Art Around Town
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Blue on Blue
A friend and neighbor when dividing her garden for better growth gave me these bulbs several years ago. They have bloomed every subsequent spring, bringing a shot of color and beauty to a spot that technically is not mine, but is on the edge of the woefully neglected yard of my next door neighbor.
As I walk around the neighborhood admiring one bloom after another in this exuberant season I think about how much the front gardens are not just for ourselves, but an offering for each other–friends and passers-by alike. Sharing the beauty is such a wonderful way to connect.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
Sadhana
The chant this evening was “no war, yes, peace.” It is not enough, if things are going to change, just to say what we don’t want. We need to offer and work towards alternatives.
United States Capitol, January 9, 2020
Chanting (and the People’s Filibuster)
After work and before going to an evening asana class, I joined in at the People’s Filibuster on the looming tax bill. Speaking were a mixture of dedicated elected officials and people of the cloth. Several of the latter were arrested today for reading the Bible out loud inside the Capitol–perhaps because instead of reading the passages that support ill treatment of women and those who don’t follow a traditional heterosexual mold, they were reading the passages about how Christ advocated treating the poor and the sick.
The crowd chanted “kill the bill” and “not one penny,” but it had the resonance of gospel or kirtan.
Have you called your elected officials (or sent a postcard)? Do you have friends or family you can get out to vote? How are you going to use your voice to further spirit?
Minding My Own Business–Sort Of (and Seva)
When I was walking to work this morning, I saw this man stretched out on the grass in Stanton Park. It was drizzling, but pleasant. I did not feel any need for an umbrella. The man was definitely breathing, and he had put some cardboard on the ground before lying down. Had it been sunny and had he been lying on a bench or a spread out blanket instead of on wet grass, I would not have wondered at all whether he might need help.
Would he want “help” that would include waking him up? Would it serve to call emergency services when his lying out in the rain did not seem like an immediate matter of life or death, though did raise questions about whether the man was ok? If all calling did was trigger police waking him and telling him to move actually have made things better for him? Because I could not answer these questions and because he had made himself the pallet of cardboard–leading me to think he had chosen the spot rather than fell, I decided to leave him be. I cannot know whether that was the right thing to have done.
This debate in my head did raise questions about the conundrums of offering charity and service and whether and when we can ever serve selflessly, unclouded by our own preconceived notions of what is right and good.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
