Confucius said, “Man cannot see their reflection in running water but only in still water. Only that which I still in itself can still the seekers of stillness.”
Confucius did not know about mirrors in his time, and many and before mirrors and still cannot find stillness because they seek the wrong things in the reflection before them. The stillness they need is within them, as is the real reflection of stillness they should seek.
I sit here in one of my rare quiet moments, not in demand, or anxious to be somewhere or need to do something that needs to be done.
I am holding my cup of coffee or rather I am looking at it because I just put it down. I see it is half empty and thinking that the right thing to do when something is only half full, is to refill it.
My life is that way, as I seek that path in my life. One needs to only seek those things that bring us love, joy, laughter, and love to replenish the things that truly fulfill us each day without doing harm to others.
Go in peace I say, but if you have a moment come sit for a spell, and grab a cup and share the things that fill your day.
We all follow a path meant for us to each individually follow, but without instructions or rather the instructions are given only if you bother to listen to the quiet voice that speaks to us.
Many have forgotten how to listen to this voice on the outside because there are so many clamoring around us, trying to tell us only to listen to them.
These instructions are not often clear because they give us choices, because we must choose the direction we may follow because each choice teaches us valuable lessons.
Sometimes these lessons are hard, and like the photo above are not smooth and easy. The danger is in whether we are selecting the easy path or not, because the easy path does not always teach the best lessons.
It is often with challenges we grow mentally and physically, and we carry our physical and internal wounds proudly, even when the journey has been hard.
Choose wisely in your journeys and maybe our paths will intersect but each of us have our own lessons to learn in this life, before our next life. Choose well, listen closely because you do not really want to repeat the same lessons because you have failed to learn what you were here to learn.
What snack would you eat right now?
Snacks! I love snacks because they are fast and easy. Right this monument I would grab a banana, mandarin orange, and a handful of mixed nuts, and think I was doing pretty good, because all are heart healthy and easy to prepare, although peeling the orange is harder, not really hard, but harder than the banana.
Come up with a crazy business idea.
I have given this a great deal thought, and as I have aged I came to realize that it is not your mind, hair or hearing as you age which has been reported in the media. The first thing you lose, as a male, is your rear end. There is a point where you become a part of the saggy bottom boys group, and you begin to not only need a belt to hold your pants, but a suspenders to hold up the rear of your pants. Being older I have found it is not just your pants but included your under underwear. I am forever having to pull my underwear up although I am wearing a belt and suspenders. Anyway, I am seriously designing special underwear suspenders for my underwear so they will quit falling down while wandering around the house in my briefs, so I am not flashing plumbers cleavage to people hanging around my house.
What are your thoughts on the concept of living a very long life?
I come from family, on both sides, who live long lives. I am in favor of this and thank them for their hardiness, which gives me hope. I do want to live a long life.
My mother was 97 when she passed on. It wasn’t easy because with the loss of anyone you love it is never easy.
My father’s only brother lived into his nineties and I believe my father would have too, but a train versus van caused his and a five year old brother’s premature deaths.
There are no guarantees we have these long lives because it runs in the family, because another brother three years older than me passed on from colon cancer, but was also struggling with lung problems caused from smoking, and other things in his environment.
I am 67, sixth born of eight children, and recently had a massive heart attack although all my blood pressure checks, etc., showed my doctor and I that I was in pretty good shape, although a little over weight.
The doctors all declared after the event which nearly claimed my life, all but for the attention my daughter paid to my sudden symptoms the day after this past Thanksgiving. I had an abnormal heart attack, and the thing that caused my heart attack was abnormal, and it was really challenging to find and correct.
Truly, my right arm was black and blue from wrist to shoulder from their first attempts to do an angioplasty on me, and finally had to go in from the groin. Thankfully, I was not alert because they said I resisted them on just my arm because the pain was too intense.
Silly thing being allergic to hydrocodone does create some unique challenges for surgeons, so other decisions had to be made to save my life.
They found the problem on the back of my heart and it has been there for a while. I had an abnormal artery with an odd shape which created a slump or place for blood to pool. My heart was pristine, as they said many times, and there was no plaque, but something caused this little pool to break loose and block my heart. Well enough of that. They brought in a scoop shovel on the third attempt and removed that little obstruction. I lived.
Three days later I was released to travel back home in ten days, so stayed at my daughter’s until I could safely drive for eight hours home.
I was not then nor now ready to toss it all aside and give in on the game of life. There is far too much I have not seen, or learned. Far too many projects, goals, or even books read.
I am absolutely in favor of long lives, so I can watch my children, grandchildren, and my future great grandchildren grow.
I love the laughter, beauty, and good things and thank God for the hard lessons I have learned to make even to my current age. It is from these things I write, photograph or paint. And, pray I have at least the long life my mother and others in my family have had.
If you have a cup or glass nearby and it doesn’t matter the contents, take a sip and celebrate with me one more day of life.
Do you spend more time thinking about the future or the past? Why?
Why of course I do. I write to tell stories which propels me both backward and forward through time so I can capture ideas, thoughts, images, and sound playing my mind. I also write in the moment which quickly fades to the past, because we only live in the present for a moment, then it is gone. We look to the future to see the possibilities and stimulate hope, happiness, and many other things we want to see in our future.
What colleges have you attended?
We do not begin life in a university or college unless you simply call that living. I began getting my fill of working by following my mother in the fields while she was helping her father picking potatoes in his field with the family, and again later my parents flower shop.
Sometimes we forget the lessons we learn, or at least set them aside to tell our children and grand children when they come along, just as my parents and grandparents did for me. Usually, it was about a lesson they learned.
I have done many-many things in my life, long before I went to the university, mostly to work. I did take a lot of classes but my focus was work. Still I learn about management, laws, time management, personnel, art, creative writing, and especially on how to be physically tired most of the time. I won’t bore you with all the details, but it was for thirty-eight years.
I moved up from being a custodial foreman to an assistant director of operations over many facilities. This was achieved by remembering all of the lessons from the field and the many jobs I had growing up, and the lessons my parents and grandparents told.
My fathers words stayed with me and kept me going when things were hard. He told me once, “Can’t is a sluggard, too lazy to try.” I have always tried.
Success is measured by the attempt, and you will know if you succeeded even when others don’t.
I succeeded.
Do you play in your daily life? What says “playtime” to you?
Let’s sojourn for a time in our own private purlieus and let our minds effloresce in our incommodious and polymorphous filled bookshelves we often tearing our way through like a bushwhacker fighting his way through a dense jungle. This is not our respite, but our destiny to deny us any repose. We are nothing but mere heathens in our minds.
—WLC
While I write or perhaps before I begin, I look for prompts to inspire me. Sometimes the prompt may only be one word or in groups of words. Sometimes it may be only a scene, picture, thought, or a dream that will not leave my mind and they begin to stream like a short film being played out to some sort of conclusion. Sometimes, there does not seem to be a point to the story, which I must explore to its end—if it ends. On occasions they simply drift away because there was not much there to build upon. Sometimes there is more,
I began with the title then began to build on the fluffed up words that really do exist but for the majority of the readers means very little, but can be found easily in a dictionary. Most of would not even bother but will glean some sort of sense out of the nonsense, much like how we live in the real world where we find people who try to impress by speaking above you, while others will simply try to mimic other forms of speech they are subjected in their regions, or state. Personally, I like play with all of these tools because they help me understand others I come in contact with.
At last count I have been studying twelve languages. Now I am not saying I am good at it, nor am I really proficient at any of them, including English, or at least our Idaho version of English. I say this because when I was in basic training minding my own business, laying on my bunk, before lights out, some shouted, “Hey Idaho!” Until that moment I thought I was alone was from Idaho but promptly three other voices responded, including my own. Later, I would ask how they knew I was from Idaho and they said it was the accent. I surprised because I didn’t know people from potato country had and an accent. Honestly, I still have a hard time cyphering an accent from anyone in Idaho, but I suppose from those on the outside we do. Nevertheless, I like to believe mine has changed a bit because of the languages I have studied, which shows up from time to time when I throw in a bit of slang, or foreign words to make a point which more than likely causes others to say, what or huh?
Now, to the point, which I am really slowly getting to, is that when you write, try to know your audience you are writing to, so they will understand exactly what the heck your are saying, but enjoy the ride of thoughts as you jot them down, and if it gives you joy to write a whole lot of nonsense that only the few bravest will even try to understand—go for it and enjoy the journey. Life is truly way to short to worry about everything.
Life In General 