The headache leaves, you download
Everything in a new folder.
The illusion of memory intrudes
Thinking separated parts can be put together
Again. Theory and performance clash
Ego comes between and hard to beat but ways
Are present, deep inside are instructions:
You can achieve oneness.
The rain started last night and continued today
I didn’t walk to the river this morning
Instead I went to the Wellness Center for a workout.
This afternoon I was in the Study Center
In the library helping students with their homework.
Afterwards I attended my Rotary Club meeting.
This evening I started reading Conversation With Friends,
A novel by Sally Rooney.
The little things that make life interesting.
We can measure the day by how long it rained
HOr by how happy is the student after
She understood what she was studying for days.
A green leaf started sprouting from a seed
Aboard the lunar lander at the surface of the moon.
That’s a living plant listening to Moonlight Sonata.
The seeds get strayed from the garden
Travel in miles of air
The petals fall like kisses
Or is it kisses like petals falling
Landing on your hair, shoulders and dreams
And I waking remember the fragrance
Of the place where you once walk.
I remember you telling me
Not to get anchored in dreams
“Shape your future in reality,” you said.
The egret standing on the riverbank
Remains like a statue
When a boat passes by
The egret looks at me
as if asking a question
Will a rose remains a rose
If no one looking?
The friendly egret
The sidewalk where I walk
Mixing of their snores
Is like tangled vines
Where monkeys fight
Swinging and sometimes laughing
The waterfalls stop flowing
The moon hides behind the banyan tree
Then they breath again heaving
In increasing crescendo
Then the crest is reached
The noise stops
Like the sound of the dead
Like when we were children
Playing hide and seek
You and I hide our breath with a kiss.
Today I went for my walk before I had my breakfast. It was 53F and the sun was trying to peek behind the clouds. A light brown, tall poodle lumbered out from a door and ran ahead of me. I heard a young woman called out, “Mozart, Mozart, come back.” The woman and I exchanged pleasantries. I remarked that she has a beautiful dog. I met a walker with his dog, a smaller one thanMozart. We greeted each other, Good morning. They were walking on opposite direction.
I continued my walk to the river. A few fishermen were socializing among themselves. Their lines resting on the riverbank.
Two towering palm trees across each other on the sidewalk greeted passerby’s. They remind me of a warmer place somewhere. The yucca plants did not give me a similar memory.
Perhaps because of a rain for the last 2 days the street was fairly clean. The birds sang joyfully.
By the time I turned around to walk back home the sun has burst out. The top of the hills has risen above the clouds. The breeze 55F grazed my face like a whisper.
My morning of holy moments.
We lose sleep because we want
To know if our life has meaning
What’s the meaning we are looking for.
I pray for the Holy Spirit to help me
I went to see my primary physician today. Seeing a physician is a confirmation of our mortality. We are mortals. We are subject to decay. It’s a morbid reality.
When we pray we affirm our hope for immortality.
We should realize both conditions offer us a chance for greatness. Greatness means steps of extraordinary work. Greatness is immortality in the eyes of man and God.
My doctor told me I have work to do.
The object of the Rule of 6 Plus One is not about accomplishments but simple enjoyment of state of being.
It’s a daily practice of self-discovery. It’s an expression of awareness. It’s a celebration of life where you give your “fullest, deepest attention.”
This evening Mrs. Abstract and I went to dinner with a couple of friends. We met other friends in the restaurant. It’s our Rotary club’s Dine and Donate night.
Where will I put this occasion in the Rule of 6 Plus One?
It’s not an imaginative play, or ideas to ponder? It’s a tight squeeze for Encounters with Beauty. Dinner with friends is sharing. It’s relationships.
For children and adults Sharing is an additional category in the celebration of life. It deserves a separate category which will overlap with the others. All the seven activities can be shared. The Rule of 6 Plus One will need an additional activity: Sharing. The daily activities will become Rule of 7 Plus One.
My mnemonics can be: Imagine Baudelaire Walking Writing Sharing Intense Poetic Encounters
What do you think?
My Pagoda
If I’m blindfolded I will not see the hummingbird feeding.
I can hear a waterfall.
If I’m blindfolded I will not see the stars
I can hold a fishing pole and cast a line.
If I’m blindfolded I will not see the rain
i can hold a purring cat.
If I’m blindfolded I can’t say there’s only light
If my eyes are open I will be blinded by the sun.
If I’m blindfolded I will not be able to drive.
I can play chess.
If I’m blindfolded I will not juggle a lighted torch.
I can whistle.
If I’m blindfolded I will not see the waves
I can ride the crest.
With my eyes open I can be blind.
In scarcity I can find gratitude.
Simplicity of life and death.
Then I meet you.
Once upon a conversation.
It’s New Year. How do you spend your day? I was asked.
I spend my day like a homeschooler.
Why is that?
Being at home (I’m retired) I’m like a homeschooler. Home is freedom from school, from work.
13 years ago I accidentally logged on a blog of Melissa Wiley, a homeschooler mother. She teaches her children at home. She “borrowed” a Rule of 5 by Charlotte Mason of what to teach children every day. Melissa added one more activity and made it a Rule of 6. Here is a link: Rule of 6 to her original post.
Here is the First Five:
•Good books
• Imaginative play
• Encounters with beauty (through art, music, and the natural world—this includes our nature walks)
• Ideas to ponder and discuss (there’s Miss Mason’s “something to think about”)
• Prayer
Melissa Wiley added: Meaningful work to make it her Rule of 6.
For my part I added one more activity: Writing to make it my own Rule of 6 plus One.
I don’t know how I stumbled on her blog/website. Since that time I used her homeschooling plan of “Tidal Learning” for my daily activities.
As a way of my modification or explanation:
The Good books can lead to Great Books.
The Imaginative play can include Physical Exercise, Tai Chi and Yoga.
Encounters with beauty can also involve Dramatic Art, Poetry and Dance.
Ideas to ponder and discuss include Creativity and Innovation, “things we think about”
Prayer also can mean Silence and Solitude
Meaningful work includes philanthropy of time and work.
Writing ranges from doodling to writing novels.
My Rule of 6 plus One
Good books
Imaginative play
Encounters with beauty
Ideas to ponder and discuss
Prayer
Meaningful work
Writing
I hope you and I can live a simple and harmonious life every day.
Yesterday Mrs. Abstract and I spent the New Year with our friends. We dined on Tuscan Bread Soup, lobster tails, French baguette and bubbly.we watched the movie, The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out a Window and Disappeared.The movie was funny and with ridiculous sequences of events that ended well.
I wish always to reach the age of 100 just to experience what it feels like to be a hundred. With my cancer, though on remission, and my 4-coronary-artery heart bypass my chances of reaching 100 is slim. My goal every day is to remain healthy.
I’m reading coincidentally a book, The Hemlock Cup, Socrates, Athens and the Search for a Good Life.
I just finished reading an essay, A Meditation in a Toolshed, by C.S. Lewis. He explains that “One must look both along and at everything,” to know the truth.
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