You may scoff or just ignore
Swear you’ve heard this song before
Hide your soul and slam its door
When the time comes to explore
Make another row your oar
To plant your flag and claim the shore
If seeking cash becomes your chore
Stack it up you’ll still be poor
So just a few days ago some information from a book (from a legitimate publisher) informed this blog that there were approximately 100 million stars in “our galaxy.” From that number and a pretty good estimate about how long it would take to count to a million this blog put out that it would take around five years to count, not all the stars in the sky, but just the ones in our stellar neighborhood. But then…. New information was collected and it’s more recent and legitimate. This information was produced using a new lens (technically a new telescope’s capacity to gather information along with further proof from some space probes. Is this new telescope more accurate? Don’t freak out because it is pointed into space, however, the most correct description of the capabilities of this spy glass is that it can detect/see something the size of a human hair from about 400 miles away. So… if this thing worked here on the planet and I’m standing somewhere in western Nebraska, the lawmakers wiping their backsides near the Golden Dome in des Moines had better keep the shades pulled down. Okay… so using this new tool the estimate of stars in our galaxy was. Revised and now the number has jumped from 100 million to about 1.3 billion or about 13 times as many. Well that means counting would now take about 65years. What else does it change?
Stars in the Sky vs. sand on the Beach?
Of course, now that we can see more stars, we can definitely state that there are more stars in the heavens than sand on the beach in fact there seems to be 10,000 stars for every grain of sand even those you find in unmentioned places after you notice an uncomfortable itch. Oh and although there isn’t as much sand, we shouldn’t ignore it. In fact, some scientists are starting to become concerned because we are “harvesting” sand and using it to make concrete and some other sand products like glass and computer chips at a rate faster than the Earth can make more sand. Due to the need to track such things, scientists now have the ability to examine grains of sand and determine when they were formed and where on Earth they originated. Now that may seem a bit extreme, however, due to the impact of climate factors and weather events the changing impact of less sand is being noticed. This has led to a more interesting and somewhat shocking discovery.
Because sand is becoming a more limited resource illegal gathering and sales of sand has become a real. Thing. In fact, there is something that can be named with accuracy a sand mafia .. Yep you read that right Guido … There are cartel like enterprises complete with bribing of local governments —read about this in Scientific American—and it stems primarily from the use of sand to make concrete. Who uses the most concrete? Well…. We’re aren’t pointing fingers on the root cause of this grainy grift, but reliable data indicate that China used more concrete for construction between the years of 2011 and 2013 than the U.S. used in the entire 20th century and that is even when you allow for whatever happened to Jimmy Hoffa.
So what does all this have to do with Seeking Peace and Joy?
First, when you get new information is really okay to take a couple minutes and rethink rather than deny. Second, as time goes by we can develop wisdom and experience that might allow us to see things differently and with a good deal more clarity. It doesn’t mean we were stupid before and it doesn’t mean that anyone or everyone who still uses other lenses is stupid or to be shared or laughed at. Share what you now know and how you learned it and use the way the new information allows you to change to take action remembering that the world around us usually learns more from our example than our opinions. Also it might be good to understand that we can learn a lot about the universe and the people in it by paying attention to something as big as a star and as small as a grain of sand. … and so it is with peace and joy. Moments of Peace can be captured in a single breath and the seeds of joy can be planted with the wink of an eye or a nod, or a quick little smile.
Oh and beware if someone with a dumbstruck is riding around your sandbox muttering “here’s and offer you can’t refuse.
In the last entry the moon was the star…so to speak.. and on earth we have only one moon and in “our solar system”==as if humans can claim ownership over a solar system? After all, we live here on earth and yet we claim it all? Isn’t that like living in a shed somewhere in Eastern Alabama and claiming New York City is yours? Oh well… back to thanking some stars…. Okay which stars should we thank and how many should we thank just to make sure we get the lucky ones? After all we wouldn’t want to thank some that really don’t deserve it by mistake you know. So where to begin?
Well in “our solar system” there is one star so MR. Sunshine—-thank you. All in all with the exception of that causing cancer thing you do..we appreciate the fact. That you help all the plants grow, provide pretty much. All the light we get outside, and once we get the whole solar panel thing figured out you might keep us from fighting over who gets rich from extracting fossil fuels from the ground.
Now let’s expand a bit to”our galaxy.” Again we claim to own it as ours and that’s like that’s like a fry cook at McDonald’s claiming to be a chef at the Four Seasons… but forgiving that let’s just move on to the stary night in the Milky Way. Some estimates say there are a hundred million or so stars in the Milky Way. Has anybody ever counted? Think about it… If we count 1,2,3,4…. About 1 count per second and do that for 16 hours a day—gotta have time to eat and sleep… it would take about 16 days to count a million. If that’s accurate and your phone didn’t go off reminding you of your teeth cleaning and causing you to have to start over, it would take just a bit short of five years to count to the 100 million mark.
So five years from now when you’ve got them all counted how do you choose which ones are lucky? Oh and let’s say we had some way of picking the lucky ones right when we started counting. Just because they are lucky for us are they lucky for everybody? Oh and even if star number 17,345,789 was lucky when we counted it can we guarantee that it is still lucky and deserving of thanks when 89,034,142 comes into view? How do we know? Of course, we don’t even want to wonder about the accuracy of our count when we didn’t clean that little piece of a fire fly that drifted onto our lens and might have been counted sometime in the third year?
So where does that leave us if we want to thank our lucky stars? Well…here’s a proposition related to seeking peace and joy. Let’s accept that each of these stars is providing us something to be curious about and that is a fortunate thing—so say thanks for that. Let’s say some of these stars “fall” and they aren’t really stars… but we call them that and these falling stars give us something to tie a wish to and keep our spirits up so… thanks for that. Ancient mariners (no not really old Seattle baseball players) used groups of these. Stars to navigate the. Planet and some did it better than others didn’t they mr. Columbus? Nonetheless… we used them to get from here to there…so thanks for that. So you see there are a lot of reasons to be thankful for almost any star might be helpful for something at some time or another and being ready to say thanks seems like a reasonable stance. Oh.. and when we think of it aren’t a lot of people sort of like stars…you know providing a little help in unexpected ways at somewhat unexpected times. Hasn’t someone said “hey your shoe is untied.” Hasn’t somebody pointed to your tire and said… wow that looks like it might be flat?” Do your servers ever say.. “careful that’s hot” when they bring your food out? You see… our lucky stars/people might be all around and since there are so. Many of them let’s start counting… 1..2..3… see you in 2029?
For all of recorded history even some we didn’t record and post to “Tick-Tock” (not spelled that way I know or YouTube or as a reel on the Gram, humans have been gazing into the night sky and particularly at the Moon. We “Earthlings” have sent some people up there to get some rocks, take a modified golf cart for a spin, and, of course smack a few chip shots. Oh, and let’s not forget posing for MTV which no longer shows music videos which again is a little odd since “Music” and Video” are two of the words “MTV” stands for. However, let’s not get all wound up about that since the cereal Grape Nuts has been around longer than MTV and it has never had grapes or nuts in it.
Okay Back to the Moon
…and that’s exactly where it seems we want to send people and a whole lot of stuff because from there we think we can get to Mars. That could be since two of the richest persons on Earth have. Decided to spend money and get a little more from the government of the U.S. to work toward that.It is sort of a cool idea and since the U.S. is racing china to get back to the moon first it will probably happen, yet recent history and attempts have shown us it”ain’t easy pal.” The unmanned or “un-pronoun—ed “ lander finding the moon tipped over because it sort of landed with one foot in a hole and since we didn’t build it like one of those clowns you can punch and it never falls down there it sits like the brand new bike somebody didn’t put the kickstand on. So we went 25,000 miles and didn’t stick the landing. That’s not all…. The “new” launch and booster rockets we want to use to send large payloads to the moon haven’t done so hot either. Both significant tests have ended in….. love this phrase so read it carefully….
“Rapid unscheduled disassembly”
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out they took off and then blew up.
To say the least it’s not guaranteed that this all happens like we have planned and that brings us to the “Seeking Peace and Joy of it all”
As a human race we are going to invest a lot of time, energy, dreaming, and money to get back to the moon. When we think about it, of course, we would. Some folks would say go for it because we want to see if Pink Floyd gave us the definitive treatise on “the dark side of the moon, or is there a store of riches left to be uncovered? Also, there are a lot of folks very afraid that we are pretty much wrecking the Earth and we need unescape plan. So the moon has both fear and curiosity going for it. One might wonder if the super rich really need their names connected with all this because the billions and billions used to do this surely couldn’t be used to insure better shelter, food, education, transportation, oh and even recreation for the folks here on this planet? The let’s shoot the moon crowd might argue that “it’s about the future man” and it is a human thing to focus on and worry about what could happen because what’s happening here and now can get a little intense. Having said that, if people get joy from working toward the hope of knowing the moon, and if that is a dream that let’s them explore a purpose for mankind and. Not just for themselves, well that's a worthy enterprise—you see how I built in that “Trek” word?
It’s a balancing act when we dream about a future and try to stay in the moment. It’s probably a good thing our focus on “the moon” is being played out from earth which only has one moon. After all the solar system has 292 or so discovered moons and if we were launching from Mars we’d have to decide between 2. Moons and if from Jupiter or Saturn it would be a choice of over 90 and in that case there might always be “a bad moon rising?”
To sum up… well heading to the moon is the literal definition of shooting at something in the dark and yet using our best guesses and for that let’s strap some brave souls to thousands of tons of explosives and lightt’em up. We can also take a moment to figure out how to balance dreams for far away with dreams for right now and right here. Go outside tonight and think about what the world will be like when there repeople out there looking back here wondering about you and then maybe we will finally understand that the greatest mysteries almost always emerge from the universe within?
Early this morning the flags were unfurled
My hair has gone limp and it needs to be curled
Off in the distance the frat boys have hurled
They wish to be knighted but they just wound up “Earled”
I checked for my pistol it’s handle was pearled
These aren’t the things I need in my world
I want umbrellas and canes that are twirled
And a big ice cream cone with a top that’s been swirled
If you want a rainbow you have to have some rain
If you want to break some bread you’ll have to plant some grain
If you want to share a view have the guts not to obstain
If something’s needs repeating sing out that refrain
Every Street you travel doesn’t need to be the Main
Can’t carry all your worries let some go down the drain
Others need not lose just for some to gain
Understand that life is messy we’re bound to leave a stain
Just because their app looks nice
Should we accept this sacrifice?
We overpay for beans and rice
So-called drinks three quarters ice
That used to have a lemon slice
Why must we pay a princely price
For meals that surely starve two mice?
Perhaps it’s time for thinking twice
Since it’s not bee season and there are no electric razors in the immediate vicinity and atmospheric conditions provided a long awaited opportunity the most likely origin of the sound that starts just before dawn and lingers well after the moon emerges —what the heck..let’s get to the point it’s snowmobile season. The buzz? Well it’s not the vintage 1901 steam-powered log puller that started this craze or the long-forgotten experimental Model T equipped with skis and a propeller. It’s probably not a classic antique that weighed about half a ton and topped out at 20mph. It is mostly a herd of two and four stroke one or two passenger sleds sporting a 2 or 4 stroke engine and maybe an electric engine (but not likely around here)…. It’s a sleek machine with a fast response track and independent front suspension and the people who ride them happily claim they are freedom machines leading to a feeling of speed and excitement in the quiet of nature.
Well… we have no real ground covered with snow or not to stand on to dispute what most snowmobile riders might perceive, however, the data would suggest only some are freed by this winter sled like 7 out of 8 riders are male and most have some disposable income as owning and using these things costs an average of somewhere between $300 and $350 per month and over half the time guys with a little extra cash are hauling them somewhere just to be able to ride. Conclusion —freedom in the form of your Polaris, Yamaha, or Ski-doo isn’t for everyone and isn’t really free. Oh and as a side note while this blog treats some syntax principles very loosely it should be noted that sometimes punctuation and spelling have significant and meaningful implications. For example “ski-Doo” is one of the largest names in recreational craft on water and snow… however the intended name was “Ski-Dog” but this mistake slipped through the editing process which smelled like doo dog dog? Oh this serves as such a reminder of how nuts English as a language has become. How hard is it to avoid terrible mistakes? Well let’s just say there is a fairly significant difference between man’s laughter and manslaughter as claimed by the apostrophe and the precisely placed space.
Now back to the buzz and what it might mean in the seeking peace and joy universe
Winter weather often represents a barrier to freedom and so do thoughts and routines that impact one’s ability to fully engage in change… so maybe people need to fight against such barriers? If so the buzz is a happy sound. Maybe the riders feel like they are in control of their lives and can conquer nature and will go to extraordinary lengths to prove it… and learn that such efforts are very costly and perhaps when one tries to conquer nature instead of honoring it’s cycles seeking peace and joy out of context might just be costly? Then the buzz becomes a reminder that sometimes are efforts to conquer nature only leaves us with a buzzing in our heads that is not particularly pleasant to anyone after a while?
On the other hand maybe some of the sled jockeys stop from time to time and take in the beauty of the land, smile at the sunlight shining on a newly coated winters cape and realize that we all spend a lot of time just skimming the surface without daring to know what lies beneath?
There is some fear that many sledders just go around and around on the same path and only worry about how fast they might be able to go while in the end they really didn’t see much or go far and maybe it’s important to ask what was their buzz worth? And by extension maybe seeking peace and joy usually requires asking what’s the buzz and what is it worth?
Stay safe
Now for the drummers…. Now the drums shout out loud “play attention to the rhythm of things.” Again in the seeking peace and joy of life… maybe we could pay attention to the rhythm of things a bit more… Like for whatever reason the holidays have challenges for some folks every year and if we know folks like that maybe we can reach out and offer them a smile or two extra… and if it’s us maybe we can understand that. This rhythm is constant. Or this rhythm is something I can encourage the other drummers in my life to change? The point is…. That life has a lot of drummers and a lot of rhythms that repeat. Also if you have 12 drummers drumming maybe as drummer number 7 you could rest a bit or lay down a back beat instead of just marching along to someone else’s beat?
Anyway the tree is bak in the basement and lights are. All tucked away so the twelve days of Christmas must be up. Now don’t be. Afraid to start thinking about who gets what next year.
And speaking. Of marching to the beast. Of a different drum and a different rhythm… perhaps this entry should wrap up with one of. Those 8 line rhymes about a dramatic performance that. Fell outside the guide rails of what was expected… Enjoy
How long could are taut nerves last?
Hopes were high the crowd was vast
The tension broke with a cannon blast
The students cheered but just half-assed
The Critics sat there all aghast
Hamlet played by the Simpsons cast
On a ship that sailed without a mast
The classics going nowhere fast
So in a world of everything important being said in 30 seconds or less we can shrink 12 days of Christmas into just a few more entries.
There’s no doubt that this is a fictional song simply because in any legitimate “dance” event there would never be more males than females dancing….so the lords leaping could never outnumber the ladies dancing. However, a lyric that mentioned five ore six guys two-stepping while the other lords were sitting on the bleachers or checking ESPN on their phones would be pretty hard to sing. As for the maids ho are milking for a gift now there’s a gift. The endless supply of milk beats a bird in a fruit tree especially if it includes the cows which could at some point be steak. Now the question I might have would be… On the 13th day of Christmas would we be thinking about building a barn to handle the Christmas gifts and on valentine’s Day is the true love going to be dropping off off a pen full of prime Iowa pigs and maybe a stable full of palomino ponies?
Now let’s get to the peace and joy perspective on this….
We’ve got a couple more days of the song and they speak of musicians which would go well with the dancers and because we are hoping that the new year contains some joy and since dancing usually reflects joy… it might be a good idea that no matter how many left feet you have… you should take a moment to listen to the music and let your feet do what they might.
Well this is being written on New Year’s Eve so it seems like a little extra may be in order….. so here’s a little 8-line rhyme to top this post off and if you listen carefully you can hear some pipers piping to introduce the final entry in 12 day saga….Happy New Year!
This year’s about to swap
And This joint? it’s going to hop
So watch out for the cop
As Teenyboppers start to bop
When the ball’s about to drop
The tunes they jam non-stop
The cork you hear it pop
Cheer loud we’re at the top
