2024 - Gratitude in Public

A daily record of noticing the beauty of life in 2024

1/1 - ringing in the new year with you by blowing off the lame New Year's party and watching Will and Grace

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1/2 - They say when the student is ready, the teacher appears. I found an amazingly clear resource on meditation that resolves and explains so many questions that have arisen in my practice over the past couple of years, http://mctb.org.

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1/3 - Dining al fresco, just the two of us, on the pool deck, chair dancing, grilling our steaks on hot rocks, listening to pop music.

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1/4 - Despite a whale of an argument, we persevere.

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1/5 - A day of travel where everything is on time, there are no problems, no luggage is lost and you make it home when scheduled is indeed a gift.

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1/6 - For the first time in weeks, Saturday night, a glass of Seasmoke Southing, jazz playing on our stereo, and the cats snuggled against our legs.

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1/7 - Listening to music, making dinner, you dancing around the kitchen, a free spirit and a foil to my stolid demeanor, though inside I yearn to dance freely as well.

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1/8 - After a dreary morning, a windy front pushed through from the northwest, bringing crispness and sunshine, so I walked outside in meditative thought for a while, soaking up the sun, and enjoyed the feeling of being just on the edge of perceiving the vibrations of sensations as if, there is something more and something less just beyond my grasp.

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1/9 - T'Challa, my ten month old kitten, crawled up on my chest, laid his little head down on my shoulder, licked my beard twice, and promptly feel asleep.

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1/10 - I achieved a new effortless, flowing, joyful, peaceful meditative state (the 1st or 2nd jhana?) that I can only describe as harmonious, blissful music compared to the noise, silence, and effort of previous meditations. Perhaps meditation is like playing music — at first you just have random noise, then you learn some chords and scales — and, at some point, those efforts become wired into your mind and suddenly, you can effortlessly play a beautiful "song", the first of many melodies to come.

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1/11 - First meeting of the year with the full BoldBrush leadership team and I am reminded, once again, how thankful I am for the people we've been blessed to work with at BoldBrush. Thank you Ric, Sarah and Angela.

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1/12 - The north exhales in a roaring whisper of wind, cooling us, clearing the atmosphere, cleaning our world to present us with a beautiful vista outside our window complete with shimmering sunny dappled light as the tree branches dance with the breeze. This frosty arctic breath promises shivers ahead, and serves as a herald with the message and warning to prepare for the unbridled run of the winter race in the coming days.

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1/13 - You, dancing around T'Challa, our kitten, to "Soul Sister" while brushing him, and him leaning into it with ecstasy.

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1/14 - The compassion and love in your heart as I watch your careful concern and preparation over giving the outside cat a place to stay warm during the freeze.

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1/15 - Morris, my old friend - the auspicious old orange outside cat - is temporarily ensconced in our warm garage in a kind of hiatus from normal feline activity while Jack Frost plays outside for a couple of days. I sat in the garage to meditate and keep him company and he curled up on my lap and slept, melting my heart for the entire session.

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1/16 - As I walked, I gazed into the brilliant afternoon sky, with the pale crescent moon as my companion, and I felt deeply that all of existence is holy, and experiencing it with deep wonder is worship. The physics of this universe may exist without humans - the electromagnetic wavelengths we experience as "light" exist -- but the experience of it, the human eyes and minds that turn those dead electromagnetic wavelengths into beautiful "light", the wonder of it all is the holy gift we alone present back to the universe, as, through us, the universe (god if you wish) gets to experience itself and the full ecstasy of its beauty, poetry and wonder.

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1/17 - After dinner family time is my favorite time of the day, it's my time with you while the cats sleep and play.

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1/18 - A realization: attention is holy, meditation is worship.

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1/19 - a project we’ve been planning for a long time, we outlined with the team that can bring it to fruition today, and I feel good about their vision and abilities.

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1/20 - Ensconced in coziness and warmth on a chilly January day, sitting on the living room floor with the cats - who are enjoying late afternoon preening - while we listen to Jason Aldean.

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1/21 - A day of drizzle, hanging around the house, working out, a normal day, nothing out of the ordinary, but still extraordinary.

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1/22 - Meditation is like a varnish on the oil painting of your life, though it is invisible, it washes everything with depth, feeling, love, color and joy.

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1/23 - Today is rainy and dreary, as was yesterday, as was the day before that. A string of drizzly, dreary, cold days takes its toll on my mood, but perhaps the way through is straight through - to simply embrace the dreary mood. As I write this, I sit in the dark with no light except the gray light from the window and the electric glow of the computer's monitor. I want to feel the dreary. To live the dreary. To absorb it deeply and understand what it is. For really, to feel something is a gift and dreary is certainly something felt. And when the sunshine returns, having embodied the darkness, I can once again revel and soar into the light.

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1/24 - I have a friend, Dave, who, whenever we eat a meal, with no fuss or anything says, "Thank you Lord for another fine meal" and digs in and that makes me happy.

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1/25 - Our team surprised us with a late Christmas gift (we were away at Christmas) - a case of assorted Pinot Noirs from Foxen Vineyards! Our team knows us well. Our team is the best.

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1/26 - After a few years of meditation I've come to realize a huge reason ancient wisdom says to "do unto others what you would have them do unto you" is because at some fundamental level, there are no "others" and "you." So whatever you do unto others you are doing to your Self, our Self, the Self.

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1/27 - Sunshine finally wrested control of the heavens from the dreary gray, and gifted us with a perfect Saturday. A day made for insouciance and walking...both activities in which we heartily partook.

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1/28 - I’m doing my best to be weird and, hopefully getting weirder. Weird is the place where one escapes societal expectations and demands, weird is the path to freedom. Weird is the path to joy.

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1/29 - I sat and opened myself completely, perhaps for the first time, to the full power of this exact moment and felt the reality's ponderous weight push gently and blissfully into my very self as I disappeared into joy.

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1/30 - We are blessed to work with one of the best vets in the world, and he is just a few blocks away from us. T'Challa had his fourth CT scan and his growths are completely gone. The doctor is going to write a medical case study about him. "These growths just normally don't go away on their own. I haven't seen that before. Your kitty is going to be famous in a few months," He said.

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2/1 - Even in the midst of sadness, even grief, one has the ability to let go of those thoughts and have moments of normalcy, and even moments of joy, however small they might be, and for that I am grateful.

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2/3 - Daily life is sacred, listening to country music, vacuuming the house, occasionally petting the cats, and smiling at my wife is worship.

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2/4 - Leftover Pizza from Pam's Patio kitchen makes a meal fit for divinity.

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2/5 - After a difficult day, an upsetting day in many ways, when laying down to go to sleep, T'Challa snuggled up in my arms, licked my beard, hugged my arm, and nestled his little head up under my chin and purred until he fell asleep.

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2/6 - I picked up T'Challa, and his eyes stopped on the decorative finial at the bottom of the ceiling fan cord and it held his attention rapt. And, just for a moment, I saw the wonder of the simple things in life through his eyes. And yes, we played with that cord.

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2/7 - I struggled to write down my reflections today, but I eked out the beginning of an idea and then, through the course of the day, synchronicities brought related quotes and thoughts to my attention and a fully formed piece emerged.

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2/8 - I love that my wife is always there to remind me not to stop a good time when I’m in the middle of one.

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2/9 - An unexpected resource become available to us and we had a call that was extremely illuminating and helpful in many unexpected ways.

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2/10 - The gestalt of Saturday night - a 2021 Seasmoke Pinot Noir is opened with a pop, Ribeyes are grilled over glowing coals, Texas country music plays over outdoor speakers, and conversation with friends.

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2/11 - Sun shines outside the windows, the cats nestle down around us. A day of reading, contemplation and insights. Of reflection and recreation. Of preparation of potential.

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2/12 - Deep amber glimmering light rays parade through the branches between two neighbor's homes as the sun says farewell to another day. A red tailed hawk swoops low overhead and lands on the branch of the light blessed oak tree and her branches reach out to greet her noble guest.

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2/14 - You were standing by the bathroom vanity reading your iPad when T'Challa ran up, jumped on the vanity, stood on his hind legs and put both front paws on your chest and demanded you give him attention. You pulled out a hair brush and started brushing him and he delighted in ecstatic joy.

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2/15 - The gift of imagination. The gift of fantasy. The gift of entering a world in my own mind where magic and alchemy and love and joy exist. For these gifts, I thank the creator. For the feelings and thoughts and ideas they generate are absolutely real.

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2/16 - When you follow your curiosity, when you do the thing that you yearn to do, when you do that which only you can do...that is where you will be of most service to the world, for that is why you feel that magnetic pull to do it. That is why you are here.

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2/17 - Curiosity, inspired deep curiosity (as opposed to shallow dopamine laced, rabbit hole curiosity), I realize, increasingly, is a divine gift. These deep yearnings are breadcrumbs in the forest of life, calling to you to follow them, for they will lead you to the path of meaning - the path of the true fulfilment and realization of your Self.

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2/18 - There's something magical about a Sunday evening, after all the days tasks are complete, workouts have been done, and there's nothing but pure family time on the agenda.

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2/19 - Our cats display more wisdom than we do when they consistently remind us to put down our devices and pay attention to what is happening in the real world, specifically, to them.

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2/20 - DM, one of the builders we are considering, was gracious enough to arrange for us, with past clients, to tour several homes that he had built and that are being built. He generously spent the better part of his day and early evening with us.

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2/21 - Today was a day where things went wrong, plans were obliterated, and obligations pulled my attention to and fro, creating a situation of stress and pressure. But, it led to a realization - life is beautiful if one truly pays attention to the wonder of the current, for attention is truly the only real currency any of us have to pay. In the late evening, finally having a moment to reflect, with my wife next to me, a book in hand for a few minutes of reading, and our cats snuggled against us or playing with us, I had a few moments to pay that attention and it led to this re-realization.

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2/22 - With only a week left before a deadline for a writing symposium I am part of, I had nothing, and had resigned myself to drop out and then…I sat down at my computer to do other work and the Muse alighted and I started typing and watched with baited breath as characters were born and a story emerged precisely fitting the them of the symposium. After an hour, I read the story back to myself and it felt like it had been written by someone else. Beautifully spooky.

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2/23 - My wife replaced our dryer's heating element this week without my involvement. She had found the parts online and the videos showing how to install them and when the videos didn't match our unit, she put it all back together perfectly anyway. My wife is a badass.

2/23 - evening Moonlight and Coltrane:

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2/24 - We were listening to music with the cats when Far Behind by Candlebox came on harkening back to the 90s, which reminded me of partying with Danny.  A smile came to my face. Such joy. Such potential, such futures we had! We would keep Rockin’  Partying.  Achieving our dreams!  I felt my mind crave this.  Then sorrow. Grief.  Crushing grief.  And I felt my mind’s aversion to this reality.  To the reality that Danny is gone. And then, unexpectedly, an ascension. Mentally hovering above both feelings. Seeing clearly that both feelings are part of the overall whole.  And then gratitude, love, and bittersweet joy at having experienced any of it at all. Acceptance.   Is this wisdom?  Is this truth?

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2/25 - A friend of our experienced in developing a property, walked our lot with us helping us consider where to put the house, where to put the driveway, where to put the gate, where to put water features.

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2/26 - Back in the office with the engineering team. It felt good to work together again, to plan, to scheme, to plan our next few hires, and to hatch plots to grow the empire.

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2/27 - I published my short story, Drivin' His Life Away, and, about an hour later, while we were eating lunch, my wife checked her email and came across it and she stopped everything and sat there and read the whole story from start to finish. I am blessed.

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2/28 - I posted a Substack note about the divine play between creation and destruction being two parts of god, with humans being the force powering the creation part, and someone said, "This may be the most profound thing I've ever read on the Internet. Thank you." I am humbled and grateful.

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2/29 - While hosting a live webinar, T'Challa screamed for attention and threw himself against the door to my office. I let him in and he hopped onto my lap and licked my fingers, purring loudly for most of the rest of the webinar

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3/2 - The kitten was in thrall to a spectacle outside the kitchen window. He sat chittering and twittering on the sill, and I stepped outside to investigate. I stood outside the window under the blooming mountain laurel. Sunshine shone sublimely, bees buzzed busily, butterflies flitted and flowed, they all performed their tantric dance of delight around the purple explosion of blooms that ejected their pheromonic pollen into the surrounding air, filling it with the pleasant odor of childhood summers: Little league baseball games with hubba-bubba tucked into the corner of one's mouth, blowing bright purple bubbles, and lazing around on a hot day in a hypnagogic, dreamy state, living in purple-tinted imagination. I stood this way for a few timeless moments, in a sort of living j'hana, where I disappeared into the flowing river of bliss - enraptured as the kitten had been before me. Then, I went back inside and agreed with him, it was indeed a sacred spectacle we were both blessed to behold, he yawned, licked my finger in silent agreement, and turned back to continue in his study of the miracle of life.

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3/3 - A couple of thousand square feet of space and all four members of the family are squeezed into the smallest area possible, cats snuggled and purring.

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3/5 - The shamanic drum beats slow, but steady.

Our verbal firearms, chambered and ready.

The war snares volley opposed frantic tattoos.

Our shots were fired against a backdrop of blues!

Our volleys crossed, wounding us dearly,

What happened? We battle cavalierly?

Mortal wounds though, we have not inflicted.

For somewhere underneath the anger so heady,

The drumbeat of love still beats,

slow and steady.

Listen closely! Upon the field we lay,

Recovering from onslaught of that day!

You can hear them softly inside your head,

As we use our fire together instead,

that cadence rises to a deafening roar,

That brings us together, on this day we're reborn!

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3/6 - No creator creates to torment his creations. This seems self evident.

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3/7 - Curiosity, of the type I call Inspired Deep Curiosity (as opposed to shallow, follow pointless rabbit holes curiosity), I realize, increasingly, is a divine gift. This feeling comes from a mysterious force I call The Divine Force.  I don’t know what this force is - perhaps it is simply one’s subconscious.  Or perhaps, since time is an illusion, it is your future self whispering to you.  Maybe it is something truly divine.  Wherever these feelings and ideas come from, these deep yearnings are breadcrumbs in the forest of life, calling out to you, whispering in your ear, creating in you a subtle sense of anxiety if you ignore them and a feeling of rightness when you listen. and for them, I am grateful.

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3/8 - the divine truth lives inside of, and powers, all of us.

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3/9 - Our kitten had surgery and had to stay at the vet's office for four nights and we finally brought him home today, when we set him down, even though we knew he had been given a sedative, the first thing he did is walk to his favorite toy, a tiny little blue ball, pick it up and drop it at our feet to play fetch.

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3/12 - Before we get out of bed, T'Challa jumps in the middle of us and we form three spoons, me holding T'Challa and T'Challa holding my wife, he stretches out his delicate paw and holds her gently.

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3/13 - Today was what I call a “hi-hat day” in the cadence of a life: work, obligations, responsibilities, for the most part an ordinary hi-hat beat that provides the rhythm for the snares beats and cymbal crashes to come on other days.

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3/14 - T'Challa, our kitten, is one year old today. Pi day is his birthday! Technically, he's a cat now, but because he had so many difficult times during his kittenhood, we've told him he's allowed to have a make-up kittenhood for a few more months.

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3/15 - I stepped out into the silent solace of suburbia. Oak leaves crunched. A pair of doves flew by in formation, banking to the left, a purple martin in pursuit, the newly sprouted bluebonnets swayed in the breeze. It always amazes me to be in the middle of a city of two million people, and yet, I step out my front door and experience absolute silence, other than the wind whispering, perhaps a dog barking, the tweets and chirps of various birds. Sometimes I even hear a hawk scream. Yet we are surrounded by people, houses, cars and businesses. Truly a modern miracle of sorts. Increasingly, I try and be present and to enjoy the mundane miracle of silence around me.

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3/16 - Tom (as I've named him), the bright green anole lizard, crawled forth from the underbrush into the light to perch upon the photo-sensitive cell that turns on our landscape lights when the sun goes down. It's the perfect spot for Tom to catch some of the sun's warming energy. As I return from a walk, I notice the landscape lights are on despite the brightness of the day. Tom has again, left the light on for me, and as I walk by, we give each other the mutual nod of knowing.

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3/17 - After dinner, Bellag'heera meandered over to the table and stood up next to my chair, tapped me several times on the arm, and issued the tiniest little squeak that means, "I want to play, follow me!" So, I said "OK" and stood up, and she ran to the room and laid down on her side, which means she wanted the pre-play massage and pet session, she likes, like an athlete, to have her muscles warmed up first, and then, when ready, went to sit by the armoire where the interactive toys are kept whereupon she fixed me with a stare that unmistakably communicated, "get out a toy, human, and do your job of playing with your cat." So I obeyed.

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3/26 - The sun shone today and I jumped into the vat of sunshine, like pooh bear jumps into a vat of hunny.

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3/27 - After a gray and drizzly morning, the sun again took the stage for an afternoon encore performance and invited us to be part of the play of life. We shut down our computers and postponed responsibilities for a lovers’ walk through the neighborhood, just a man and his wife, talking, walking, laughing and occasionally, bitching. Nevertheless, the promenade was divine in its mundaneness.

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3/28 - The cats tried to wake us up for an early breakfast but instead, we enticed them to snuggle with us, T'Challa settled by my face, pressing his back into me and his paws into my wife's back, and Bella curled up against our legs, and I wrapped my arms around my wife and for thirty minutes enjoyed the best thirty minutes of my day while I silently surrounded my wife, and all of us, in wordless prayer energy of protection and love and mentally hoped our day would be happy, healthy, peaceful and free of suffering.

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3/31 - Hanging out in the kitchen, listening to jazz, drinking wine, playing with the cats while making Easter dinner together.

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4/1 - Talking with Don, Jason's mom's boyfriend who worked in Silicon Valley in the late 70's through the 80's and hearing his stories of his dealings with Apple, Tandem, Intel, HP, Atari, Lockheed, and learning a bit more first-hand about that fascinating convergence of time, place, and ethos

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4/2 - We realized today that God has intervened and prevented us from making a big mistake and had sent the perfect solution, gift wrapped and ready to go, to us.

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4/3 - T'Challa and I sat watching a squirrel sun himself, hanging upside town on a tree outside the kitchen window.  T'Challa made little chittering noises and tapped me with his tail, occasionally touching my hand with his paw while, the squirrel shook his tail back and forth, eyeing us first with his left eye, and then his right, while we chuckled at his audacity.

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4/4 - My wife, reverse polarity from me, complements me. The path to the highest form for both of us is to embrace the dance of feminine and masculine energy.  Understanding, and keeping this top of mind, has changed everything for the better.   All of creation depends upon the dance of protons and electrons combining to higher and heavier elements to form infinite beautiful creations, including life. It is a dance of differently charged equals pushing and pulling each other that enables the whole universe.  This continues, this feminine and masculine dance all the way up to its highest consciousness forms - men and women.  And so, I realize, my wife and I comprise a holotropic unit - we are each whole, and we are each part of a larger whole, and together, when we remember this, we make the whole and the parts better.

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4/8 - The clouds masked most of the eclipse, but people came out of their houses, and for the first time in a long time, we stood and talked with our neighbors.

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4/9 - a story idea bubbled up from the spring within my head or, at least, my mind, or from wherever story ideas come from, and, as a writer, that’s always something to be grateful for. 

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4/10 -  At dusk, the moon and a single star rose to watch over us as sentinels. 

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4/11 - Realization: artists are noble creatures who aspire to manifest inspiration for the benefit of all. Nobility is born by discovering our unique abilities and mastering then to their full potential in the service of others.  That is exactly what artists must do, since the purpose of art is to allow humans to send inspiration, energy, and subjective knowledge to one another across space and time.

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4/12 - A front dried and cooled the air, invigorating Morris, the outside cat, and me.  We decided venture into the lawn and soak in some sunshine. I pulled the leaves and tangled mats out of his fur while he "groomed" my forearm with licks as well as little quick and soft "chewing," of my skin as he reciprocated the grooming  favor.

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4/14 - In a way, we are all a sort of god, made up of trillions of “children” called “cells.” Each cell contains a small but essential piece of  us, our DNA, as their “soul.”  Each cell lives and dies and is re-incarnated by that same soul-dna.  The cells work together to create the whole, grouping into societies, organs, all working as one entire “universe” that is you.  As their “god”, we should not inflict self harm on them, though there may be times we must destroy some of them, or allow them to perish, for the greater good of their overall universe, our body.  Our ego is quite a different creation from this reality, it realizes we are, in a way, one self when looking inward.  But it also pretends that we are still one self even when looking the other direction, outward toward the universe that we live in and support.  But, in reality, while we are god to the beings inside our bodies, we are one of trillions of “cells” that make up the larger universe that we can perceive outwardly.  Each of us, just as the cells contain our DNA, contains a small piece of the larger universe as our soul.  So, when facing the direction of the outward universe, we must surrender our self as the cells that make us up surrender themselves.  We have seen what happens when cells do not surrender to us, they go rogue and, if not destroyed, wreak havoc upon our bodies in the form of cancer and other diseases.  We do not want to do that to the outer universe and hence those who are awake realize the truth of no-self/true-self.

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4/15 -  You made taco soup in your new Staub cast iron dutch oven, and, although it seemed a small thing, it was a big thing.  Thank you.

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4/16 - Last night, while in a hypnogogic state, drifting off to sleep, I  meditated shallowly for a couple of minutes.  My eyes were closed and  I noticed a bright purple Nimitta in my field of vision.  I see it often but this one was more pronounced so I started focusing on it.  About that time T'Challa, my young cat, hardly out of kitten-hood, came and curled up in my arms, touched my face, and started licking my arms and hands.  His head was positioned right in front of my face.  My eyes were still closed and, at this point, the Nimitta expanded into a field of purple and black energy movements with other colors mixed in here and there (mostly red and a tiny bit of yellow when another color appeared). For a while I perceived T'Challa and I interacting not as thoughts but, instead, just as two fields of energy that were merging slightly where we touched.  I continued to pet him, but kept concentration on this phenomenon.  Then, the whole scene become clearer (my eyes were still closed and the lights in the room were off).  Suddenly, I was seeing, in purple energy, T'Challa's physical form as he licked me. I could see the shape of a cats head moving up and down.  I could see glowing purple "eyes" and an outline of him.  It looked like a computer rendering in, only purple and black, of a cat outline - kind of a wireframe look if the "wires" were a sort of pulsing energy that came and went in a nebulous field-like manner.  It sounds crazy, but it was there, plain as day.  I brought my hand up to my face, and saw a purple outline of my hand and sort of energetic "veins" of light inside of it, but, at the same time, I could still also faintly perceive T'Challa’s purple wireframe face "through" my hand. I'm not sure exactly what to make of this experience, but it was strangely comforting in some way.

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4/19 - A stressful day of catch up and, at one point, I started stressing and getting angry but, perhaps three years of meditation and awareness is starting to pay off, because just a few minutes into my "tirade" I dropped that negative energy and returned to my joyful center.  

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4/21 - After too late an an evening, and too early of a morning, my wife suggested we lay down for a lazy Sunder afternoon nap.  God bless her.  

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4/23 - A walking catch up meeting with my lead engineer - no notes, no laptaps, no agenda - just a deep discussion, and, something precious - real human connection.

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4/24 - The feeling of knowing who you are deep down. 

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4/25 - T'Challa came and curled up under my chin while we slept.

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4/26 - We finally got the house footprint sprayed out and confirmed the final placement of the house. 

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4/28 - Why does it seem like people love their pets more than people?  I think it’s because animals don’t have a thinking mind like we do.  And by thinking, I mean language.  we create egos and our egos get in the way of communicating if we don’t drop them, thus we close off our feeling and intuitive parts to each other and project ego lies onto one another.  With animals, since they don’t have egos, or language, we can only communicate with them via feeling and intuition. Our interactions with them show us the love and kindness that we are truly capable of and hint at how we are meant, in nature, to relate to each other.  That’s an insight I’m grateful for today.

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4/29 - Since today, I'm working from the office, I stepped outside into the morning sun, the first clear morning in a while.  As I drank from the sun's freely offered cup, Morris, the outside cat who's adopted us, decided he wanted to sit with me in the grass and sun himself as well.  We sat for a while, listening to the choir of birds sing to our life giver in the sky, while he and I enjoyed each other’s company. When I felt refreshed and joyful, we bid each other adieu and I headed out cheerfully to the office. 

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4/30 - a difficult day with many things challenging my mental state,  but, I was able each time, to stop the dark spiral and return to my center. 

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5/1 -  The cats cry, Bella wants to play with me, and T’Challa wants to play with everyone, and, at first it annoys me, they simply refuse to to adapt to my schedule, but then I remember how it feels when a beloved pet has passed on, and you wish with your entire being you could play with them just one more time. So, tonight, we played. 

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5/2 - Matter/Nature is our mother.  Awareness/Consciousness is our father.  When they meet inside our true self, when our egoistic self dissolves, they embrace each other in reunion and make love, giving rise to a wholesome natural bliss. 

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5/3 - Friends who are there even when the weather, both metaphorical and actual, is challenging.  

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5/4 - I went to feed morris, and, as we rounded the corner, the squirrel decided to launch into a tirade against Morris, myself, and the two inside cats who were enthralled with the little guy shaking his tail.  In fact, all four of us stopped, in rapt attention, as he scolded us and pontificated about his rights to the area around the tree and the bench. 

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5/5 - A reader commented that my recent writings had "really spoken to her soul" and, in the same sentence she compared what  I've been writing about to Julia Cameron and John O’ Donoghue.  

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5/6 - A dark, grey day, but a moment of sunshine appeared, the curtain of the clouds parted, and the spotlight of the sun illuminated center stage. And upon this stage of the universe, Morris and I absorbed solar energy and felt our pulses quicken, a lizard came out to join us.  We attempted to befriend him, but he would have none of that and retreated to a nearby branch to show off his dewlap.  

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5/7 - Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  Suddenly it makes sense. Beautify your gaze and suddenly the entire world becomes a delightful playground and we can see beauty wherever we look.

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5/8 There are truths one can feel, and can know with the very fiber of one’s being, but that cannot be put adequately into language. That does not make them any less true.

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5/9 After skipping a few days of meditation, even 20 minutes felt like slipping into a warm bath after trekking for hours through a merciless blizzard.

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5/10 - We opened one of our few remaining bottles of Seasmoke Southing.  It tasted of summer sweetness and explosions of cherries, and paired perfectly with our cat, Bella, laying on our feet while the sounds of Miles Davis showered us with resonance from the overhead speakers.

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5/11 - Insight:  Creating is the true prime directive.

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5/12 - Several open mental loops regarding the book I'm currently writing suddenly clicked into place elegantly and insightfully.

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5/13 - Despite a full day of projects, and a gnawing sense of should,  my wife and I spent 20 minutes upon waking doing nothing but holding each other tightly.  Well, that, and playing with the kitten batting at our hands and demanding attention.

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5/14 - I had an insight into the way people use the phrase “contraction” and expansion” in conjunction with meditation.  

I thought it meant something bodily, like a contraction in the chest when one experiences fear, or an expansion in the chest experienced with love, and I suppose there is an element of that. 

But, it’s primarily about a contraction or expansion of awareness.  

A desire is a contraction of attention, such as attention contracting upon, say a cookie.  If attention contracts enough, suddenly, that cookie is the only thing in the world and you must have it.  

An expansion of awareness is the opposite and if one expands their attention enough, there are no more desires or aversions.   

I’ve experienced this in a small way with pain while meditating (such as a foot cramp), if i focus on the pain and make it the object of meditation, at first it hurts, but then, if i allow it to expand through my whole body and beyond the pain diminishes.  

Perhaps this is one reason we, as humans, love wider, open spaces in architecture and the outdoors -  more room for expansion of attention and less desires and aversions.

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5/15 - After nearly three years, almost four, all my dental work is finally done.

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5/16 - T'Challa, a cat who think's he's a puppy, has developed a new habit of insisting that he come to work with me when I’m working from home.  He comes into my office and paces, restlessly,  bats, bites, makes little whimpers, or chews things he shouldn't, until I either let him sit on my lap, or provide a little palette for him on a box next to me, whereupon he promptly turns in a circle, licks my hand, and curls up and sleeps while I work. 

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5/19 - Entering the Mystery is training your mind, conscious and unconscious, to attune to the Resonance of Real Truth, while Mastery is training your body to become a unique instrument to add harmony and counterpoint to that Resonance.  In essence, the act of becoming an artist is training to be both the player and the instrument.  The resulting music, when in tune, creates Myth, this Myth transfers both that Resonance and Myth to other humans, providing them a glimpse of the inspiring and terrific Truth, which they perceive in a different and unique way, prompting them to, in turn, repeat the act with their own unique instrument, even if only in their own mind, and this allows them to also join in this beautiful ongoing symphony of transformation.

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5/21 - T’Challa used to play fetch.  But as he matured, now he has invented “reverse fetch” or “fetch the human.”  The rules of fetch the human:  He takes his ball to a particular spot in the hallway and then cries for me to come to him and throw it.  When I finally do, he chases it but doesn’t bring it back to me immediately.  He patiently waits for me to go sit back down in the other room and then, he does it again. In other words, he controls the game, not me.  Unfortunately for me, he does this over and over.  Fortunately for him, I’m a fast learner and he trained me well.