Main Street

America began on Main Street. We live on Main Street. It is the place of our hopes and dreams. Our neighbors are known and we love them. We welcome the newcomers. We honor the people that lived here before we arrived. Main Street is felt inside our homes and lived outside our homes.

We are Main Street. We live beyond our fences and yours. We share our stuff because if you need it and we have it that is the right thing to do. We might ask for a cup of sugar but that is only temporary and you can have a piece of our cake when it is ready.

Main Street is the solution. Main Street knows Wall Street better because Wall Street moved away and decided to make their own street. A Street without sharing or even caring. Main Street knows Washington and knows it is broken. Washington can’t keep its own house in order and wants us to live in fear of how broken they are. They want to carry their message to the world……….and they are. The message that Washington IS NOT Main Street. They can wrap it in a flag, salute it, cluster bomb it across the globe, and it is still wrong. We are not conquerors. We are not about war.

Main Street is about peace. We live and let live. We may think our neighbors are a bit weird at times……we may even think them wrong at times. They are still our neighbors. Wall Street wants their money. Washington wants their respect. We want them happy and at peace. We want to smile when we see them headed to worship and have them smile when they see us being whatever the hell we are.

America began on Main Street. That is where it will rise again from the ashes of this shit storm of fear and nothingness that Washington and Wall Street are spreading across the world and right into our back yard.

We are stronger than darkness, fear, and hate. We will survive. We will make things right. We are Main Street….a place where dreams are born and lived. Welcome to the neighborhood.

You are my neighbor and I love you. I am Main Street. So are you.

Mabon 3

Mabon is a time of artistry. Dashes of colors as parts of nature go to rest, soon to be tucked in a blanket of white. Smells of fruits and fires carried on crisp winds that nip the noses that drink in the aroma. Reflections of times ago as cycles circle again and prepare for the long journey to the next time of balance.

Random Effective

Counter movements bussing a new schooling.

Snap shots into the crowd hoping for change.

Black and White faces pictured in despair.

Outspoken ones openly targeted by sneaks and creeps.

Fingers pointed towards barrels shooting death.

Jesses, Jackies, and Juans witnessed Martin’s, Bobby’s, and John’s.

Family baptized in the reflecting pool of shared dreams.

Speaker Preachers teaching new reaches.

Rainbows purpled hazed with rosy colored granny glasses.

Looters and shooters and bashers and thrashers.

Flowers bulleted into student bodies.

Malcolm ex-ed while Mississippi burned.

Mother, May I take one small step closer to I am a man?

Winds of Change blew our long beautiful hair away.

Something a long time coming is happening here.

Mabon 2

Love is to value and protect. Look to Gaia and understand the love and what happens when love is not there. Look to each other in love for the truest definition offers the broadest rays of hope. Hope that loves becomes more than hearts and flowers. Hope that love transcends selfishness and greed. Hope that love is not just taken but given in return.

Mabon offers that hope for the time of balance is here. Day and Night are equal. The Sun God goes to rest. This is the time of Thanksgiving for all that Gaia gives and all that Gaia is. Love each other. Value and protect each other. See the life that is the very ground you walk upon and then look forth into the heavens and see the life that is there as well. Linked as sure as limbs to torso.

Mabon is the time of balance. Seeking it. Living it. Giving it. Keeping it. Not an act. Balance as a way of life. Take what you need. Give what you can. See the linkage that makes us as one.

Disagree Able

(Another piece from that still in-work "Reports from the Frontal Lobe".)

It’s okay to disagree. You might not agree with me but that is the point since it is perfectly alright. Disagree to your hearts content. I disagree with some of the best. Disagreement helps me understand. I disagreed with the Dali Lama today. The Dali Freaking Lama. How is that for balls? Disagree with the Dali Lama? Yep. Today. Read something he said about countermeasures, surprised me that word was even in his vocabulary. Helped me see the Dali Lama in even a greater light. He is human. Just like all of us. Loved that I disagreed with something he said because, well, because I am like that.

Disagreed with Elvis. On some of his song choices and life choices. He is the single biggest influence on my love of music and evidence of how much each one of us can mean to so many others…….and he sang some shit. He made it all sound good but come on, Elvis. You made some shit choices on songs. “Old McDonald?” “The Wiffenpoof Song”? “Sign of the Zodiac”? “Queenie Wahine’s Papaya”? A voice like that used on such crap? Yeh, I even disagree with the King.

Disagreement just means we see some thing differently. I like honoring other’s point of view even when they are so different than mine. Like honoring their choices even if I think they are wrong. My choices are my choices and some of them have been wrong. Gloriously wrong. Spectacularly wrong. Choices I made and live with….and learned from and honor. After all, I am human and I get stuff wrong at times. Just like all of us do. Even the very best of us. Even Elvis. Even the Dali Lama. If we think someone is flawless, we discount their human experience. If we think we are flawless, that is our greatest flaw. Gosh, I love irony. You might not. That is alright. That is how this how piece started……disagree to your heart’s content. Does not threaten me. Maybe that is why we have four cheeks…more time to turn away and ignore the disagreement.

Turning the other cheek takes strength. Doesn’t mean you won’t kick someone’s ass if you need to kick it. Just means you turned the other cheek.

Mabon 1

Harvest comes in many forms. Seeds planted long ago sprout in seemingly random places and ways. Little blossoms of abundance surface for that is the way of Mabon. See the flow of the harvest and connect back to the time the seeds were sown for the sowing will be necessary again when harvest is stored and shared.

Mabon is more than just harvest just as harvest is more that just harvest. Mabon is reward for work done long ago. Some seeds harvested exactly as expected in the places expected. Others harvested after thought thrown to the winds in waste. Any seeds given to any with good intent will harvest. From other directions perhaps but the harvest comes for the seed was sown well and freely. See the trickle now. Prepare for three fold and three fold that. Mabon Magick. Earned not just given.

Mabon

The shift to the dark and the cold. Harvesting what was planted to sustain us through the season ahead. Mabon touches some as a time of dying and assures others of the circle of life. It is the time to prepare for what is known will challenge and even isolate…and enter that time when sharing is sweeter and warmth comes from deep in the soul. We taste the movement of our own time as dark and light switch their balance. This is the season where some mourn what passes and others celebrate what comes. Light has provided and will return. Cold comes and will nip for as long as it can. All things needed to move the circle again to where the circle goes. Mabon comes round. Gather up what you have harvested and light the fires of home.

Lammas 31

The joy of the now and the bliss seen ahead is exactly as promised. This is not a dream. This is not an illusion. This is the new reality. This is tribe and herd linked to the SOURCE and moving to what has been there all along. What comes is indeed what was long ago but even better. Reunions are sweeter than first meetings. Hands reach out to welcome. Thoughts reach across time and space to say hurry home. Soon, the waiting will be over. The difference is that this is not a trip that is to a destination. It is a trip that is a bridge itself. Not just blazing the trail homeward but marking it for all to see that are shown how to look again.

The threshold is here. The bride will not be carried across but walk through on her own with those she loves in tow. The bride is not just a bride. She is they and they are tribe.

Lammas 30

The abundance will come in many ways. What is right and intended will happen quickly once faith and trust fuel the drive. It will seem at times that things take on a life of their own. It will seem as if moving too fast since many will struggle to keep up with a timeline that rockets to completion. Let the flow go freely and be open to all that comes. Some that come will not truly come at all but will open doors needed to be at the right place when the time of completion draws nears. The sources will surprise you. Look not at eyes that see other purposes as wrong but as means. The tribe is of the SOURCE and the outcome will be determined by the SOURCE.

Lammas 29

Change is as the whirlwind as all that was is scattered. Some things are bashed and broken. Some survive the change and show their sturdy construction. All are changed. See not the disarray. See the opportunity presented to purge, replace, reorganize, and streamline. See the new order. See the improvements that can be.

The whirlwind is not alone. Change is a world of whirlwinds. Plan for that and the whirlwind dances through what is yours with welcome for the path is cleared and ready. Leaves dance and objects fly while you and yours watch from the safety of tribe and herd.

Lammas 28

Seek not the answer for there is no such thing. There is An answer. An answer that is exactly right to the question that must be answered to complete each. An answer that is exactly the key to unlock the door that bars your progress. There is An answer. Seek it and it shall be yours. It shall be yours again when you discover the next question and the next.

Many seek the answer. This is folly for those that do because when they think they have found it, they settle and journey no more. They establish routine and ritual around the answer. They begin to die for growth is no more. They find the answer and stop asking. In fact, they discourage questioning from any who fail to see the answer as they do.

Truth Shared

(Another piece from the in-work "Reports from the Frontal Lobe".)

Just because you can, does not mean you should. I am a writer. I share my truth. Speak it from a place that shows my ups and downs and the straights and narrows along the way. It is what I do. I write. What you see is what you get. I am a writer and my words are true. Whored and exposed fully for the world to see. Blemishes and all.

Practice makes perfect. Perfect is far from truth. Truth is flawed. Truth is human. Truth screws up sometime. It spits forth in righteous indignation. It flies forth from the heat of anger. It releases pain only to inflict it elsewhere. Biting the tongue in fear is the pain of weakness. Biting the tongue in love is the pain of strength. Sometimes that bites. Bites hard and long and deep. Jams that righteous indignation right up the asshole that almost let it rule his mouth. Sometimes the truth hurts even when unspoken. Sometimes that pain is right.

So I learn to balance. The tight rope act of showing my pain without sharing it. A place where I am seen and heard and even felt. Where sharing my truth lightens others’ burdens. Compassionate passion. Tempered steel of my own resolve. Righteous dignity. Brave enough to speak it. Wise enough to keep it. Strong enough to share my words and man enough to eat them sometimes and digest my own shit rather than fling it on the walls of the world and stink up the place. Sometimes right is wrong and that ain’t right even when it is true.

I feel pain, know pain, show pain, and can be a pain. My truth is on the other side of my pain. Speaking while in my pain is a weakness to me. Truth is on the other side of pain. Speaking of the pain when in the pain can be a pain. Denying the pain when in the pain only increases the pain. So I suffer in silence, not denial. Sometimes the right words are words that wait. Sometimes the truth needs patience as the patient heals from the battles of being human.

My pen is my sword. I am armed to the teeth with words. A mighty warrior for truth on the front lines of life. A Ninja with a keyboard. My words can slice. Inside and out. I am also a Sensei…responsible for my words. Sometimes I need to just shut up. That’s the truth.

Lammas 27

Finishing work approaches on many long overdue and much needed changes. Lammas moves to closure with projects well underway and close to completion. Projects that, now seen as much closer to what they will be, changed things totally. As if completely new. Remnants of the old even difficult to see unless you look very close. The work honored the past but prepared for the future. Finish it well and then keep it well. It is like new and that will impress all that see it.

Weema Wept

(Another piece from the in-work "Reports from the Frontal Lobe". Little trips through the mindfield that is my inner self.)

Pop goes our Jesus.

Crossing the road.

Playing chicken on dem bones.

Hambone, Hambone, have you heard?

Heard the news tonight.

Bad moon rising.

Rising star.

Rising to the occasion.

Rose by any other name.

Thorny issues from good books masking bad men with itchy fingers and dirty minds.

Touching without feeling, feeling up, and pushing down.

Denial.

Press conference to address the issues.

Stamp your feet.

Postage due.

Do not bend, fold, or mutilate.

Spindle me this, my inquisitive friend.

Who pays the piper when the piper blows smoke up your ass?

Ring me up for church on Sunday.

Cock a doodle did.

For whom does the bell toll?

Ding Dong.

Avon calling.

No ticky-no shirty.

Ring around the collars.

Pay as you exit.

No need to panic.

Move along, folks.

Show’s over.

The next service will be somewhere else.

Coming to a theater near you.

See you soon.

Save me a seat.

Let’s wait for the DVD.

Someone said something about it but I will judge for myself.

Here comes the judge.

Supreme pizzas and supreme courts.

Hot peppers and hot topics.

Under them robes are more robes.

Under the underrobes is something that should be behind the curtain.

In a box.

Big deal.

A really big deal.

Put that in Double Jeopardy, place your bets, give me the hard ways, and cover the horn.

Ain’t that one hell of a tune?

I can name that tune in Cliff Notes.

Cheat sheets.

Cheating death.

Death and taxes.

Render unto Caesar.

God only knows.

Come up and see me some time.

Pop in any time.

This is where I came in.

Shimmy, shimmy, coco puff.

Shimmy, shimmy now.

Now is the time for all good men.

That’s the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth so help me whatever your name really is.

My god is bigger than your god but I still have a hard time dotting the i.

Crosses are T’s.

Tea for two.

At three.

For three.

Thirty-Three and a third.

Maybe a fifth.

No more than a quart.

Is that a deposit bottle?

Do they still make those?

No Deposit, No Return.

Look who’s back.

Surprise.

Hi there, Pop.

Fool on the Hill.

Sees the world spinning round.

Round, Round, Get around, I get Around.

Gather round, boys and girls.

Pop goes our Jesus.

Unknowing

(Another piece from the in-work "Reports from the Frontal Lobe". Written a while ago......still true.)

I am deeper into my unknowing. On strike against what I was. Monkeys don’t need metaphors. As a primate of some order in what used to the chaos of my own creation, metaphors smell a bit different. Perhaps it’s all the bullshit I used to buy and eat and work to have more of. It oozes from my pores and stinks up my metaphors. The world reeks of it right now. My world. This brave new world where I am a stranger in a strange land just off the map of all I knew. New smells. The decay of the old stinks and the decomposition is fertile. Something blossoms as the flash bulbs flash forward through what I pictured as truth. Flowers smell better once we stop flinging bullshit in our own backyard. I am on strike against my own bullshit.

The strike is really easy. Question everything. Slow as all get out but it works for me. Question everything. Everything I did, knew, learned, and lived. Question everything that ever was. Question everything I do. Each turn of the key each time I even sit behind the wheel of the last of my herd of noble chariot beasts. Must I drive? What’s the cost? Where did all this come from? Why not walk? Why not just not go? Why today? What’s it all about, Alfie? Was Alfie really Mad? Did Alfie really look like that freaky guy on the wall of the Palace in Asbury Park all those years ago? Do I need to drive. What drives me to drive? What drove me to drink? What feeds my soul? What pops my cork? What drives me to even think I am in the driver’s seat or even have to be? Maybe writing about Alfie is more important than whatever I am about to do when I turn this key. Maybe? Why not? Why not now? If not now, when? Now. Now, now. There, There. There will wait. I am here now. Hear, hear. Hear me roar. What’s it all about, Alfie? I don’t know. I am unknowing and that is what it is all about.

Back away from the key slowly. Keep your hands where I can see them. Place them on the keyboard nice and slow. That’s it. Now talk. Talk. Don’t make me shine the light in your face. That is so 40s. So Avant guard. So new wave. So yesterday. Yesterday. Remember yesterday? Where were you between the time you first went to work and yesterday? Where were you? We have witnesses. Stand here and answer the following questions. We know who you are. We know what you did. What were you thinking?

What was I thinking? In the unknowing, I begin to understand what I did, what I was thinking, and what I am going to do about it. Right now, I am not going to do anything about it. I am just going to let it come. It will come when it is due. It will come when it is past due. Past due might be just right. Right on time. A stitch in time saves nine. A stitch ahead of time might be just the right thing. Just the right recipe. Just what the Doctor ordered. What’s up, Doc? Take two of your own pills and don’t call me in the morning. One pill makes you want them. Two pills makes you dumb. The one that Alice gives you, ain’t on the menu at all. So ask Alice if you wonder. Don’t ask me. I don’t know. This ain’t on schedule. It comes when it is time. It will be here when it is time. If I have to do time, I will do time. Time in on my side. Yes, it is. Time waits for no man. I wait for no man. I am on strike. Don’t wait for me. Don’t try to keep up. Don’t ask me. I don’t know. I just unknow right now and I unknow a lot more every day. That is the key to unknowing.

So I don’t turn that key, keep my finger off the button, and get ready to strike. To strike it rich because of my unknowing. Rich beyond anything that money can buy. Money can’t buy happiness. Want to know why? Cause happiness is free. Free as a bird. Naked and free and yours for the taking. Actually, it is yours for the having and for the giving. Money can’t buy happiness cause happiness can’t be sold. So I ain’t buying that bullshit any more. I am on strike. That much I know.

Lammas 26

Tribal energy draws more to it. The curious. The longing. The lonely. Those in tune and in search feel it more and more. A magnet that brings them from the darkness. Many will want to know. Answer all who do for within those that do are the tribe and the herd. Not all of them. The best. The truest. The most sincere. This is not an easy journey so many will choose not to take it. Leave them to themselves and forge ahead. Those that do will live in joy long overdue but now forever.

Lammas 25

Handle the abundance well. Ensure the many resources moved to you and yours are shared with all. The abundance is earned and moves to you now. Rule it. Control it. Monitor it. Invest it. Share it. All that moves to you is intended for use. Use determined by tribe. Use for the SOURCE. Be examples in this regard.

Lammas 24

Rally in the most trying times for the strength of tribe and herd will grow. When needed, harness the beasts and push them to exhaustion, tend them a bit, and then harness and work them even more. The beasts will see how hard tribe can push and will relish whip and crop. The beasts will sleep deeper and savor more each tending at hands that push them to help build bridges of hope and community.

Darkness fell. Sorrows drowned. Be the light in the way tribe and herd should and reach forth to help. Tribe will be more tribe as a result and the herd will be more herd as well.

Lammas 23

Be what you are naturally or you are not being natural. While this may sound easy, this ability is a gift. Those with this gift are what they are in all settings and play not to the crowd. They merely do things that should be done in the way they do them. They are open to change and to growth but not to doing things that feel unlike what they would do. Their pace is their pace. Their way is their way. They move with intuition and instinct.

Those linked to SOURCE and self will know they are being natural for anything unnatural to them feels wrong almost immediately. They take counsel. They seek advice. They listen to criticism. They adapt and change. They do not compromise self in the process. This makes them true. Not by choice. By nature. By ability. By birth.

Lammas 22

Claim what is yours and use it freely. The very usage is a joy and will draw others unto you. As tribe and herd wallow in the totality of their service, look to each other to embrace the totality of the SOURCE. There has been celebration but the fullest celebrations are to come. In unions of tribe to tribe and herd to herd and tribe to herd. Claim. Act. Rule. Live.

Lammas 21

Leadership of the strong is for special rulers. The strong must learn to follow. The strong move to leadership when there is no leadership and they mistake situational leadership for rule. These strong beings lead and begin to think they are not followers and could not be followers. This will challenge rulers for beasts that have roamed free are tough to corral and beasts that have roamed free and herd others are the toughest to move to pen and field.

The rulers know this and move with the wisdom of caution. Once moved to following though, the strong will be worth the investment many times over. There will be other followers as well for there are, and always have been, many followers. They are as special as the former leaders but in a special way. The former leaders will follow well once taught and then controlled. The former followers will see this change and be further awed by the rulers that made it so. Respecting still the former leaders but holding the rulers in even higher regard for their ability to harness the power of the strong. In following, their strength is enhanced and that will impress tribe as well as herd.

Lammas 21

Leadership of the strong is for special rulers. The strong must learn to follow. The strong move to leadership when there is no leadership and they mistake situational leadership for rule. These strong beings lead and begin to think they are not followers and could not be followers. This will challenge rulers for beasts that have roamed free are tough to corral and beasts that have roamed free and herd others are the toughest to move to pen and field.

The rulers know this and move with the wisdom of caution. Once moved to following though, the strong will be worth the investment many times over. There will be other followers as well for there are, and always have been, many followers. They are as special as the former leaders but in a special way. The former leaders will follow well once taught and then controlled. The former followers will see this change and be further awed by the rulers that made it so. Respecting still the former leaders but holding the rulers in even higher regard for their ability to harness the power of the strong. In following, their strength is enhanced and that will impress tribe as well as herd.

Burning Man Revisited

This time years ago I was in Black Rock City. A Burner was born thirteen moons times three ago. The nights found me in Center Camp, enjoying the flow. Recharging after a day of energy massages. A cup of coffee. Anticipating fresh cut French Fries from the big ketchup bottle. Just being. The conversations happened each night and each was special in its own way.

Black Rock City is felt again this year even though it is there and I am elsewhere. It calls to me. To celebrate where I was and where I am. Each time I try to embrace where I am not, it falls to the ground in uselessness. That feels nice. To know that place is in me all the time. It woke me at 3:30 and I traveled there for hours while the day was busy being born. It was a feel of what was there and the change there and in myself in the time since. The Burner moved for the City shines like the light that it is.

There were many special moments in Black Rock City. The ones that called to me this night are the ones between the day and sleep. After Center Camp and French fries and wandering. Along side the tent and by myself. In a chair, connecting to the moon and the movement that is that place that Burners know. That is what I felt now and feel more and more. When there, it was time to know there were lessons deep and rich and vital and more. Now, it is to know that lessons are lived. I felt their importance while in the energy of Burning Man. I understand their importance more with the energy of Burning Man within the changed male. To give of self and know that community balances the book of needs for all there. To include, share, accept, simplify, celebrate, and more. Lessons felt that night, lived this night, and honored all nights.

Others are there now. Each will be touched in their way. Each has the opportunity to rise from the fire of the Burn new and better. This night is my night to feel that and wish them newly forged truths. I am Burner, wherever I am.

Lammas 20

As tribe and herd form stronger bonds, things around that are not of tribe and herd are viewed differently. There is less connection to things that tribe and herd can not influence yet new hope to touch things in positive and long lasting ways when tribe and herd work in tandem. This is the essence of hope guided with insight. Things fall from the sky, bad people still do bad things, hopeless individuals live in sometimes not so quiet desperation, and events not within our grasp occur but you see clearly what you can and can not shape. That is insight. Hope is when you see the things that used to dishearten and frustrate and see that differences can be made on very large scales. This is the Power of tribe and herd. This is the Power of the SOURCE.

Lammas 19

Homecomings are sweet. Reunions are special. Family gives joy. The joy of these moments sustains in time of trouble and strife for the joy of these moments confirms the most essential strength for tribe and herd. The strength of union forged in the flames of trust. With family, there is knowledge and exposure in the comforts of connection since the bond of trust is pure. Each opens and shares and then opens and shares again. Shedding light into the deepest darkness. Healing light. Warming light. Embracing light.

Once found, even if thought lost or even if forgotten, embrace family and find self. For the energy of family is stronger than blood and spans time as well as space.