suc·cess Pronunciation: s&k-'sesFunction: nounEtymology: Latin successus, from succedere1 obsolete : OUTCOME, RESULT2 a : degree or measure of succeeding b : favorable or desired outcome; also : the attainment of wealth, favor, or eminence3 : one that succeeds

I sometimes wish that I could have had some measure of success. A crown that I could hold high. See what I have done? See what I have accomplished? Instead, I am, and have been, only doing my best; and it all falls short. I could be a better friend, a better father, a better husband, a better this or that. I am suited to taoism. A hermit in the hills. I sometimes wish that I could escape away into obscurity. Become invisible to all that I have known and to all that have known me.
Isn't it interesting to note that I have made little to no mark upon the world? Isn't it interesting that one would aspire towards wanting to? When I am dead and gone, within a few years none will remember me. If I died and thousands remembered me, wherein would the difference lay?
So, is there really success or the lack therof?

Bathed in the sound of springtime peepers, he thought of the simplicity of love and the complication of life.
O' that things could be made simple.
Breathing in the heat of a mid-summer night and gazing at the moon and stars, he thought of the embrace, the entanglement, the spent energy of lovers.
O' that things could be made that simple.
The wind and colors, the cleanliness of autumn air, he thought of the passage of time and yearned for that exchange of Yin for Yang, Yang for Yin; his heart beat faster.
O' that things could be made that simple.
The winter snow, the absense of an open fire, no sustanance, an empty hearth. He is slowly dying.
O' that things could be made that simple.

The Dingo and the Meatstick

We have custody of the Meatstick (on the left) every other weekend. Watching her personality grow as it only can with a 2 1/2 yr old, is fun. Compound that with the Dingo, (on the right, duh!) and the fun is more than doubled. The Dingo is my oldest daughter's girl and is 1 1/2. The Dingo is the one that hit 911 in a very random order and had the police at my door.
One of the greatest truisms ever uttered is, "Having Grandchildren is so much fun. You get to love and spoil them and then send them home when you're done".

I am so god damned depressed,

the wick is trimmed;

the light fades...

Tacet,

Tu ne cede malis sed contra audentior ito.

Namaste....

In the out door?

Life is simple when we deal with absolutes. Our religion is well packaged. Our role within society is understood. Everyone and everything in its place. No grey areas to contend with.
During WWII, the enemy was clearly defined. The horrors of war were quickly forgotton as the American dream took the total focus of the returning veterans. Working full time jobs, sometimes two and three jobs at a time, buying a house, having kids.
Things slowly began to change after the US entered Korea. Militarily and politically, grey areas began to surface. Communism was faceless. The cold war difficult to define.
With the assassination of an American President in 1963 and the commitment to hold back the communists from entering South Vietnam, our resolve weakened and everything was questioned. Religion, our political leaders, our involvment in southeast Asia, our individual roles as whites, blacks, labor, corporations, environment....
While the modern conservative movement might blame this seemingly chaotic, unstructured mess on the liberal movement and their hold on the American universities and modern media, those who hold the power in America truely relish the state of things. It makes it easier to pick our pockets, send our kids to war, and be held accountable by no one.
We Have Become What Our American Founding Fathers Most Feared.

Of all the enemies to public liberty, war is perhaps the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.

I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be.

The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that I wish it to be always kept alive.

If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.

If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest.


America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy.

A coward is much more exposed to quarrels than a man of spirit.

War...should only be declared by the authority of the people...instead of the government which is to reap its fruits.

"Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes. And armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended. Its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war . . . and in the degeneracy of manners and morals, engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
James Madison, April 20, 1795

http://www.vetsforjustice.com/

God Bless American's Veterans

http://www.bushflash.com/vets.html

coming home
betrayed _________
As for Jeremy Feldbusch, blinded in the war, his hometown of Blairsville, an old coal mining town of 3,600, held a parade for him, and the mayor honored him.
I thought of the blinded, armless, legless soldier in Dalton Trumbo's novel Johnny Got His Gun, who, lying on his hospital cot, unable to speak or hear, remembers when his hometown gave him a send-off, with speeches about fighting for liberty and democracy.
He finally learns how to communicate, by tapping Morse Code letters with his head, and asks the authorities to take him to schoolrooms everywhere, to show the children what war is like.
But they do not respond. "In one terrible moment he saw the whole thing," Trumbo writes. "They wanted only to forget him."
In a sense, the novel was asking, and now the returned veterans are asking, that we don't forget......from http://www.duckdaotsu.org/

My father, a WWII POW, had a deep seated resentment for portions of the military and government based on his view of what it was like to have suffered as a soldier and what you could expect in return for your service. In time, I found that his feelings were well shared. A WWII vet could immerse himself in having a family and in work. They distanced themselves from the war. In time, their minds allowed them the ability to remember the times of glory, the times of brotherhood. Everything else faded into black.
My cousin went off to Vietnam in pomp and circumstance. Joining the Marines. The future looked golden. He returned home and died in his early fifties after years of alcoholism. At his funeral it was stated that, "Bobby, died of Vietnam."
There are people that I know and respect that are now immersed in the military and politics of the "War on Terror." I blog with several. One young gal has just shipped off to basics with the guard. Another blindly (in my opinion) worships the ideology of Ann Coulter and refuses to talk with me.
The war to end all wars was as ficticious as the war on terrorism. The shell game of words. War appears endless in world history and we seek more reasons to prolong its place and reasons to join in the fight. And then, we too soon forget the veteran, the soldier. We fight for freedom. To spread democracy. Are we?
I would rather take up arms against my government than allow one of my sons to join this fight against terror. The terror is in my own back yard.

... 

I took a walk through
the woods nearby.
Although littered,
marked and scarred,
beauty presented
to my trained eye.

... 

... 

... 

... 

Larger bubbles 

Gnawing, gnawing, gnawing,
at the perception
of myself.
If I do this;
I will improve.
If I do this;
I will be somebody.
I have to achieve,
believe,
concieve of a me
that is better
than the man I am.

.....Does the crow live in this way?

.....Does the fish look to grow legs?

Nay, but they are not human, you say.
It is we who have the burden, the need to
improve, to grow, to attain.

But I say, that is a misrepresentation
pointed at by the prophets and sages,
and too often the pointing finger has been
mistaken for the moon,
the river, once crossed, has us
leaving the canoe on the bank.
How often is the river crossed
and the canoe blinds our view
because we unwittingly refuse
to drop it.

Be still.
Watch.
Judge not.
Practice.
Be still.
Watch.
Judge not.
Practice.

Doctrines, scriptures, sutras, essays, are not to be regarded as systems to be followed. They merely contribute to understanding. They should be for us a source of stimulation, and nothing more... Adopted, rather than used as a stimulus, they are a hindrance.

True Enlightenment, as experienced by the Buddha and transmitted through the patriarchs, is independent of verbal explanations, including the record of the Buddha's teachings (i.e., scriptures) and later doctrinal elaborations.

Apples in the night, exchanging glances