Tending One’s Own Garden

 

Someone recently quoted to me the saying that the most beautiful flowers die first because those are the ones which are picked. I looked at the person and replied ‘those which are killed first are those designated as weeds’.

 

Often in the pursuit of perfection, love, happiness, and all that American Dream Jazz, we overlook the things which really matter. Kafka was fascinated with the fact that, before going to kill his son Isaac, Abraham ‘set his house in order’, he made sure that everything was perfect before setting out to slaughter his child to prove that he loved God.

 

There are many ways of interpreting the story of Isaac and Abraham (see Kierkegaard’s Fear and Trembling for the best analysis), I, like Kafka will focus on what it means to set one’s house in order. As with the flowers, for them to blossom the ‘weeds’ must be destroyed, as with Abraham, to make himself into a great and holy man, his son must be destroyed. The conceit in both of these actions is glaring. One is declaring that one’s definition is the right definition and all others are inferior. One well knows that in the bible it is written that before you remove a splinter from your neighbour’s eye, you must remove the plank form your own. In this it is saying that to be of value one must first correct one’s own faults rather than another’s. With the weeds, why not rename them flowers (would a weed by any other name not smell so sweet?) for often it is the weeds which contain the medicinal properties whilst the harlots, aka flowers, just look pretty.

 

‘Neither need you tell me,” said Candide, “that we must take care of our garden.” “You are in the right,” said Pangloss; “for when man was put into the garden of Eden, it was with an intent to dress it: and this proves that man was not born to be idle.’

 

Voltaire

 

It is quite apparent that the rise of systems (capitalist/communist) has change the landscape, not only external but also internal. Karl Marx wrote:

 

‘Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people’

 

In which he is condemning religion (not realising that people now see him as a religious figure, go figure) yet if one is to study religion in depth, to look at the teachings from Lao Tzu, to Jesus, to the Buddha etc one will see that religion is, primarily, about tending to one’s own flaws so that one can be of real use and purpose within this ‘weary world of woe’ (not necessarily but I really like that Dylan line and use it whenever I can). Whilst I am not a fan of organised religions and find them, somewhat, lacking in gravitas and usefulness it is clear that through religion, philosophy, psychology and the natural sciences one can get a better perception of one’s own self and place in the world for, although the external landscape may change, the internal landscape of who we are and our needs is constant, and maybe, just maybe, we might discover that we are the weeds and it is us that needs to be changed so that we can blossom in a world of woe and, inch by inch, measure by measure, make the world a slightly more beautiful place for all, not only for those arbitrarily designated as flowers.

 

Why not?

 

‘till next time

RIP Scott Walker

 

“We Came Through”
written by Scott Walker (aka Scott Engel)

We came through
We came riding through like warriors from afar
Our black horses danced upon the graves of yesterday’s desires
Haunted by our visions framed in fire
I greet you, for you still believe in what’s behind the door
You’ve seen the children freeze upon their knees
And praying to the wind
To send their grey madonnas back again
Fire the guns, and salute the men who died for freedom’s sake
And we’ll weep tonight, but we won’t lie awake
Gazing up at statues dressed in stars
We won’t dream, for they don’t come true for us
Not anymore
They’ve run afar to hide in caves
With haggard burning eyes
Their icy voices tear our hearts like knives

We came through
Like the Gothic monsters perched on Notre Dame
We observe the naked souls of gutters pouring forth mankind
Smothered in an avalanche of time
And we’re giants as we watch our kings and countries raise their shields
And Guevara dies encased in his ideals
And as Luther King’s predictions fade from view
We came through

—-

Rest In Peace, the world is a quieter place without you

It’s All About The Benjamins

 

One topic which has been in the news recently is that of Israel (when is it not) and the comments of a freshman democratic senator. The senator tweeted in 2012 (before she was in congress)

 

‘Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel.’

 

And then the other week she tweeted that U.S. support for Israel was ‘all about the Benjamins baby.’, or for those of you, like me, who are not cool, it is all about money.

The defence of the member of congress focused on her ethnicity and religion, saying it is hard for her as a Muslim in the US with death threats etc., and it cannot be denied that it is hard for her, however, this does not mitigate what she is doing, namely, repeating, over the two tweets, tired and, frankly, ignorantly racist comments, tarnishing all of Israel’s citizens (aka Jews) with one brush, the same thing her defenders say have been happening to her. Whilst this speaks to a deeper concern that I have about politics at the moment, i.e. those with no political experience entering into politics as part of a new wave, be in Republican, Democrat etc. and not even knowing how to act as an adult. Members of Congress carry great weight when they speak, so such comments, which may be well intentioned (although it is hard to see how), reek of ignorance and stupidity and, in other times, would be grounds for a more serious reprimand than the Democrats handed out.

 

Israel is a topic which seems to fall under the category ‘acceptable racism’. Often when a musician wants to play a concert in Israel there are mass protests from their fans in the West and they cancel the show and apologise. Apologise for what? For creating something that people like and then giving people the opportunity to see them live? Yes, the Israeli government has serious problems and the geopolitical situation amounts to little more than two old men falling out and many generations being taught to hold the grudge without really knowing why, but who suffers most in such conflicts, and in such ignorance being spouted by those in power, is the people, the yous and mes who want to see Radiohead, who defied their ‘fans’ and played Israel (which I am sure cheered people up…) and these are the people whom suffer due to conflict between people in their ivory towers who live in a world where, to quote the American Civil War poet Henry Timrod, ‘wisdom… grows up in strife’. Yes, people have the right to free speech etc. and free speech should be applauded and protected but no one has the right to be wilfully ignorant and to hold positions of power to spout their ignorance. Likewise, the defence, ‘ah, but I get treated badly too’ is what children do to justify hitting someone. However, children have the excuse that they are children still being taught about the world, something those in power, you would hope, wouldn’t try to use as a defence for behaviour which is as repulsive as it is stupid. And if you wish to bring such comments to the world, then maybe you should remember the words a Jew once spoke:

 

‘Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?’

 

And maybe you’ll realise the hypocrisy within your own soul  and you will remember that you, and everyone else, are merely human and every nation on earth, every religion, and everything within civilisation is human and it is, indeed ‘all about the Benjamins’ and the Susans and the Maryams et al.

 

‘till next time

The Kindness Of Strangers

 

‘I have always depended on the kindness of strangers’ thus spake Blanche DuBois in Tennessee Williams’ 1947 play A Streetcar Named Desire. The phrase carries certain connotations within the play, none of them good and the given irony that it is those who are not strangers but family who are her undoing, but let us consider the validity of the phrase.

 

We lead our lives within bubbles. The majority of people with whom we interact are well known to us by sight, name or personally. In one day one may talk to ten, for example, people whom they know and will report it thusly, ‘today I spoke to ten people’. However, if we expand the bubble, or, as we shall call it, frame, we see that one has not spoken to ten people, rather one may have spoken to 15, or 20, of even 100 people. But who?

 

We live in a service culture where everyone seems to work in a manner to serve others. I don’t mean service as in waiters or taxi drivers, I mean service in the wider sense, both direct and indirect. What do I mean by that? Well, Martha, I mean that someone hitting a nail on the other side of the world can effect/affect what happens on this side of the world (see what I did there?). Someone may be building a train or sealing an envelope (sending an email) which affects my daily living and e/affects my being. The amount of complexity which goes into ‘just having a banana’ is beyond our comprehension for one must a) plant the tree, b) water the tree … h) check the fruit…y)pick the fruit…aa) put it in a van, bb) drive it to the docks/airport and so on and so forth until the x number of x’s. Yes, everyone is (hopefully) working for pay and given how the ‘developed’ world is all capitalist (it is) it is what one needs to do to survive (in many cases barely survive). However, all systems are built upon one thing, and that is people. I am well aware that if Marx or a Marxist et al went up to a ‘worker’ and said ‘brother, we are all in it together’ (ahem) they would receive either a resounding punch or violent indifference simply because this is theory and not reality, but when I say ‘people’ I mean flesh and blood. Not an ideology or class or any of that other nonsense people call important but actual people for all systems depend upon human behaviour. It is all well and good saying ‘here is my system’ but unless one asks, ‘ok, here is the system (theory) how is it used? (practice)’ one cannot get a clear understanding of how the system actually works and thusly one may not understand that the smallest thing can effect/affect the smallest thing, even on a sub-atomic level, which in turn can affect the overall project.

 

There are many theories as to what makes a worker/ a work good and in spite of every theory, it seems clear that the key to success is the people using the system as the best work is done by people who are happy (beware the apathy of contentedness) for when people are happy they work harder and their mood is better and, in many cases, without any problems to blame the world for, they are kinder, thusly, I think it is fair to say that, for the success of our daily lives, we all depend upon the kindness of strangers.

‘till next time

Down The Road

 

In recent weeks I have been haunted by a passage from a Jack Kerouac novel that I read years ago. Eager to put an end to my haunting, I set out to find the whole quotation so that I could make a copy of it. My initial Google search came up with an article from a respected New York based publication and an article from an author explaining his ‘shame’ at having once liked Kerouac.

The premise of the article was that Kerouac lacked substance and one must be ashamed to find him having substance. My one ‘criticism’ of Kerouac, and why I haven’t read him for many years, is that many of his books are about a child who plays American Football, becomes a star, goes to college, whose father dies etc., essentially Kerouac’s life story. There are only so many times you can read the same story in different guises! But this does not detract away from Kerouac and his writing.

 

When I was 20/21 I first read On The Road and other than loving the

 

‘the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes “Awww!”’

 

the same way I loved Ginsberg’s ‘I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness’ from Howl, I found the book to be a bit boring. I reread it a few years later, having read much more of Kerouac’s work, and understood the book, the book wasn’t about being mad, having parties and underage prostitutes (hmm) it was America viewed from behind a veil of tears, be they tears of sadness or tears of joy.

 

The substance of Kerouac’s work is not the ‘madness’, the drinking, drugs, homoerotism of how he views the likes of Neal Cassidy etc., the substance of books lies in this, which sounds simple but really isn’t, it is the ability to do as William Blake wrote:

 

To see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand

And Eternity in an hour   

 

In Visions of Gerard, Kerouac recounts how his older brother, who passed away as a child, taught him to lie on his stomach and watch how their cat’s tongue curls to lap up milk, in Big Sur he listens to the story the sea can tell him in its own voice, in The Dharma Bums he realises  the power of dreams as he hurtles down a mountain side ‘It’s impossible to fall off a mountain, you fool!’ why impossible? Because such things cannot touch you when you are alive. And the creepy Dr Sax sneaking through childhood’s imagination and the sweet balm of first love (and broken heart) with Maggie Cassidy. The substance of Kerouac is the ability to see beauty in the profane, in the everyday, to see people as whole, each with their own stories to tell (aka lives).

 

The citric, I think, raises and important point. He is not saying that he is ashamed of reading Kerouac, rather he is saying he is ashamed of who he was then, and that he is still harking back to it suggests that he is ashamed of who he is now. Yes, it is true that what thrilled us—filled us with fantastic feelings never felt before, to paraphrase Poe, may no longer have the same power and awe as then, however, we must remember that once upon a time it did and who we were then is still part of who we are now and to be ashamed of what we cared about then is merely a shadow cast by the shame we now may feel for who we are now.

 

And as for the passage that haunted me…

 

 

‘And what does the rain say at night in a small town, what does the rain have to say? Who walks beneath dripping melancholy branches listening to the rain? Who is there in the rain’s million-needled blurring splash, listening to the grave music of the rain at night, September rain, September rain, so dark and soft? Who is there listening to steady level roaring rain all around, brooding and listening and waiting, in the rain-washed, rain-twinkled dark of night?’ (The Town And The City)

 

Told you it was beautiful.

 

 

‘till next time

Is The Bible Literal?

Walking past a meeting room the other day I saw a board outside asking, ‘Can You Trust The Bible?’. This board caused me great confusion as to what it meant. Can I trust it to look after my money? Can I trust it to give me good legal representation? But, eventually, I settled on, is what it says true?

 

Well, I doubted that this question could be solved over ‘bread and soup’ (whatever happened to bread and fishes?) and, as the actual feeding of the 5 had finished, I did not feel the need to enquire more.

 

Whether or not the bible is literal is a question of great seriousness for many people. There are those who say, ‘how can you believe it, I thought you were opened minded’ (let’s call these people ignorant hypocrites) and there are those who say, ‘how can you not believe it? You will go to hell’ (let’s call these people something which won’t damn us for all eternity). But the question remains, is it literal?

 

One story, in the bible, in particular, is that of Noah. Noah, knowing that it would rain, built a big boat to save two of each animal. Amusingly a character in the TV show The Big Bang Theory when asked how he fed them replied ‘The floating bodies of drowned sinners, of course. ‘. Herodotus is known as the father of history. A Greek historian, he compiled the myths and histories of the Greeks, including a story about a couple who survived a great flood on a boat which destroyed the world. Likewise, the Roman poet, Ovid, tells the same tale. Why would all three tell the same tale? Yes, there would be cross culture ‘contamination’ in a time when immigration and different cultures didn’t cause paranoia and fear, but historians have shown that all three accounts are said to take place at the same point in history when a glacier melted and flooded the Mediterranean, or in the days of pre-flight and shipping, the whole world. Thus, these stories can be seen as ways of interpreting nature, as with all mythology. So far, so simple, yet I would like to go beyond the obvious and consider the whole of the story in the sense of the moral and ethical aspects. The story seems clear- if you are bad you will be punished so it is better to be good as you will be rewarded, something which permeates Christianity, something I have an issue with, but I think that the bible cannot be taken as a guide of how to get to heaven or avoid the wrath of God, rather I think the bible itself is a parable of the basic concerns that one must have, or in other words, how to be human. Feed the hungry, heal the sick and protect the weak, something so many seem to have a problem with, especially those who parade around in the guise of Christians…

 

‘But the enemy I see wears a cloak of decency

All non-believers and men-stealers talkin’ in the name of religion’

(Dylan)

 

Which leads me to the conclusion, can the bible be understood literally? No, in terms of the stories as historical documents but yes in terms of the meaning, in my opinion the actual content, the actual bible. Also, I think if the bible invites you in for bread and soup, you may be able to say yes, after all, if the bible is literal in every sense, there will be more than enough for everyone.

 

 

‘till next time