An Experiment in Carrots

"The day is coming when a single carrot, freshly observed, will set off a revolution."
--Paul Cezanne

A wave of inspiration hit me today. An abstract wave, not a concrete aqueous one. I decided to start a revolution. Why? Umm..it’s a nice day out so,…I gathered many spices and herbs. Baptised them in olive oil. Mixed the solution with chopped carrots and baked them at 400 degrees. Twenty minutes later I burnt approximately 757 epithelial cells (commonly called taste buds…and in Mennonite Ville Central Virginia…taste friends) while tasting them.

On a scale of 1-5, with 1 being absolutely horrid and 5 being manna-from-heaven-delicious, I would give them the tangent of 74…in other words a B+.

Pre-herbed carrots.

Random Carrot Fact #1 The Spanish word for carrot is zanahoria, which also means nerd.

All the players

Mixed herbs and spices. I find it is best to use a tin can that was once used to store green tea. And if it has a picture of Jack Casady impersonating Buddha...so much better. (Atmosphere you know)

The final product. Note: I prefer to cook using cast iron skillets. The theory being when you cook, iron molecules are transferred from the skillet to the food, thus increasing the healthiness factor.

Random Carrot Fact #2 If cows eat too many carrots their milk tastes bitter.

I am spending my days reading philosophy/physics/theology books and pondering my role in the cosmos.

Am I really here?

Am I really just a compact mass of photons interacting with the fabric of space?

Lately I've decided that we're all 4-D actors running around on the stage called Earth while under the direct supervision of higher sentient beings. The ancients called them names like Zeus, Athena, Apollo, Gabriel, Michael, and Melchizedek. We don't believe in these fellows anymore because they're not empirically verifiable creatures and don't fit into our worldview. I like to think we are their pet creatures and like all pet owners know, you never interfere with a cat's life.

Last night I had a dream I lived in a trailer, with a pick-up truck, and a dog. In the back yard, beside the chickens, sat one of those stone giants from Easter Island...guarding the premises...intimidating the neighbors...basically just doing the 'speak softly and carry a big secret' thing. I don't know exactly what caused this dream, but I recall towards the end of it, there was a small earthquake and the Rapa Nui head fell onto the trailer. It was a total loss and I was forced to become an alpaca farmer in Idaho.

I have been to Idaho once. I don’t recall much about it as it was a dark and stormy night. Boise would be alright, but wintertime I'd have to migrate to southern CA and prune grapes or drive a bread truck or something.

Do you believe in fairy tales? You should. They are more true than you think. I see myself living in a house rather like this some day. There is something 'Wind in the Willows' about it.

Art is important

"If we are to change our world view, images have to change. The artist now has a very important job to do. He's not a little peripheral figure entertaining rich people, he's really needed."

--Vaclav Havel, former President of Czechoslovakia and writer

Fan Talking

On hot days like today, what better to do than talk into the fan to hear your voice change?

Come on, we all did it when we were young...

Anxiety is a sign of spiritual immaturity. While I've not been feeling anxious, I have been feeling restless lately in my spirit. It is hard to say exactly why, but I feel like I need to make a significant change in Life...and fairly soon. I have spent the past few years (decade really) living a somewhat reclusive Robinson Crusoe type life. And although it is quite peaceful, I feel that I need to be around other people on a more consistent basis. I think (this is a little hard to admit) I am a bit too opinionated and interacting more with others will help. Perhaps living in a slightly different culture??? Hmmm...I wonder how my brain would react to hanging around some hippy California people...or living with a band of gypsies in Romania...or...hmm...becoming a gold prospector in Bolivia.

I must think about this.

A Day on the C and O Canal towpath

Yesterday. Westernport, Maryland. 18-mile-hike. Much walking. Much tiredness. Good weather.



One of the many small arches associated with the canal. This arch reminded me of the ruins of a medieval castle in Scotland and it got me thinking...All homes should have a rocky wall to give the place a sense of history.



Map of the Four Locks. By the Potomac River stands the remains of four lockhouses used to keep prisoners. For a few dollars one can stay overnight in one.




The sign reads, 'Danger-Dam Upstream' I could not help but think, 'As to the blessed upstream? Hmm...something strange is afoot on the Potomac...'




Reason #108 why people don't go on extended hikes with me.



The trail was literally covered with these blue flowers which looked like minature trumpets.



Close-up view of one of the blue trumpet flowers.







The road less traveled...except for week-ends and summer holidays.





Funky fungi on a Sycamore tree.





Waterfall over a dam. It looks like a minature Niagara.

"Do you find it easy to get drunk on words?"

"So easy that, to tell you the truth, I am seldom perfectly sober."


— from a conversation between Harriet Vane and Lord Peter Wimsey in Dorothy Sayers’ Gaudy Night

"Monarchy can easily be debunked; but watch the faces, mark well the accents of the debunkers. These are men whose tap-root in Eden has been cut; whom no rumor of the polyphony, the dance can reach—men to whom pebbles laid in a row are more beautiful than an arch. Yet even if they desire mere equality they cannot reach it. Where men are forbidden to honor a king they honor millionaires, athletes, or film-stars instead; even famous prostitutes or gangsters. For spiritual nature, like bodily nature, will be served; deny it food and it will gobble poison."

— C.S. Lewis, from his essay “Equality” in Present Concerns

God requires of us what He has created us unable to effect without Him.
--George McDonald

God's ways are not our ways. We say we want to do right, when what we really mean is we want people to think we are right and feel good about ourselves.

People want to be in their right minds, but when they are at their most lucid, they sense the deep hollow cavern within the deepest part of their being and rush to fill it before sadness and regret wash in.

Men are not made to be evil. To be evil is un-human. Suffering and regret are what causes us to acknowledge something is seriously wrong with us. They are the functional equivalents of a computer virus. The laptop can run, but is never truly 100% reliable and liable to break down at any time. It needs a computer programmer to take the hard drive out and debug the system. The laptop is unable to de-bug itself. The best it can do is acknowledge a software glitch after running a systems check.

Creations and inventions of creators and artists cannot mend themselves. Paintings are created for art lovers, not for other paintings. To have a painting compare itself to another painting is meaningless. Art lovers give paintings their meaning and purpose, not vice versa.

Rare inventions have a specific purpose. The more quirky a gadget, the greater specificity it's job. Some jobs require a mind that is curious about everything. The same minds usually have a unique perspective into reality and show great influence over many people. Do-gooders and well-wishers often tell the quirky mind to settle down and join the crowd, but curiosity will prevent the quirky mind to restlessness with the status quo. They must travel, and explore, look for kindred souls to dance as partners in the Dance of Life, and of course they must capture the moments with pen and brush.

Why DO writers write and Dreamers dream? They have to. They must. Writers write to live. Something compels them. Some unknown force fans the the flame of their spirit and they must pick up the Z-grip medium black pen and scribble furiously.

It's breathing. It's food and exercise for their spirit man. For this were they made. What are words but useful tools to describe experiences that cannot truly be depicted. The spirit of a man knows more than the body and soul knows. The intuition, providing the spirit is in sync with the Holy Spirit, will always be correct. It is the mind that confuses things--especially if the man is overly rational. This is why overly educated people take forever to make a decision.

Women are more intuitive than men, are more in touch with their spirit, and more often than not know when a good decision should be made. I think men know this and are secretly happy to receive a women's advice even if they do not say in so many words. A Christian woman is infinitely valuable for her spirit is congruent with the Holy Spirit. And being much more intuitive and sensitive to the Holy Spirit can urge and nudge her husband (if she is married) into situations and places he should be going. When a man discovers such a woman, it would behoove him to acknowledge he's discovered a pearl of great price and (if he has any sense) try to win her heart. The tricky part is--the man knows the woman has infinite value and will rack his brain trying to come up with ideas to woo her...and probably become over-bearing and say non-sensical things. Hopefully, the woman will see through his short-comings and use wisdom to deal with him.

2012

This summer go on an urban picnic.











You'll need one of these from these people.

They also have an extraordinarily neat blog.

Thoughts in Solitude

No man appreciates hospitality more than the shipwrecked traveler stranded on a deserted island.

Art requires movement

Art requires movement.

Muses are carnivorous beasts who only strike at moving targets. They're like sharks, and to borrow a Woody Allen quote, (who compares sharks to relationships), they must keep moving forward lest they die.

One's calling in Life is like this too. People must do what they love because of their love for doing it. Doing something for money is to worship Mammon and will lead to an early grave. Besides, it is a rare person who can do something with excellence when money is the only goal.

In other news: the synthetic thyroid hormone I've been taking for the past ten days has given me more energy, a slight improvement in my appetite, and my skin is a bit smoother as well. Yesterday I went on a 6 hour hike on the Appalachian Trail and felt good. Normally I would feel completely exhausted and sleep 12 hours straight like someone in a coma. So, things are definitely looking up.



This is a map of yesterday's hike. I parked at the Humpback Rocks Visitor Center, which has it's own pet raven lurking around the parking area eating tidbits from visitors, and proceeded south for 6 miles.



There is also a farm from the 1890s by the visitor's center. This is one of the restored houses.

Inspiration and how not to be a dragon

The first step to receiving inspiration from something is to simply watch it.

Observe it closely as if you were a child again. Children have no pre-conceived notions about the laws of the universe and are pleasantly surprised by everything that happens.

Every experience is a novelty and a date with adventure. As we grow older, we become set in our ways. We get callouses on our eyes and ears and filter reality through dirty glasses. We grow scales that in time harden.

More scales. More time. More hardening of the heart and soul.

We turn into dragons. We forget our true nature as soft fleshy creatures with a passion for things unknown. We lose our curiosity for mystery and adventure and retreat to our caves. We horde over beds of gold we call treasure.

The Creator of Life wants us to shed our dragon skin and become real humans. If you ask Him, He will be more than happy to remove it for you. But be prepared. Removing dragon skin can be quite the lengthy process and be a bit uncomfortable. But after the scales are removed, you will be free to travel and discover again.



Picture is from the Xinwei Ancient Life Fossils Museum in Anshun, Guizhou, China.

Connections

Sometimes I think God made the stars to be used as points of direction. Connecting the dots will lead directly to Him. And then...

A Letter to a Friend

All things were once thinks, but not all thinks become things.

To think and not do...to merely daydream...is like promising your girl a vacation window-shopping along the streets of Paris but never buying the plane ticket.

A maker of things from his own thinks is called an artist and a writer.

To think and construct is to reveal the hidden things of reality that the Creator has secretly revealed to your spirit. This is the purpose of the artisan and lover of words.

Not everyone has this gift. It is rare, and like gemstones hidden in the bowels of the earth, quite valuable.

They see pictures in their minds and transfer the abstract reality to the concrete world of atoms and molecules and in doing so, reveal a tiny part of the complex personality of God. The world, even in their fallen nature, recognize their broken-ness, perhaps are not able to articulate exactly why they are broken...they just sense something is terribly wrong within them and things can and should be much better, and are attracted to the works of the artist/writer and hence to the Creator.

You are more important than you think you are.

Workin' Man

As you can tell by the picture I'm hard at work now.

Actually I'm finished and munching on tacos and watching the thunderstorms roll in whilst Zeus throws lightning bolts around to liven things up a bit.

Fortunes in sugar and flour

'Don't pass up a once-in-a-lifetime offer'

This was in the little fortune cookie I received this afternoon.

I'm in Berkeley Springs, WV for a couple of days this week for work. Tiny town. One main street and some side streets. It's sandwiched in between two state parks and some Civil War battlefields. Its peaceful here. Quaint. Rustic. Homely. And there is a small castle nearby to boot.



Castles are the perfect homes. As long as they're properly furnished with rugs, tapestries, libraries, statues, paintings...

I'd like to be married in one--someday.

picture from wallpapervortex.com

Christians are a different species of man. And this may sound spooky, but they glow. They radiate light from their spirit. It's true. You'll have to ask somebody who studies theology more than me to explain why, but here's what I think happens. When a person gives up (and this can be nearly impossible without help) their life to God--completely--their spirit somehow gets re-ignited--hence the glowing. After a time, the spirit of a man gets restless and turns naturally towards the purpose he was created. He cannot help but do otherwise. He will also be drawn towards others whose calling is similar to their own and desire to walk in parallel with them along Life's journey.

The Artist: Evelyn Underhill says in her book 'Mysticism'...stick with me here...the purpose of the mystic is to 'actualise within the world of time and space, perhaps by great endeavours in the field of heroic action or by small ones in the field and market, that more real life, that holy creative energy which the world manifests but indifferently.'

I like this. She also goes on to say...and I'm paraphrasing from the last chapter of the book...and have made it a sort of motto for life.

-work for mercy, order, beauty, and significance
-mend where you find things broken
-make where you find the need
-bring the Real Presence from it's hiddenness and exhibit it before the eyes of men

'For the teeming life of nature has yielded up to your loving attention many sacramental images of Reality, it is far more significant than what you supposed. So proclaim by your existence the grandeur, the beauty, the intensity, the living wonder of that Eternal Reality within which, at this moment, you stand.'

When I read this yesterday, I hurriedly scribbled down the words (since I felt like she was speaking to me) and consider it good and useful advice. It's one thing to wander about all creation like a hermit, seeing things others don't. But some time sooner or later you've got to use your talents lest they dry up and turn brittle.

Life Lessons

Some lessons in Life are hard to deal with. One of the lessons I've learned is that if you gaze at a beautiful woman long enough, she turns to stone.

Another thing I've learned is tyrants do not respond to words alone. Force must be used.

A third thing I have discovered is this: one must practice one's talent, and practice, and practice. For the day may come when somebody will need help that only you can provide. And if you are rusty and dry the other person may go to sleep before their time.