Cultural shocks; interpersonal sweetness. Which is more real?

February 17, 2025

Another winter storm two nights ago, with this time, about five inches, which turned icy yesterday. Tried to walk puppy Scampi at around 8 AM, but he balked, decided 10° was too cold, and salt on roads kept getting into his paws.

So I took him home and started out by myself, to Aldi’s, going out of my way to get a good walk in before I got there. Part of the journey was the usual thrill, for me, feeling my 82-year-old body respond so wonderfully to the rhythms of  life-long daily fast walks. At least on those surfaces that were not icy. When possible, I chose to walk on quiet, cleared roads, rather than on sidewalks, many of which remain unshoveled. Which made me wonder, are the houses that don’t shovel their walks rentals?

On the homestretch to Aldi’s, I found myself on a block-long unshoveled sidewalk only two feet wide and bordering very busy 3RD Street (St Rte 46). On the other side of a chain link fence that cut off half the sidewalk loomed the tall walls of a ghastly dark building under construction  — another car wash! I read somewhere that they are all the rage right now with investors. Lots of profit, very little maintenance, and no need for workers. Who can beat that? Gross.

So there I was, slowly and carefully stomping my way over the narrow icy portion of the unshoveled walk that the chain link fence did provide, cars, pickups and giant 18-wheelers whizzing by, within inches. Had I fallen, and part of me land outside the narrow space I was trying to walk on, it would have been all over.

Which brought to mind, once again, how I am protected. Over and over again, all my life; no matter how foolish my choices — and today, yes, it would have been wise to go the other way, make a long detour to Aldi’s rather than take my chances on that one scary block — yes; it’s as if I walk inside a soft, loving cushion.

Meanwhile, one motorist, who had not bothered to clear the right side of either her front window, or her side front window, nearly ran me over as she was turning right at a crossroads with me there and about to cross the street in front of her. Luckily, I noticed the condition of her windows, and knew she would not stop.

I notice, these days, that just about just about everybody seems, not just distracted, but at least mildly frantic.

Yet, in the midst of constant culture shocks that we are all undergoing, as federal fraud, waste and corruption get exposed in the glaring light of DOGE, drying up all sorts of grants to DEI nonsense, to states and localities, academia, hospitals, etc., putting thousands upon thousands out of work and desperate, I notice that a bunch of Bloomingtonians are getting together next Sunday to go over new bills before the Indiana state legislature. 3-5 PM at the Unitarian Universalist church. I’ll be there.

I notice that the event is being put on by prominent Democrats. Of course. Bloomington is an academic town, dominated by Democrats.

I used to be a Democrat.

In the wake of the last four puzzling years, who still calls him or herself a Democrat?

What will I call myself at this meeting. Will I come out? Or will I maintain my usual secret judgmental silence. It will be an interesting experience.

Not that I’m now a Republican. But I do very much appreciate the DJT blitzkrieg.

Back to this morning: at Aldi’s, as I was walking up and down the aisles, I couldn’t help but notice that the shelves were  full as usual; that, obviously, supply chains haven’t (yet?) been affected by Trump’s blitzkrieg. Blew me away, actually, how resilient the overall system is. Or, well, kinda. For example, have you noticed that searches for criminal attorneys are way way up in the DC area? And this, just today:

 

At Aldi’s, when done shopping, I remembered that I only had cash with me, so could not check myself out. Oops! Casting about (only three workers are on shift at any point during an Aldi day), I found an Aldi worker unpacking boxes, who said she’d stop to check me out. As I was pushing my cart to her check out station with my few, carefully chosen, non-seed oil, unprocessed items, an old bearded man, with his cart full to the brim of processed stuff, suddenly appeared, going in the same direction, ahead of me. I went “Oops!” interrupting my flow; he noticed me; graciously indicated for me to go first.

Then, my transaction complete, I turned and thanked him again for allowing me to go ahead. “Just a random act of kindness,” he responded, with a shy grin.

“Thank you again!  I’ll pay it forward.”

Grateful for the kind encounter, I walked out, shouldering newly heavy backpack that would help ground and stabilize me on the ice, and proceeded to continue on my exceedingly dangerous walk home.

 

 

SHOCKED into ABIDING AWARENESS

February 14, 2025

Amazing discovery . . . or is it? Actually, it’s what does happen, and has happened, over and over again in my very long life.

And yes, it’s perfectly natural for this to happen, even though, just before I discover it again, usually, I simply can’t imagine something even worse preoccupying me. Here’s what I mean:

This morning, at 7 AM, I did the usual, got clean clothes and went to take a shower. That’s my routine. Daily. First thing.

Note: I always think, during times of struggle, “thank god I have routines! patterns, to keep me on track!” And as my teacher once intoned, “Routines build character.” So what kind of character did I want? Well, good character, virtuous character. Okay. Then let go of smoking. Oops! That took me until I was 39 years old. No matter how hard I tried to stop, I failed, until that miraculous moment when I “gave the problem to my higher self.”

How I Stopped Smoking

A Metaphysical Approach to Addiction

Just because I finally succeeded in releasing one addiction, however, does not imply that I released the tendency to addiction. No. I’m an addict, through and through. What has changed is the nature off my addictions. Except for my root addiction to “the news” (since I was five years old), I choose good addictions, ones that build character. Good routines! Like walking, yoga, chikung, taichi!

Okay. Well, lately I’ve found myself more and more disturbed by inner issues. Basically, and to put it bluntly, how to get all that I want to done before I die? Is this even remotely possible? If not, why not give up some of my goals? But if I do, which ones? Constant perplexity. Then: Oh, do I really have to? No. I can do it. I can accomplish them all.

On and on, over and over again, I go round and round with myself inside.

Much depends of course, on just when I do die. If I have another ten years (likely, with my genetics and lifestyle), then I CAN get everything done, I assume. Like a fool. Who knows? of course. One never knows. Plus, the whole world could blink out at any moment, says this lifelong apocalyptist.

Okay, so this early morning, after a very fitful night, I was facing a very full day of promised (to others) deadlines, after managing to postpone them all for one week, until my son Sean left, which he did, late yesterday. Full of trepidation, and yet determined, I grabbed my clothes to take a shower, went into the bathroom, threw clothes on floor, sat on the toilet and took a poop.

Then, getting up, I flushed the toilet . . . Or I tried to. It was sluggish, didn’t really go down. I flushed again. Oops! This time the brownish water went up almost to the rim. Oops! Got a bowl from the kitchen and gingerly scooped some of the brackish water into it, put it in the tub to drain. Hmmm . . . is the tub really draining? It seems sluggish too, though not as bad.

Flushed it, or tried to, one more time, and this time the brackish water DID overflow, and worse, there was water leaking from underneath.

Okay. Call the plumber.

Which I did. They can’t get here until around noon. Okay. Write note to still sleeping housemates to use the second bathroom in the next door DeKist house (this Overhill house has only one bathroom).

And forget showering this morning!

 

 

Now here’s what I want to get to:

During this entire time, about 20 minutes altogether, during which I also went outside to find a decent bucket, in case I needed it, and checked the basement to see that yes, it was leaking down there too, I was perfectly calm, relaxed, my focus like a lazer beam. No biggie. We got this.

And that’s what I wanted to get to in this post. How, during emergencies, we really do “rise to the occasion.” It’s simply human nature to do so. Everything that seemed so important and worrisome just moments ago vanishes into right brain’s abiding awareness utilizing left brain logic.

So then the question becomes, do we have the capacity to utilize to shock to ascend, from 3D to 5D, over and over again, as needed, on a daily, hourly, minute by minute basis, with hopefully, brief periods to rest and recover?

For that likely, is what we are facing during this climactic year 2025, especially once Saturn and Neptune both move from dreamy Pisces to fiery Aries. Because from then on, it’s ignition.

One beautiful use of Pisces during these last few months, when even so, and not just thanks to DOGE, it already seems like lightning change is nonstop: VISIONING. Visualize what we would like to see; who we want to be, both in ourselves and with each other, as humans, on our beautiful planet Earth so teeming with life.

For whatever we dream up, if it is strong enough, and if enough of us do it, that IS what we will set in motion.