Pondering parachutes

Parachute Pondering

These thoughts they cross my brain

Linked together like a chain

There’s no use  I won’t complain

That’s just time gone down the drain

I have spent time on a train

ridden bikes through storms of rain

It’d be a thrill—Perhaps insane

Should I jump out of a plane???

This morning the rain was hauntingly cold, but garbage is what garbage is and it’s not going to up  and wander it’s way to the dumpster.  It was a not-so gentle reminder that the fall season in the land of the pine is about to shift and soon the evergreens will remain while the rest will stand stark until the calendar rolls over and through the holiday corridor.  It seems the calendar moved pretty quickly sometimes in this last year—but that’s what people who spend more money on candles than cake when it comes to birthdays often say.  

Well walking back empty handed thoughts came to what the rest of the day might bring and beyond that  how many things on how many days will need some attention before what they call the permenant winter.  Some folks might refer to this type of musing as t”thinking about your “bucket list”. 

This morning the pondering of this sort didn’t render a large list.  However one item has appeared and vanished several times over time.  It’s not there now and maybe it has gone the way of phone booths, blacksmiths and keypunch operators—just a memory.  

But what about this parachute idea.

How did someone answer “Yes!! Let’s suspend me from a tablecloth  on some wood strips (DeVinci’s notion) or some rope and jump from somewhere above the earth okay?”   Well history says the first successful parachute  drop came from a hot air balloon in France right before 1800.  No one talks about jumps before that  which were not successful mainly because those people attempting  to do so really didn’t talk much after their efforts came up short and a lot faster than they anticipated so to speak.

Once success was achieved people, as people do, started to find all types of reasons to dare nature with these ice cream cone shaped bed sheets and of course one of the most significant advances came in the name of having healthy people jump out of perfectly good planes  holding weapons so people on the ground could shoot at them until they got on the ground and started shooting the people already there.  Of course, in order to avoid being floating target practice jumpers started this practice of jumping at night onto the ground hundreds and sometimes thousands of feet below in the dark heading for someone on the ground who had started a small fire or had a flashlight.  Oh and because these troops might need things in front of and behind enemy lines we strapped parachutes on equipment and food and all sorts of things and tossed them earthward too.  

Well fortunately right now we aren’t doing that so often except to put out wild fires and smoke jumpers are already a special breed of people who run into fires and what’s the big deal about jumping out of a plane to do that?  Since around 1940 that’s been an effective way of getting to remote places before there are wildfires raging through downtown Reno.   

So what about doing this just for the thrill —just for the fun?  What’s that really all about?  Well about  40,000 US citizens have a certificate  or a license to take their double chute  pack —yes having a back-up chute is now standard because you can sky dive without a chute opening once but after that and hitting the earth (some have survived it) at terminal velocity  which for a human is a mere 120 MPH, a back up plan seemed like a good idea.  In fact the modern pack that runs about $8,000 or so including helmet and a computer sensor that can automatically deploy the spare if it seems you are taking the free falling a little too freely.  Oh and the modern parachute isn’t the round shape any longer.  It is a rectangular wing-shaped contraption  that you can steer a little bit …unless you know .. you don’t control the weather  as you drop the ten or 14 thousand feet that is the normal distance jumps are.  When it’s around 10,000 you get about 30 seconds of free fall and at 14,000 it’s about a minute.  Now the world’s record is some slightly twisted fellow who rode a super high  altitude balloon to about 25 miles high and how high was he?  When he decided that was a good idea?  

Okay let’s get down to earth and to the peace and joy part of this.  

In life sometimes we face barriers and need something to lift us above them knowing there will come a moment when we must have the courage to take a leap into a whole new space.  Rising above or away from where we are now may make it possible to gain a whole new perspective and to choose a different landing spot where we can begin again.  Many people board that plane  and dare to see another perspective, however, so many of us get close to the door but don’t trust that we have the parachute we need or will be able to find support where we land.  So then our plane circles around and in no time we are back right where we started.  There is little peace and joy in that.  Perhaps if we want others to leap to better things we need to jump with them or we need to promise to be on the ground and not where we are now but where they will land and need our support.  Sometimes we all just need to believe the support will be there or come when they see us falling.  In short- take a breath- take a leap- hold tight to the chord and three-two- one—rip it!!! 

 

Rock and ROLL and it’s important

Time to rock and ROLL II

The previous  entry regarding “rock” was the “resurfacing” so to speak of the “seeking” blog and will be part  of this combination of the upcoming pod… the second part?  Well when you have Rock you’ve got to have roll.. and sometimes it feels like Led Zep when it’s been a lon, long, long lonely time since.. but that’s over now!

Roll?

Since things move so much easier on wheels (physics tells us it only takes about 5% as much force to move things on wheels as dragging them  and when things are kind of a drag we all know that right?  

However, there are a lot of types of rolling like there are communities that use huge rolling logs to move entire houses from place to place.  These people don’t have fancy stereo or bluetooth but they really know how to walk and roll.  They also know how to roll stop and drop when needed?  

Okay rolling?  WE roll a lot.  Ever since we figured out the round shape of a wheel and started using it—which was supposedly somewhere 3,000 plus years before the modern era so 5,000 or so years ago.  And so.. what are some of the most useful and least thought about “rolls” we might use to seek peace and joy?

Well in my family and in many others I suspect you can’t say the word “roll” without conjuring the word cinnamon  before it—and yet while they might be part of many snacks  and breakfast dreams.. the rolls that inhabit our lives and get little respect most the time  come in the form, not of pastry—but of paper.  Yes we are speaking of paper towels and of course the Big TP.  

Paper Towels

Americans  and we keep track in terms of dollars of course—use about 20 billion dollars worth of paper towels per year and that’s in addition to the cloth towels that we use to the tune of 3 billion worth as we buy 200 million of them annually.  But the cloth ones don’t come in rolls so let’s leave them hanging for now.  

Now the paper towels come in rolls of between 60 and 80 feet per roll and now you can start imagining how far how the rolls would stretch.. but just relax combining them with the other big paper towel player so to speak makes this far more interesting.  

Toilet Paper

This my friends is what “rolling” is all about.  We use it for so many things and like so many things once we treat it with some disregard just throw it away.  We not only expect it to dissolve we invest in it and then when it gets soiled we use industrial strength engineering to make sue it becomes forgotten.  Oh sure during a pandemic or an upcoming storm it becomes important and sought after but then see you later alligator.  Question: how many experiencing and people in our lives do we treat the same?  How many do we flush and then expect to always be there when we need them?  When the disposal thing isn’t there when we expect it how irritated and how quick are we to find someone to blame for not making sure  we have the TP?   So in the seeking peace realm maybe we should or at least could try to appreciate the TP and the people we have and will come in contact with and then let dissolve away.  Maybe just once a day consider the human interactions that are so casually treated  as temporary and disposable  and maybe offer a bit of joy during those interactions?

Now back to the paper towel and toilet paper combo…

Some initial approximations indicate that if we stretched out —unrolled” all the rolls we use annually  in America we could go to the moon and back with the stuff we use to clean our moon well over 2000 times and if instead we decided to circle the globe at the equator well that would be a significant JUMBO  SIZE roll as we could circle the planet some 41,000 times.  There is no question that this would be a very large roll and yet when the Earth is spinning would the roll be placed so that the paper came off “Over Or Under”??? 

Anyway it’s time for us to keep rolling along  and the next entry will be something about —you guessed it “rock and roll” or rock music and it’s forms.. but for now. Respect the TP and don’t forget to put the seat down- or lift it depending on the actions that need to be completed.  

Life is messy (clean it up with some paper if needed ) but don’t be afraid to leave a beautiful stain.   

Time to Rock and Roll Again

It’s time to Rock and Roll…

Last night a friend sent me a text just to check in.  When this happens in life it’s about concern and expectations and maybe it demonstrates the best part of what humans can be and quite frankly are.  This blog about seeking peace and joy has always been about experimenting with different lenses on experiences most of us have had or will have or wish to have or never want to have.  The blog has never been a prescription, never attempted to be a road map.  It has been an attempt to lay out one person’s parts for constructing a compass of sorts and long about a year agate choice was made to suspend the writing to work on some other parts of the collective soul.  Well ..those parts are now up and flowing and creating questions that this blog can muse regarding and since typing exercises  the finger muscles used while keyboarding on the piano-that flow continues one of the new streams life is presenting in my personal seeking piece and joy universe and speaking of flow it’s time to let that stream flow down this lazy river and offer it to anyone who might care to use some time seeking peace and joy.  

Enough with all the why this is a new blog after so many moments gone by—let’s “Rock” and “Roll”!!

ROCK

One of the new streams that will be part of this blog moving forward is the Disability Rock Opera” inspiration has brought into my adventure but we’re not going there today.  We are starting with real rock—No not Grunge, 90’s Alternative Rock, Not regal, not Old School Hip Hop and not Punk.. and not in any way shape or form disco.  We are talking the big three.  Igneous - Sedimentary—and metamorphic .  

Most of the Earth’s surface -it’s landmass etc is covered by Sedimentary rock.  This rock is formed by little bits of stuff just sitting around-d for a really long time and being under pressure for a long enough time time that it quits moving, gets stuck and hardensIt seems like a lotto ideas held by a lot of people follow this pattern and yes it seems to happen all over the world.  It isn’t shocking that most people suggest that things are just a certain way—you know “it is what it is.”  Well while sedimentary rock covers a lot of the planet guess what?  It isn’t what the world is really made of.  

Igneous

Igneous rock you know the type that comes from the center of the earth the heart of the planet and is formed from heat and lava…well that makes up the majority of the Earth’s crust and maybe life events that are explosive and create streams of flowing thoughts and emotions really make up the most significant parts of our lives and moments of discomfort and change wind up forming the shell that defines and protects our inner core?  

Metamorphic 

Now This is an interesting  type of rock.  It is formed when the Earth’s crust big plate of stuff decide to attempt to occupy the same place at the same time and these collisions have such force that completely new structures in the stone appear.  Yes this is the stuff of mountain ranges and tsunamis.  Landmarks often show evidence of metamorphic change or igneous eruptions and so it is with life.  

Each type of rock has qualities and usually is pretty easy to identify so pick up a rock or two and think about what is happening in your life right now for that is a method for exploring the next step in the seeking peace or joy process.  

We won’t go too far down the path today although it’s probably made of gravel sand and chips of the most common mined rock which is limestone  and limestone makes up the base for most roads sidewalks and driveways and along with sand works together to make concrete and cement.  Now we find so much use in this sort of rock yet we often seek and pay for diamonds and rubies, and sapphires  and emeralds which are not as much a part of our daily lives but in terms of Earth time  these stones didn’t work harder to become special or really change more than most other things on the planet.  Other than making great cutting edges and stereo record player parts diamonds  might be a girls’s best friend but give me sand any day.  Sand makes castles that help us realize that no kingdom states around as the waves of time move in and out.  Sand helps us get a grip when the ice and snow make our wheels spin and sand allows us to form glass that provides protection and let’s us see into things including the future and past with stuff like a telescope.  Sand in an hour glass let’s us have a time perspective and some illusion of control when it comes to time.  Speaking of which this blogs thanks you for spending some of yours reading or listening today.  Oh and what goes with rock?—Well Roll of course but that’s for tomorrow or the next day for sure.. Oh and if you used to listen to the pod…it’s coming back too…. 

Find some peace and joy comes what may  and understand life is messy so leave a beautiful stain.

 

curses foiled. Again while seeking peace and joy

Curses Foiled Again?  

We are in a very warm stretch of the Summer season and making a number of attempts to avoid using indoor appliances to heat food.  That means cooking things on an outdoor grill.  

A couple days ago we decided to prepare a lean cut of seasoned pork - why the entire pork menu isn’t bacon?—who knows?  However cooking on an outdoor grill even our infrared  electronic  device can be tricky since like in life heat and cold are often distributed unevenly no matter what your intentions might be.  This being the case we often find it efficient and effective  to wrap our intended feast in aluminum foil.  When getting the meat ready a sheet of foil was pulled off the roll and some thoughts came into focus.  First, the foil was thinner than usual.   This prompted the question—would this still be useful?  Of course once one question emerges the flood gates opened.  

What does being useful foil involve?  If you type it wrong all you have is a fool?  So thanks to Sr. Gregory my association with foil leaped from something a cartoon villain was “cursed and foiled again” to a method used to multiply algebraic terms.  Foil of course stands for First Outers Inners then Lasts.  If you fully understand this then add in a useable knowledge of squares between 1 and 50 then multiplying any two digit number by another two digit number becomes as easy as counting to 10 starting at 9.   There is of course the sword fighting instrument known as the oil.  It’s a long thin sword mostly impactful when you jab  or stab with it.  However, let’s do away with that and get back to the sheets of aluminum  coming from a roll.  Now cooking isn’t the only use for this.  Rumor has it that it can block the harmful rays beamed down by aliens or perhaps Russian or Chinese satellites?  Ok let’s not get into those conspiracies they never helped Jimmy Hoffa.  

So lets’s start moving toward the seeking peace and joy connection to foil.  So this thin metal which is now being sold in thinner and thinner sheets assort of like the world today.  Our protection agains harmful things  like rays —oh wait  we’re back to the Russians?  Seriously our insulation from exterior factors has grown thinner  and thinner  so what this foil was like in 1910 when it emerged as a product is not what it is toda.  Yet if we can imagine our ideas and emotions wrapped in the silver blanket that sells around 30 billion dollars  in product, then we can handle random heating  from all environments  much more effectively.  So in seeking peace maybe finding some spiritual foil like meditation, music, prayer, or exercise is a good idea. If we experience joy maybe we can not only take some of it in we can reflect some of it back out into the world?  We can turn the shiny side in to hold in heat and produce juices that remain or we can go shiny side out so cooking can take it’s good time and we can relax and smell the goodness we are about to eat.   Sometimes it’s good not to hurry through things.  

Finally this foil becomes a container  for holding in the nourishment it helped to prepare.  Maybe something to think about when seeking peace and joy us “what containers do we have that holds in the experiences of peace and joy?  Do we share the stories that remind us and others of our peaceful and joyful moments?  Do we look for the shiny side in others?   Like the foil do we understand that the roll doesn’t go on forever?  Do we accept that seeking peace and joy is a process and the result of that doesn’t always go on forever?

Well speaking of going on forever… this entry has gone on quite long enough.  Like the pork we are making again soon, it’s time to wrap this up?

 

Relax Karma Can chill a Limerick

 For a moment let’s put down our mugs

Our prescriptions and other odd drugs

for Often it’s true 

It’s not all about you

Sometimes Karma just stands there and shrugs 

Have A Hopping Happy Holiday

 Hopping Happy?

Well we’ve probably all heard the expression “hopping mad” right?  So angry we couldn’t stand still?  However, given we also celebrate “Happy” Easter and the mascot of that holiday since created by the Germans in the 1700s has been a rabbit/bunny, it seems reasonable to suggest we might be Hopping Happy as well.  

Certain folks are probably happier than others at Easter.  Depending upon your spiritual beliefs of course  it is a day of celebration, but that’s not all.   If you like candy eat candy or sell candy or if you fix the damage done to your teeth by candy.  Then you should be happy.  Americans alone buy over three billion dollars worth of candy for Easter including 200 million Cadberry eggs alone.  Also if you make cheap baskets out of “real” or plastic Easter is your jam… oh and that plastic grass?  Who came up with that idea?  I bet it was the tinsel people sitting in a marketing meeting and somebody said :we’ve done this in silver, gold, and some other colors and Marvin in the corner chomping on the last candy cane three days after Valentine’s Day said let’s try green.”  Now Mary pulled out her world famous eye roll but just before unleashing  a smart Alec remark licked her lips and said “Yep.. let’s do it.. let’s go green and put it in Easter baskets so parents trying to convince kids a bunny brings this stuff can make it look like there is more stuff by filling these baskets up with something they will call grass.”  We’ve already  got people buying eggs and someday they’ll believe the price of them is economically significant so they won’t buy as many to color them for the baskets… and so we have cheap baskets with plastic grass and we hide some of the candy to watch our kids search around  for things that will rot their teeth…but it’s fun right?  There are a number of apps that include Easter Eggs hunting in them so you can avoid the baskets and grass, however maybe that isn’t really in keeping with the spirit of the “hopping happy” holiday?  

Seeking Peace and Joy for Hopping Happy”

Well… maybe a hopping delivery bunny doesn’t make sense.  Maybe mounds of candy in a cheap plastic basket filled with plastic grass isn’t practical when you stop to think about it?  On the other hand or other foot —aren’t rabbit’s feet lucky?—and maybe the candy we give to kids and others are little shots of colorful happiness?  Maybe peace and joy comes in small doses.  Maybe we should imagine carrying these small gifts around with us and quietly distribute them in unexpected places?  Maybe people should be able to open up a hard shell and find something sweet inside?  In short maybe we all should go for a little hopping happy now and the? 

The world is out of order, perhaps

 A segment to be found in the upcoming “book” effort—

Table of Objects—

Warning!— This table (and the book itself) May Be out of order

So it is expected that written materials, well all lengthy materials will include a table or index to guide folks  to specific chapters, pages, sections, images or whatever.  When your organizing metaphor is a junk drawer  do you really expect traditional organization devices?  Well.. there will be a table of objects with a grouping label.  Just for fun a somewhat serious attempt will be made to present objects and experiences in alphabetic order.  Well not exactly.  You see when something is “in order” people generally don’t give the order of things much attention.  If, instead, you put a sign on something  that reads “out of order” it gets immediate attention.  We aren’t saying positive attention, however, it’s attention  none theses. Like for instance when you’ve had too much soda or coffee and you pull into the rest stop and walk quickly to relieve your bladder and you scout out the restroom only to see the dreaded words—“Out of Order”  that will get your attention.  When you have a craving for M&Ms  and a moderately large handful of change  and you find a vending machine next to that noisy ice machine at the hotel and then spot the nasty taped on half sheet or paper taped over the coin slot… well you get it—out of order  makes you take notice.  

The intent here is not to be annoying yet why not take advantage  of the out of order organization principle?  

Hmm?  

Actually sometimes compromise is the best route.  So If you look really closely to the objects table you might figure out that within the “categories” the objects are listed in order—reverse alphabetical order.  

Why “reverse?”  Generally because it will slow the reader down a bit and let things get a breath.  From the youngest  of ages we teach children the alphabet in alphabetic order  usually by singing that song.  We can recite A to Zed in record time, however doesn’t it take a bit more time and thought to do that in reverse order?  The objects in here mean enough that taking a bit more time is warranted.  Therefore, the section on “keeping Things Together” will start with Zip Ties and wander through to Athletic Tape.  

Before moving forward or backward maybe we should demonstrate that the traditional alphabet  isn’t getting completely disrespected.  After all, it has a long celebrated  developmental history starting way back in the ancient middle east and is sort of known to actually settled a bit by the time of the Roman Empire.  Of course the letters and the word alphabet come from ancient Greece  and speaking of ancient grease I just smelled some Mcdonald’s fries.  Anyway, after J became the final letter added to the modern alphabet  around the 16th century and the & sign didn’t hold onto the 27th spot, we had a system which could be used to “order” everything.   There are more things to be known about this and when you get to the “education” category you will learn more about writing, reading, math, and yes the alphabet and numbers too.  For now we will move ahead and simply acknowledge that the topics here might not fall into an easy order yet if we think about it we might ask—“Does life, time, and/or our experiences and the meanings we give them follow a lock step linear scheme?   

For now remember this

ZY X W V U T S R Q O N M L K J I H G F E D C B A —  Oh where’s the P?  Running down your leg.. didn’t we tell you the restroom was out of order?