Dreaming about the lovely Absaroska Mountains in Paradise Valley, Montana near Chico Hot Springs Resort and Day Spa. Up near Yellowstone and Livingston. They don’t call it Big Sky for nothing. Saddle up and move ’em out.
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Today, I smell peonies growing in my front yard, the scent filling my office. The Earth has already opened its arms to the solstice and I am following suit.
Many across the country have already experienced summer’s heat … and fire or floods … but she’s only recently revealed herself to us here in the Pacific Northwest, shyly exhaling soft, warm air over all the living things. Big sigh. Not to say that things haven’t been growing around here; it’s a moist Lord-of-the-Rings sort of landscape lush with pine and green. A shade garden, I think they call it.
What I know is, it’s warmer outside than it is in here, so that’s where I’m heading. To celebrate the sun.
And … to find scented geraniums at the garden shop. I’ve got the truck today!
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Right now in Toronto, Moses Znaimer’s ideacity11 conference is in full swing. Also known as “Canada’s Premier Meeting of the Minds,” ideacity reminds me of a three-day TED talk for “the 600 privileged to attend.” Those unable to be there can watch featured talks and more from the website.
I’m thinking of the very first time I heard of Moses Znaimer. He spoke at a Promax confab. The co-founder of Citytv so rocked everyone’s world with what he had to say, that he honored the group with an encore performance –this is the one I witnessed. Not that I wouldn’t have gone to his original gig; I remember being drawn to his photo in the program (to the left). I just wasn’t allowed to go at the time. Which is fodder for another post.
Nevertheless, Moses did not disappoint. Back then, he was leading a “Television Revolution,” presenting his ideas about media production, punctuated with innovative Citytv video expressing his theories in action:
Television is the triumph of the image over the printed word.
Print created illiteracy. TV is democratic. Everybody gets it.
The true nature of television is flow, not show; process, not conclusion.
As worldwide television expands the demand for local programming increases.
The best TV tells me what happened to me, today.
TV is as much about the people bringing you the story as the story itself.
In the past, TV’s chief operating skill was political. In the future it will be -it will have to be- mastery of the craft itself.
TV creates immediate consensus, subject to immediate change.
There never was a mass audience, except by compulsion.
Television is not a problem to be managed, but an instrument to be played.
It was exhilarating at the time. Much still tingles today, doesn’t it?
For those of the thinking persuasion, it’s not only a desire, but a passionate need to meet with others of their tribe and -well- think together every once in a while. Author and teacher Robert Grudin calls it, The Grace of Great Things. At least for me, it is.
Moses may like the sound of that, too.
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This is not to say that I’m actually working, wearing flannel pajamas (think the flannel suit on Wall Street, for those uninitiated in the foibles of freelance work). Unless it’s four o’clock in the morning, I arrive in my office dressed appropriately and smile every time I answer an email. Even if it is just down the hall.
Yet I’m still sleeping in flannels, under several comforters, too. Long winter’s nap, as they say, the preamble to summer solstice notwithstanding.
Only the occasional morning greets me with sunshine right now, frequently mellowing throughout the day to the gray of clouds –angry rain clouds at that.
And it’s chilly. My office stays a brisk 62 to 65 degrees.
Good sleeping weather, though.
It’s just that … with the sun rising here a little after 5 AM, setting after 9 PM, it’s such a pity to squander the light behind a veil of dull.
This of course, is just my opinion.
I’m very ready to enjoy a cup of coffee sitting outside on the deck … in a caftan, perhaps (come to think of it, I even own a flannel caftan).
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Photo credit: erix! Erich Ferdinand
Father Reason
The universe is a form of divine law,
your reasonable father.
When you feel ungrateful to him,
The shapes of the world seem mean and ugly.
Make peace with that father, the elegant patterning,
and every experience will fill with immediacy.
Because I love this, I am never bored.
Beauty constantly wells up like the noise of springwater
in my ear. Tree limbs rise and fall like ecstatic arms.
Leaf sounds talk together like poets
making fresh metaphors.
The green felt cover slips;
we get a flash of the mirror underneath.
The conventional opinion of this poetry
is that it shows great optimism for the future.
But Father Reason says, No need to announce the future.
This now is it. Your deepest need and desire
is satisfied by this moment's energy
here in your hand.
~Rumi
I find great comfort in these words. I hope you do, too.
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Who are you? What do you want? Do you believe in the wisdom of uncertainty? Why would kitties sit in any sliver of sun when it shines? Does love come into the heart with a song? Can you wrap your legs around your head? Do you want someone to listen to you? How many times do you sneeze in the morning? Is that coffee in your cup? Which do you prefer – the left coast or the right? Is that a live oak or a red oak? Are you a gold or silver kind of person? Can you watusi? Do you want to be heard? What is the color of heat? Do you think if you live the questions, life will move you to the answers? Are you fascinated by the shape of trees? Do you like reading my posts? Why not sign up for an email subscription – you receive a little somthin’-somthin’ to ponder every Tuesday and Thursday? What is my purpose?
Americans have our top 10’s, our winners, our honeydo’s, our grocery lists. I’m an organized person and pretty old school about my lists – I like to write them out and check them off (if applicable).
Can you tell a lot about a person from their lists? Hmmm. Take, for instance, my own fickle list of favorites, (partial, among other things):
Favorite guilty pleasure: ABC’s Castle
Favorite current TV image campaign: USA’s Characters Welcome
Favorite recent television commercial: iPad, VO: Peter Coyote
Favorite newscast: ABC World News
All-time favorite newscast: CBS News Sunday Morning
Favorite TVchef du jour: Roger Mooking, Everyday Exotic
Favorite new spice mix: vadouvan
Favorite drink: all things wine
Favorite mind game: meditation
Favorite exercise: yoga
Favorite fashion inspiration: Anthropologie windows, catalogs … and shoes
Favorite book at the moment: Stieg Larsson’s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Favorite music discovery: Tina Malia, The Silent Awakening
Favorite sanctuary: San Diego
Favorite thought-provoker: spirituality & religion
Favorite garden flower: geraniums, especially scented geraniums
Favorite night sky: full moon in the desert
Favorite Steeler: Hines Ward
Favorite Charger: Antonio Gates
Favorite Cowboy: blue-eyed Miles Austin
Favorite Saint: Drew Brees
Favorite Falcon: Michel Turner
Favorite Giant after Michael Strahan: Osi Umenyiora
All-time favorite coach: Bill Parcells
Favorite owner I love to hate: Jerry Jones
Favorite NFL TV show: FOX NFL Sunday
Favorite football commentator of 2010: Jon Gruden
Favorite other sport to watch: Tennis, especially the US Open
Favorite moment of the day: the moment of gratitude
Now … you tell me.
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I learned recently that the Greek root of the word, enthusiasm literally means “inside God,” interpreted as being inspired or possessed by divinity.
What is your last enthusiastic response? Does it bring you joy?
My most enthusiastic response is re-dedication to my yoga practice. I come away from class in a state of grace, joyful, in the present moment. And it flows into everything else that I set my mind to. Enthusiastically. Like the vinyasa I practice … inhale, move through deadlines … exhale …set my mind at ease.
The release is my play.
The effervescence is the laughter of my soul.
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Raincloud
De rigor, Deceptive
Threatening, Releasing, Nourishing
Water, Shadow, Meadow, Light
Hiding, Streaming, Revealing
Remarkable, Restorative
Sunbreak
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