Up, Down.
"O governo falseia a realidade", afirma dom Erwin Kräutler (see here).Eu também.
It has been long & difficult & fruitless meditation (tagged problematique) on 'worthless existence'. What could they have meant? What could they mean?Arriving at a dim memory of my complete misunderstanding of In Watermelon Sugar - it was 1968, I liked thinking of sex with Pauline. Just now discovering the dark & hopeless story of what happens when the salt really does lose its savour - an exemplar, a paradigm (see Matthew, & the complete text of In Watermelon Sugar here).
A comprehensive website around Richard Brautigan gives me, "[He] reminds us that a worse thing than violence and death could be a life without pity or joy."
Disliking Derrick Jensen - but accepting the signs & blazes in his premiss on Hope if not agreeing with all of his points. Hobbits and Muggles oh my! One Ring to find them and in the darkness bind them.
Mideo Cruz, a Filipino artist, and his colleague Racquel De Loyola. And a Brazilian cartoonist, a gaúcho, Allan Sieber, who writes, "Fé em Jesus é um beijo no apêndice."
The 'teu sonho' / 'your dream' in the photograph at the right refers to Sister Dorothy. That Erwin Kräutler fellow is no slouch now, is he? Look at the smile on 'im. And again, below with one arm around Tuíra Kayapó. Look carefully at these smiles. Somehow he has threaded the needle. Not one of those wily Jesuits but a missionary of the precious blood (whatever that is).Does anyone doubt for a moment that the government has falsified reality? That they do little else? Could anyone possibly be so lost & twisted as not to see light shining in this man? (Light y'unnerstan' ... not 'the' light or any such tosh.)
Disliking Bill McKibben and the milquetoast k-k-Canadian activists ... but ... (still) (maybe) ... getting on a bus early Tuesday morning to go to Washington and join the protest (if I get there & if they'll have me). And later on, next month (maybe), in Ottawa.Or not. If my health allows. If my fears allow. If I feel like it. If my feet allow or even in spite of my feet. If ...
She says, "pity or joy" you see, not faith & hope, not 'Faith Hope & Charity and the greatest of these ...'
(not, as our Jack's ghost squeaks & gibbers at us from beyond the grave in his perfected & sentimental suicide note, adjuring us: "My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world." Precious stuff. Sententious stuff. Stuff & nonsense. ... More like: Be afraid. Be terrified. Be angry. Despair. Grasp at love if you will but abandon hope. Grieve. But do not die. Though you will change nothing, go and strengthen what you can find of what remains.)
Typically when we say 'contingent' we mean: Liable to happen or not; of uncertain occurrence or incidence; by chance; not determined by necessity in regard to action or existence; free. (Free?) But in a literal sense, from the meaning of the Latin contingere it is: Touching each other, in contact - and a host of related, even geometric (tangential) allusions.
Bringing me full circle (as it were) (yet again) to the good samaritan being touched in his guts.Be well gentle reader.
| Houve um incêndio na floresta e enquanto todos os bichos corriam apavorados, um pequeno beija-flor ia do rio para o incêndio levando gotinhas de água em seu bico. O leão, vendo aquilo, perguntou para o beija-flor: "Ó beija-flor, você acha que vai conseguir apagar o incêndio sozinho?" E o beija-flor respondeu: "Eu não sei se vou conseguir, mas estou fazendo a minha parte". | There was a fire in the forest and while all the animals ran in fear, a little hummingbird went from the river to the fire carrying drops of water in her beak. The lion, seeing this, asked the hummingbird, "O Hummingbird, do you think you will succeed in putting out the fire all by yourself?" And the hummingbird replied, "O Lion, I do not know if I will succeed or not, but I am doing my part." |
Amos Oz: The Order of the Teaspoon / A Ordem da Colher de Chá
| Let us conclude with my story of the Order of the Teaspoon. I believe that if one person is watching a huge calamity - let's say a conflagration - there are always three principal options. Option 1: Run away, as far away and as fast as you can, and let those who cannot run burn. Option 2: Write a very angry letter to the editor of your paper demanding that the responsible people be removed from office in disgrace. Or for that matter, launch a demonstration. Option 3: Bring a bucket of water and throw it on the fire, and if you don't have a bucket, bring a glass, and if you don't have a glass, use a teaspoon - everyone has a teaspoon. And yes, I know a teaspoon is little and the fire is huge, but there are millions of us and each one of us has a teaspoon. Now I would like to establish the Order of the Teaspoon. People who share my attitude - not the run-away attitude, or the letter attitude, but the teaspoon attitude - I would like them to walk around wearing a little teaspoon on the lapel of their jackets, so that we know we are in the same movement, in the same brotherhood, in the same order, the Order of the Teaspoon. This is my philosophy in a nutshell - or in a teaspoon, if you wish. | Vamos concluir com a minha história de Ordem da Colher de Chá. Eu creio que se uma pessoa está olhando uma grand calamidade - quer dizer uma conflagração - estão sempre três opções principais. Opção 1: Fugir, tanto longe e tanto rapido possível, e deixa eles que não podem correr para queimar. Opção 2: Escreve uma carta bem zangada para o editor de seu jornal mandando que as pessoas responsiveis sejam despedidos no defavor. Ou seja montar uma demonstração. Opção 3: Traz um balde de agua e joga no fogo, e se você não tem balde, traze um copo, e se você não tem copo, usa uma colher de chá - todo mundo tem uma colher de chá. E sim, eu sei que uma colher de chá é pequena e o fogo é imenso, mas nos somos milhões e cada um de nos tem colher de chá. Então eu gostaria estabelecer a Ordem da Colher de Chá. A gente que participam a minha atitude - não a atitude de fugir, nem a atitude da carta, mas a atitude de colher de chá - eu gostaria que eles usar uma pequena colher de chá na lapela de seus casacos, ate que sabemos que estamos no mesmo movimento, no mesmo fraternidade, na mesma irmandade, na mesma ordem, a Ordem da Colher de Chá. Isso é a minha filosofia resumidamente - ou mesmo numa colher de chá. |
If you don't know of these guys, it probably wouldn't hurt to find out a bit about 'em.Betinho said of himself, "Eu nasci para o desastre, porém com sorte." / "I was born to disaster - but with luck." Just look at the way he smiles beside his son Daniel. And - he was a dancin' man, yeah. It took more than haemophilia, tuberculosis, AIDS, to get this guy down. There is an album of photographs here.
There is lots of stuff on the Internet and in the library.Amos Oz fought in the Six Day War and was a founder of Peace Now. In particular I recommend his little book How to Cure a Fanatic.
Down.
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