Today: A beautiful day in San Diego. Yes, it’s true. There are many such—even in January.
Our first discovery was a hawk which I heard the moment we stepped out the door. I tried to mimic the sound and told Sadie it was a hawk. We walked to the end of our street where the hawk was perched on the lamp post. Sadie looked up at it as I greeted the hawk. So far as I can recall, she’s never barked at one.
Even before we reached the hawk, Sadie made another discovery. I have no idea what it was but I know from her level of excitement that it was a *huge* discovery. Rather than drag her along to some predetermined goal of my own, I indulge her explorations even when I can’t tell what it is that she’s so enthralled with.
For her part, she tolerates me stopping to take pictures. I don’t think she understands why I do it. For that matter, I’m not sure I fully understand why I do it. But I enjoy it. I like sharing them.
At one of the many “choice point” corners, the sun was just beginning to rise enough to light up the bougainvillea bush. It’s quite prevalent in the San Diego area so I assume it tolerates the climate quite well.
Next we saw the sun rising. Contrails are also visible. Contrails are mostly composed of the potentially lethal substance: “Hydrogen Hydroxide” aka HOH or, more commonly H2O; i.e., water. Yes, you can drown. OTOH, you are more H2O than anything else and you can’t live without it. We tolerate the presence of water and even encourage it even though approximately ten people a day drown in America.
The pineapple palm shown below has its flowers lit by the early morning sun which tends to exaggerate their orange color. Palm trees flourish in California and Florida. But apparently, it isn’t so much that the relish the sun and the heat as that they don’t tolerate freezing temperatures very well. I saw some, for instance, in Limerick, Ireland, not known for a balmy climate.
I next spied these sunlit Christmas decorations. Of course, I could tell they were Christmas decorations and not Kwanza or Hanukkah decorations because, as everyone knows, the wise men found their way to Bethlehem on Reindeer. Or camels. Whatever. Jesus is often portrayed as blond and blue-eyed, so… Anyway, speaking of tolerance, some folks believe all Christmas decorations should be removed no later than January 1.
Why?
Are they confused? Do they look at these reindeer and think, Oh, my God! I thought we just had Christmas, but no! Here it is again already! I’ve got to buy more presents! Or…? It bothers me not the slightest if people want to keep their decorations up all year, be they Christmas, Easter, Halloween, or whatever. After all, some extremely wealthy people celebrate “Wealth Day” 365 days a year with their displays so why not?
As we continued our walk, the golden sun lit up Sadie’s fur so I snapped the picture below.
And then we came to the golf course. This is the tenth green. If you want to play golf, you will need to become tolerant of your own errors.
So, as we began the long climb back up the street to our home, I began to wonder why tolerance seems so difficult for so many people. Intolerance of other races. Intolerance of other religions. Intolerance of other cuisines, clothing styles, color schemes, music, book genres, traffic merges, waiting in line, sexual preferences, and so much more.
On the one hand, I don’t want to “be” anyone else or any other organism. I admire the hawk but I don’t want to be a hawk. I’m happy being a human. I admire many of Sadie’s abilities. But I don’t want to be a dog. There are many choices that other humans make which are different from the choices I make.
I’m mainly a visual person. I’m much more distracted by, for instance, a butterfly wafting by than a truck backfiring. Like nearly everyone, I love music. But I don’t go out of my way to hear it nearly so much as do many others. But there are sounds that I love: Simple sounds. That is why the poem itself needs to be short and neat. Those are the kinds of sounds I’m talking about. Discrete.
And some of these sounds I think I inherited a love for. Others, I grew to love. And some sounds I believe have elements of innate beauty and of learned significance. The sound of a well-hit baseball is satisfying in some deep sense over and above the significance in terms of the game. It has a resonance of beauty beyond the even more important sense that it shows what humans are capable of. All of us feel pride when we watch an athlete perform some amazing feat of strength and skill and training and will and concentration all coming down to a moment of truth and *CRACK!* there it is and you know long before it clears the fence because you heard the Home Run first.
So, there’s that. But I can’t help wondering why we can’t find a way to also feel pride in all the accomplishments of all human beings. They’re all in our family. And, we recognize that, at some level. See paragraph above.
The snapping sound of a puppy’s jaws “missing” a toy is something I haven’t heard for many decades. Sadie reminded me of that sound from more than a half century ago. Some sounds you remember your entire life.
Have you ever been called the “Life of the Party”? Have you wanted to be the “Life of the Party”?
When you read the expression, “Life of the Party,” who or what do you think of? Who is the “life of the party” when it comes to our Garden?
Is it the brightly colored hooded oriole who flitted about just outside my office window during hours of ZOOM calls?
Or, was it his more drably colored mate?
Both are needed for the species to survive.
You might tend to think of flowers as the “Life of the Party” and it’s true that our Garden has many colorful flowers!
Bougainvillea A few of the many colors of the “Jacob’s Coat” rose in our Garden.
And even the not-so colorful flowers can be infused with light. Are they then, the life of the party?
White poppies.
In addition to flowers, the garden has more active members such as bees, lizards, and rabbits. I often see coyote scat, though I’ve never seen a coyote in the garden.
Can a snail be the Life of the Garden?
We may think of flowers as being the life of the party, but without leaves, flowers and fruits would not grow because they wouldn’t have a source of energy. Leaves also can exhibit many beautiful patterns and colors.
There are a few human figures in the Garden — statues engaged in two of my favorite activities: dancing and reading.
Are they the life of the party?
The crows are certainly among the most vocal of the participants in the party. Does that make them the life of the party?
And, what about me? I help show the beauty of the Garden far beyond its physical boundaries. Of course, that happens anyway! The bunny eats fruit in the Garden and poops somewhere else to fertilize the soil and perhaps spread seeds, sometimes taking them far beyond the range of the wind. All the green leaf plants in the Garden take CO2 out of the air and return O2, each molecule of which diffuses far and wide, eventually across the planet. The bees cross-pollenate across Gardens.
So, who, exactly is the life of the Garden? I think the only accurate answer is that everything alive is the “Life of the Garden.” Not just everything within the “boundaries” of our Garden but on the entire planet. Every molecule that is here, will eventually be somewhere else. Every molecule that will be here in a few million years is now far away.
You and I and King Cobra and Queen Anne’s Lace and every other living thing on earth are small and temporary little leaves on the ancient (4.5 billion years and counting), vast, and diverse Tree of Life. Typically, you know a lot more about the neighborhood surrounding your little leaf than you do about mine and vice versa. Yet, I may discover things that are of use to you. And, you may discover things that are of use to me. So, humans, have one gift that is valuable above all others.
But before we explore what that valuable gift is, let me ask you a question about how you would react to a hypothetical.
Suppose you were so poor that you barely had enough to eat, no clothes to wear, a small damp cave for shelter. You were cold in the winter and hot in the summer. Now, suppose I gave you a magic ring that changed all that. If you wear this ring — voila! — you now have clean water and sufficient food and plenty of clothes and a house that really shelters you from the extremes of the environment. In return, you must wear the magic ring at all times. If you remove the ring, your life reverts immediately.
How tempted would you be to throw that magic ring in the toilet?
Yet, that is precisely what many people do.
And, if a sufficient number of people throw away the ring, everyone will essentially live the life of a beast.
That “magic” ring is, like most rings, circular. It represents the whole of humanity. It represents the family. It represents a club, a marriage, a lodge, a company, a church, a school, a class, a group of friends. It represents our respect for each other as human beings. It represents our ability to communicate with each other.
You could call that ring love and I wouldn’t object. It need not be imbued with so much positivity that people feel love. But it must be overall positive. It represents truth. It represents empathy. Love is strong and it can overcome both a few misdeeds by everyone and many misdeeds by a few. But if lies become more commonplace than truths, civilization will run downhill and eventually cease.
Similarly, if hate and fear and contempt are how we mostly regard each other, the marriage, the family, the club, the school, the church, the party, the lodge, the company, the group of friends will eventually disintegrate. In many cases, it would disintegrate into a self-destructive war except that most people will stop themselves because they don’t want to be ostracized or jailed by the larger society. If, however, the entire society becomes rife enough with hate and fear, no one will come to anyone else’s rescue.
Our entire survival depends on our gift, our ring, our community, our country, our fellow human beings.
Our gift is not our lightning speed of running.
Our ring is not our ability to out-swim the shark.
Our gift is not our powerful jaws, or our steel strong talons.
It is our ability to communicate with each other by sharing experiences. It is truth, caring, and cooperation. That is our one gift that enabled us to survive and thrive.
A democracy can take many specific forms. What it is, at base, is that it recognizes the gift as a fundamental value to be cherished and used. The fundamental purpose is to ensure that government is aware of and takes into account how policies and people and processes actually impact people who live in the democracy. In a representative democracy, the people, in turn, can vote for people to represent them. They can vote for any reason they like; e.g., because they admire a particular person; they believe they will do a competent job; they like the candidate’s promised policy changes; they find that the candidate reminds them of his funny old uncle Al who always had the best candy on offer.
No democracy is perfect. There has to be in its structure and processes more truth than lie; more empathy than indifference; more love than hate; more hope than fear. In some democracies, there are basically two parties; others have dozens. Parties may differ on philosophies, priorities, platforms, programs, etc.
A “party” who rejectsdemocracy itself however, is not an actual political party. The term “political party” only makes sense in the context of a democracy. If “elections” are determined by those in power, they are not actual elections and there is no party. It’s just a group of thugs who want to rule by hate and fear and lies. That is not a political party. It is not a legitimate part of a political process. They want to throw the ring away in the toilet. They want to subvert the truth to lies. They want to severely limit love and enhance fear and hate. They divide rather than unify. Oh, and guess what else? Historically, they want war. They will ensure that war just as Putrid is doing right now.
Democracies have also been known to start wars. When they do, it’s often based on lies. As communication has become more ubiquitous, it has been harder and harder for democracies to lie, cheat, and be cruel. Most people don’t want that! Most people want there to be more truth, love, caring, and cooperation. There are plenty of differences about how to go about that. That’s fine. That’s just the sort of difficult and messy problem that democracy is particularly less bad than any other system.
As I said, I really think most people prefer interacting in a caring and cooperative way. We see that it’s more effective in getting things done and it simply feels better for everyone. For that reason, dick-tater-$hits have to provide lies to help assuage the consciences of its citizens. “Oh, they are all murderers and rapists! You shouldn’t feel bad about being cruel to them!” Another favorite is: “Oh, they aren’t really human beings, the way we are. No need to treat them any better than a fox trying to steal your chickens!”
Photo by u041eu043bu0435u0433 u042fu043au043eu0432u043bu0435u0432 on Pexels.com
Needless to say, this ploy completely fails on many people and isn’t completely effective on anyone. Any time you’re cruel, whatever story you tell yourself about it, you know you are destroying a bit of yourself. Except, what you are really destroying is something much vaster than a bit of yourself. In fact, what you are destroying is something much vaster than all of yourself. What you are destroying by being cruel, whatever story you tell yourself is the human branch of the Tree of Life. Lies weaken that branch. Cruelty weakens that branch. Bullying weakens that branch. So too does cowardice.
The architecture of karma shows that the future impact of your present day behavior is much greater in scope than your present impact. Behaving well is in your interest because what you are is essentially a very small and very temporary part of that ancient, vast, and diverse Tree of Life. The more you can enhance that tree with truth and love, the better for the whole tree.
Don’t throw away the ring. Wear it proudly. It is truly an amazing gift!
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