mermaidcamp
Keeping current in wellness, in and out of the water
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As Above, so Below-the Border
December 24, 2012
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How irresistible is untaxed profit? So magnetic that a Border Patrol agent just was stupid enough to load a large shipment of dirt weed into to his migramobile for transport right next to the border recently. I live in Tucson, in the slipstream of untaxed profit provided by the border. It feels to me like the economy that transpires outside the law, under the table, is much greater than legal business in my state. We are so damn fast, furious, heavily armed, and racist that anything can and does happen. South of the border, down Mexico way, kingpins of crime created a much stronger economy than the local legal economy. They now have their own saint which is a sure sign that they are in control. The border itself offers them the risk reward system of illegal commerce that increases their power and wealth. Sure, they have guns (supplied by us), but they only enforce their special jurisdiction with guns. If they had no economy based on smuggling they would have no power in Mexico or the US, thus no need for a saint.
- The closer to the border, the higher the risk/reward.
- The closer to the border, the more violent the scene
- The closer to the border, the higher the pay for crime
- The closer to the border, the higher the bribes
At the border everything is exponentially magnified and all the cops are criminals, all the sinners saints. Stakes are high and the dominant criminal precedent has been set in place forever. Smuggling pays well, and pays law enforcement the highest salaries, one would imagine. The fence that was built to solve our bizzillion border issues has magnetized them. The pay is now higher to break laws at the border, and the violence much greater. Every pendejo who loves lawlessness is attracted to the Arizona/Sonora border. Why? It is simple. The pinche-punk criminals flock to both sides of the border because the border itself is pura pendejada. The migra doesn’t even have a saint. How pathetic is that?
What Would My Ancestors Do?
December 23, 2012
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Sears Cemetery, Barnstable
You do not need to hold a seance to contact the spirits of the dead. You can use a few facts, or many facts if you have them, to query your ancestors. These are not fictional characters of history, but your DNA connection to the past. The novels you have read in your life can not possibly match the drama of the story of your particular historical survival. Your ancestors handed down to you an ethical will. Those who left no written document have nonetheless passed values to the future, with less precision. You are now actively creating the history and the ethics you want to survive in the world.
I started to study my ancestry to learn about the ethical will of my people, whoever they were. My mother had never described her family in any racial terms. I was taught that the Taylors were, in no uncertain terms, Confederate Rebels. My mother, Ruby Taylor’s very large family all lived in Texas. They were involved in religion to a much greater degree than our family living in Pittsburgh. The went to church at least three times a week, including Wednesday. They did a bit of holy rolling and other practices foreign to me. Indeed, my great grandfather Taylor fought in the civil war and received a Confederate pension in Texas in his old age. He was a farmer and preacher in the Church of Christ. This story was the known history of the Taylor tribe, and even this information was never retold to the Taylors of the 1960’s.
What nobody knew at the Taylor family reunion in Houston on the 4th of July each year in the 1960’s was that our Taylor forefather and his wife’s uncle had been burned at the stake as Protestant martyrs in England. Now that is what I call a Rebel. The roots of each family feed the ethical expression (also known as fruit) of the family spirit. The tongue speaking, chicken frying Taylors of Humble/Houston all shared a particular extreme view of the Bible that freaked me out when I was young. The Pentecostal experience, when I was exposed to it, frightened me. Now that I know about the stake burning it all makes perfect sense.
My forefathers and mothers in the grave yard pictured above lived in Holland, then sailed to Plymouth to build a shining city on a hill, creating a strong, complex ethical will. They had a lot to say about the way they thought all cosmology worked in harmony with government. They had strong convictions by which they lived and died. Now that I know more about the lives of these elders in my tribe I have a greater responsibility. I can no longer look at Thanksgiving as a bunch of stuffing. I need to discover the meaning of the Puritan Ethic they created. The values they held are more significant than the physical goods they once owned in old Cape Cod.
On the surface they all seem to use the Bible as an excuse for their own human folly. Just under the surface is the fact that humans have always indulged in folly to learn the folly of our ways. What did they learn? How can we acquire wisdom from their knowledge?
Drugs, Guns, and Risk
December 22, 2012
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If Mr. McMurphy doesn’t want to take his medication orally, I’m sure we can arrange that he can have it some other way. But I don’t think that he would like it.-Nurse Ratched
The shadow America does not want to face is our mental health system. Mental health treatment has been a barbaric system of emergency drug administration with no hope for cure. My parents could afford the best available when they needed help in their last years. The problem was finding any ethical and effective treatment for them. Everyone was ready to charge big bucks, but nobody had any real therapy (or even care) for the patient. They had unlimited access to all drugs, but no access to careful diagnosis or medical ethics. When I volunteered for the VA my Vet was long-term suicidal, and there was no available help for him either. I am sure there are some quality programs somewhere, but before going out and spending twice as much money giving people twice as many drugs, why not evaluate the efficacy of the treatments used now? I am going out on a limb and say our neighborhood system of mental health treatment is damaging to all concerned. Random pharmaceutical drug use is not healthy, mentally or physically.
In my neighborhood, here in central Tucson, where you can virtually buy drugs in the middle of the street and there is probably a weapons concierge who will bring a selection of guns to your house for purchase, a 6-year-old was found with a loaded gun in has backpack at school. His dad was arrested for an old felony charge so the kid who said he did not know how the gun got into his backpack is now probably a foster kid while his father serves time. This is the reality for the youth here, and they may or may not know how the gun got there, but they know it will not be the last gun they will see. This deep, sociological, complex problem will be resolved by government programs with an arsenal of pills. Is that, in any way, believable?
We also have a very large mental health center available to the public and funded by Medicare. It is close to a public bus stop with a convenience store on the corner. People from all over the city can come, buy enough alcohol to be over the limit, and be admitted for the night to the mental health clinic. If they are not at the limit, they simply walk back to the store and buy another pint of liquor. They will be given prescription drugs as a result of the entry to the clinic which they can sell right there in my neighborhood. The clinic is supposed to make sure that the patients leave the area, but of course there is no way to enforce that rule. So the patients are released to repeat the cycle. Spending twice as much money on this will create at least twice the insanity and grow creepy petty crime around here. It is a risk to continue to pretend we are treating mental illness or Vet suicide. Money spent on this denial while asking for more funding is running from the reality that systems profit from status quo, and not from change. We need fundamental change, comprehensive. Stopping the madness will involve stopping the flow of drugs as a substitute for therapy. This is a war on drugs worth fighting and well within our power.
Much Ado About Satan
December 21, 2012
I believe that the South Park gay Satan may be the strongest projection of our collective image of evil outside of ourselves. While Rocky’s Fearless Leader worked for the cold war, gay Satan breaking up with Saddam Hussein is the right farce for now (ridiculous). Of course the U S Marines were grateful to have the footage to force gay Saddam to watch his South Park episodes. (Semper Fi). If somehow you were captured by Marines in your dreams, which episode of South Park would they force you to watch?
I admire the ability to use irony as torture. John McCain has data that proves torture by old fashioned methods did not yield useful information. John McCain is my own state’s expert on torture, as he ably demonstrated with his own ironic choice of running mates. Our intelligence community, as they are known, often think outside the intelligence. If you meet them please have some courtesy, have some sympathy, have some taste.
Event Planning: End of the World for Americans
December 19, 2012
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The American Dream of EOW is like all things in our world. It ironically stars Charlton Heston as the celebrity Head Horseman of the Appocalypse. All attention is given to sets, costumes, and rehearsals. While wildly distracted with what you will be wearing to Armegeddon you completely ignored the fact that the Anti Christ is your banker. You failed to see the signs of impending doom even when the horses of the Appocolypse thundered down Wall Street, veered off to the Jersey Shore, then set up a camp in Connecticutt. Denial cum negligence.
Notice that the Catholic Church, blazing a trail into excellent customer service for those who desire express service at this important time , has set up the @Pontifex twitter account. The NRA, a religious institution of massive power in the US, is taking a look at being open to the idea (a vitriolic debate about) of banning assault weapons for casual use. Congress is redesigning itself as a newly reborn baby dysfunction, while the world knows the political power in Washington resides on K street, so it hardly matters who goes to Capitol Hill. There is not even a flimsy disguise of that fact.
The folly in all of this is that it is based on not only ignoring reality (the negligence part), but also on the belief that human beings will cast, costume, write, direct, and produce the EOW. Ask your local Jehovah’s Witness. They can tell you, as they have been, what the Bible says about this particular subject. It is their specialty. They have a boutique religion for EOW, preparing all the Witnesses for the eventual probability that they will not even be in the rapture group. If the EOW is handled with the style and grace to which my fellow Americans have become accustomed, the USA will truly miss a once in a lifetime opportunity to go out representing liberty and justice for all.
Just as a hypothetical question, what are you planning to wear? The Swiss have practical advice. They say that the last suit has no pockets. They mean that you will not be taking your CHF to the rapture, because a new kind of value will be established that is superior even to Swiss Francs. Imagine that. The guys below are not only well dressed, but they have a full explanation for everything. This is the special season in which we can ask not,” Are you ready for Christmas?”, but “Are you ready to meet your maker?”
All God’s Children Got Shoes
December 18, 2012
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This song has been going around in my head as I focus on my goal for 2013. I plan to convince Tony Hseih that Floatli is the perfect official company sport of Zappos, so he will want to market it with me. Normally they take already developed products being sold elsewhere and market them. I want the Zapsters to partner me to refine and package it to perfection with me as well. What I can offer is an international trademark on the name Floatli, my expertise, and a fun versatile product that works for sports as well as therapy and training. It is a perfect match for Lake Mead, or the inevitable pool for employees downtown that will be in the future. When I visited them I was really happy to know they can pull off such a pure and direct match between the core values and the results. Floatli also works from the core, and is fun. I came within a few yards of Tony as I was leaving in my Zappos shuttle back to Vegas. I had a giant urge to blurt out my intentions, but I thought better of it. Now I have thought about it, and I am clear. I want to Zap, and believe I can convince the Zappsters of the merit of Zapping with Floatli. We will work this from the ground up, starting with the most important of all things, shoes. Once I know which shoes to wear, then I will enumerate the core values and how we align perfectly, fluidly, and even geographically. Yo, Tony, I am going to convince you, and you will like it. I want to Zap with you for the benefit of ALL the sentient beings. Resistance may not be futile, but Floatli is a lot more fun (one of our mutual core values).
He’s Got Shoes
Redefining Wealth
December 17, 2012
— 3 Comments
If you have a mortgage on your home chances are good that a redefinition of your family’s wealth has swept through your reality. To evaluate risk you might have made the assessment that your home was a good investment. You might have accepted that without question and without comparison to liquid investments. You might have purchased your home during the wild and crazy time when the banks were riding high on the fake valuation they gave your home. You might have thought, like the banks did, that there would never be any reckoning for this obvious inflation of the truth. This harsh reality may feel like a purposeful fraud that was executed on you without your participation. The question to ask is ” Did I convince the bank I could afford this, or did the bank convince me?” It does not matter.
What will make a meaningful difference is learning discernment from this kind of tragic error. The Elephant and Donkey Show is now at the point of considering taxing more heavily citizens of the US who make more than a million bucks a year. I am so all over that if they tax the living daylights out of that group, and actually take their immunity through loophole out of the game. While the world watches America is hosting an epidemic of poverty and lawlessness that make some people believe the anti Christ is the American Dream. Since Viet Nam the US has been sporting bravado rather than ethics. Being the greatest country in the world does not involve more spin and PR than real greatness. It involves adding value and kindness to the world by educating and caring for your own citizens.
Super Sandra Day O’Satya, Defender of the Highest Law
December 16, 2012
— 2 Comments
Supreme Daily Show
I idealize and adore Sandra Day O’Connor, so it was not really a surprise to find her as a super hero in my dream last night. She was a super judge, which of course she is, but her super powers had expanded beyond the regular earthy ones. My visual recall of my dreams is still pretty crumby, but the ability to hold on the the basic story and characters is improving. She could swoop in like Mighty Mouse or Batman. She wore fashionable street clothes, not the robe, but did have one of the little collar thingys they wear. She had those same piercing baby blue eyes that had a spectrum of vision that showed her where the rule of law was being abused by the cranky pants people.
The cranky group was diverse and included cops and judges along with regular angry bird citizens (the one’s we think might shoot somebody). The judge archetype seeks to balance justice and compassion. The shadow judge manifests as destructive criticism, judging without compassion, as misuse of legal authority, or threatening others through association with the law. Sandra Day was angelic and gave darshan and peace to the cranky panted ones. She had a clarity about her, as one might expect from cross between a real life Supreme and my dream judge/ justice avenger. She restored order like Jesus healed the sick. She had no props, no wand, no sleigh, just the truth. She was so brilliant that she enlightened the darkness in all the hearts she touched. What she did have in common with Santa was a need to keep moving because there was so much clarity, justice, and compassion to be distributed to all the good little girls and boys. By applying exactly the same fair and equal treatment to all the bad little girls and boys she proved that she was so beyond Supreme.
In real life Sandra Day and I are both Arizona hotties, although she is a Phoenician. She is co chair of an institute to foster civility in Tucson at the U of A. Her reputation for civility is epic, not that unlike my dream Super Supreme Sandra. Her favorite poem in real life tells her secret to Supremehood ( and SuperSupremehood):
Sometime when you’re feeling important;
Sometime when your ego’s in bloom
Sometime when you take it for granted
You’re the best qualified in the room,
Sometime when you feel that your going
Would leave an unfillable hole,
Just follow these simple instructions
And see how they humble your soul;
Take a bucket and fill it with water,
Put your hand in it up to the wrist,
Pull it out and the hole that’s remaining
Is a measure of how you will be missed.
You can splash all you wish when you enter,
You may stir up the water galore,
But stop and you’ll find that in no time
It looks quite the same as before.
The moral of this quaint example
Is do just the best that you can,
Be proud of yourself but remember,
There’s no indispensable man.
[Saxon N. White Kessinger, There is No Indispensable Man (1959).]
How simple. These instructions, followed regularly can easily lead to civil discourse. This Supreme’s got SOUL. Let us all wish her luck on her nocturnal flights through the universe. Hi- Ho, SuperSandra, away. Let’s assume that this poem is the gift she wants us all to use while she is busy fighting injustice.
You better not
Intuition, Archetypes, Ancestors
December 15, 2012
Historical enemies, sagas of war, and the tragic impact violent thoughts have on society today are harsh reminders of human disorder. We can not look back to find a perfect time in history or a completely noble story of our ancestors’ survival. The mixed bag has always existed, known and unknown, true and false. When evil rocks the world we are all quick to isolate culprits and round up perps in our own minds. It does not matter which demon we blame, even if we never mention it out loud. The very act of deciding who is to blame will be a process to eliminate knowledge of one’s own part in building a more hateful world. The question of the moment is “Who started this?”, but we all know intuitively the answer to that eternal question.
The prostitute archetype in each of our dramas will test and be tested to discover ethics and limits. The question will be answered in this lifetime about how blind you are to others in order to enhance your own comfort. This story will star your prostitute archetype. Your storyboard will be repeated in different costumes and sets until the line has been firmly established between your soul and what you are willing to do for physical comfort. You may find it is an opera one time and a comedy the next, but if you look back you can identify the segments like vignettes on the Twilight Zone. You created and produced these stories to find your limits. Your own unconscious mind has written, directed, and been in charge of casting the stars. There are sometimes entire decades of reruns. I feel that our nation has been rerunning an unfortunate version of our best selves with less than admirable results.
One meaningful action we all can take is prayer and meditation, to the best of our training and ability. Palestrina’s Requiem for 5 Voices may be helpful. Pax vobiscum.
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