Sláinte . . . Here's to a clear-headed year . . .
Well, here we are: it’s a Moon Day and 2024's first day . . .
. . . suddenly you know: It’s time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings. – Meister Eckhart
Four years ago yesterday, The World Health Organization first learned of “viral pneumonia” cases in Wuhan, China; the disease was later determined to be COVID-19, which became a global pandemic the following year.
We’ve got to be as clear-headed about human beings as possible, because we are still each other’s only hope. – James Baldwin, in an interview with Margaret Mead,
Nothing can make our life, or the lives of other people, more beautiful than perpetual kindness. – Leo Tolstoy,
Speaking of novelists: Today is J. D. Salinger's 104th birth anniversary. The author of The Catcher in the Rye was born on this date in 1919 New York City
Debra Ponemon posted a note of positivism for our resolutions list.
It is not happiness that makes us grateful. It’s gratefulness that makes us happy – David Stendl-Rast
“Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. . .if they're running and they don't look where they're going [they could fall off a cliff]. I mean, I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be.” (Holden Caulfield) — J. D. Salinger
Knee-deep in The Way
New Year's Eve comes on Sol's day … and the Watercourse continues to deposit in the mailbox:
The last retrograde of the year continues to Jan. 1, 2024. To help with some of the shifting going on under the Mercurial umbrella: Computers make it easier to do a lot of things, but most of the things they make it easier to do don’t need to be done. – Andy Rooney.
Today in 1857, Ottawa, Ontario was named the capital of Canada by Queen Victoria.
Birthdays today:
Actors Anthony Hopkins, and Ben Kingsley were born on this date. Hopkins, born in 1937, Port Talbot, Glamorgan, Wales, turns 86; Kingsley, born in 1943 Snainton, North Riding of Yorkshire, England, turns 80 today.
And, often regarded as the most important French painter of the 20th century, Henri Matisse was born on this date in 1869 Le Cateau, Picardy, France.
With the middle East on the edge of confligration, Mirabai Starr offered a Sabbath blessing for our “not knowing.”
Fearlessness is what love seeks. Love as craving is determined by its goal, and this goal is freedom from fear… Such fearlessness exists only in the complete calm that can no longer be shaken by events expected of the future… Hence the only valid tense is the present. – Hanna Arendt, Love and Saint Augustine, (transl. and ed.) University of Chicago Press; 1st edition (April 26, 1998)
Understanding is love’s other name. If you don’t understand, you can’t love. – Thích Nhất Hạnh, How to Love, Parallax Press; Reprint edition (December 1, 2014)
So what does Thay (Hanh's affectionate nickname) mean when he says “understand” ? First, it is a word, and as a word it is a metaphor. It stands for something other than its symbolic nature. To “understand” is both physical and psychological in nature. Contrary to standard use, to stand under is to step back from what one presupposes. Love is unconditional. One cannot love if one already has a notion of what that love is. Only by stepping back from that a prior definition can you allow love to teach you what it really is.
In the coming year, may each of us “step back” to experience “the beginner’s mind” at least once .
The night belongs to lovers . . .
It's a Satyr's day . . .
Today is the birth date of short-story writer, poet, and novelist (Joseph) Rudyard Kipling, born in 1865 Bombay, India,
Novelist Douglas Coupland turns 62 today. He was born on a Canadian military base in 1961 Baden-Solingen, Germany.
Bo Diddley was born on this date in 1928 McComb, Mississippi.
And, Patti Smith turns 77 today. The poet, rock songwriter, and singer was born in 1946, Chicago, Illinois. See “The night” below.
Also, Tom Smothers has found a new gig, now in memory
“This grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on seas and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls.” – John Muir
My ambition is to be a friendly lunatic uncle. . .avoid retirement at all costs. It’s a shipload of purposelessness. . .It’s better to be a fool in the world than to have no occupation at all. — Garrison Keillor
Contentment is a synonym for loneliness, cool loneliness, settling down with cool loneliness. - Pema Chodron