False Alarms and Needs Met

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on December 7, 2022 in Assistance, collaborating, Community, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

December 6, 2022- Arriving on time, for a scheduled medical check-up, I found that my provider had left the particular practice. No notice had been sent by the practice, and I determined why, very quickly-they are operating with a skeleton crew, after a troublesome upheaval, a month or so ago. A veteran provider at a higher level, who has done good work for me, is still there. So, I trust them enough to have rescheduled for later this month, with another provider. It was a minor hiccup, in terms of my schedule. Breakfast at Pangaea Bakery, and being greeted by a lovely, effervescent counter person, who works hard for her customers, set the day on an even tone.

Most of the day was spent helping an equally diligent phlebotomy crew, at a Blood Drive in Prescott Valley. I was the “Blood Ambassador”, greeting donors as they walked in. The team lead, a whirling dervish of a woman, seemed to accomplish ten things in the time it took the rest of us to do one or two tasks. I learned, quickly, to just sit back and let her give staccato instructions, then proceed as directed. It was likely the first and last time I will be invited to join that particular team, but there were no mistakes and three dozen people were successfully processed.

This being the 42nd Anniversary of meeting Penny, I went to dinner. Since LeffT’s Steak House was not too far from the Blood Drive site, I stopped in for an early repast. LeffT’s is a relaxed, down-home establishment. So, when a woman came up and asked me how I liked the open-faced meatloaf sandwich I had ordered, it was no trouble to recommend the dish, wholeheartedly. She so ordered, and agreed with my positive assessment. I had a nice chat with her and her husband, on the way out.

It’s always a nice touch to make friends, from the beginning to the end of a well-spent day. Even those who seem to be begrudging can be brought into one’s corner, with patience and diligence.

Hiding the Obvious

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on December 6, 2022 in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, distraction issues, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Striving

December 5, 2022- The winsome, but giddy, girl asked why I was walking away from her and her friend: “Don’t you like us?” I reassured her that they were very much liked, but I didn’t want to be seen as hovering. That satisfied her, though they sought attention in other ways, for the rest of the class, including by trying to hide a cell phone-which she insisted was not there, until it fell on the floor.

Eleven and twelve year olds can be expected to try and hide the obvious. Being recognized, in the midst of the change from child to adolescent, is a comfort-even when everyone concerned knows that the means to that recognition is ludicrous. After I played along, for a bit, with the cell phone ruse, they got more serious and asked for help with an assignment-related problem.

Special needs children, on the other hand, especially those who are in the “Severe and profound” category, are unable to hide anything-especially their non-verbal cues. The only way many can communicate is with their bodies-stiffening up, going dead weight, yelling, trying to run away. They are being very obvious about saying that something in the situation upsets or frightens them. Misreading their cues, or responding with an old-school “Just give him a good old-fashioned swat”, will do one thing: It will widen the chasm even further. It is instructive that a new teacher has relieved an older teacher, who believes in corporal punishment, of her duties-after the older woman lashed out at a special needs child. The child has challenges, but has not, historically, learned from physical or loud verbal chastisement.

The obvious, with me, is that I love others’ children, as if they were my own. So is it best to give them constant, and consistent, guidance and encouragement- placing limits and channeling behaviour, as much as possible. That can best be accomplished by not clinging to past violent methods-but following a much more rigourous path of constant teaching and modeling respectful behaviour-and expecting it be returned in kind.

I choose not to hide the obvious.

Peace Is Not A Seesaw

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on December 2, 2022 in Assistance, collaborating, Community, distraction issues, impediments, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

December 2, 2022- A man with whom I had a fairly minor disagreement, some weeks ago, was in attendance at a gathering this evening. He once more offered his apologies for that incident, and promised it would not happen again. I do not hold grudges, and called him Brother, as indeed all men are to one another, could we but see clearly.

One of the building staff then loudly called my name and demanded attention, on a separate matter, which I quietly gave him. He continued to be loud and boisterous, until I left the area and went to join my dining companions. His intent was to prove that the other individual and I were NOT on good terms, for whatever advantage that might have given him. I noticed that the apologetic one also moved to a different seat, away from the staff member.

Peace between individuals is not a zero sum game, in which “if you like him (her), you can’t be MY friend.” It is not a seesaw, with a dominant partner keeping the other up in the air (or in the dark). The angry person from this evening will eventually come back around and show courtesy, but I will not live or die waiting for that to happen.

I have experienced the loss of a couple of friends, who are outwardly loving and congenial, but inwardly volatile and rebuffing of many efforts at friendship. Their worlds are outwardly all-embracing, but inwardly exclusive, almost to the point of self-asphyxiation. I cannot do much, other than send out positive energy, in the hopes that they will gradually both love themselves more and see that some of us value them as souls and as people.

Peace is a level field, not a seesaw.

Some Shooting Stars Miss Their Mark

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on November 30, 2022 in Assistance, collaborating, Community, distraction issues, impediments, Inspiration, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

November 30, 2022- I was struck by the number of “Giving Tuesday” e-mails which returned today, saying they had fallen short of their goals; struck, but not surprised, by the news. While money is like water, and the amount in toto doesn’t change, the form in which it exists changes constantly. Snapping one’s fingers or thrusting out one’s hand does little, or nothing, to increase flow, when the supply in liquid form happens to be a trickle. I was the recipient of no fewer than 800 e-mails, over the course of Thanksgiving weekend. I gave what I consider to be a reasonable amount, during that period, and will continue, throughout the holiday season, to offer what I consider a reasonable amount.

There is another aspect to this: The very real consequence of constant bombardment, even by the most deserving of causes, is ennui; disinterest, the passing into White Noise of the message being trumpeted. At worst, it can even trigger opposition to the cause. None of these are what I want to see happen to groups like Sandy Hook Promise, Stand With Parkland, Mercy Corps/Haiti, Lady Freethinker, and World Central Kitchen. There is enough nefarious thought in the world, without bringing it to the fore.

I favour an appeal for volunteers as much, if not more than, the call for funds-as much as the mantra, “Money is our life blood”, or the cloying “Money pays the bills” may stoke the intellect. Human energy is equally beneficial, and the more local that energy, the better.

Shooting stars that aim to intensely at one target may well miss their mark. Sometimes,less is more.

72 and Change

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on November 29, 2022 in American Legion, Assistance, collaborating, Community, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Slow Food, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

November 29, 2022- This morning, I woke seemingly clear-headed and well-rested, and yet a few faux pas came between the time I awoke and the time I alighted in my window seat, on the plane back to Arizona. They were nothing that apologies didn’t rectify, and the rest of the journey back to Home Base was uneventful. My seat mates, on the plane and in the shuttle from Phoenix to Prescott, were very pleasant; quiet but congenial. I enjoyed a Korean barbecued pork sandwich, with chicken noodle soup on the side. Knocking out what was left of last week’s cold was crucial-and yes, I was one of three people in the travel party who wore a mask in close-quarter situations.

It’s time to look at what the ellipse that is the tail end of 2022 and the first eleven months of ’23 might bring. Next week, I work four days and have my skin scan. There will be a heavy schedule, here in town, Friday and Saturday, with Indian Market and a few other events. Acker Night is Dec,9 and Post 6 Christmas Party, on the10th. After that, SoCal is calling, for 3-4 days, Dec. 12-15-following a Slow Food event in south Phoenix, on Dec. 11. Dec. 16-25 will be close to Home Base, with a few days afterward spent somewhere up north, barring any weather weirdness or Red Cross emergency.

That brings up January-September, 2023-and so far, I have no clear guidance from Spirit Guides as to what, if any, travel will take place during that time. Sept. 30-Oct. 1 is the likely time for Baha’i Unit Convention. After that, October-early November looks like Pacific Northwest, Alaska and some of the Asian Pacific Rim. THAT guidance is very clear. We know from last year that these signals can change with outside circumstances and shifting energy frequencies.

So- stay tuned!

Seventy-One: The Wrap

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on November 27, 2022 in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Family, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Striving, Travel

November 27, 2022, Grapevine- The dignified, courteous waiter brought the courses in order: Fresh bread; stuffed mushrooms, sitting atop a bed of cream sauce; garden salads; pasta dishes (Chicken Jerusalem; Rigatoni and, for me, Lasagna). The last was not the common, 3-5 layers stuffed with ricotta, spinach and ground beef/succhini. This was a delicate, two-layered lasagne, an elongated, open ravioli-type pasta with a sublime filling of ground beef and mozarella, covered, but not swimming, in sumptuous marinara. Another variation of one of my favourite Italian dishes-and heaven on a fork. Spumoni and Italian coffee topped off this day-early birthday meal, taken at Grapevine’s Cafe Italia, truly a hidden gem.

Tomorrow, when I actually turn 72, is a back-to-work day for Yunhee and. in the evening, a service time for me, so a Sunday celebration it was. For now, though, having followed the epicurean meal with a walk along Mill Creek, which is flowing at quite a robust level today, it is time to reflect on the past twelve months.

This was a year of catching cold, but not COVID. It was a year of planes, trains, ferries, two SUVs and a pair of Greyhound buses. Key West was followed,three months later, by L’Anse aux Meadows. A pair of drunkards, six months apart, tried to devalue me as a human being, and failed, in both cases. A couple of young ladies, two weeks apart, pointed out a blind spot in my own character-and provided a goal for the coming year: Use words, as well as expressions and gestures.

It was a year of Andersonville and the Tuskegee Airmen; Seminoles and Micmaqs; Astronauts and Vikings; down-home cooking in Whycocomagh, Crossville, Mishawaka & Oley; upscale fare at Cooks & Soldiers-and at Farm Provisions. (All of it prepared with love, so to my palate, there is no difference in satisfaction.) It was a year of Sonesta Midtown and Casa Remuda; of House of Trestles, Bikini Hostel, Gram’s Place, Quisby House; of Auberge St.Lo, Blueberry Patch Cabins, Three Bears Inn, Fair Isle Motel and Abbie’s Garden. Within the last twelve months, there appeared before me the Parthenon of Nashville, Natchez Trace, Cape Breton Highlands, Gros Morne, Big Cypress, Lake Ontario, the Overseas Highway, Marland Mansion, Craters of the Moon-and the Amitabha Stupa.

Friends came and went, but most stayed. I will miss Dharma Farm and Synergy Cafe, at least for a while-but Hiking Buddy, the Pieper family, the Prescott Cluster Baha’is, and my extended family from California to Florida, on up to Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, pinging back to Idaho and Nevada-and all points in between, are a core of my being.

Of those who left this year, Kevin Locke, Jim Seals and Thich Nhat Hanh enkindled the spirit; watching Yvette Mimieux, when I was only nine, affirmed that my heart would always be drawn to girls and women, first and foremost; Nichelle Nichols and Sacheen Littlefeather showed that any typecasting of a talented human being is a fool’s errand; Mikhail Gorbachev showed that a person can redeem himself, by embracing a wider view.

There were those whose departure shrank the window on my childhood and adolescence: Harry and Gisele Surabian, Carmine Moschella, Philomena Mattei, George McCarrier. Jr., Chuck Shipulski, Danny Rossetti, Bill Warren, Ron Napolitano, Uncle Tim Lynch and Aunt Helen Connolly. Of more recent vintage, Gene Gertler, Gregory Gooch, Mona Gilstrap and my last living father figure, Jarrod Fellman each left their mark on my psyche.

There were also the hallmarks of continuity: Two friends were married on Memorial Day and a tough little boy made it into this world on November 9. I took on more crucial roles at Baha’i Unit Convention and with the Red Cross. With those, I am reminded that life surges on, and in the end, it merely changes form.

A Non-Starter

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on November 22, 2022 in Assistance, children, collaborating, Education, impediments, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

November 21, 2022- Both of us are respectful of electricity and its power, being careful to avoid mishandling the pair of battery jumper cables. Friend was glad to hand off the task of attaching the cables cables to me. I did so, easily enough, but when I started Sportage and tried the same with the problem vehicle- crickets. As a “door is ajar” warning sound continued to ding, even when all doors were closed, I suspect a short in the wiring. I gave friend a ride to a place of lodging, and he will resume dealing with the matter tomorrow morning, hopefully with help from his insurance carrier.

This was nearly the last task to occupy me today, before my flight to Dallas, early Tuesday. The day mostly consisted of accompanying a 10-year-old student from one class to another. She is soft-spoken around adults, but is very much independent and seemingly in charge of her disability, rather than the other way around. The day went well, and her teacher asked me to consider taking on the task full-time. While it might be better for a younger, female paraprofessional to do the job day-to-day, I am not ruling it out for the second semester.

The last task was to conduct a Baha’i study of social action formulae. We came close to finishing the unit, but my purpose is to generate meaningful discourse, which indeed came out of our study of three sections. leaving two to examine, next Monday evening. This will mean my birthday dinner will be an early event, which I prefer anyway.

After a bit of packing for tomorrow, it was early to bed- with joy at a productive day.

A Whirlwind Is Still A Force of Nature

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on November 17, 2022 in Assistance, children, collaborating, Education, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

November 16, 2022- There are two competing children in the class where I am working today, tomorrow and Monday. They don’t particularly like one another, the one being fun-loving, feisty and given to salty language and the other grasping, yet surly at the same time, and given to thought-salads, asking for one activity, then going on to another, and another, within a span of two minutes. Both are capable of mayhem, yet the first child will explode, execute the mischief and calm down within a 2-3 minute timeout. The other, in my opinion dangerously over-age for the classroom, does not struggle much, fortunately, but stores his insolence, taking it out on the teachers and classmates-at random moments.

We have a protocol that has one staff member sitting close to the second student and gently bringing him back to his seat when he gets up to see what mischief he can cause. The first child basically just wants to dance, fairly gracefully, and do the assignments given-but in her own way, Both could be nurtured in good work habits, if a 1:1 could be arranged for them. A whirlwind, as destructive as it tends to be, is still a force of nature, energy that could conceivably be turned into a beneficial power source-though admittedly, the technology that would make that feasible is a long way off. We are closer to harnessing the strengths of even the most unruly student, but we need to overcome a paralysis of will in education, especially in public education. It will take a massive amount of energy, from parents, educators and community-at-large, especially the business community, to replace the drive towards homogeneity with a culture that once again values innovation and individual initiative.

I will have more to say, after tomorrow’s events. Yet, a whirlwind is still a force of nature.

Back to Basics

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on November 16, 2022 in Assistance, collaborating, Community, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

November 15, 2022- I set out from Tomahawk Motel, around 11 a.m., with no sense of how a visit with long-ago friends would go. They were happy to have me stop by, though, and after a simple but satisfying breakfast at Pippo’s, a small cafe on Cortez’s Main Street, I was up for whatever the day brought.

I got a text message to”Just come in the front door”, but spotting the couple in the back yard, I went around to greet them and we gathered for a while in the living room. Conversation ran the gamut from “Do you remember ___________ and ___________, to what the husband viewed as the breakdown of our country’s social order. I did not find any of it unpleasant, certainly, as we need to consider all points of view, in dealing with what IS going wrong. We prayed together, shared our experiences in the military (both of us are Vietnam -Era Army veterans), and I was offered a light, delicious lunch, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Heading steadily south and west, after bidding my friends farewell, and having no incidents similar to the back-up of yesterday, I drove clear to the small Dineh settlement of Cameron. It has a lovely old trading post, which has expanded into a fine-dining restaurant, hotel and gift shop. I felt the need for Green Chili Stew, which came with fry bread and honey-itself a perfect dessert. The Green Chili Stew helped brace my system for the unusually cold weather permeating the Mountain West. I got stuffed potato skins, as well, eating half as an appetizer and keeping half for tomorrow’s lunch-as a two-day work assignment awaits.

The best things in life are often simple-and predictable.

An Off-road Caravan

Posted by Sagittarian Seeker on November 15, 2022 in Assistance, collaborating, Education, Hiking and Nature, impediments, Inner Struggles, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

November 14, 2022, Cortez, CO- As I approached the small community of Tonalea, AZ, en route to Monument Valley, a man in an orange vest held up a sign that said “Emergency ahead”. I came to a line of stopped traffic, and waited patiently for about twenty minutes, as it slowly inched forward, every so often.

Then, I noticed more and more people were taking an alternative, rough dirt route, which I figured would take us past the stalled traffic. So, once close enough to the entry to that of-road track, I joined the somewhat more steadily-moving queue. This brought back memories of visiting various traditional Dineh families, by taking similar tracks, up mesas or through sage-laden deserts.

Every so often,as the caravan inched along, a Navajo policeman or local volunteer would reassure us that we were on the right path. At one point, we encountered people coming the other way. Some of the caravaners opted to go up a somewhat steep bank of soft sand. That did not work for Sportage, so the oncoming vehicles backed up, until the five vehicles behind me, and I, had passed through.

When we got to a gravel church access road, 5 miles along and an hour later, the emergency had cleared and we were all back on the highway. Sportage was no worse for the wear, and I got to Monument Valley around 3:15, which allowed for a short, but satisfying stop near The Mittens, and other nearby formations. It was still a bit nippy, so a short visit was all that I was up for, anyway.

Here are some scenes from that stop.

The upshot is that I will surely return at some point in the relatively near future, to hike Navajo Trail, which goes near various of the formations.

Duty called, though, and as the saying goes “Responsibility never takes a vacation.” I delivered a box of Baha’i materials to a Dineh friend, in Aneth, about an hour east of Monument Valley, then stopped for the night at Tomahawk Inn, in this Four Corners hub, so as to have the WiFi needed to host a Zoom meeting. Life, even with challenges such as the off-road experience is very sweet.