I am grateful for: Blue Plate restaurant in SF – yummy Americana Comfort food with local and organic sensibilities. Mmmmmmmmm. Also they are serving Four Barrel espresso, and the macchiato I had was BEATNIK PIRATE GOOD. Like you knew it was going to be good because people talk about it all the time, and then [...]

Paying attention Due to the economic recession, I have been spending a lot of time on the phone with clients and colleagues in an attempt to both secure businesses for my team as well as to touch base with people and gain a better understanding for how my network is responding to the tough times [...]

Exploring the connection between love and the significance of a life.

“Do you feel like you woke up this morning as one man and that by lunch time you were another.” – yes exactly like that. I mean, every moment since has been like a series of new men, growing, changing, awaking into someone else – like someone I was meant to become.

More and more I am convinced that all of life is about learning how to live with this amazingly heavy and inspiring responsibility.

I got into a discussion recently about Reagan and heard it said that Reagan did more to bring down USSR than anyone else. It got me thinking – here are some of those meandering thoughts in the form of an email response. There are some interesting links included that I thought would be of interest even more than my half baked analysis of a situation that is well beyond my knowledge of history – more armchair historian than anything.

These are some initial exploratory steps and research inspired by readings about wastes and toxins like bleach – included is a great list of alternative non toxic ways of doing things. Try a few and let me know what you find – I will do the same.

But something has furthered this feeling of global citizenry during my last trip and reinforced today. I know that part of it is because of the technologies involved in both travel and communication and how easy it is to move both your body and your communications around the globe.

Andrisky Church

It takes becoming regular in certain places and along certain routes to recognize the patterns that teach about a place. There is no doubt that even a short visit like this can teach one about one’s self but to really learn a plus you must find a rhythm or a path and stay in it for a time.

The last time I was in Kyiv, I was treated to winter. This time I am here as winter turns to spring, and more than any other part of the year in seasonal places I love this moment. The moment when out from under the cold and often dark tones of winter peeks the most tender moments in nature.

I think that so much of the wonder of being in other cultures is recognizing that underneath the language, traditions and cultures we have tribes that stretch across the earth.

Today I met my god daughter Sofia Zinchenko! She is soooooo precious – a little smiling cupid that shot a cute little arrow right into my heart.

One thing you get clear about in traveling to new epicenters of human activity like Kiev, is that when opportunity is born people come flooding in.

So I have started over the last few months to ask myself these questions more and more. Asking myself where I am placing value, and looking for ways to do well buy doing good, rather than doing well to then do good.

I recently came across some of the new photos of Abu Ghraib prisoners. I found myself thinking – I know that there are good people out there who are supportive of our current leadership, but I cant help but feeling that these people are truly not paying attention at a common sense level.

The passing of an amazing soul back to her community. Flags at SF City Hall flown at half-mast.

and here are those using their powers for good

On PETA I found a list of companies that test animals and companies the do not – this is the list of companies that do. Warning – ignorance is bliss peeps.

green link

exerpt from Ray Anderson’s speach to the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility – http://www.socialfunds.com/news/article.cgi/article94.html

Captain of Industry or Plunderer of Nautre?

The last few months have seemed to be heavy to me. The other day while driving to work I heard the discussions about Iran and felt some despair about the situation. The thoughts actually popped into my head, “Just think about something else”. I immediately recoiled at this. If I do what does that say about me? Does it say that I am powerless, and that I have nothing to offer? That even my thoughts and passions have no power – even over myself?

let’s get busy people

my holiday letter that i couldn’t get in the mail on time Mucho love to all.

Please listen to the show from Democracy Now covering Bush’s authorization for NSA to Eavesdrop on Americans without court approval http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/12/19/1515212

Think this says it?

I just got back from the Green Festival, and boy am I ready to take this fight to the next level.

“If I had let myself think too deeply about what might happen to me, I might have gotten off the bus,” wrote Parks. “I was tired of giving in.”

When I went in today, there was a barista I do not know too well but seems like a nice person. The owner of Muddy’s was there too (I will not divulge his name as he may wish to remain anonymous) and we exchanged our hellos. I noticed a plate of candy and asked if they were already getting into the spirit of Halloween. I was told that it was a Mongolian tradition to put out candy when someone has passed on, and that Paulabarak had died in a car accident.

more bushspeaken

I am doing the recap of our adventures in installments. I will republish it all as one peice when finished, but for those of you on the edge of your seats, I figured I would give it to you as I finish it in amidst the business of being back.

Is there no stopping Bush from trashing this country?

The beauty of reclamation

God I want to “go native” – as in swinging like a monkey right back into that rainforest

andrei and sherry in costa rica stumble upon an internet cafe.

I am going back to my natural state – where my brain ends inside of me. I won’t be able to reach out into cyberspace and grab factoids and figures and I won’t be able to check statistics or online news. I will only be able to reach the natural world around me and then of course inward – into the abyss that grows less lit yet more sacred the deeper one reaches.

People, good decent people, will be forced to cross some lines. Some to protect themselves will use weapons against the aggressors that are on the edge of that bell curve, some out of need for food or water will loot places, some out of misery will push and shove. We must respect their struggle to maintain the connection to the law in their heart in some of the worst times of their lives.

I want to reach into myself and into the stranger on the street and I want to lift out all that is holy and all that is the same. I want to take the mother of all road trips and discover every difference that can be pointed to between one person and another and I want to hold it up to what is sacred – beautiful, good and true about us all.

For anyone who considers the complexity of controlling progress and the use of tools and technology in such a way as to be their master rather than their servant.

Gandhi, “If it is man’s privilege to be independent, it is equally his duty to be inter-dependent.”

I am on a little bit of a journey this weekend, here in exotic Arizona. This weekend I am going to visit my sick and dieing father who I have been moderately to completely estranged to for the past 10 years…

Can’t say I completely agree with you on this one DB. Faith has always been a powerful force – both constructive and destructive. Faith is also at the heart of things like relationships, recovery from addiction as well as connection with the Other.

Humans tend to move rocks around.

meeting minutes transcribed during the British Prime Minister’s meeting on July 23, 2002—a full eight months PRIOR to the invasion of Iraq on March 20, 2003

So here is a new and shining soul and what world shall I give her? What, when I turn towards this precious being will I be saying with my life? I am reminded of a mountain top experience when sitting alone at night in a redwood forest I heard my name spoken.

On the heels of the British Prime Ministers visit and call for the US to play more of an active role in reducing greenhouse gasses, a senior associate in the office that coordinates government climate research resigned and leaked that top White House aids were editing scientific reports to downplay the significance of the impacts of greenhouse gasses on climate change.

It has become a path for me, and at times the path has had a sound. Tonight its sounds come from Matt Bauer

Forest

So there is one person I don’t usually write about. Surprising because she is at the center of my universe, a soft orange glow, she is the weather that governs the garden I keep. My journals are filled with her name and my days are made in concert with the sound that comes through her soul.

Now I say that with some sadness. I have done my packing, its 3am in Kyiv. In two hours we will climb in a cab for the airport.

Wow being sick while traveling on business is my least favorite thing in the world � well maybe not my least favorite thing. There was that time in the Saudi Arabian dessert where I was stuck in a broken down vehicle, cold and running out of food and I� well that�s a different story.

Can not come out to blog or play. Kyiv is still enchanting us. Some highlights: met many new people. I am getting a sense for the frankness of the people here.

After a great night�s sleep in our awesome apartment. A word about our abode. One of our contacts here had helped us find an apartment to rent in the older part of the city. Complete with 20� ceilings, windows almost as tall, a balcony overlooking one of the central streets and comfortable beds.

So where has life decided to take me but to the Ukraine. And though by the last leg of our flight from Amsterdam to Kiev I felt like a wadded damp towel in a mildewy New Orleans bathroom, I was still feeling excited when we landed.

“Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is not gold.” Leo Tolstoy “In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.” Leo Tolstoy

YUSHCHENKO!

As many of you know, I have been moved by the struggle of friends in the Ukraine to keep hold of their country. The wild winds of the former soviet union states have been blowing in the direction not unlike what we saw during the Cold War. With corruption running rampant, the presidential election was rigged and stolen by corrupt politicians tied to allogations of bribes, backroom deals and even murder.

Below is a letter that was composed by technology workers in the Ukraine. What an exciting time for us as a world to have such energy being put into the struggle for moving the world in the right direction.

Friends, I have some news to report. Below is a piece of an instant messenger conversation I am having with my friend Roman in Kiev where election scandals are coming to a head with a right wing (aligned with a group of former soviet states including Russia that are moving that region back toward the cold war) and a progressive candidate who clearly has the support of the people as you can see http://www.1plus1.tv/video/camera.php

http://www.zmag.org/introtopol.htm

I was online this am with a friend in Kiev who shared with me the anger he and his friends are feeling as they see their country pulled away from a leader they know can make a difference in their country. Sounds like some very dubious election behavior. It is in the air…
http://www.kirotv.com/news/3940711/detail.html

Stay agitated!

Until we have built a society that would willingly dismantle the institutions, technologies and processes it has lovingly created � not because they are not in working order or profitable but because they do not contribute to the long term vision and harmony of the planet � we will continue to work blindly toward our destruction.

When I would recreate myself, I seek the darkest wood, the thickest and most interminable, and to the citizen, most dismal swamp. I enter a swamp as a sacred place – a sanctum sanctorum. There is the strength, the marrow of Nature. – Henry David Thoreau

Now this is just about the most encouraging thing I have heard. If this is a time of recreating ourselves as Marc suggested in his blog and as Mr. Thoreau points to in this quote – well then I am encouraged.

There will be no end to the troubles of states, or of humanity itself, till philosophers become kings in this world, or till those we now call kings and rulers really and truly become philosophers, and political power and philosophy thus come into the same hands.- Plato

Dear President Bush:

Congratulations on your victory over all us non-evangelicals. Actually,
we’re a bit ticked off here in California, so we’re leaving you.

On the morning of November 2nd I had a short meeting with Angela Davis the radical philosopher and activist and in the evening my heart was breaking from the results of the election. The next day I fell into despair as so many progressives did.

Does everyone notice a theme here? Things are remaining pretty intense for all of us. This weekend I had the privilege to attend a the Green Festival http://www.greenfestivals.com/ that was focused on the revolution at hand.

I want to rush towards optimism – as I always do. And yes in the heart of this experience I do find light � the same light I always find. The light that lives in the hearts of those close to me and connects one to the other in love � so much beauty, so much goodness.

One has to question the nature of change when one sees such things as this. It shapes thoughts about progressive change. It would be interested to see various issues plotted against this map.
http://www.learner.org/biographyofamerica/prog10/maps/

What a dark and dismal day. Forgive me a moment as I try to work toward some hope. I am facing the fact that our world is indeed in the hands of religious extremists on just about every front. The Evangelical Right has gained more ground in this country.

Long ago, or so science and many holy books suggest, the human race came up out of the mud. Since then we have crawled over this globe, shifting in facial features, body types and skin color. We speak different languages and perform different rituals; we sing different songs and eat different foods.

Voting Irregularities

funny – http://stupid.sweetrush.net/movies/Voting_Machine_1.wmv

Man I love this guy – If I wasn’t going to be me, or Sade, or Anthony Hopkins I would be him, only more handsome.

For those of you who think John Stewart of the Daily Show should be president

John Stewart is one of the sanest and most intelligent voices on television right now. He and his colleagues on the Daily Show have consistently taken the high road � even while interviewing guests who have opposing views.

OK Maybe he isn’t stupid – maybe it’s something worse.

Video shows what James Fallows reported as “a striking deterioration in George W. Bush’s speaking skills in last 10 years.”

http://stupid.sweetrush.net/movies/BrainTenYrs.mov

I have been wrestling with the most susinct way to convince people that we need a change of administration, but haven’t found it until now… http://stupid.sweetrush.net/movies/seriously.wmv (its worth the wait).

I have been reading more and more about PhD programs that might support some of my curiosities. Here is a synopsis so far � I would love any feedback that people have.

OUTLINE OF GOALS
Discover and communicate the ongoing impacts of information technology (defined as the acquisition, processing, storage and dissemination of all types of information using computer technology and telecommunication systems) on human consciousness and spirituality.

takes a few minutes to download, but worth the wait.
http://home.earthlink.net/~houval/gopconstrm.mov

So recently I received an email from the father of my later friend James Lowrie. In it was a link to a website that played something they called – “We Still Need to be Reminded” which proceeded to play some ominous music and a series of quotes from the founding fathers �then the sound of an airplane and a crash and pictures of 9/11.

Below is a letter a friend of mine from Baltimore after one of her closest friends passed away. I was so moved by her words that I had to share it with her permission. The way she describes the life of her friend is an inspiration.

This info about the presidential debates is from the PBS website for Bill Moyer’s television series NOW – if you are not watching this show you are not watching the most informative and honest program on television.

Dear Friends,

Enough of the handwringing! Enough of the doomsaying! Do I have to come there and personally calm you down? Stop with all the defeatism, OK? Bush IS a goner — IF we all just quit our whining and bellyaching and stop shaking like a bunch of nervous ninnies.

OK, so though the journaling about the fast did not go very well the fast did. I lost in the neighborhood of 20 lbs. Though I should gain a bit of that back. More than the weigh my body feels clean on the inside, and I have been meeting with a nutritionist to get educated about the things I should be eating.

Facts about our president – our rather THEIR president: (I think I posted somethign like this before but just couldn’t help putting this up)

�

That man is the richest whose pleasures are the cheapest.
Henry David Thoreau

The cost of a things is the amount of what I call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.

My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind. Albert Einstein

I am at the beginning of a ten day fast – who knows where it will lead me. Will I be thin, will I have new insight into what sorts of substances I want in my body. Will I have visions (other than visions of cheeseburgers and shakes and decadent chocolate yumminesses) � stop torturing yourself man!

“I think he is a bully, and like all bullies, he�s a coward when confronted with a force that he�s fearful of. His reactions to the extravagant and unbelievably selfish wish list of the wealthy interest groups that put him in the White House are obsequious. The degree of obsequiousness that is involved in saying �yes, yes, yes, yes,� to whatever these people want, no matter the damage and harm done to the nation as a whole � that can come only from genuine moral cowardice.� So speaks former Vice President Al Gore of President George W. Bush in his interview with David Remnick of The New Yorker.

Dwell as near as possible to the channel in which your life flows. -Henry David Thoreau

For Sherry On the Occasion of Our 9th Wedding Anniversary

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary:Love \Love\, n. [OE. love, luve,
1. A feeling of strong attachment induced by that which delights or commands admiration; pre["e]minent kindness or devotion to another; affection; tenderness; as, the love of brothers and sisters. Of all the dearest bonds we prove Thou countest sons’ and mothers’ love Most sacred, most Thine own. –Keble.

2. Especially, devoted attachment to, or tender or passionate affection for, one of the opposite sex.

When you are overwhelmed by an experience in nature � a walk on the beach or an island waterfall or even a flower in a city garden � it is not because you have for some reason become a keener observer.  It is because for a moment you have abandoned the illusion that as a [...]

Exploring creativity As a lifestyle creativity can change the world around you, it can foster new ideas and practices, it can beautify and reveal truth and goodness through expression.  At its essence creativity is the act of taking in the world and giving it back to itself through the unique interpretation and expression of an [...]

from a New York City craigslist post: A great story of racial harmony in the DC subway. ——————————————————————————–Reply to: anon-35320278@craigslist.orgDate: Fri Jul 02 07:07:16 2004 OK, so check this out, I took the red line from metro center to Shady Grove, It was delayed so TONS of people had to sardine into the trains. It [...]

In honor of women’s history month and in memory of Erma Bombeck who lost her fight with cancer, her are her words of wisdom.     IF I HAD MY LIFE TO LIVE OVER – by Erma Bombeck (written after she found out she was dying from cancer).   I would have gone to bed [...]

Liberty in the Open I have been thinking a lot about liberty lately. I have been seeing its calling in everything and I think that above all liberty is a place of origin for us all, and when our wills subside, giving way to the natural currents of love and order we feel the pieces [...]

A Favor In less than 48 hours, Congress will vote on an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would permanently deny marriage equality to same-sex couples. This is unprecedented — never before has our Constitution been amended to take away anyone’s rights. This is scary stuff people As all of you know, my mother is [...]

Passing Afternoon Inspiration �There are times that walk from you like some passing afternoon� � if it weren�t for those moments that I realize just how short it all is. Like I accidentally notice how quickly a day passed and for some reason connect that to where I am in my average white male life [...]

Summer Moods Never did summer feel so little like summer. It almost feels like I have enetered a season seen only on TV � the season that always seems to fit the mood. Saving for maybe a few days that felt like rain but it never came. A tenderness, a lightness of spirit sniffs against [...]

Wisdom form Thoreau That man is the richest whose pleasures are the cheapest.Henry David Thoreau The cost of a things is the amount of what I call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.Henry David Thoreau Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for [...]

Change the World Smiley Smiley people make the world a better place simply through being alive. Happy people change the world by getting up in the morning. You want to change the world? Find your happiness and smile often!

Quotes to Inspire Change We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.- JOHN F. KENNEDY The [...]

Create Your Day Hi Everyone – life is busy and I am working on an essay about liberty and freedom so much of my writing time is going into that right now. I did want to share something a work colleague of mine (Thanks G.) turned me onto. This is very related to the philosophies [...]

Sharing the Dream with Shelby and Scott On a hilltop on the Northern California coast, surrounded by wild purple irises I found the words I wanted to say to my friends Shelby and Scott during their wedding ceremony. Of course I cried my way through most of it so I thought posting them here would [...]

Stormy Weather Gives Way to Sunny Skies The bad thing about not being prone to depression is that when you get it you are like a deer in the headlights of hard times. The good thing is that you can actually work your way out through a good dose of personal reflection, some herbs from [...]

Long Dry Season As many of you know I have been having a difficult time lately. I feel like I have been trekking through a barren land of thorns and uncertain horizons. I am seeing signs of life though, and I wanted to thank everyone for being so supportive and concerned. I will be spending [...]

You Tell Him Bette! Dear President Bush: Today you called upon Congress to move quickly to amend the US Constitution, and set in Federal stone a legal definition of marriage. I would like to know why. In your speech, you stated that this Amendment would serve to protect marriage in America, which I must confess [...]

Safety or Liberty – Make a Choice! The more I see our liberty ripped from us in the guise of safety and defense, the more I feel we are at a true crossroads in our country�s history. Ben Franklin comes to mind here, �They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary [...]

Spring has SPRUNG It is so beautiful outside I can hardly concentrate on my work today. It makes me think of my tribe, out there working in your jobs, maybe also daydreaming like I am. It makes me wish we were all at a cafe in the mission outside smiling and laughing. Some great iced [...]

Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside,thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming – “WOW — What a Ride

The Same Freedom I just got an email from my dear friend Shelby, who was reflecting back eleven years ago when she came to San Francisco and was brought to tears when she saw the gay pride rainbow flags along Upper Market Street. Having come from a place where she had watched friends being tormented [...]

Expect Nothing!!! I think it is important to teach ourselves that we are humans living in imperfect systems � technology, politics, group dynamics and communication, language, etc. While as professionals we can overcome many of the problems that arise from these imperfections, we should reserve energy for the inevitable fine tunings that arise after trying [...]

A Metaphor for Valentine’s Day In 1995 I fell in love with a woman who had loved me for longer than I could understand. Most of what I know about love, real enduring and patinet love has come from the relatinoship I still feel is a grace I will never come close to knowing how [...]

Spring Coming to California? Is it me or is spring creeping in. I am so ready � longer days, more time in the garden, more birds more bugs, more sunshine, more outside time, still time to enjoy sweaters here and there. Still the smell of fireplaces going on colder nights. I guess my California is [...]

More Thanks It�s one of those mornings, were things are falling into place seemingly because I am not forcing them to be otherwise. Like I entered the flow that is always so easy to get in while on vacation and so hard when you are not. I got up, showered and made my way through [...]

Tofu is Murder!!! At long last I have tracked down the ruthless Mike Nathanson – advocate of soya hunting and mass soya murderer. The TLF – Tofu Liberation Front – has been seeking him in connection with a sinister policy of complete tofu consumption. Finally tofus can roam free once again. See below for an [...]

Sneaking Up on Change I feel like I might have learned something about change today. I was at the gym doing my cardio (like a good boy), and as I have lost some 18lbs since the New Year I have embraced some different ways of doing my life. For a long time I seemed to [...]

Money is Not More Important than my Mom’s Suffering I love to debate with people about political and ideological matters. But I am not writing about some abstract political matter, I am writing to you with troubling memories of the pain my family has suffered. When I was quite young, my mother came out as [...]

State of the Union Numbers Whether you are a Bush fan or a Bush basher – the numbers below are interesting and tell as much about the man as it does our times. All should be of concern to us as we cast our votes and make our voices known in conversation. Today the President [...]

A Smile on the Treadmill So I am working out this morning at the gym � running along on the precor treadmill and listening to my drum and bass. I am focused and when I close my eyes I imagine a lighter, faster, stronger and fitter me running through the desert alone. It is very [...]

In Her Memory for Her Children Kate and Sebastian Dear Kate and Sebastian, We have never met, though several times your mother and I tried to find dates so that we could. I feel as though I knew you through your mother�s stories of you. When I heard that she had passed, my mind went [...]

All the Falls I Have Loved Before My mind drifts again to the far away places of fall. Those amazing east coast leaves, the monsoons of Korea, the nights growing colder in Saudi Arabia. And my California, its ocean smell deepening, sunsets joined by brilliant clouded skies. The smell of fireplaces, the last BBQ smells [...]

Possible Problems with Voting Technology For those of you interested in the democratic process as it relates to the way we vote – check this out.

Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others. Cicero (106 BC – 43 BC)

Love the Doing I am learning a deeper lesson about how to do things. As the novelist/ philosopher Ayn Rand once wrote, �You must be the kind of man who can get things done. But to get things done, you must love the doing, not the secondary consequences.� It seems to me now that the [...]

Ralph Daniel Hedstrom on the Occasion of his Birthday My grandfather is the type of man I have come to understand more and more over the last several years. As I have become a husband, a business owner and a home owner, I have reflected more and more on the lessons he taught me, not [...]

Pink on Blue Grace All of a sudden there is an old feeling � one of perspective and clarity is mingled with a deeper experience of attention to detail and love of action, I have slipped out of an angry myopic struggle for control of tiny matters and back into a place where I simply [...]

Fresh Spangled Speck In the center of it all is a little speck. That spec is me, the center is relevant to my particular particle. To others, I am merely a part of the mesmerizing specks that whirl in the background of their own center. Part of a whole, lost in other parts of holes [...]

Arnold Timeline from www.rotten.com 17 Aug 1907 Father, Gustav Schwarzenegger, born. 1 Mar 1938 Gustav Schwarzenegger joins the Nazi Party, two weeks before Anschluss. At the time, he sported a “Hitler-style moustache.” During the war, he fought in France and on the Eastern Front. 1 May 1939 Gustav Schwarzenegger joins the Sturmabteilung, or S.A. Brownshirts. [...]

Stopping the Violence, Marriage Advice, Addons and Other Catching Up You know those times that are so full that not only do you not know which way is up or down but you start to doubt that there is an empirical up or down all together. That�s me. The last month has offered so much [...]

What Can I Say – It Can Get Stranger Hmmm well I suppose it could have been worse. It could have been yet another Bush, or it could have been Jean Claude or it could have been… pretty short list. Now don’t get me wrong. I have been moaning about how we always get one [...]

A Wonderful Note from Sherry to our Peeps Falling off the face of the earth has it’s charms, but losing touch with special friends and family is definitely the down side. The construction of the “garden cottage” is nearly finished and our roller coaster has suddenly sped up even more. With painting, furniture moving, kitchen [...]

Through the Eyes of a Visionary From time to time you run into the work of a true visionary. Someone who’s vision of the state of humankind is both beautiful and terrible. It reflects our cutest child and the twisted people who border on the monstrous. About a year ago my friend Josh turned me [...]

The Voice of an Old Poet Evidently this poem by W.H. Auden written around the time that Hitler was closing in on Poland. It was widely distributed on September 11th, but I never came across it until this morning on KPFA. Today definitely crept up on me, and I find myself feeling it more than [...]

The Lion is Feasting It�s clear outside but it feels foggy in here � like when you haven�t gotten enough sleep and then you go to a matinee and come out and it is still light. In the pit of your stomach everything becomes confused, muddled. Maybe its this music, floating like a James Bond [...]

A Sentence Being Written More and more it happens. More people usher it in, this solid feeling of wakefulness. As if names mean something, as if the actions of people, their words and their gazes are metaphors for deeper matters. Maybe it is that we move and speak in these metaphors because, at this point [...]

Let It Be Up Every once in a while I am hit by a song I have listened to a thousand times and never really heard. I was listening to the Beatles today and got to thinking� Verse 2And when the broken hearted people living in the world agree There will be an answer, let [...]

Pumping Me Up OK, so I am definitely obsessed. Something is WRONG with me. I find myself wishing that I could go to the gym again today. I went this morning, I paid my dues at the altar of sculpted flesh, I gave my pound of flesh to the washboard tummied deities. I guess one [...]

Flash Geeks So I am in San Jose at the Flash Kit conference. Josh and I have come down to hear the experts tell us more about Flash and all of its new uses. Josh has been blown away by the fact that the people here are not all 20 year old whiz kids. Instead [...]

Now I’ve Learned My ABC’s These last days, slightly overcast and a slight chill in the breeze draw my gaze past my work. I find myself wondering about far off places again. Sometimes it is a bit overwhelming the volume of lives that exist on this planet, who move, love, ache, suffer, rejoice and contemplate [...]

REST I am sitting in a room that used to be a saloon and is now a part of a historic Inn called Fensalden Inn www.fensalden.com. It is as quiet here as in the Blue Ridge Mountains where I returned from last week. Everywhere are beautiful and restful scenes to contemplate. Life abides in stillness [...]

So Busy and Baltimore Bound I am slammed right now, but I am still floating eastward toward Baltimore and all of my East Coast friends. At the end of this week, I am packing my bags and jumping a flight with Sherry to go back east to catch up with some of my favorite humans. [...]

It Was All for the Union This last weekend I had the pleasure of officiating my first wedding – that of some dear friends Doug Hammer and ChiLing Mai. There is so much to say about it, and in truth I am still trying to wrap my head around the experience. Instead of going on [...]

Introduction to an Emerging Southbay Poet I have been meaning to turn you on to an emerging south bay poet and friend of mine (and the unofficial cut throat editor of my novel Driving Socrates)- Alisa. She has recently published some of her work on her website (still evolving as any good personal website should). [...]

Andrei’s Driving Metaphor 101 Out on a back road in the middle of nowhere, tall grass blowing and far off rolling hills spotted with California live oaks. Solitary notions of the smoothness of being on the right road drifts between my hands and the rubber meeting the road. I feel like I am balanced on [...]

Dreams+Plans+Labor=REALITY In dreams we swirl our bodies through time and space and we think nothing of it. In dreams we lift our bodies from the solid ground, tread water, fly, shrink, transform and become heroes or villains, and we think nothing of it. Such powerful centers of our lives are lived in these visions. Cultures [...]

For Love of the Father What would you do for your father’s love? Several years ago I found myself asking that very question of myself as my relationship with my father seemed to be slipping away. I had a falling out with my stepmother and with the faith I grew up in, and my father [...]

A Curriculum for Love For some time, maybe even since college when I began studies in Ancient Greek, I have wrestled with writing something about love. One of the things that captured me while studying Greek was that they had four words for love, where we had one. A year or so later I came [...]

CHAOS(Part of My Master’s Thesis) This is a part of my Masters Thesis that I wrote in 1998. There are some real foundational peices of my own personal philosophy waking up in this work. My life as an aspiring integrator is definately beginning to show here, and if you read nothing else skip to the [...]

A donut in the morning 9:15 (college journal entry) I went out to study Greek this morning. Fred gave me an old fashioned glaze. We sat on the couch that’s on our front porch. I drank some ice tea, and chowed on my chunk-o-sugar. We sat there saying nothing. Fred sighed several times. He did [...]

The High Priestess Goes Before Us I am certain she is Mr. Rogers’ neighbor now, and that she and Mr. Rogers are sitting with the King of Love (that’s what she called Dr. Martin Luther King jr.) and Medger Evers, and with other souls who put forth their energies and passions so that others might [...]

Suzanne – cool song lyrics by Leonard Cohen Suzanne takes you down to her place near the riverYou can hear the boats go byYou can spend the night beside herAnd you know that she’s half crazyBut that’s why you want to be thereAnd she feeds you tea and orangesThat come all the way from ChinaAnd [...]

I found the devil Pssst…. SBC (PacBell) is the devil. I know it is true. I can’t go in to it here, but remind me to tell you about my life under the evil tyranny of SBC DSL – or lack thereof.

33 years old So this entry will make no attempts at profundity. If by chance it hits anywhere near this mark, it is purely an accident and could not be helped. 33 years old. It is a very interesting birthday, unlike any before. I feel like for the most part I am in the zone. [...]

You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one… Josh was nice enough to provide me with the John Lennon Anthology (disks 1-4), and I have to say I am in the mood for peace. But not only that, I am in the mood to feel like… come on people stop being [...]

As the Good Doctor has Said The below exerpt is from Martin Luther King’s Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech of December 1964. I have been actively searching for people and words of hope in amidst these times. I believe that every word this man said was a bit more of the secret he shared. A [...]

Turning it Toward the LightClick here for a PDF version for printing I have been struggling to find words that would be appropriate for the seriousness of the days we are moving through. The last several days as I have caught pieces of the reality TV war, I have wrestled to fight back my own [...]

Love Needs No Excuses Self preservation is not selfish – loving another and being loved and cultivating that love is what makes us strive to make a better world. It is also what sustains us. Whether we are trying to make a living, create a work of art or dig a ditch – loving another [...]

My Sweet Sunrise Not many mornings have I awoke by the time of sunrise.The day and night before each has been filled with life’s compromise.Try as I might I see so few beginnings to my days.So few skies filled with scarlet clouds or velvety orange rays.I wake, I stretch, I feed the cats and make [...]

“Life is for Service” The title of this blog is words inscribed on a plaque that hung in the office of Mr. Rogers. Fred Rogers, host of Mister Roger’s Neighborhood, died last week of stomach cancer at the age of 74. The list of awards presented to Mr. Rogers runs more than 25 single-spaced, typed [...]

The Weeping Crusader I wrote this story at the end of 1991 when I was struggling with both the religion of my family as well as the role I had played in the Gulf War. There is a heavy sense of being Christian at the beginning of the story, but I beleive you will find [...]

Embracing the Laws of Being Human I have long held that within our hearts is written the natural law of our species. That when we reached inside of ourselves in a way that took into account the lives and events around us, we would know the right thing to do. My experiences on a jury [...]

Serial Rapists are NOT my Friends Yep, I’m on jury duty, and lucky me I get to hear all about this complete sleezeball who picks up prostitutes and takes them to dark and scary locations and rapes them at knife or gunpoint- allegedly speaking that is. I of course can not share any details, not [...]

Fletcher Memorial Home (revisited) In 1997 Pink Floyd released an album called The Final Cut. On it was featured a biting song about “wasters of life and limb” – i.e. the world leaders who have led us into war. The song is entitled “The Fletcher Memorial Home” named for Roger Waters’ (the then lead singer [...]

SweetRush Update Life is so busy right now. SweetRush has been inundated with requests due to a marketing campaign we just started. Everyone keep their fingers crossed for continued success. This could be just the thing to start generating the resources for other projects I have been wanting to get off the ground. I hope [...]

People Marched in the Mission Tonight – the dove of peace followed them Tonight we were pleasantly surprised by a peace march in the mission. One of these pics is a good old standard pic of folks carrying a peace inspired banner. The other two are a bit more interpretive, with the dove of peace [...]

A Hollow in the Night Sometimes there is a hollow in the night, and while I am waiting I sense that I am within it. Between each wavelike choral sound of night insects both close at hand and on the very edges of my hearing, I am resting in that hollow. While by day those [...]

Baraka – Blessing This I just finished watching the film Baraka. In Sufi the word Baraka means blessing, or at least that is its broadest definition. I know that some of you have seen this film. For those of you who have not, I would beg you to. There was so much to see and [...]

Customer Service for the Poor So what does a person have to do to get some service around here? Maybe it is me. I bust my ass to make our customers feel like they are the only customers. I guess that makes me feel like I should be treated the same. Or hell, not even [...]

A Heart Warmed Thank You This last weekend, I received one of the most wonderful requests of my life. I was asked by my friends Chi and Doug to marry them. I know…it is so amazing, and such an honor, and my jaw is still dragging around on the ground. My head has been filled [...]

Carousel of Time Tonight I am enjoying the company of friends, food and song at Sunny and Lauren’s place in Bernal Heights. It’s warm in the circle of our new friendship that feels already familiar. They are singing a Joni Mitchel song – the circle game. Today has been all about dreams of youth and [...]

Blue Dreams of Peace The sunset tonight was amazing. We drove into the city along ocean beach and the water was a pearly blue. It reminded me of a time when sherry and I were on the east coast. We hadn’t seen a sunset on the water for a long time. While on a trip [...]

So Blessed Was it not absolutely gorgeous today in the Bay Area? I was fortunate enough to have a meeting in the East Bay and drove across the Bay Bridge. It was so crisp. This is California, and we are of course destined for such weather, but I mean 71 degrees in San Francisco in [...]

Ode to it all Oh, brave streaming nightLidless slumber.Dreams of organic cusps.Other. How do I approach you? With banter or philosophical musings? Nay, I think today in action. It is in deed that I see you in my life now. For certain you are still in thought, but you have already considered yourself in me. [...]

New StepsIt is always so difficult getting started. Whether a diet or a blog or a resolution or change in general. It reminds me of the movie Bodies, Rest and Motion staring Tim Roth, Eric Stoltz and Bridgette Fonda. This wonderful film applies the theories of bodies, rest and motion to human relationships and behaviors [...]

First Blog, Best BlogIn the begining there was no blog. The emptiness was as vast as infinity would allow. There was no room for speculation, rationalization or conceptualization. There was no profunditude, no systematic analysis of bits and pieces of the whole, there was no language, no form and no meaning or purpose. Slowly and [...]