From Ponder About

Neat stuff in the world

There's an interesting place on the side of the road on the way to Carrboro from I-40 on Old Hwy 86.  It's a stone spiral that was built by architect John Hartley at the entrance to Stone Knoll neighborhood.

Stone Knoll is  a very nice subdivision with large, interesting houses on large, wooded lots that tend to be ornamented with flowers, gardens, yard art, hammocks and comfortable lawn chairs, play sets and a general air of happy, affluent families.

The side closest to the highway is a field of wildflowers and there is a little turn off from John Woods Road into the field.

 There are 4 tall standing stone in the cardinal directions and a flat stone in the middle.  These five have plaques with poems on them.  Hotlinks are to other websites that have the texts of the poems.

In the East is Maya Angelou's Inaugural Poem  written for Bill Clinton in 1993

To the North is Wilderness by Carl Sandburg

Wendell Berry  has a poem in the West.

And in the South, Mevlâna Jalâluddîn Rumi

There's a memorial tree over to the side but still within the spiral.

 It appears that Donna Lotstein was a lover of horses.

The stone in the center has the Navajo Way Blessing Prayer

I've seen a couple of places online refer to this installation as a "stone circle", but it isn't a circle.  If you are actually in it, you can see the spiral winding into the trees and outward, eventually petering out in the direction of Old 86.

You can even see it in Google Maps.

View Larger Map

Fiona, lying in her bed

"We ignore the blackness of outer space and pay attention to the stars, especially if they seem to order themselves into constellations. “Common as the air” meant something worthless, but Hackworth knew that every breath of air that Fiona drew, lying in her little bed at night, just a silver flow in the moonlight, was used by her body to make skin and hair and bones. The air became Fiona, and deserving—no, demanding—of love. Ordering matter was the sole endeavor of Life, whether it was a jumble of self-replicating molecules in the primordial ocean, or a steam-powered English mill turning weeds into clothing, or Fiona lying in her bed turning air into Fiona." 

— Neal Stephenson (The Diamond Age, A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer)

Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I'm an extrovert.  MBTI ENtj.  When I had my appendix out last month, I was batshit by noon the next day because they left me alone in my room with no conversation.

My husband is an introvert.  We manage the difference by me going out into the world to be with people and him  going to the woods to be alone.  Several of my friends feel that it is their obligation to get me out of his hair.

And they're right.

We really enjoy each other's company.  But he really needs time alone in order to enjoy my company.  And I need company more often.

I work in a big company with lots of people around me and as much conversation as I want.  He works from an office in our home.  He can go a whole day in the presence of no other human than me.

And this works for us.

He's been reading a couple of things that talk about silence.

I sometimes long for silence.  Not aloneness.  But being present without chatter being a requirement.  When I am not talkative, many people say, "What's wrong?" and are puzzled when I say "Nothing."  They seem to be mollified by "I just don't have anything to say."

I sometimes think I'd like to have a Day of Silence.  But I can't do my work without communicating with coworkers.  I know how to have a day in the world without some communicating.  And writing notes to the barrista  in order to get a latte is cheating, imvho.  It's still communication, even if the talk is written rather than  spoken.  How do you shop without telling a salesclerk that you don't need hir help or that the card you are using is a debit,  not credit or "Wait, I have a penny"?

And I find silence calling to me (ha!) when I am most ... in the moment.  When the distractions are most intangible.

This I isn't programmed for solitude.  Being present with others is enough, though.

For a year, I've been trying to figure out a way to have silence of the mouth without estrangement of the world.  I don't seem to be making any progress.

Be

IIn this composition the word kun (‘be’) is simply inscribed in kufic script. The word alludes to the phrase in the Qur’an, ‘and the day he [God] says “Be”, and it is’ (Qur’an 2:117). 


From Stars on a Dark Night

Yyyyyyyyyyyyyep!

Really, when ya come right down to it, enjoying good food is one of the two most fun things a human can do.

~ Steve Lacey

Weeds

When I had lived here a year or two, my neighbor asked me when I was going to mow those weeds down in my front yard.  I said,"I'm waiting for those little flowers that came up to stop flowering first."  He said, "Those aren't flowers.  Those are weeds."  I said, "Weeds are flowers you don't want and I like those.  I'm not mowing until they finish blooming."

They are called Star of Bethlehem and they are NC wildflowers.  They are all in my grass and flower beds, managing to bloom even when their leaves have been mown.   Or weedeaten.

Even with plants, it's all a matter of perspective.

This life

I am the wife of a lovely man. He fits me.

I have an almost-adult son. Most of the time (when he's not living at home) I really like him.

I have a great house. It is small enough to be manageable for tending to and I could afford the mortgage even before I found this husband.

I have an incredible yard that we have filled with things that bloom and things to eat and things to delight the eyes.

I live in an area where there are interesting things to do.

I have an old dog and 2 cats. They all adore me and we snuggle a lot.

I have work that suits me. I have a handful of coworkers whose conversations I really enjoy. One is a real friend away from the lab.

I have a good adult relationship with my parents.

Do you see that this life is excellent?

When I read horror stories that are the lives of other dreamers I say "thank you." I am grateful that I get to dance this happy dance. There will be time for pain dances and sorrow dances and angry dances. But this I is getting the happy dance and even when the I is having a not-perfect day, I still recognize that it is a happy dance.

I would not dare to tell an I who is dancing a pain dance that it is a good dance too. S/he might dance a step or two with me. And "good" is a value judgment that doesn't really matter. They are the right dances for the here-and-now of I and I.

Unexpected author

Nothing exists; all is a dream. God—man—the world—the sun, the moon, the wilderness of stars—a dream, all a dream; they have no existence. Nothing exists save empty space—and you!...And you are not you—you have no body, no blood, no bones, you are but a thought.

 
Mark Twain (1835-1910)

Art and Artifice

http://www.futilitycloset.com/2011/04/11/art-and-artifice

This too shall pass.

Today, joy.

Tomorrow, pain.

Next Thursday, want.

On June 8th, a stubbed toe or a random act of violence or a birthday.

All passing.

All replaced by the next thing.

You will not have this moment again.

Love it.

Sweet, sour, salty, bitter, spicy, umami, astringent.

ROYGBIV

The Dark Side of the Moon

No apologies to Pink Floyd.

Hmmmm

But, say you, surely there is nothing easier than for me to imagine trees, for instance, in a park, or books existing in a closet, and nobody by to perceive them. I answer, you may so, there is no difficulty in it; but what is all this, I beseech you, more than framing in your mind certain ideas which you call books and trees, and the same time omitting to frame the idea of any one that may perceive them? But do not you yourself perceive or think of them all the while? This therefore is nothing to the purpose; it only shews you have the power of imagining or forming ideas in your mind: but it does not shew that you can conceive it possible the objects of your thought may exist without the mind.

– George Berkeley, A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, 1710

Posted on Futility Closet

This is true

The sorrow for the dead is the only sorrow from which we refuse to be divorced. Every other wound we seek to heal—every other affliction to forget; but this wound we consider it a duty to keep open—this affliction we cherish and brood over in solitude.

Washington Irving (1783-1859)

I wonder what the mechanism in human brains is that causes this?

XKCD

I love this

What a piece of work is man
How noble in reason
How infinite in faculties
In form and moving
How express and admirable
In action how like an angel
In apprehension how like a god
The beauty of the world
The paragon of animals
I have of late
But wherefore I know not
Lost all my mirth
This goodly frame
The earth
Seems to me a sterile promontory
This most excellent canopy
The air-- look you!
This brave o'erhanging firmament
This majestic roof
Fretted with golden fire
Why it appears no other thing to me
Than a foul and pestilent congregation
Of vapors
What a piece of work is man
How noble in reason

How dare they try to end this beauty?
How dare they try to end this beauty?
Walking in space
We find the purpose of peace
The beauty of life
You can no longer hide
Our eyes are open
Our eyes are open
Our eyes are open
Our eyes are open
Wide wide wide!

Sometimes she just speaks to me. Or for me.

"All I Really Want"

Do I stress you out
My sweater is on backwards and inside out
And you say how appropriate
I don't want to dissect everything today
I don't mean to pick you apart you see
But I can't help it
There I go jumping before the gunshot has gone off
Slap me with a splintered ruler
And it would knock me to the floor if I wasn't there already
If only I could hunt the hunter

And all I really want is some patience
A way to calm the angry voice
And all I really want is deliverance
Do I wear you out
You must wonder why I'm so relentless and all strung out
I'm consumed by the chill of solitary
I'm like Estella
I like to reel it in and then spit it out
I'm frustrated by your apathy
And I am frightened by the corrupted ways of this land
If only I could meet the Maker

And I am fascinated by the spiritual man
I am humbled by his humble nature
What I wouldn't give to find a soulmate
Someone else to catch this drift
And what I wouldn't give to meet a kindred
Enough about me, let's talk about you for a minute
Enough about you, let's talk about life for a while
The conflicts, the craziness and the sound of pretenses
Falling all around...all around
Why are you so petrified of silence
Here can you handle this?

Did you think about your bills, your ex, your deadlines
Or when you think you're gonna die
Or did you long for the next distraction
And all I need know is intellectual intercourse
A soul to dig the hole much deeper
And I have no concept of time other than it is flying
If only I could kill the killer

All I really want is some peace man
a place to find a common ground
And all I really want is a wavelength
All I really want is some comfort
A way to get my hands untied
And all I really want is some justice... 

For pondering later

mojodragonfly  An interesting quote regarding a narrative conception of the self:

“Man is...a story-telling animal. That means I can only answer the question, ‘What am I to do?’ if I can answer the prior question ‘Of what story or stories do I find myself a part?’”

-Alisdair MacIntyre

Totally Meatspace

"Embedding disabled by request"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acvIVA9-FMQ

Do you hear me,
I'm talking to you
Across the water across the deep blue ocean
Under the open sky, oh my, baby I'm trying
Boy I hear you in my dreams
I feel your whisper across the sea
I keep you with me in my heart
You make it easier when life gets hard

I'm lucky I'm in love with my best friend
Lucky to have been where I have been
Lucky to be coming home again
Ooohh ooooh oooh oooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

They don't know how long it takes
Waiting for a love like this
Every time we say goodbye
I wish we had one more kiss
I'll wait for you I promise you, I will

I'm lucky I'm in love with my best friend
Lucky to have been where I have been
Lucky to be coming home again
Lucky we're in love every way
Lucky to have stayed where we have stayed
Lucky to be coming home someday

And so I'm sailing through the sea
To an island where we'll meet
You'll hear the music fill the air
I'll put a flower in your hair
Though the breezes through trees
Move so pretty you're all I see
As the world keeps spinning round
You hold me right here right now

I'm lucky I'm in love with my best friend
Lucky to have been where I have been
Lucky to be coming home again
I'm lucky we're in love every way
Lucky to have stayed where we have stayed
Lucky to be coming home someday

Ooohh ooooh oooh oooh ooh ooh ooh ooh
Ooooh ooooh oooh oooh ooh ooh ooh ooh