Life is rampant with unintended consequences. Upon completing my last blog, I sent an email to Ferndale's mayor, police chief, city administrator, city council members, and the community resource center's coordinator, the last more because I consider her a friend, whom, I know to be deeply interested in our local community. The email was brief and contained three intentions. The first to express appreciation for the time the mayor, police chief and city administrator had put into the town hall meeting they'd held. The second to point them to the blog which I'd written in response to the town hall meeting. The third to hopefully create a positive impression of myself.
The following day I left home early, to find out that I am suffering "fractured tooth syndrome" in my number three molar and to do some volunteer work at the Ferndale Community Resource Center. I returned home to an angry and vocal spouse.
At 10 am, during my absence, the phone rang and a man, who refused to identify himself launched into a tirade at my hapless and unsuspecting wife. As I understand from my wife's report, the voice on the phone was ranting about how we couldn't be who we said we were because our address wasn't even in the county assessor's records. My wife, who had read my blog, was completely unaware of my email and was forced to piece together what the call was about while at the same time enduring the vehemence and rudeness of the caller. After refusing to identify himself, ranting at her, and apparently unwilling to give my wife an opportunity to provide a meaningful response, the caller hung up.
I suppose that the caller thought himself safely anonymous. Caller id and some quick research identified the caller as one of Ferndale's city council members. Shortly after having received my wife's report of events, I called Councilman X. I identified myself by name and stated that I was calling regarding his earlier call to our home. Councilman X, immediately launched into a tirade about how I had to be misrepresenting myself because my home address did not exist. I assured him that it did exist. That the address had been changed nearly a year ago and that I have a letter from the city planning department, explaining that they'd made an error in assigning the original address to our home and that they were changing it.
What is so ludicrous and ironic about this whole address thing is that it began because we were unable to authenticate our address with on-line resources, specifically the US Postal service. A visit to our local postmaster concluded with the postmaster and myself walking across the street to discuss the addressing issue with the city planning department. The city planning office told me that they needed to research the matter and would get back to me on the matter. About a week later I received the following via snail mail, EXHIBIT A. In the letter we received, the city planning department the assured me that they would notify all the appropriate governmental agencies about the change. I, on the other hand, was responsible for notifying the rest of the world about the change of address.
As last year's election season rolled around, I remained quite concerned about this address change and it's potential impact on my ability to vote, so I took a copy of the letter to the county assessor's office and presented it along with an address change form to insure that my right to vote and have my vote count would not be compromised.
I have no explanations why Councilman X, was unable to validate my address with county assessor's office, nor why he was unable to find any record of the address in the city's file as he claimed. I assured him that I'd look into the matter.
Returning to my conversation with the councilman. After numerous attempts to get him to drop the address issue I finally was able to ask him what he thought about what I'd written. "Too wordy" he responded. "I couldn't understand it because it was too wordy". He repeated himself with slightly modified negative phrasing several times concluding with a lecture on what was the "appropriate" manner in which to communicate with public officials. By this time, I was pretty dumbfounded by his entire rant. I told him that my wife wanted to speak with him and he hung up.
Now I would agree with Councilman X, my style can be considered wordy. I prefer to consider it thoughtful, rich in detail, rhythmic and lyrical in tone. In any event, I am sorry that he found it difficult to read and understand. On the other hand, I spent the better part of a day documenting the ideas and rationals that I had in response to the town hall meeting. It was the equivalent of several type written pages I am sure. I used my blog as the medium because it affords me the opportunity to explore my thoughts in an informal and personal manner. I invited Councilman X and others to read my blog as I did not feel obliged to create some formal rebuttal or plan in response to the town hall meeting. I believed that sharing my thoughts as I'd written them would be a sufficient contribution to the community discussion.
In the absence of facts, we often rely on speculation. Subsequent to our conversations with Councilman X, my wife and I speculated on the councilman's apparent lack of education and/or intelligence, the source of the aggressive aspersions he cast at us, his extreme rudeness, his condescension, on and on. In the end, we had to conclude that not knowing Councilman X we had no honest way of judging him, so in the end I concluded, my bad!
PS. Here's an executive summary of the above for Councilman X. "You behaved like an asshole! I trust that there is more to you than that."
Gayland Gump
2127 Poplar Drive
Ferndale, WA 98248-9179
360-671-3077
If you doubt the legitimacy of this address please see EXHIBIT A. If you are a "birther" and actual documentation is meaningless to you then you are way beyond anything I can say or do.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Our City
Last night was another first for me, I attended a town hall. Judging from the remarks from the mayor and others, attendance was just this side of spectacular, the largest in the history of such events in our fair city. An agenda was distributed and then Mayor Jensen opened the meeting with a welcome and a call for civility which was largely honored. Police Chief Knapp then provided a overview of Police Department needs, focused primarily on facility issues. A group of local library supporters kicked off a series of speakers in support of the measure to raise the levy on library operating funds. The initial appeal for more operating funds morphed over the speakers to a call to support building a new library. Frankly, I never got a clear picture of why a new library is needed other than the parking and access to the existing library are woefully inadequate. This portion of the program concluded with a speaker from the organization that is holding an anonymous million dollar donation telling us about how the donor is supporting a fund raiser to find additional donations for a new library.
The mayor and another community member spoke on the long history of attempts to find an adequate home for the police department. The woman who spoke on this particularly emphasized the repeated cost of studies made during these efforts. The city administrator followed with a summary of current city plan for building a new library and converting and expanding the existing library into a police facility almost six times as large as the current facility.
A very cursory presentation of a so called "people's plan" followed which involved moving the current public works facilities to another location, building a new library at the current public works site, moving city hall into the existing library, putting the police department into the current city hall and finally resurrecting the old fire damage boys and girls club into a community center. This plan was discounted by the presenters as being too complex and costly. That the proponents of this plan were not allowed to present it frankly weakened the city staff's critic for me. Councilman Zimmerman a proponent of the people's plan did make an after the fact argument for the plan. How effective he was able to be in view of the prior skewed presentation remains to be seen.
The meeting was then open to questions and comment by the town hall attendees. At this point I will need to abandon any further efforts to report on the various questions, comments, and rebuttals made by the public and city staff, as I made no effort to record them in the detail they warranted.
I lost a lot of sleep last night tossing and turning as I tried to get my head around the plans that were being presented and what I could get behind. I came to the conclusion that the solutions being proposed just don't make good sense to me. First I am not sure that I can agree with some fundamental assumptions of this debate. So let me start with some basic questions/concerns that I feel are pertinent.
First do we really need a new library? What I heard last night only convinced me that we need additional parking and a better access/egress plan for the library.
Let's examine my fundamental concept of a library. Libraries are repositories for the accumulated knowledge, wisdom, and cultural minutia of mankind. Libraries differ from museums primarily in that the material's provided are expected to be readily and generally available for use. Library staff perform the essential tasks of creating and maintaining systematic access and order to the materials housed in the library. A library without a committed, knowledgeable, well motivated, service oriented staff is about as useful as my attic.
You'll notice that my definition of a library says nothing about the form a library actually takes. Historically, the first libraries were oral, embodied in the story teller lineages of our most ancient ancestors. Subsequently scribes, provided more lasting but still relatively fragile and transitory materials from which to build our libraries. Gutenberg brought mass production and opened the doors to the modern library. Technology is once again altering the fundamental substrate upon which we will be recording our accumulated knowledge, wisdom and cultural minutia. Today we are imprinting this information on atomic scales. The consequence of this is that I can carry in my hand a substantial portion of the Library of Congress. It's entire contents and frankly digital representations of every unique item in all the worlds libraries could easily fit on a single wall in my home. I will not be surprised if that will shrink to something that I can hold in my hand in the not too distant future. The upshot of this discussion is that we are about to undergo a significant change in how we will deliver library services.
I expect that fewer and fewer physical manifestations of our literature, books, magazines, newspaper will be produced. More and more archives will be converted to digital forms. I know that there are many people who dread such a future, especially those devoted bibliophiles for whom the touch, scent, and sight of tome upon tome running off into the mysterious darkness in library stacks are the truest rendition of heaven. What is coming are simple ubiquitous tablets that techno-magically render in visual and/or aural ways the contents of the all the libraries of man. Over time our librarians will find themselves supplanted by technology because they can't match the speed and comprehensiveness of artificially intelligent search engines. It will take a while for this future to manifest, judging from the changes I've seen in my life, I can easily imagine this taking place in the next 20 years and most likely sooner.
Now a library is more than the collection materials it holds. It provides a wealth of programs and meets a variety individual and community needs. I don't think the need for library's will disappear, but I do believe that less and less space will be needed to house the content of libraries. In my opinion, the days of large libraries are over. I would argue that an investment in small neighborhood based libraries makes much more sense. A million dollars may not build a large brick and mortar library today, but if could easily pay for 3 or 4 modest community libraries. Placing these in proximity to the people who use them reduces the need for travel to and from the libraries. Built with green technologies they can serve as models of a better way to live sustainably. The facilities if properly designed could serve as community refuges in times of danger. Hours of operation could conform better to the needs of a smaller community thus achieving operational efficiencies. Many of our communities today lack a focal point for the exercise of community. Large public edifices are ill suited to supporting the kinds of gatherings that serve to build and unite communities. Smaller facilities are often more welcoming and approachable.
Our current library might be insufficient to serve the current needs of the entire city, but it would certainly be adequate to serving it's local community. Distributing community based library facilities throughout our city would allow us to add capacity in tandem with our actual growth, thereby omitting many of the limitations and problems created by faulty foresight.
I believe that much of what I have said about libraries applies to police stations as well. Do we need/want a monolithic edifice to house our law enforcement and public safety functions? Should this edifice attempt to balance legitimate security needs with needs for open access for the public?
I have been in the current police facility and I absolutely support providing our law enforcement folks with much better facilities than they currently are being subjected to.
We know from experiences in the past decade that it can take only single dedicated terrorist, eg. Timothy James McVeigh, to bring down any large building. Frankly, it doesn't make sense to me to build such targets in the first place. Terrorists are only one of many potential threats to our public safety people and a minor one at that. Mother nature is a far more likely and deadly threat. In view of this I believe that decentralization of our public safety facilities is both a more pragmatic and ultimately cost effective approach to meeting public safety facility needs.
Decentralization of our public safety facilities serves many purposes:
Building a community police station that provides primarily administrative support and public access to basic services does not demand a fortress.
The next level of security requires the management of people who are potentially harmful to themselves or others. Facilities to protect everyone in such circumstances require controlled access, egress, and short term isolation and/or confinement. It makes sense to me to locate investigatory assets in facilities with this level of security.
At the town hall much was made of the lack of adequate physical security for evidential property in the city. My contention is that the best security and most cost effective for this are remote/isolated facilities (bunkers) with multiple physical barriers (high fences and lots of razor wire) and tightly controlled entry/egress points. I believe that collocation of manned communication , forensic labs, data and administrative centers, etc. with evidential property sites is an excellent match.
I would also contend that the public information and public administration functions of the police department are best located in or near city hall.
Another item that came up at the town hall that I found particularly interesting were the comments regarding the $300,000 plus communication's van that the police have obtained. I applaud the efforts of our public safety folks to acquire this resource. Now I have to ask, how are we going to use it? What are it's capabilities? If those capabilities are important enough to warrant its use in times of emergency, wouldn't they also be useful in day to day operations?
Furthermore, wouldn't it be best if they were actually used on a day to day basis to insure that they were in fact operational at the time an emergency occurred; that not only our public safety staff but all our public employees were trained and skilled in the use of this emergency communications resource through daily use? I don't really get why we would acquire something as basic as communications capabilities and then limit our use of them to emergency situations.
Let me conclude this missive with a few comments about the future as I see it. I believe that we as country have been undergoing profound changes during my generation, I am a tail end baby boomer. I believe that we have been undergoing a massive wealth transfer from the middle and lower classes to the coffers of a small and increasingly affluent upper class. I believe that we are seeing diminishing opportunities for education, employment and upward social movement. I believe that "free market" capitalism as an economic system is based on false assumptions and that the system currently in place is anything but free and competitive.
I want very much to believe that my country is the best that it can be and the best in the world. I love America, she is my homeland. I'm a veteran and I believe that in some small way I've earned the right to be critical of her. My country is on a path now that truly frightens me. Disinformation, out right lies, hate speech, bigotry, run rife in our nation. A sizable group of individuals and organizations are responsible for most of it, funded by corporations controlled by a network of interlocking of corporate boards, executives, and wealthy individuals. I do believe that they believe that their world view is the right one. I disagree.
I strongly doubt that our economic woes will rebound in the near term and that we will see appreciable economic growth for a long while. Too many fundamental economic factors are going in the wrong directions. Loss of capital resources and manufacturing to the far east, corruption in government, business, and main stream media all bode ill for us. All of this is way beyond any influence I can bring to bear on the world. So I am choosing to focus most of my energy effecting what I can reach, my community. I hope that you will have found some worth while ideas to chew on in the above. I welcome your civil comments.
Sincerely,
Gayland Gump aka Muckwa Ogimaa aka Red Path Walker
The mayor and another community member spoke on the long history of attempts to find an adequate home for the police department. The woman who spoke on this particularly emphasized the repeated cost of studies made during these efforts. The city administrator followed with a summary of current city plan for building a new library and converting and expanding the existing library into a police facility almost six times as large as the current facility.
A very cursory presentation of a so called "people's plan" followed which involved moving the current public works facilities to another location, building a new library at the current public works site, moving city hall into the existing library, putting the police department into the current city hall and finally resurrecting the old fire damage boys and girls club into a community center. This plan was discounted by the presenters as being too complex and costly. That the proponents of this plan were not allowed to present it frankly weakened the city staff's critic for me. Councilman Zimmerman a proponent of the people's plan did make an after the fact argument for the plan. How effective he was able to be in view of the prior skewed presentation remains to be seen.
The meeting was then open to questions and comment by the town hall attendees. At this point I will need to abandon any further efforts to report on the various questions, comments, and rebuttals made by the public and city staff, as I made no effort to record them in the detail they warranted.
I lost a lot of sleep last night tossing and turning as I tried to get my head around the plans that were being presented and what I could get behind. I came to the conclusion that the solutions being proposed just don't make good sense to me. First I am not sure that I can agree with some fundamental assumptions of this debate. So let me start with some basic questions/concerns that I feel are pertinent.
First do we really need a new library? What I heard last night only convinced me that we need additional parking and a better access/egress plan for the library.
Let's examine my fundamental concept of a library. Libraries are repositories for the accumulated knowledge, wisdom, and cultural minutia of mankind. Libraries differ from museums primarily in that the material's provided are expected to be readily and generally available for use. Library staff perform the essential tasks of creating and maintaining systematic access and order to the materials housed in the library. A library without a committed, knowledgeable, well motivated, service oriented staff is about as useful as my attic.
You'll notice that my definition of a library says nothing about the form a library actually takes. Historically, the first libraries were oral, embodied in the story teller lineages of our most ancient ancestors. Subsequently scribes, provided more lasting but still relatively fragile and transitory materials from which to build our libraries. Gutenberg brought mass production and opened the doors to the modern library. Technology is once again altering the fundamental substrate upon which we will be recording our accumulated knowledge, wisdom and cultural minutia. Today we are imprinting this information on atomic scales. The consequence of this is that I can carry in my hand a substantial portion of the Library of Congress. It's entire contents and frankly digital representations of every unique item in all the worlds libraries could easily fit on a single wall in my home. I will not be surprised if that will shrink to something that I can hold in my hand in the not too distant future. The upshot of this discussion is that we are about to undergo a significant change in how we will deliver library services.
I expect that fewer and fewer physical manifestations of our literature, books, magazines, newspaper will be produced. More and more archives will be converted to digital forms. I know that there are many people who dread such a future, especially those devoted bibliophiles for whom the touch, scent, and sight of tome upon tome running off into the mysterious darkness in library stacks are the truest rendition of heaven. What is coming are simple ubiquitous tablets that techno-magically render in visual and/or aural ways the contents of the all the libraries of man. Over time our librarians will find themselves supplanted by technology because they can't match the speed and comprehensiveness of artificially intelligent search engines. It will take a while for this future to manifest, judging from the changes I've seen in my life, I can easily imagine this taking place in the next 20 years and most likely sooner.
Now a library is more than the collection materials it holds. It provides a wealth of programs and meets a variety individual and community needs. I don't think the need for library's will disappear, but I do believe that less and less space will be needed to house the content of libraries. In my opinion, the days of large libraries are over. I would argue that an investment in small neighborhood based libraries makes much more sense. A million dollars may not build a large brick and mortar library today, but if could easily pay for 3 or 4 modest community libraries. Placing these in proximity to the people who use them reduces the need for travel to and from the libraries. Built with green technologies they can serve as models of a better way to live sustainably. The facilities if properly designed could serve as community refuges in times of danger. Hours of operation could conform better to the needs of a smaller community thus achieving operational efficiencies. Many of our communities today lack a focal point for the exercise of community. Large public edifices are ill suited to supporting the kinds of gatherings that serve to build and unite communities. Smaller facilities are often more welcoming and approachable.
Our current library might be insufficient to serve the current needs of the entire city, but it would certainly be adequate to serving it's local community. Distributing community based library facilities throughout our city would allow us to add capacity in tandem with our actual growth, thereby omitting many of the limitations and problems created by faulty foresight.
I believe that much of what I have said about libraries applies to police stations as well. Do we need/want a monolithic edifice to house our law enforcement and public safety functions? Should this edifice attempt to balance legitimate security needs with needs for open access for the public?
I have been in the current police facility and I absolutely support providing our law enforcement folks with much better facilities than they currently are being subjected to.
We know from experiences in the past decade that it can take only single dedicated terrorist, eg. Timothy James McVeigh, to bring down any large building. Frankly, it doesn't make sense to me to build such targets in the first place. Terrorists are only one of many potential threats to our public safety people and a minor one at that. Mother nature is a far more likely and deadly threat. In view of this I believe that decentralization of our public safety facilities is both a more pragmatic and ultimately cost effective approach to meeting public safety facility needs.
Decentralization of our public safety facilities serves many purposes:
- It geographically distributes physical risk to our public safety facilities from man made or natural cataclysmic events.
- It would help ensure that needed resources are accessible from different places in our city.
- It would facilitate implementation of community policing practices.
- It would allow gradations of security appropriate to actual needs.
- It would help minimize response times in times of critical need by reducing travel times.
- It would allow us to add capacity in tandem with the actual growth of our city.
- I suspect there are more points to be added here but right now they are not coming to me, feel free to suggest them via comments to this post.
Building a community police station that provides primarily administrative support and public access to basic services does not demand a fortress.
The next level of security requires the management of people who are potentially harmful to themselves or others. Facilities to protect everyone in such circumstances require controlled access, egress, and short term isolation and/or confinement. It makes sense to me to locate investigatory assets in facilities with this level of security.
At the town hall much was made of the lack of adequate physical security for evidential property in the city. My contention is that the best security and most cost effective for this are remote/isolated facilities (bunkers) with multiple physical barriers (high fences and lots of razor wire) and tightly controlled entry/egress points. I believe that collocation of manned communication , forensic labs, data and administrative centers, etc. with evidential property sites is an excellent match.
I would also contend that the public information and public administration functions of the police department are best located in or near city hall.
Another item that came up at the town hall that I found particularly interesting were the comments regarding the $300,000 plus communication's van that the police have obtained. I applaud the efforts of our public safety folks to acquire this resource. Now I have to ask, how are we going to use it? What are it's capabilities? If those capabilities are important enough to warrant its use in times of emergency, wouldn't they also be useful in day to day operations?
Furthermore, wouldn't it be best if they were actually used on a day to day basis to insure that they were in fact operational at the time an emergency occurred; that not only our public safety staff but all our public employees were trained and skilled in the use of this emergency communications resource through daily use? I don't really get why we would acquire something as basic as communications capabilities and then limit our use of them to emergency situations.
Let me conclude this missive with a few comments about the future as I see it. I believe that we as country have been undergoing profound changes during my generation, I am a tail end baby boomer. I believe that we have been undergoing a massive wealth transfer from the middle and lower classes to the coffers of a small and increasingly affluent upper class. I believe that we are seeing diminishing opportunities for education, employment and upward social movement. I believe that "free market" capitalism as an economic system is based on false assumptions and that the system currently in place is anything but free and competitive.
I want very much to believe that my country is the best that it can be and the best in the world. I love America, she is my homeland. I'm a veteran and I believe that in some small way I've earned the right to be critical of her. My country is on a path now that truly frightens me. Disinformation, out right lies, hate speech, bigotry, run rife in our nation. A sizable group of individuals and organizations are responsible for most of it, funded by corporations controlled by a network of interlocking of corporate boards, executives, and wealthy individuals. I do believe that they believe that their world view is the right one. I disagree.
I strongly doubt that our economic woes will rebound in the near term and that we will see appreciable economic growth for a long while. Too many fundamental economic factors are going in the wrong directions. Loss of capital resources and manufacturing to the far east, corruption in government, business, and main stream media all bode ill for us. All of this is way beyond any influence I can bring to bear on the world. So I am choosing to focus most of my energy effecting what I can reach, my community. I hope that you will have found some worth while ideas to chew on in the above. I welcome your civil comments.
Sincerely,
Gayland Gump aka Muckwa Ogimaa aka Red Path Walker
Thursday, September 10, 2009
My Response to Obama's Health Care Reform Speech
I'll get behind your plan as soon as you stand behind single payer health care.
As far as I can tell, I am being sold down the river by my party, the administration, and you, Mr. President. We, Progressives, have seen our country brought to virtual bankruptcy on so many fronts by the regressive policies of conservative and centrist elements in our country. It is time for the pendulum of justice and right to swing back.
The right has redefined the debate in my country so that our ideas are dismissed out of hand. I cannot sit by any longer and wait for moderation of right wing extremism. I want justice for all Americans. I want affordable comprehensive health care for all Americans.
The solution is pretty simple. Dismantle the massive American WAR Machine and use the savings to provide health care to the American people. Straight up and simple. Naive? Together we can do anything we choose. Isn't that your message of hope, Mr. President?
As far as I can tell, I am being sold down the river by my party, the administration, and you, Mr. President. We, Progressives, have seen our country brought to virtual bankruptcy on so many fronts by the regressive policies of conservative and centrist elements in our country. It is time for the pendulum of justice and right to swing back.
The right has redefined the debate in my country so that our ideas are dismissed out of hand. I cannot sit by any longer and wait for moderation of right wing extremism. I want justice for all Americans. I want affordable comprehensive health care for all Americans.
The solution is pretty simple. Dismantle the massive American WAR Machine and use the savings to provide health care to the American people. Straight up and simple. Naive? Together we can do anything we choose. Isn't that your message of hope, Mr. President?
Monday, August 24, 2009
Five months to the day ...
So it has been 5 months to the day since I put up my last blog. Nearly half a year. I said before that I didn't think I was really cut out for this blogging thing. It was a pleasure though to go back and read my last blog. A couple of weeks ago I posted a note up on my Facebook wall. Granted it was a piece that I'd written almost 3 years ago that I'd come across while wading through the never ending paper deluge that follows me through life. It too, was a pleasure to read. I thought, you know not many people have seen this. Its good for a few sentimental tears. I should share it. To the best of my knowledge only my youngest daughter has seen it, or at least was the only one moved to comment on it. I know it's good when I read something that I wrote and it still brings a tear to my eye.
I guess I want the same response from my blog as I got from Bill Moody's eulogy or the letter I read at my eldest daughter's wedding. People came to me and shared their tears with me, letting me know that they could feel the love that I feel, that my words touched their hearts and minds.
I know that this blog reaches few readers. It's lack of regularity and iconoclastic focus no doubt don't help it to gain notoriety. I keep thinking that I need to communicate with more people. I know there have to be others out there that are as outraged and angry as I am. They're the people who I know I can reach because I've done it before.
I am like a lot of Americans, politics gives me the creeps. For the most part, I've thought politics doesn't seem to impact my life on a day to day basis. Yet, I am coming to realize that is not true. I've been paying attention to politics pretty intensely now for almost a year and a half. It started when I realized that in order to serve my community I had to actually involve myself in my community.
Initially, I did that by volunteering with my county democratic party organization. I found that I was not well suited to that degree of participation. I did not have the will to put up with bad behavior on the part of others. I wasn't willing to throw out my rationality or principles in the name of political expediency. On the other hand, I did find that at least some others thought I had some leadership skills and it has lead me to much more aware of just how much of my life is being impacted by politics in my country.
Unable to function in a political party environment effectively but knowing that I still needed to involve myself in my community, lead me to volunteer in an environment where I knew I would excel. I went back to elementary school! Finally, I was around folks that I could understand and provide some modicum of service to, first and second graders.
I expanded upon that by volunteering with a local community center providing socialization and recreational opportunities to special needs folks. A couple times a month, I take my collection of drums and other instruments to the center or a park and encourage these wonderful people to be loud and outrageous.
I was at a loss when school went out of session. Dropping from 12+ hours hanging with all those wonderful elementary types was tough. Fortunately, a Sun Dance at the end of June, provided me with a whole new opportunity to be of service. My wife and I traveled to near Dunseith, North Dakota.
There I had the great fortune to meet a fantastic community of people and to share a very spiritual five days supporting the Sun Dance. My experience as I slammed an ax into the tree that was to become "Lone Man" was awesome and lead to my commitment to fast with the dancers for the next four days. Due to health concerns, I did take water during the fast unlike my brothers and sisters who suffered without. It was an extraordinary few days.
Finally, arriving back home at the beginning of July, I was once again bereft of community engagement, aside from the couple of hours scheduled to work with the Max Higbee Center. Fortunately, my wife's desire to check out the Ferndale Farmer's market one Saturday lead to an encounter with a very energetic woman promoting the not too recently established Ferndale Community Resource Center (FCRC). A subsequent meeting lead to more meetings, so now I am engaged in helping to set up an Internet presence for the FCRC and donating some embroidery to its parent organization the Ferndale Community Service Cooperative (FCSC). There's been some talk of getting on the board's of one or both of these organizations.
The good news is that school starts in about 10 days. I've been told that I should contact the school in the middle of September after they have a better idea of their volunteer needs. Woohoo! Maybe I'll get to hang with Kindergartners along with the 1st and 2nd graders.
Still there is all this outrage and anger I am feeling. It stems from the very sick political machinations have and are being played out daily in our national politics. What Reagan, Bush I & II, Cheney and the Republican Party in particular have done to this county appalls me. The redistribution of wealth from the middle classes and poor to the obscenely wealthy, the disemboweling of the few legal protections we had by immoral, greedy corporate predators in the financial, energy, pharmaceutical, insurance and health care industries, to mention just some, truly sickens me.
The salaries, bonuses, and other rip offs that are being awarded to CEOs, CFOs, COOs and other management plutocrats in the corporate world is obscene, outrageous and without any valid justification. The good ole US of A is not the democracy that I loved. It is in fact a plutocracy or or tipping over into being one. Money talks and the people with all our money are the bankers who ripped us off big time with the financial crisis they created and it's the bail out; the health care industries, who feathered their beds to the tune of a thousand fold increase in their profits in the past 8 years alone; the oil barons who led us into a war in Iraq, lying to us all the way; the main stream media which is owned and controlled in-toto by corporate interests; and finally the lobbyist and bought and paid for politicians, who've facilitated this wholesale theft.
There is so much more beyond economics that we've lost in the past two generations. My parents were children of the depression. The social contract that FDR established with them, and Kennedy and Johnson extended is being torn apart by the people that Eisenhower warned us about.
I am outraged, angry and increasingly hopeless. Obama, today's great hope, appears to be selling us down the river, assisted by Rahm Emanual, the Blue Dogs, ConservaDems, the Republican Party and the obscene right wing media (Oh yeah it appears there is no real left wing media, unless you count the paltry few, The Nation, MSNBC, Air America, and PBS. Thank god for the left wing bloggers.) Fox News, Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, and others the right have successfully entrenched in talk radio.
Having vented I don't feel any better. All I know is that I am doing what I can now. I am trying to stay informed about what is going on in politics and I AM SHOUTING AS LOUD AS I CAN TO ANYONE WHO WILL LISTEN.
"Get involved, express yourself, write, call your Senator, Congressman, President, local political leaders, your neighbors, anyone who will listen. Take back our country from the plutocrats and crazies."
I guess I want the same response from my blog as I got from Bill Moody's eulogy or the letter I read at my eldest daughter's wedding. People came to me and shared their tears with me, letting me know that they could feel the love that I feel, that my words touched their hearts and minds.
I know that this blog reaches few readers. It's lack of regularity and iconoclastic focus no doubt don't help it to gain notoriety. I keep thinking that I need to communicate with more people. I know there have to be others out there that are as outraged and angry as I am. They're the people who I know I can reach because I've done it before.
I am like a lot of Americans, politics gives me the creeps. For the most part, I've thought politics doesn't seem to impact my life on a day to day basis. Yet, I am coming to realize that is not true. I've been paying attention to politics pretty intensely now for almost a year and a half. It started when I realized that in order to serve my community I had to actually involve myself in my community.
Initially, I did that by volunteering with my county democratic party organization. I found that I was not well suited to that degree of participation. I did not have the will to put up with bad behavior on the part of others. I wasn't willing to throw out my rationality or principles in the name of political expediency. On the other hand, I did find that at least some others thought I had some leadership skills and it has lead me to much more aware of just how much of my life is being impacted by politics in my country.
Unable to function in a political party environment effectively but knowing that I still needed to involve myself in my community, lead me to volunteer in an environment where I knew I would excel. I went back to elementary school! Finally, I was around folks that I could understand and provide some modicum of service to, first and second graders.
I expanded upon that by volunteering with a local community center providing socialization and recreational opportunities to special needs folks. A couple times a month, I take my collection of drums and other instruments to the center or a park and encourage these wonderful people to be loud and outrageous.
I was at a loss when school went out of session. Dropping from 12+ hours hanging with all those wonderful elementary types was tough. Fortunately, a Sun Dance at the end of June, provided me with a whole new opportunity to be of service. My wife and I traveled to near Dunseith, North Dakota.
There I had the great fortune to meet a fantastic community of people and to share a very spiritual five days supporting the Sun Dance. My experience as I slammed an ax into the tree that was to become "Lone Man" was awesome and lead to my commitment to fast with the dancers for the next four days. Due to health concerns, I did take water during the fast unlike my brothers and sisters who suffered without. It was an extraordinary few days.
Finally, arriving back home at the beginning of July, I was once again bereft of community engagement, aside from the couple of hours scheduled to work with the Max Higbee Center. Fortunately, my wife's desire to check out the Ferndale Farmer's market one Saturday lead to an encounter with a very energetic woman promoting the not too recently established Ferndale Community Resource Center (FCRC). A subsequent meeting lead to more meetings, so now I am engaged in helping to set up an Internet presence for the FCRC and donating some embroidery to its parent organization the Ferndale Community Service Cooperative (FCSC). There's been some talk of getting on the board's of one or both of these organizations.
The good news is that school starts in about 10 days. I've been told that I should contact the school in the middle of September after they have a better idea of their volunteer needs. Woohoo! Maybe I'll get to hang with Kindergartners along with the 1st and 2nd graders.
Still there is all this outrage and anger I am feeling. It stems from the very sick political machinations have and are being played out daily in our national politics. What Reagan, Bush I & II, Cheney and the Republican Party in particular have done to this county appalls me. The redistribution of wealth from the middle classes and poor to the obscenely wealthy, the disemboweling of the few legal protections we had by immoral, greedy corporate predators in the financial, energy, pharmaceutical, insurance and health care industries, to mention just some, truly sickens me.
The salaries, bonuses, and other rip offs that are being awarded to CEOs, CFOs, COOs and other management plutocrats in the corporate world is obscene, outrageous and without any valid justification. The good ole US of A is not the democracy that I loved. It is in fact a plutocracy or or tipping over into being one. Money talks and the people with all our money are the bankers who ripped us off big time with the financial crisis they created and it's the bail out; the health care industries, who feathered their beds to the tune of a thousand fold increase in their profits in the past 8 years alone; the oil barons who led us into a war in Iraq, lying to us all the way; the main stream media which is owned and controlled in-toto by corporate interests; and finally the lobbyist and bought and paid for politicians, who've facilitated this wholesale theft.
There is so much more beyond economics that we've lost in the past two generations. My parents were children of the depression. The social contract that FDR established with them, and Kennedy and Johnson extended is being torn apart by the people that Eisenhower warned us about.
I am outraged, angry and increasingly hopeless. Obama, today's great hope, appears to be selling us down the river, assisted by Rahm Emanual, the Blue Dogs, ConservaDems, the Republican Party and the obscene right wing media (Oh yeah it appears there is no real left wing media, unless you count the paltry few, The Nation, MSNBC, Air America, and PBS. Thank god for the left wing bloggers.) Fox News, Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, and others the right have successfully entrenched in talk radio.
Having vented I don't feel any better. All I know is that I am doing what I can now. I am trying to stay informed about what is going on in politics and I AM SHOUTING AS LOUD AS I CAN TO ANYONE WHO WILL LISTEN.
"Get involved, express yourself, write, call your Senator, Congressman, President, local political leaders, your neighbors, anyone who will listen. Take back our country from the plutocrats and crazies."
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
A very good day.
This past Saturday was pretty cool for me. While G^2 went off to a "Gardening with Northwest Native Plants" out at Cloud Mountain Farm, I participated along with a couple dozen or so others in "The Ceremony of 8,000 Sacred Drums" (Historical Reference). The ceremony took place at Maritime Heritage Park in Bellingham beginning at 10:45 am, led by Unci (Lakota: grandmother) Jan Super.
Unci Super and a half dozen or so others were there as I showed up with 3 of my drums, turtle rattle, and 3 of my flutes. Unci Super, fired up some sage and smudged us. She started us off with a heart beat rhythm, offering prayers, until 11:00. People kept drifting in, mostly in ones and twos. Members of the Lummi Tribe arrived with a powwow drum. I don't know if this is a tribal drum, but I had that impression. In any event, Unci Super welcomed it with appropriate fanfare.
Unci Super, sang a summoning song, calling in spirits from the four directions. She guided us to face each direction as she sang and we drummed with her. She told a story of a man, who while on a Hanblecheyapi (vision quest) had a vision. In his vision, he saw an arbor. At the east gate, he saw yellow flags for the yellow nations, the south had black flags for the black nations, the west white flags for the white nations, and the north red flags for the red nations. The arbor had been the sole province of the red nation but in his vision the man saw all the races of man within the arbor. (Note, I may have not gotten the colors associated with the proper gates as my memory for this kind of thing seems seriously flawed.)
The man took his vision to his elders seeking their guidance. After 4 days they bade him to go forth and follow his vision. Now, I'd heard this story about 10 years ago when I first embarked on my walk along the red road. Next, Unci Super, put a name to this man, "Martin High Bear". As she said his name a warm flush and tingle spread through my body. I felt a magnificent new sense of connection to Unci Super, the drumming, and the ceremony.
It was with great pleasure that I realized that Unci Super had a connection with Martin. I only have a distant connection with him. Leon Stiffarm, who held the first sweat lodge I attended, and others appear to have known Martin personally. Martin was responsible in part for opening Native American ceremonies to others outside the red nation. So I am personally indebted to him and his followers for the leadership they've provided that has allowed me to share a spiritual path that resonates with me.
As the ceremony continued, a couple of the Lummi women who accompanied the powwow drum, sang at Unci Super's behest. Unci Super, sang more, said prayers and led us all in a dance. She asked several time's if people had songs to share, one woman offered a song that was totally unknown to me, I couldn't even tell what language she was singing in. She was across the circle from me, far enough that with the drums accompanying her I wasn't really able to make out her song in any detail. I wanted very badly to offer a song. The best I could do thought was to tell Unci Super that there was a Lakota Thanksgiving song that was sang in lodge that I loved to sing but couldn't lead. Fortunately, Unci Super knew the song and led it. I did my best to sing with her though as with so many of the songs I have been exposed to my memory seemed to fail me and I was far enough away from her that I had difficulty following her lead.
The ceremony concluded with several minutes of heart beat rhythm. I pulled out a couple of my flutes and played a couple quick runs as a personal offering in appreciation of the ceremony and to satisfy my ego needs for attention. A couple approached me about the flutes and I got the opportunity to promote Miguel's and his flutes with them. I had to excuse myself from talking with them as Unci Super was getting ready to depart. I thanked her for mentioning Martin High Bear and asked her if she knew of any lodges that would welcome someone such as myself. She said that her lodge would welcome me. So I gave her my number and email address. She said that she would begin work soon to bring the lodge into order. I told her I would be interested in helping her to get the lodge up and running. So now I am waiting for a call or email to join in the effort.
I was very pleased that all my drums were used in the ceremony. A couple of women showed up early on sans drums and I was able to offer my extras. I didn't really interact with many of the participants. I was impressed that their seemed to be a fairly wide range of folks. Women seemed to be the most numerous distinct group. They seemed diverse in thier makeup otherwise. It was very cool. I am indebted to the person who sent me an invitation though I have no notion of who she is nor how she came to include me in her invitation. So I feel blessed to have been a part of the whole event.
I returned home to G^2 grateful for my path, my life. Later, after a bit of begging G^2 agreed to accompany me to the drumming group I've been doing monthly since leaving my job at Marianne's House. The group is comprised of members of the Max Higbee Center, an organization supporting the developmentally handicapped community in Bellingham, Washington.
It was the largest gathering for drumming since I began offering the group. Every drum and most of the percussion instruments in my big black bag were in use for most of the hour that we were there. The folks I drum with there are vary greatly in their abilities but seem united in spirit. They respond exceptionally well to my buffoonery and teasing. Drumming provides many opportunities to share in community experience denied many of these folks in their everyday existence.
I wish I could have captured the joy and exuberance that developed during our hour together and share that with you all. Yeah, it isn't great music, but somehow it sounded good to me. When I think back on the faces I witnessed as various people stood to take charge of the group I am brought to tears. So I got to act the clown, drum and watch others blissfully share in an event that I helped bring about. It was a damned good evening and afterwards G^2 and I supped at Supon's, which I suspect may be the best Thai food in Bellingham.
It was a very good day. Mitakue Oyasin.
Unci Super and a half dozen or so others were there as I showed up with 3 of my drums, turtle rattle, and 3 of my flutes. Unci Super, fired up some sage and smudged us. She started us off with a heart beat rhythm, offering prayers, until 11:00. People kept drifting in, mostly in ones and twos. Members of the Lummi Tribe arrived with a powwow drum. I don't know if this is a tribal drum, but I had that impression. In any event, Unci Super welcomed it with appropriate fanfare.
Unci Super, sang a summoning song, calling in spirits from the four directions. She guided us to face each direction as she sang and we drummed with her. She told a story of a man, who while on a Hanblecheyapi (vision quest) had a vision. In his vision, he saw an arbor. At the east gate, he saw yellow flags for the yellow nations, the south had black flags for the black nations, the west white flags for the white nations, and the north red flags for the red nations. The arbor had been the sole province of the red nation but in his vision the man saw all the races of man within the arbor. (Note, I may have not gotten the colors associated with the proper gates as my memory for this kind of thing seems seriously flawed.)
The man took his vision to his elders seeking their guidance. After 4 days they bade him to go forth and follow his vision. Now, I'd heard this story about 10 years ago when I first embarked on my walk along the red road. Next, Unci Super, put a name to this man, "Martin High Bear". As she said his name a warm flush and tingle spread through my body. I felt a magnificent new sense of connection to Unci Super, the drumming, and the ceremony.
It was with great pleasure that I realized that Unci Super had a connection with Martin. I only have a distant connection with him. Leon Stiffarm, who held the first sweat lodge I attended, and others appear to have known Martin personally. Martin was responsible in part for opening Native American ceremonies to others outside the red nation. So I am personally indebted to him and his followers for the leadership they've provided that has allowed me to share a spiritual path that resonates with me.
As the ceremony continued, a couple of the Lummi women who accompanied the powwow drum, sang at Unci Super's behest. Unci Super, sang more, said prayers and led us all in a dance. She asked several time's if people had songs to share, one woman offered a song that was totally unknown to me, I couldn't even tell what language she was singing in. She was across the circle from me, far enough that with the drums accompanying her I wasn't really able to make out her song in any detail. I wanted very badly to offer a song. The best I could do thought was to tell Unci Super that there was a Lakota Thanksgiving song that was sang in lodge that I loved to sing but couldn't lead. Fortunately, Unci Super knew the song and led it. I did my best to sing with her though as with so many of the songs I have been exposed to my memory seemed to fail me and I was far enough away from her that I had difficulty following her lead.
The ceremony concluded with several minutes of heart beat rhythm. I pulled out a couple of my flutes and played a couple quick runs as a personal offering in appreciation of the ceremony and to satisfy my ego needs for attention. A couple approached me about the flutes and I got the opportunity to promote Miguel's and his flutes with them. I had to excuse myself from talking with them as Unci Super was getting ready to depart. I thanked her for mentioning Martin High Bear and asked her if she knew of any lodges that would welcome someone such as myself. She said that her lodge would welcome me. So I gave her my number and email address. She said that she would begin work soon to bring the lodge into order. I told her I would be interested in helping her to get the lodge up and running. So now I am waiting for a call or email to join in the effort.
I was very pleased that all my drums were used in the ceremony. A couple of women showed up early on sans drums and I was able to offer my extras. I didn't really interact with many of the participants. I was impressed that their seemed to be a fairly wide range of folks. Women seemed to be the most numerous distinct group. They seemed diverse in thier makeup otherwise. It was very cool. I am indebted to the person who sent me an invitation though I have no notion of who she is nor how she came to include me in her invitation. So I feel blessed to have been a part of the whole event.
I returned home to G^2 grateful for my path, my life. Later, after a bit of begging G^2 agreed to accompany me to the drumming group I've been doing monthly since leaving my job at Marianne's House. The group is comprised of members of the Max Higbee Center, an organization supporting the developmentally handicapped community in Bellingham, Washington.
It was the largest gathering for drumming since I began offering the group. Every drum and most of the percussion instruments in my big black bag were in use for most of the hour that we were there. The folks I drum with there are vary greatly in their abilities but seem united in spirit. They respond exceptionally well to my buffoonery and teasing. Drumming provides many opportunities to share in community experience denied many of these folks in their everyday existence.
I wish I could have captured the joy and exuberance that developed during our hour together and share that with you all. Yeah, it isn't great music, but somehow it sounded good to me. When I think back on the faces I witnessed as various people stood to take charge of the group I am brought to tears. So I got to act the clown, drum and watch others blissfully share in an event that I helped bring about. It was a damned good evening and afterwards G^2 and I supped at Supon's, which I suspect may be the best Thai food in Bellingham.
It was a very good day. Mitakue Oyasin.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Musings
Well, judging by my long absence from the blogosphere, blogging is not a deeply ingrained or urgent activity. I have actually thought on several occasions that I wanted to blog about some topic or another. But I was unable to overcome the feeling that my efforts would have the net effect of pissing into the wind. It seems largely pointless to write when I have little if any real audience. On the other hand, I desperately want to make some difference in the world.
I have been giving a lot of thought these past few years about my life. I most often end up visualizing my self as an infinitesimal point in an infinitely large and wondrous universe. This is not a bad description. Regardless of how small I might be in the grander scheme of things, the whole would not be the same whole if I were not here. So in this sense, I define the whole just as it defines me. We have this mutual thing going: Mitakue Oyasin ( All my relations).
There is a lot of comfort in those thoughts. Yet, there is another avenue of thought which proves to be troubling for me. In this visualization, I am a hapless bit of flotsam tossed about in the time-stream of existence. Emotionally, I feel as if I have no control. Intellectually, I believe that control is illusory.
Mostly, I can't seem to find anything that seems like ambition or chosen direction within me. The material world for the most part has little draw for me. Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy my creature comforts and have an obscenely large collection of things attached to me. But when I think about these comforts and things for any length of time I recognize that in large part I could live, not as comfortably, but nonetheless live without almost all of it.
It bothers me to think that in large part I have a similar relationship to people as I have with things. In this case though, my people world is decidedly less crowded than my things world. At present, my people world consist of four people. G^2(my partner/wife), my daughters P & J, and Mom. Oh, I have other family and know other people, but when it comes right down to it these are the only people that I share any significant part of myself with.
It bothers me that I have no functioning social group. Yes, there are people out there that I count as friends and feel strongly towards, Brenda, Miguel and Peter. Yet in truth, we shared a very narrow range of experience together, primarily sharing ourselves at the sweat lodge. I see my friends rarely since moving from Portland. In the 2 plus years that we've been in Bellingham/Ferndale, I have yet to make any new friends, numerous acquaintances, but no friends.
Honestly, friends have been a rarity in my life. People have pretty much come and gone in my life, touching me, even changing me some, but none have remained close and connected. This is no doubt due to a very introspective and possibly narcissistic personality on my part. I can't seem to maintain a long term outward focus.
Clearly I am adrift, my thoughts wandering to and fro as I write this. When I started I'd thought that I should just write and see what came out. Not surprising that, in part a sense of lonely has come to the fore. I suspect that my longing for connection will most likely go unfulfilled as I am unlikely to undergo some trans-formative experience which will alter my fundamental pattern of being.
I did want to talk a bit about my want to have some direction in my life. What I am talking about here is actually more than a direction. What I am looking for is a Passion, an Obsession, something that drives me forward. I am suddenly struck by the irony of what I am asking for, in the sense that I have never felt as if I was in control of my life and here I am asking for something to take control away from me and drive me.
I am a dabbler! I paint. I draw. I write. I act. I drum. I play flutes. I do lots and lots of things. None of the particularly well. I enjoy doing them but I am not compelled to do any of them. I am not compelled to excel at anything. I suspect that fear of failure may be at the root of my lack of compulsion to excel. Maybe, I am truly just too lazy.
I am not happy with my lack of drive, because I want my life to amount to something more than just existence. Although, I do think it is pretty cool that the universe wouldn't be the same if I weren't here. I want my existence to have some larger impact on the universe. I suppose that is ambition, so I guess I do have it. So I am coming full circle once again. Leading me back to that mantra which plagues me and pushes me up against my fear, my angst. "Show Up!" "Show Up!"
I have been giving a lot of thought these past few years about my life. I most often end up visualizing my self as an infinitesimal point in an infinitely large and wondrous universe. This is not a bad description. Regardless of how small I might be in the grander scheme of things, the whole would not be the same whole if I were not here. So in this sense, I define the whole just as it defines me. We have this mutual thing going: Mitakue Oyasin ( All my relations).
There is a lot of comfort in those thoughts. Yet, there is another avenue of thought which proves to be troubling for me. In this visualization, I am a hapless bit of flotsam tossed about in the time-stream of existence. Emotionally, I feel as if I have no control. Intellectually, I believe that control is illusory.
Mostly, I can't seem to find anything that seems like ambition or chosen direction within me. The material world for the most part has little draw for me. Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy my creature comforts and have an obscenely large collection of things attached to me. But when I think about these comforts and things for any length of time I recognize that in large part I could live, not as comfortably, but nonetheless live without almost all of it.
It bothers me to think that in large part I have a similar relationship to people as I have with things. In this case though, my people world is decidedly less crowded than my things world. At present, my people world consist of four people. G^2(my partner/wife), my daughters P & J, and Mom. Oh, I have other family and know other people, but when it comes right down to it these are the only people that I share any significant part of myself with.
It bothers me that I have no functioning social group. Yes, there are people out there that I count as friends and feel strongly towards, Brenda, Miguel and Peter. Yet in truth, we shared a very narrow range of experience together, primarily sharing ourselves at the sweat lodge. I see my friends rarely since moving from Portland. In the 2 plus years that we've been in Bellingham/Ferndale, I have yet to make any new friends, numerous acquaintances, but no friends.
Honestly, friends have been a rarity in my life. People have pretty much come and gone in my life, touching me, even changing me some, but none have remained close and connected. This is no doubt due to a very introspective and possibly narcissistic personality on my part. I can't seem to maintain a long term outward focus.
Clearly I am adrift, my thoughts wandering to and fro as I write this. When I started I'd thought that I should just write and see what came out. Not surprising that, in part a sense of lonely has come to the fore. I suspect that my longing for connection will most likely go unfulfilled as I am unlikely to undergo some trans-formative experience which will alter my fundamental pattern of being.
I did want to talk a bit about my want to have some direction in my life. What I am talking about here is actually more than a direction. What I am looking for is a Passion, an Obsession, something that drives me forward. I am suddenly struck by the irony of what I am asking for, in the sense that I have never felt as if I was in control of my life and here I am asking for something to take control away from me and drive me.
I am a dabbler! I paint. I draw. I write. I act. I drum. I play flutes. I do lots and lots of things. None of the particularly well. I enjoy doing them but I am not compelled to do any of them. I am not compelled to excel at anything. I suspect that fear of failure may be at the root of my lack of compulsion to excel. Maybe, I am truly just too lazy.
I am not happy with my lack of drive, because I want my life to amount to something more than just existence. Although, I do think it is pretty cool that the universe wouldn't be the same if I weren't here. I want my existence to have some larger impact on the universe. I suppose that is ambition, so I guess I do have it. So I am coming full circle once again. Leading me back to that mantra which plagues me and pushes me up against my fear, my angst. "Show Up!" "Show Up!"
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