old lady upon a white horse;
Rings on her fingers, and bells on her toes,
And so she makes music wherever she goes.


Willy boy, Willy boy, where are you going?
I'll go with you, if I may.
"I'm going to the meadow to see them a-mowing,
I'm going to help them make hay."

Not what I really wanted to hear

Ask the Oracle . . .

Don't move!

Do you feel like you need more movement in your life? Having trouble laying still in bed after sitting at your desk, in your car, at the table, in the easy chair? We have a drug for that:   requip!

All sarcasm aside, and recognizing the fact that the drug companies (represented in our executive branch by Mr. Rumsfeld) are among the ruling class, and acknowledging that some people may really have tingly legs that are driving them nuts, there is nothing healthier than movement. However, if you want to be a corporate zombie, then learning not to move much can be a real asset. Ok, maybe I couldn't shake the irony. I need to shake my body.

Move baby! Shake it but don't break it!
dance dance dance dance
dance dance dance dance
DANCE

Science fiction?

Operation Terra - the journey continues . . .

Please fasten your seat belt (if you think it will help).