8.30.2021
Me. You? What now? "I also thought: Mea culpa. For those past two decades, I’d prospered and thrived in the new political economy. And unharmed by automation or globalization or the new social contract, I’d effectively ignored the fact that the majority of my fellow Americans weren’t prospering or thriving....
That's James. "Highly empathic people process familiar music with greater involvement of the brain’s social circuitry, such as the areas activated when feeling empathy for others. They also seem to experience a greater degree of pleasure in listening, as indicated by increased activation of the reward system. “This may indicate that music is being perceived weakly as a kind of social entity, as an imagined or virtual human presence,” Wallmark said.....
But only billionaires, correct, middle-class? "In 2012, Piff’s then-colleagues Michael Kraus and Jennifer Stellar hooked volunteers up to ECG machines and showed them two short videos: a “neutral” video of a woman explaining how to construct a patio wall and a “compassion” video of children receiving chemotherapy treatments for cancer. Relative to the wealthier participants, the poorer ones not only reported feeling greater compassion for the kids but also exhibited a significantly larger slowdown in heart rate from one video to the next. If affluent people are less moved by the suffering of others, they should be less likely to help those in need, and this too seems to be true both in the lab and outside it....
I've always seen and hated this about we non-poor. I still do. More than ever. Kills them. It kills us.
8.28.2021
I really don't know love at all... Joni Mitchell?
The Epitaph on our species, and on virtually all of us.
And even the one in a million of us that have been loved probably don't know it. Unless we are unconditionally loved and feel it from our first days, as I was by my father, we can't know love.
Daisy in The Great Gatsby.
Jesus loved us, but we don't know it despite all the singing.
It's life's Illusions I recall. Yes, all of us have the illusion We've Been Loved, that we are loved. Not I, except by my father. A curse, the divine blessing.
8.25.2021
8.24.2021
A fellow I know mentioned that he is soon going to have a child....
Some very thoughtful and well-intended individuals think that we can only become, or we are most likely to become, full human beings when we take responsibility for the life of the child. In my own case there's much truth to this oh, that is the things I'm glad of in my character probably would not have happened had I not had two biological offspring. In our horrible culture it is more likely that that responsibility will bring out the worst in us. But if we take great care it may do the former. It has always been true that the choice before us that we refuse to see but the choice before us each individual is to live a life of pleasure safety material well-being, or, or, or, a life with joy which allows the former to be at riak and is willing to pay that price for Joy, forgetting self and serving others. What has not been true until now is that every child virtually now faces material hell where the old choice of Happiness safety and comfort material wealth is no more. So it is only those children by luck and or good parenting that have their taste for loving service of others for joy nurtured that will have a life worth living. Hugs.
8.23.2021
8.22.2021
8.21.2021
8.17.2021
8.15.2021
As good a place to die as any. Better than most. Sometimes Sol and I get really really really really lucky.
Click photo for detail.
As near as I could tell from Google Maps there were no houses on this dirt road. About an hour after being here car drove by. Half an hour later a young woman with her three dogs appeared oh, Karen. If you need anything we are in a house a mile up the road, don't hesitate to come up. Oh my goodness what a nice Soul. Stay as long as you want! We had a lovely chat. I expect we'll be gone in the morning. Magnificent place. Extreme difficulty, pain, in walking, after being beaten to a pulp by Katahdin several days ago. But we can cycle. The mission goes on.
I have few regrets, but not telling this man thanks years ago is one.
He was the gym teacher in middle school and track coach in high school and he was always decent to me and that made all the difference period
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