Honey bee!!!!!

Was down by the pool, reading and waiting for the laundry to finish in the wash so I could put it in the dryer. Your brother came home from basket ball, his t-shirt smattered with the asphalt carried up from the ground by the basket ball. Sounded like he had a good time, despite him, Alexi and Josh getting schooled by middle schoolers. After your brother went upstairs, I passed out in the shade of the umbrella, beside the pool, my book across my chest, my sock-covered feet peeking out of the shade and into the sun. When I woke up I read an essay out of the book of collected writings by Einstein. And in that state, having just woke up, but completely and utterly relaxed in the afternoon sun, my mind was clear and open, and the essay I read sank in quickly and lucidly, until it reached a soft, piercingly deep point, which I resolved to translate to you somehow because I was so impressed by the beauty of it.

Extracted from the essay that helps prepare and defend it, the idea was this, "How can cosmic religious feeling be communicated from one person to another, if it can give rise to no definite notion of a God and no theology? In my view, it is the most important function of art and science to awaken this feeling and keep it alive in those who are receptive to it."

Ok, I'm realizing that without the essay, the point, in abstraction, really has no effect, so I've copied the first half of the essay below so you can read through it, but I'll try my best to sum up what I realized when I read this. 

The thought was that "cosmic religious feeling", (or the unity of the nature of things in the universe- be it through scientific laws or through shared human impressions),  was available to everyone and was above any cultural, social or moral distinctions. At one point or another a lifetime, everyone is impressed or awed by something in nature, something that exists independent of human cause or reason, but which presents a structure so complex, or an orchestration so unfathomable so as to make us feel smaller and in turn makes us consider ourselves merely a component of the infinite movement of everything around us- from the smallest particle inside us to the largest stars in the universe. In all human activity, there are none seemingly more opposed than art and science. Art is dedicated to momentary subjective affects, with seemingly defiant disregard to practicality; Science strives for eternal objective truths with a religious dedication to recycling its discoveries into practical applications. 

But in Einstein's phrase, the two are paired as perhaps polarized ends of the same endeavor- an attempt to understand the enormity of everything that surrounds us, and share that understanding with others around us. To celebrate it!! And instantly to me it seemed that everything else- all the busy work, our efforts to maintain health, home and safety, to collect money to be able to function within the societies in which we live- all of it paled in comparison to the moments of art and of understanding (science) when the world reveals itself, unravels slightly in front of us, and we feel a part of it, a part of something beyond ourselves, a part of something large, overwhelming, awe inspiring, and beautiful.

oop, you just sent me a text!

Oh shoot!!!! I love you like crazy missy.

perhaps love, too, is like this, but rather than the world revealing itself, it is simply two people, shedding the layers between each other, and suddenly those two people are revealed to each other, immaculately, and in every case with my missy, beautifully. Maybe that's why I light up so much when ever I come home for lunch?

yeah, definitely : )

Was gonna attach some pictures, as examples of my momentary snaps of art, when the right lighting conditions, the right subject, and a quiet moment from the daily grind, give rise to sneak peeks at the world making beautiful arrangements and presentations that exist independent of me.

Think I'll do just that!

Love you missy. Below is the essay! 

mmmmmmmmmmmmuah!

-mister

Albert Einstein:

"Everything that the human race has done and thought is concerned with the satisfaction of deeply felt needs and the assuagement of pain. One has to keep this constantly in mind if one wishes to understand spiritual movements and their development. Feeling and longing are the motive force behind all human endeavor and human creation, in however exalted a guise the latter may present themselves to us. Now what are the feelings and needs that have led men to religious thought and belief in the widest sense of the words? A little consideration will suffice to show us that the most varying emotions preside over the birth of religious thought and experience. With primitive man it is above all fear that evokes religious notions - fear of hunger, wild beasts, sickness, death. Since at this stage of existence understanding of causal connections is usually poorly developed, the human mind creates illusory beings more or less analogous to itself on whose wills and actions these fearful happenings depend. Thus one tries to secure the favor of these beings by carrying out actions and offering sacrifices which, according to the tradition handed down from generation to generation, propitiate them or make them well disposed toward a mortal. In this sense I am speaking of a religion of fear. This, though not created, is in an important degree stabilized by the formation of a special priestly caste which sets itself up as a mediator between the people and the beings they fear, and erects a hegemony on this basis. In many cases a leader or ruler or a privileged class whose position rests on other factors combines priestly functions with its secular authority in order to make the latter more secure; or the political rulers and the priestly caste make common cause in their own interests.

The social impulses are another source of the crystallization of religion. Fathers and mothers and the leaders of larger human communities are mortal and fallible. The desire for guidance, love, and support prompts men to form the social or moral conception of God. This is the God of Providence, who protects, disposes, rewards, and punishes; the God who, according to the limits of the believer's outlook, loves and cherishes the life of the tribe or of the human race, or even or life itself; the comforter in sorrow and unsatisfied longing; he who preserves the souls of the dead. This is the social or moral conception of God.

The Jewish scriptures admirably illustrate the development from the religion of fear to moral religion, a development continued in the New Testament. The religions of all civilized peoples, especially the peoples of the Orient, are primarily moral religions. The development from a religion of fear to moral religion is a great step in peoples' lives. And yet, that primitive religions are based entirely on fear and the religions of civilized peoples purely on morality is a prejudice against which we must be on our guard. The truth is that all religions are a varying blend of both types, with this differentiation: that on the higher levels of social life the religion of morality predominates.

Common to all these types is the anthropomorphic character of their conception of God. In general, only individuals of exceptional endowments, and exceptionally high-minded communities, rise to any considerable extent above this level. But there is a third stage of religious experience which belongs to all of them, even though it is rarely found in a pure form: I shall call it cosmic religious feeling. It is very difficult to elucidate this feeling to anyone who is entirely without it, especially as there is no anthropomorphic conception of God corresponding to it.

The individual feels the futility of human desires and aims and the sublimity and marvelous order which reveal themselves both in nature and in the world of thought. Individual existence impresses him as a sort of prison and he wants to experience the universe as a single significant whole. The beginnings of cosmic religious feeling already appear at an early stage of development, e.g., in many of the Psalms of David and in some of the Prophets. Buddhism, as we have learned especially from the wonderful writings of Schopenhauer, contains a much stronger element of this.

The religious geniuses of all ages have been distinguished by this kind of religious feeling, which knows no dogma and no God conceived in man's image; so that there can be no church whose central teachings are based on it. Hence it is precisely among the heretics of every age that we find men who were filled with this highest kind of religious feeling and were in many cases regarded by their contemporaries as atheists, sometimes also as saints. Looked at in this light, men like Democritus, Francis of Assisi, and Spinoza are closely akin to one another.

How can cosmic religious feeling be communicated from one person to another, if it can give rise to no definite notion of a God and no theology? In my view, it is the most important function of art and science to awaken this feeling and keep it alive in those who are receptive to it."

Missy,

This morning was perfect. Absolutely wonderful. From the moment I woke, but didn't get up, I heard you tap the snooze button on the alarm. You sat on the edge of the bed, and for a moment I thought that you might get up right away, that you might not crawl back under the covers,that you might not redouble the warmth of my body with the heat of your own. And I thought for a second, "Maybe it's better that she wakes up now. I don't want her to sleep in too late and not wake up for school."

But then you crawled back in, your back up against mine so that we balanced up against each other, overcoming the increasing dip in the center of the bed that we've made from sleeping so close together now for over two years. And I was ecstatic, overjoyed, happy as happy as can be, and dozed back to sleep, with the touch of my love up against me like the most beautiful blanket in the world.

And then your alarm went off, and you woke up, and shushed the little crickets cricketing from your phone, and sat once more on the edge of the bed, only this time with a resolve to wake up, to get ready, and to tackle the important day's work ahead of you. 

"I can do it, I can do it, I'll just put my heart into it," you said.

And I was so proud, so in love with your spirit, that I reached out and rubbed your back quickly, in an attempt to get blood moving, in an attempt to help you wake up, in an attempt to help make what ever my love desires to have happen come true. 

And it worked! You got up, headed toward the shower, with your entire outfit for the day bundled in your  arms, walked into the bathroom, shut the door, and on the other side of it I heard you turn the little lock- "click". And I laid down for a second and thought, "I could go back to sleep, and Caroline will take a shower, get ready, and probably leave before I even wake."

But at that last thought, the thought of you leaving before I could even wake up enough to walk you to the door, seemed terrible, when the obvious alternative was to wake up, jump in the shower with you, see your beautiful smile, your chompable cheeks, your shinin' teesh, and spend the morning with you before you left for school.

And as soon as that thought hit me I was up, and in the shower, and then making coffee, and then breakfast, and then watching you walk into the living room, towel perched atop your head, wrapped 'round your hair in a ball, and I couldn't have been happier. 

It was just simply a perfect morning. And in not so many hours,  I will come home and find you for lunch, and ask all about the little faces that you lit up with inspiration and joy.  Joy no doubt for the sheer brilliance of your smile, your sun-shinin' eyes, and all the love in the world that they bring. Inspiration from something as small as the scarf wrapped around your neck, colored pink and grey  and purple in an uneven splash of color and beauty, indicative of the same spirit with which you color all your art. 

You bring so much wonder, so much beauty, so much life into everything you touch. It's a wonder your closet doesn't simply spill out a rainbow or cascade a pool of bouncing light every time you open it. 

But then again, the magic and wonder of your clothes, as with everything about you, has less to do with the things themselves, and everything to do with the love you pour into them.

As one of those lucky things that gets to be in your hands, in your attention, and in your care,  I am alight with color this morning, and every morning, and love you more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more and more.

Thursday, June 11, 2009. Just a day. Not even, for it's yet to begin. Just a morning. But beautiful enough to make me stop and hear the birds outside the window. Enough to make me hear the crashing ocean wave in a passing car. Enough to make me love the satin rolling iridescence of the over cast sky, and to feel the cool morning breeze as refreshing as a cool mountain spring.

Thank you for the wonderful morning, for all of my joy, for loving me, for everything that I am, whether I shine or just glow faintly.

thank you thank you thank you.

I love you I love you I love you.

Thank you for making my morning beautiful, today, yesterday, everyday.

love,

-your mister  

Oceanic Sunsets Over Silk-Flossed Streets

Gooooood morning to...YOU. Goooooood morning to....YOU!

Morning my love. So! I've decided to give this blog another try. Not that it ever failed me so much as I failed it, but with a renewed sense of vitality from a freshly healed foot, and a refined sense of purpose from the master's applications we'll 

soon be sending out, I felt it fitting to give my runofthemorningthoughts another go.

I have two posts for this morning! The first is a report about an incredible tree that I've stumbled across a few times while walking/running

 the banks of Burr. The second is a letter I wrote, waxing fully poetic and philosophical atop the banks that shade our little town. With that said:

SILK-FLOSS TREES!

(that's MY picture!)  : )

It took me a good while to find out what these lil' puppies are called. Also called Chorisia speciosa, these guys are native to Brazil, but somehow managed to come to the dry climates of Los Angeles, where it's able to thrive. The trees blossom in a fury of beautiful pink flowers

with each blossom looking something like this

And the seeds of the tree budding in these silky, amazing little puffs like this

The more I research these trees, the more interesting they become. Generally the trees lose the majority of their leaves when they blossom, which, for most trees, would mean a loss of food supply (fewer leaves=less photosynthesis). However, silk floss trees come equipped with green trunks that can photosynthesize sunlight when the tree is leafless! And, the crazy thorns, apart from making the tree look like some jurassic relic, serve to catch morning dew and shade the trunk, allowing the tree to absorb water before it dries up. 

But what's really cool about these trees is that they're a main food source for namakemonos!! Which lead me to this amazing video (he's eating an almond leaf, but still....geeeeebobareedadlkajklfdshakjf!!)

I couldn't embed it, but go to youtube and type in "Baby Sloth Milo eating leaves". And while you're there look up "Baby Sloth"

shhhhhhooooot!!!

ok, and the second post:

___________________________

"I'm writing again, with frequency, which I realize is as necessary to consciousness as oxygen is to the heart, a necessity I am also, slowly but surely, incorporating into my daily routine with exercise.

So many thoughts on the way up here, to the bench-marked mid-summit of the Brand Park hiking trail. Thoughts that now are worn over and much too rehearsed to be real, to be honest.

Instead, I will start fresh. There's a point here, straight out from the bench I'm sitting on, where the hill feigns to be a cliff, and it's rolling connection with the hills below disappears. And the floor of the San Fernando Valley, and all of Los Angeles, becomes an ocean if you let it. The haze of the air, whether from pollution or simply the sandy dryness of the desert air, diffuses the sunlight so that the distant mountain peaks sit above a sea of light, and are easily mistaken for clouds. 

And framed in this way, I watch the sun's setting, with a fixed, intense gaze that breathes in the scope of this ocean, and finds the weight of the day revolving with the sun, slipping from off my shoulders and over the edge of the horizon.

I become a 13th century Spaniard, with the scope, and the edge of the world for that matter, matching its perception. I can fathom the boundaries of my world, but nothing farther. 

And this simple, clear definition of my surroundings, defined by my sight, for this brief moment, gives my mind a breath of clarity and the glimpse of a world where everything is not beyond my comprehension.

I thought on the way up here I would write a poem about the sun and my age. Half way up the mountain I thought I would write of music, or of the growing distance I feel from my mother.  I don't think I've ever before thought the exact words I wrote above, but I am almost sure I have felt their sentiment every time I've come up here.

There's something in that- that our experiences are not simply the real-life counterparts to writing, but that a writing is something novel, and, of itself, an event apart from the experiences that prompt it. 

The sun has set. The dusk, the crepuscule, is now my lantern and I must descend before it's gas runs out.

to my love,

forever yours,

-mister

Honey bee!!!
Originally I wanted these writings to be early morning meditations on the subtle fibers that link everything together- the early morning hours, the wakefulness of the elderly, dogs dragging their owners out to the streets, the defiant glow of the Yum Yum lights. But this morning, as with last morning, I found that I was more simply waking up than watching things closely. There are a few things that are becoming familiar trail markers on my morning run. Somewhere between Alameda and the next light there are sprinklers that pretend to be a rushing river.

oh man....banks.

money money money MONEY.....mon-nay!!

ok, pooper, everyone's home, so this'll have to be the post for today.

love you pooper.
you did awesome with aerobics today, you little worker bee.
-mister

Sep. 8, 2008

Run: home to two blocks past Alameda and back, along

Thoughts:

You are next to me, right now, typing on your computer, with a small crowd of glass holding our breakfast between us. I woke this morning, after having a dream that involved you, Olivia and Shogen, and some lost house on the dry end of a sewer ravine. I woke, went to the bathroom, turned on the lights, and the sting of it, the brightness, caused me to believe it was still the middle of the night, still 3am, maybe 4.
But as I sat on the toilet, a feeling of wakefulness came over me, and I suddenly felt the stillness of the morning, and remembered a similar wakefulness from when I was young. The street lights outside still on, and the traffic passing below the window infrequent and quiet, I remember feeling like the morning hours were entirely my own. Before school started, before my parents awoke even. I claimed the morning and its stillness as though it were a foreign country, newly decorated with the flag of my intentions. Sometimes I'd wake to a ski outfit I'd lain out the night before in ebullient expectation of a ski trip; sometimes I'd watch morning cartoons and exercise; sometimes I'd make a full and tasteful breakfast; sometimes I'd just read or write or play guitar. I don't think it was ever with strong intention that I woke up so much as it was with a desire to explore those few hours that existed before the schedule of the day devoured them.

I think it was that thought that convinced me to stay up this morning. And so with that it mind, I walked out of the bathroom, put on my swim trunks, sat by your side, watched you stretch the quiet morning air above your head and on either side of your shoulders, looked closely and intently at your closed eyes, and then went out to the streets to jog. There were many thoughts, impressions, sounds, passing people, lit morning windows and....I wanted to catch them all, the most important of which was that, with my increasing age, there seems an increasing familiarity with experiences that keeps them from seeming vibrant and novel. Sort of what we spoke of about the radiohead concert- being there but also feeling a bit like you were seeing something on t.v.

I feel like the closest experiences these days exist more in ideas than in physically emperical events.

Like yesterday, when you were down before heading to work, possibly because of music, maybe just 'cause life can get you down sometimes, and I looked at you, and didn't want you to stress, simply because I love you, and I said, "I love you. Don't stress missy."

And the idea of it crossed through everything, and I saw through all the air between us, and all the skin, bone and body between us, to you, and saw it touch you, and you smiled back at me.

I loved that.

k, gotta run to work.
See you soon pooper.
love love love you.
-mister.