Monday, February 25, 2013
Thursday, February 14, 2013
It's enough. It's plenty
Dear Human:
You’ve got it all wrong.
You didn’t come here to master unconditional love. That is where you came from and where you’ll return. You came here to learn personal love.
Universal love. Messy love. Sweaty love. Crazy love. Broken love. Whole love. Infused with divinity. Lived through the grace of stumbling. Demonstrated through the beauty of… messing up. Often.
You didn’t come here to be perfect. You already are. You came here to be gorgeously human. Flawed and fabulous. And then to rise again into remembering. But unconditional love? Stop telling that story.
Love, in truth, doesn’t need ANY other adjectives. It doesn’t require modifiers. It doesn’t require the condition of perfection. It only asks that you show up.
And do your best.
That you stay present and feel fully.
That you shine and fly and laugh and cry and hurt and heal and fall and get back up and play and work and live and die as YOU.
It’s enough.
It’s plenty.
- Courtney A. Walsh
You’ve got it all wrong.
You didn’t come here to master unconditional love. That is where you came from and where you’ll return. You came here to learn personal love.
Universal love. Messy love. Sweaty love. Crazy love. Broken love. Whole love. Infused with divinity. Lived through the grace of stumbling. Demonstrated through the beauty of… messing up. Often.
You didn’t come here to be perfect. You already are. You came here to be gorgeously human. Flawed and fabulous. And then to rise again into remembering. But unconditional love? Stop telling that story.
Love, in truth, doesn’t need ANY other adjectives. It doesn’t require modifiers. It doesn’t require the condition of perfection. It only asks that you show up.
And do your best.
That you stay present and feel fully.
That you shine and fly and laugh and cry and hurt and heal and fall and get back up and play and work and live and die as YOU.
It’s enough.
It’s plenty.
- Courtney A. Walsh
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Mardi Gras Links And Lupercus
This opinion piece was posted in 2012 by a local New Orleanian C. W Cannon. It contrasts the "rich person's Mardi Gras" with the Mardi Gras that developed in the past 20 years since the old line Krewe's were forced to integrate. The Mardi Gras we have today is better than the Mardi Gras of 20 years ago because we New Orleanians have begun to move back to smaller scale groups of individuals who costume and parade without enormous budgets. 'Tit Rex is a parady of the old line monied Rex and pays tribute to the shoebox float that ever New Orleanian school kid has made at least once. Krewe du Vieux makes fine art of satire. I will love them forever for the 2006 Mardi Gras "Corps of Engineers we hold nothing back" and "Meet me at the Breech" displays. Carnival is where we turn our ordered patterned world on it's head. Where we break loose and, as Cannon says, "the cultural concept of Carnival is to turn against, invert, or critique the broader culture in which it is enveloped."
And Mark Folse a local blogger posted about another blogger who wrote extensively about France's Occtican Carnival. (One of my favorite parts of the world). This talks about how Carnival prepares us for the shift between Winter and Spring. How we revel in the wild and cleanse the old year away. If the pictures of "Spring's Wild Forces" doesn't make you think wild thoughts, nothing will.
I have always said that Mardi Gras was perfectly aligned with Lupercus these posts reinforce that for me. So please take time to howl for Lupercus and this carnival season. People have known for centuries that it's good for the body and the soul.
And Mark Folse a local blogger posted about another blogger who wrote extensively about France's Occtican Carnival. (One of my favorite parts of the world). This talks about how Carnival prepares us for the shift between Winter and Spring. How we revel in the wild and cleanse the old year away. If the pictures of "Spring's Wild Forces" doesn't make you think wild thoughts, nothing will.
I have always said that Mardi Gras was perfectly aligned with Lupercus these posts reinforce that for me. So please take time to howl for Lupercus and this carnival season. People have known for centuries that it's good for the body and the soul.
Saturday, January 26, 2013
THE WHITE WITCH - Charles Grant
THE WHITE WITCH
"O What have you seen, my son, my son,
That your eyes are so wild and bright?
Or what have you heard in the eerie woods,
'Twixt the gloaming and the night?"
"I have met a witch, a white white witch,
My mother, mother dear;
The glamour of earth is on my eyes,
And its music in my ear.
"For we are deafen'd by angry words,
Are blinded by tears of woe,
But she has garner'd the secret joys
That only the genii know;—
"Has learn'd from the voice of the fern-hid stream
Where all sweet thoughts abide,
And the violets have told her how they dream
In the quiet eventide;
"And they fancy, mother, the world above
Where the baby cloudlets play
Yearns down to the earth in mystic love
That shall never pass away.
"The greenwood knows it; of this sweet thought
Its murmuring tunes are made,
And the strange wild tale that is ever wrought
Through its sunshine and its shade.
"And the holy moon, as she moves along
From star to star on high,
Pours forth her light as a bridal song
And a tender lullaby.
"O mother, my mother, mother dear,
Who may the white witch be?
She has heard the things we cannot hear,
She has seen what we cannot see;
"The beauty that comes in fitful gleams,
That comes, but will not stay,
The music that steals across our dreams
From a region far away;
"What vainly I sought in pain and doubt,
The light, the form, the tone,
At a single glance she has found them out,
And made them all her own.
"And with all the music we cannot hear,
The beauty we cannot see,
O mother, mother, my mother dear,
She has wrought a charm on me."
[from Studies in Verse, by Charles Grant. London: John Pearson York Street Covent Garden 1875]
with thanks to Raven Grimassi for sharing.
"O What have you seen, my son, my son,
That your eyes are so wild and bright?
Or what have you heard in the eerie woods,
'Twixt the gloaming and the night?"
"I have met a witch, a white white witch,
My mother, mother dear;
The glamour of earth is on my eyes,
And its music in my ear.
"For we are deafen'd by angry words,
Are blinded by tears of woe,
But she has garner'd the secret joys
That only the genii know;—
"Has learn'd from the voice of the fern-hid stream
Where all sweet thoughts abide,
And the violets have told her how they dream
In the quiet eventide;
"And they fancy, mother, the world above
Where the baby cloudlets play
Yearns down to the earth in mystic love
That shall never pass away.
"The greenwood knows it; of this sweet thought
Its murmuring tunes are made,
And the strange wild tale that is ever wrought
Through its sunshine and its shade.
"And the holy moon, as she moves along
From star to star on high,
Pours forth her light as a bridal song
And a tender lullaby.
"O mother, my mother, mother dear,
Who may the white witch be?
She has heard the things we cannot hear,
She has seen what we cannot see;
"The beauty that comes in fitful gleams,
That comes, but will not stay,
The music that steals across our dreams
From a region far away;
"What vainly I sought in pain and doubt,
The light, the form, the tone,
At a single glance she has found them out,
And made them all her own.
"And with all the music we cannot hear,
The beauty we cannot see,
O mother, mother, my mother dear,
She has wrought a charm on me."
[from Studies in Verse, by Charles Grant. London: John Pearson York Street Covent Garden 1875]
with thanks to Raven Grimassi for sharing.
Saturday, January 19, 2013
Carnival & Lupercus
Lupercus is a celebration of the power of wild, of freedom, of being purified of the trappings of civilation. It connects us to Nature, the Great Teacher. It is not Imbolc and lambs and milking. It is the polar opposite of Imbolc.
Carnival in New Orleans is a season perfectly aligned with Lupercus.
Tonight the Krewe du Vieux parade will roll in New Orleans
Looks like this Krewe took the lessons of Umberto Eco to heart.
"Carnival, in order to be enjoyed, requires that rules and rituals be parodied, and that these rules and rituals already be recognized and respected. One must know to what degree certain behaviors are forbidden, and must feel the majesty of the forbidding norm, to appreciate their transgression. Without a valid law to break, carnival is impossible. During the Middle Ages, counterrituals such as the Mass of the Ass or the coronation of the Fool were enjoyable just because, during the rest of the year, the Holy Mass and the true King’s coronation were sacred and respectable activities. The Coena Cypriani quoted by Bachtin, a burlesque representation based upon the subversion of topical situations of the Scriptures, was enjoyed as a comic transgression only by people who took the same Scriptures seriously during the rest of the year. To a modern reader, the Coena Cypriani is only a boring series of meaningless situations, and even though the parody is recognized, it is not felt as a provocative one. Thus the prerequisites of a ‘good’ carnival are: (i) the law must be so pervasively and profoundly introjected as to be overwhelmingly present at the moment of its violation (and this explains why ‘barbaric’ comedy is hardly understandable); (ii) the moment of carnivalization must be very short, and allowed only once a year (semel in anno licet insanire); an everlasting carnival does not work: an entire year of ritual observance is needed in order to make the transgression enjoyable.
Carnival can exist only as an authorized transgression (which in fact represents a blatant case of contradicto in adjecto or of happy double binding — capable of curing instead of producing neurosis). If the ancient, religious carnival was limited in time, the modern mass-carnival is limited in space: it is reserved for certain places, certain streets, or framed by the television screen.
In this sense, comedy and carnival are not instances of real transgressions: on the contrary, they represent paramount examples of law reinforcement. They remind us of the existence of the rule.
Carnivalization can act as a revolution (Rabelais, or Joyce) when it appears unexpectedly, frustrating social expectations. But on the one side it produces its own mannerism (it is reabsorbed by society) and on the other side it is acceptable when performed within the limits of a laboratory situation (literature, stage, screen …). When an unexpected and nonauthorized carnivalization suddenly occurs in ‘real’ everday life, it is interpreted as revolution (campus confrontations, ghetto riots, blackouts, sometimes true ‘historical’ revolutions). But even revolutions produce a restoration of their own (revolutionary rules, another contradicto in adjecto) in order to install their new social model. Otherwise they are not effective revolutions, but only uprisings, revolts, transitory social disturbances.
In a world dominated by diabolical powers, in a world of everlasting transgression, nothing remains comic or carnivalesque, nothing can any longer become an object of parody."
Umberto Eco, “The frames of comic ‘freedom’,” _Carnivale!_, Ed. Thomas A. Sebeok. Berlin: Mouton, 1984
Carnival in New Orleans is a season perfectly aligned with Lupercus.
Tonight the Krewe du Vieux parade will roll in New Orleans
"The Krewe du Vieux is a non-profit organization dedicated to the historical and traditional concept of a Mardi Gras parade as a venue for individual creative expression and satirical comment. It is unique among all Mardi Gras parades in the city because it alone carries on the old traditions of Carnival celebrations, by using decorated mule-drawn floats with satirical themes, accompanied by costumed revelers dancing in the streets to the sounds of jazzy street musicians. We believe in exposing the world to the true nature of Mardi Gras—and in exposing ourselves to the world."
Looks like this Krewe took the lessons of Umberto Eco to heart.
"Carnival, in order to be enjoyed, requires that rules and rituals be parodied, and that these rules and rituals already be recognized and respected. One must know to what degree certain behaviors are forbidden, and must feel the majesty of the forbidding norm, to appreciate their transgression. Without a valid law to break, carnival is impossible. During the Middle Ages, counterrituals such as the Mass of the Ass or the coronation of the Fool were enjoyable just because, during the rest of the year, the Holy Mass and the true King’s coronation were sacred and respectable activities. The Coena Cypriani quoted by Bachtin, a burlesque representation based upon the subversion of topical situations of the Scriptures, was enjoyed as a comic transgression only by people who took the same Scriptures seriously during the rest of the year. To a modern reader, the Coena Cypriani is only a boring series of meaningless situations, and even though the parody is recognized, it is not felt as a provocative one. Thus the prerequisites of a ‘good’ carnival are: (i) the law must be so pervasively and profoundly introjected as to be overwhelmingly present at the moment of its violation (and this explains why ‘barbaric’ comedy is hardly understandable); (ii) the moment of carnivalization must be very short, and allowed only once a year (semel in anno licet insanire); an everlasting carnival does not work: an entire year of ritual observance is needed in order to make the transgression enjoyable.
Carnival can exist only as an authorized transgression (which in fact represents a blatant case of contradicto in adjecto or of happy double binding — capable of curing instead of producing neurosis). If the ancient, religious carnival was limited in time, the modern mass-carnival is limited in space: it is reserved for certain places, certain streets, or framed by the television screen.
In this sense, comedy and carnival are not instances of real transgressions: on the contrary, they represent paramount examples of law reinforcement. They remind us of the existence of the rule.
Carnivalization can act as a revolution (Rabelais, or Joyce) when it appears unexpectedly, frustrating social expectations. But on the one side it produces its own mannerism (it is reabsorbed by society) and on the other side it is acceptable when performed within the limits of a laboratory situation (literature, stage, screen …). When an unexpected and nonauthorized carnivalization suddenly occurs in ‘real’ everday life, it is interpreted as revolution (campus confrontations, ghetto riots, blackouts, sometimes true ‘historical’ revolutions). But even revolutions produce a restoration of their own (revolutionary rules, another contradicto in adjecto) in order to install their new social model. Otherwise they are not effective revolutions, but only uprisings, revolts, transitory social disturbances.
In a world dominated by diabolical powers, in a world of everlasting transgression, nothing remains comic or carnivalesque, nothing can any longer become an object of parody."
Umberto Eco, “The frames of comic ‘freedom’,” _Carnivale!_, Ed. Thomas A. Sebeok. Berlin: Mouton, 1984
Sunday, January 13, 2013
Deep Time .... is Slow
Still ruminating on this Article from Mother Earth News
"...German environmental thinker Wolfgang Sachs <snip> believes that speed is an under-recognized factor fueling environmental problems. As he puts it, “It’s possible to talk about the ecological crisis as a collision between time scales — the fast time scale of modernity crashing up against the slow time scale of nature and the earth.” In his view, genetic engineering, with all its potential for ecological havoc, is an example of how we interfere with natural processes in the name of speeding up evolution."
The geologist in me LOVES this. It is only this view of "deep time" that will save us from ourselves.
"...German environmental thinker Wolfgang Sachs <snip> believes that speed is an under-recognized factor fueling environmental problems. As he puts it, “It’s possible to talk about the ecological crisis as a collision between time scales — the fast time scale of modernity crashing up against the slow time scale of nature and the earth.” In his view, genetic engineering, with all its potential for ecological havoc, is an example of how we interfere with natural processes in the name of speeding up evolution."
The geologist in me LOVES this. It is only this view of "deep time" that will save us from ourselves.
Saturday, January 12, 2013
Lord, I love this city!!!!
We talk to strangers like they are our best friends.
Now, this being New Orleans and, especially, this being the Rouses on Carrollton, the gentleman didn't just unload his basket.
No.
He started a conversation with anyone who would listen about why he had selected said items in his basket. Turns out he was having foot surgery (right foot, in case you were wondering) and was about to be laid up for about five days.
"I don't got nobody to take care of me, so I thought I'd make my first pot of red beans and rice to eat on."
Just as he was asking the cashier to help him make sure he had all the right ingredients, a woman standing behind me chimed in, "Why would you make red beans and rice? Just go to Popeyes. They have the best."
Well, that did it. All hell broke loose between checkout lines 5, 6 and 7. Right there at the Rouses on Carrollton.
Read the rest here:
http://nolavie.com/2013/01/love-nola-to-popeyes-or-not-to-popeyes-50639.html
Now, this being New Orleans and, especially, this being the Rouses on Carrollton, the gentleman didn't just unload his basket.
No.
He started a conversation with anyone who would listen about why he had selected said items in his basket. Turns out he was having foot surgery (right foot, in case you were wondering) and was about to be laid up for about five days.
"I don't got nobody to take care of me, so I thought I'd make my first pot of red beans and rice to eat on."
Just as he was asking the cashier to help him make sure he had all the right ingredients, a woman standing behind me chimed in, "Why would you make red beans and rice? Just go to Popeyes. They have the best."
Well, that did it. All hell broke loose between checkout lines 5, 6 and 7. Right there at the Rouses on Carrollton.
Read the rest here:
http://nolavie.com/2013/01/love-nola-to-popeyes-or-not-to-popeyes-50639.html
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Food Inc & Small Moves
Our modern American lifestyle is at complete odds with living in harmony with the Earth and Nature. Living in harmony with the Earth & Nature starts with "awareness" and a willingness to try to change, a willingness to make the small changes that build up. As Streghe, pagan, the spritually eco-aware, we are swimming against the tide. And it's a corporate tide and a powerful one.
Take the time to watch the movie Food Inc. Become aware of the corporate tide that affects everyone because it affects the very food we eat to survive. Watch how Monsanto strives against the forces of Nature. Realize how foolish this is and then with this awareness, begin to make changes in your life. A new awareness can be overwhelming. How, with a problem that large and complex, can one person make a difference? The only way to "eat an elephant" is "one bite at a time".
Which brings me to Small Moves. Contact (1997) is one of my favorite movies and "Small Moves" one of my favorite quotes. Yes Nature has "big events": Hurricanes, land slides.... but most of the time Nature is slow and steady and subtle. Evolution. Geologic ages. Human maturation....
So become aware
and then choose your own "Small Moves".
Take the time to watch the movie Food Inc. Become aware of the corporate tide that affects everyone because it affects the very food we eat to survive. Watch how Monsanto strives against the forces of Nature. Realize how foolish this is and then with this awareness, begin to make changes in your life. A new awareness can be overwhelming. How, with a problem that large and complex, can one person make a difference? The only way to "eat an elephant" is "one bite at a time".
Which brings me to Small Moves. Contact (1997) is one of my favorite movies and "Small Moves" one of my favorite quotes. Yes Nature has "big events": Hurricanes, land slides.... but most of the time Nature is slow and steady and subtle. Evolution. Geologic ages. Human maturation....
So become aware
and then choose your own "Small Moves".
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Slow Down... reconnect with Nature
Still reading and ruminating on this Mother Earth New Article
Environmental activist Jeremy Rifkin was one of the first to raise questions about the desirability of speed in his 1987 book Time Wars:
"We have quickened the pace of life only to become less patient. We have become more organized but less spontaneous, less joyful. We are better prepared to act on the future but less able to enjoy the present and reflect on the past.
As the tempo of modern life has continued to accelerate, we have come to feel increasingly out of touch with the biological rhythms of the planet, unable to experience a close connection with the natural environment. The human time world is no longer joined to the incoming and outgoing tides, the rising and setting sun, and the changing seasons. Instead, humanity has created an artificial time environment punctuated by mechanical contrivances and electronic impulses. "
Pagans go out of their way to be attuned to the solar cycle, be that the daily or yearly cycle, or the the cycle of the moon and the wheel of the year. And that is what makes Pagans "Radicals", even if they don't think of themselves in that way.
If Nature is the Great Teacher then how can Streghe not work to stay "in touch with the biological rhythms of the planet"?
This is taken from the Summer Solstice Ritual
in Italian Witchcraft by Raven Grimassi:
“O spirits of the Elemental forces, hear me. And receive our blessings. O spirits of the earth. O powers that be, hear me and receive our blessings. Assist us on this sacred night to maintain the natural balance which keeps vital the essence of the earth. Let there always be clear flowing water, freshness in the air, fertility within the soil and abundant life within the world.”
Environmental activist Jeremy Rifkin was one of the first to raise questions about the desirability of speed in his 1987 book Time Wars:
"We have quickened the pace of life only to become less patient. We have become more organized but less spontaneous, less joyful. We are better prepared to act on the future but less able to enjoy the present and reflect on the past.
As the tempo of modern life has continued to accelerate, we have come to feel increasingly out of touch with the biological rhythms of the planet, unable to experience a close connection with the natural environment. The human time world is no longer joined to the incoming and outgoing tides, the rising and setting sun, and the changing seasons. Instead, humanity has created an artificial time environment punctuated by mechanical contrivances and electronic impulses. "
Pagans go out of their way to be attuned to the solar cycle, be that the daily or yearly cycle, or the the cycle of the moon and the wheel of the year. And that is what makes Pagans "Radicals", even if they don't think of themselves in that way.
If Nature is the Great Teacher then how can Streghe not work to stay "in touch with the biological rhythms of the planet"?
This is taken from the Summer Solstice Ritual
in Italian Witchcraft by Raven Grimassi:
“O spirits of the Elemental forces, hear me. And receive our blessings. O spirits of the earth. O powers that be, hear me and receive our blessings. Assist us on this sacred night to maintain the natural balance which keeps vital the essence of the earth. Let there always be clear flowing water, freshness in the air, fertility within the soil and abundant life within the world.”
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Can we talk about Global Warming now?
Information below taken from Wired.Com
Click the link for more information
http://www.wired.com/design/2013/01/australia-temperature-map/
"What happens when a changing climate exceeds the operating parameters of the stuff we own? While we in the northern hemisphere make jokes about indestructible snow forts, it is getting hot in Australia. How hot? So hot that Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology had to add new colors to its weather map. Now, those unfortunate parts of Australia that achieve temperatures above 122ºF (50ºC) — temperatures that were, until recently, literally off the scale — will be marked in deep purple and terrifying hot pink. It is an interesting moment in data visualization history when climate scientists find themselves in the position of revising the upper bounds of temperatures they ever expected to depict."
And if you think it can't happen here, Listen to this NPR Story.
"A brutal combination of a widespread drought and a mostly absent winter pushed the average annual U.S. temperature last year up to 55.32 degrees Fahrenheit, the government announced Tuesday. That's a full degree warmer than the old record set in 1998.
Breaking temperature records by an entire degree is unprecedented, scientists say. Normally, records are broken by a tenth of a degree or so."
And read more here.
Click the link for more information
http://www.wired.com/design/2013/01/australia-temperature-map/
"What happens when a changing climate exceeds the operating parameters of the stuff we own? While we in the northern hemisphere make jokes about indestructible snow forts, it is getting hot in Australia. How hot? So hot that Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology had to add new colors to its weather map. Now, those unfortunate parts of Australia that achieve temperatures above 122ºF (50ºC) — temperatures that were, until recently, literally off the scale — will be marked in deep purple and terrifying hot pink. It is an interesting moment in data visualization history when climate scientists find themselves in the position of revising the upper bounds of temperatures they ever expected to depict."
And if you think it can't happen here, Listen to this NPR Story.
"A brutal combination of a widespread drought and a mostly absent winter pushed the average annual U.S. temperature last year up to 55.32 degrees Fahrenheit, the government announced Tuesday. That's a full degree warmer than the old record set in 1998.
Breaking temperature records by an entire degree is unprecedented, scientists say. Normally, records are broken by a tenth of a degree or so."
And read more here.
Monday, January 7, 2013
Slow Down.... pare back...
The long days of Winter are times when our lives should naturally slow down.
The bare days of Winter are time when we should be able to see the structure and bones of our existence and be better able to see what is worth our efforts when the the world warms up and the trees leaf out.
Take your time and read this Article from Mother Earth News.
The italicized quotes below are from the article.
"No matter how fast we go, no matter how many comforts we forgo in order to quicken our pace, there never seems to be enough time."
"Curiously, there has been scant public discussion about this dramatic speed-up of society. People may complain about how busy they are, how overloaded modern life has become, but speed is still viewed as generally positive — something that will help us all enrich our lives. "
This is so much like my day:
"The alarm rings and you hop out of bed. Another day is off and running. A quick shower. Wake the kid<snip>. Down a cup of coffee. <snip> Hurry out to the car, <snip>. Reaching work, <snip>. You take a couple of deep breaths, then remember that the project you didn't finish last night must be <snip>. Meanwhile, you've got five voice-mail messages and seven more e-mail messages, two of them marked urgent."
Until I got to the seven more email messages! Seven! Seven! Only Seven!
And what about Instant Messages? I stopped taking voice mails a long time ago. People ramble and you just have to call them back anyway to figure out what they really want.
And 1 project due! Please. I never have fewer than 7 project going, any 1 of which might need special handling on any given day. And then there are the walk-ins. And the meetings. The meetings you go to only so that either your time is wasted or you end up with more projects.
Americans have become more productive but I'm not sure how much more we can really take.
“The major cause in the speed-up of life is not technology, but economics,” says Schor. “The nature of work has changed now that bosses are demanding longer hours of work.” Harvard economist Juliet Schor,Author of the 1991 best-seller The Overworked American
I too have found that without concerted effort that it is too easy for anyone "working for corporate america" to end up with a life that just gets faster and faster until it spins out of control. I can speak from experience as I work for a Fortune 500 company.
Then there is Neighborhood Organization stuff which is important and rewarding in that I now have a cadre of amazing friends who care about our city its future... but it's time consuming. Taking photos, posting photos, tracking issues: water leaks, blight (yes we are still recovering from Katrina), potholes, the grinding impracticality of some city services, crime. Tracking successes: Trees planted, streets & sidewalk repairs, Houses renovated and or sold, ....
And then there is my commitment as 3rd degree to the Tradition, the Ways, the spiritual path I walk and an obligation to ensure that it stays alive, is passed on. Which happens to be the primary reason for this blog.
In the Spring of 2012,
after being interviewed and providing documentation for review to someone who was working on his PHD at Oxford (yes the one in England),
I read the draft of his PHD and realized that,
in addition to some very interesting ideas about collaborative government,
this doctoral student had put his finger on my personal issue.
Like many of the other individuals who picked up the neighborhood recovery torch PostKatrina, I was burned out!
Everything I was doing was "Good":
Job=$ to provide for my family and there are days when I really like it,
Neighborhood work = better environment around me, great new friends
Blog = true to my spiritual path
But I couldn't continue the ever quickening pace and ever increasing responsibilities.
"Yet it seems that the faster we go, the farther we fall behind. Not only in the literal sense of not getting done what we set out to do, but at a deeper level, too."
"But it has gotten to the point where my days, crammed with all sorts of activities, feel like an Olympic endurance event: the everyday-athon."
Yes.... I needed a break. Not total abdication but a break.
So I "took a break" in 2012 from some of the responsibilities with which I had burdened myself.
I lightened up on the neighborhood work and either let others take the lead or let go of the need to "participate' as often as requested by city government leaders or non-profits. And as a result some folks stepped up and some things slid by and all in all it all worked out. And I have a better plan for how I encourage others in 2013.
I "took a break" from "StregaNola". I took vacation time with my daughter and visited with my teacher. I set some blog posts up to post intermittently throughout the year and then logged off as StregaNola in March and didn't log back on until 2013. And surprise. It's still hear. Just like I left it.
My pace at work is something I'm still working on ... but everything starts somewhere.
So while we are still in what should be the slow, dark, part of the year, ask yourself:
What can you pare back? What do you want to focus on? What do you value enough to keep and what can you let go?
The 1st step in any Magic, before you ACT, is to meditate on your intent and idea and to listen to the feedback the Universe will give you. But to really do this you have to slow down.
And if you are working with the Gratitude Jar and a Yearly Jar of goals take some time to slow down and pare back and before you just start filling that Jar up with things you want to accomplish this year.
The bare days of Winter are time when we should be able to see the structure and bones of our existence and be better able to see what is worth our efforts when the the world warms up and the trees leaf out.
Take your time and read this Article from Mother Earth News.
The italicized quotes below are from the article.
"No matter how fast we go, no matter how many comforts we forgo in order to quicken our pace, there never seems to be enough time."
"Curiously, there has been scant public discussion about this dramatic speed-up of society. People may complain about how busy they are, how overloaded modern life has become, but speed is still viewed as generally positive — something that will help us all enrich our lives. "
This is so much like my day:
"The alarm rings and you hop out of bed. Another day is off and running. A quick shower. Wake the kid<snip>. Down a cup of coffee. <snip> Hurry out to the car, <snip>. Reaching work, <snip>. You take a couple of deep breaths, then remember that the project you didn't finish last night must be <snip>. Meanwhile, you've got five voice-mail messages and seven more e-mail messages, two of them marked urgent."
Until I got to the seven more email messages! Seven! Seven! Only Seven!
And what about Instant Messages? I stopped taking voice mails a long time ago. People ramble and you just have to call them back anyway to figure out what they really want.
And 1 project due! Please. I never have fewer than 7 project going, any 1 of which might need special handling on any given day. And then there are the walk-ins. And the meetings. The meetings you go to only so that either your time is wasted or you end up with more projects.
Americans have become more productive but I'm not sure how much more we can really take.
“The major cause in the speed-up of life is not technology, but economics,” says Schor. “The nature of work has changed now that bosses are demanding longer hours of work.” Harvard economist Juliet Schor,Author of the 1991 best-seller The Overworked American
I too have found that without concerted effort that it is too easy for anyone "working for corporate america" to end up with a life that just gets faster and faster until it spins out of control. I can speak from experience as I work for a Fortune 500 company.
Then there is Neighborhood Organization stuff which is important and rewarding in that I now have a cadre of amazing friends who care about our city its future... but it's time consuming. Taking photos, posting photos, tracking issues: water leaks, blight (yes we are still recovering from Katrina), potholes, the grinding impracticality of some city services, crime. Tracking successes: Trees planted, streets & sidewalk repairs, Houses renovated and or sold, ....
And then there is my commitment as 3rd degree to the Tradition, the Ways, the spiritual path I walk and an obligation to ensure that it stays alive, is passed on. Which happens to be the primary reason for this blog.
In the Spring of 2012,
after being interviewed and providing documentation for review to someone who was working on his PHD at Oxford (yes the one in England),
I read the draft of his PHD and realized that,
in addition to some very interesting ideas about collaborative government,
this doctoral student had put his finger on my personal issue.
Like many of the other individuals who picked up the neighborhood recovery torch PostKatrina, I was burned out!
Everything I was doing was "Good":
Job=$ to provide for my family and there are days when I really like it,
Neighborhood work = better environment around me, great new friends
Blog = true to my spiritual path
But I couldn't continue the ever quickening pace and ever increasing responsibilities.
"Yet it seems that the faster we go, the farther we fall behind. Not only in the literal sense of not getting done what we set out to do, but at a deeper level, too."
"But it has gotten to the point where my days, crammed with all sorts of activities, feel like an Olympic endurance event: the everyday-athon."
Yes.... I needed a break. Not total abdication but a break.
So I "took a break" in 2012 from some of the responsibilities with which I had burdened myself.
I lightened up on the neighborhood work and either let others take the lead or let go of the need to "participate' as often as requested by city government leaders or non-profits. And as a result some folks stepped up and some things slid by and all in all it all worked out. And I have a better plan for how I encourage others in 2013.
I "took a break" from "StregaNola". I took vacation time with my daughter and visited with my teacher. I set some blog posts up to post intermittently throughout the year and then logged off as StregaNola in March and didn't log back on until 2013. And surprise. It's still hear. Just like I left it.
My pace at work is something I'm still working on ... but everything starts somewhere.
So while we are still in what should be the slow, dark, part of the year, ask yourself:
What can you pare back? What do you want to focus on? What do you value enough to keep and what can you let go?
The 1st step in any Magic, before you ACT, is to meditate on your intent and idea and to listen to the feedback the Universe will give you. But to really do this you have to slow down.
And if you are working with the Gratitude Jar and a Yearly Jar of goals take some time to slow down and pare back and before you just start filling that Jar up with things you want to accomplish this year.
Sunday, January 6, 2013
2013 Gratitude Jar & the Magic of intentions.
But it got me thinking about alignment and intent and magic.
The wonderful thing about the Gratitude Jar is that it helps teach mindfulness. If you have the Jar and you are thinking about what you can put in the Jar then you focus and are mindful of daily blessings, and experiences worth savoring. You also align with the beauty of nature. One of the things my Jar will have on it "Nature as the Great Teacher Moments".
Then there is the alternate approach to using a Yearly Jar. One that is aligned with the secular tradition of New Year Resolutions. It has been said by many (even non-pagans) that writing down your goals makes a difference.
Few have said it better or to as many people as Stephen Covey:
"All things are created twice. There's a mental or first creation, and a physical or second creation of all things. You have to make sure that the blueprint, the first creation, is really what you want, that you've thought everything through. Then you put it into bricks and mortar. Each day you go to the construction shed and pull out the blueprint to get marching orders for the day. You begin with the end in mind."
The "all things are created twice" concept is the essence of all magic work. You build the idea with your energy and mind. And then you free it on the Astral Plane (or release it into the universe if you prefer) and then you work on the physical plane until it manifests. As you write your goals down and place them in the Jar imbue them with your intent. Then release them by placing them into the Jar.
At the end of the year (or Cornucopia) you can open the Yearly Jar, reassess or renew your goals.
I can promise you this: The more aligned you are with the ebb and flow of the universe, the more mindful and aware you are (and the Gratitude Jar helps with this) the easier it is to "make magic".
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
New Year's Day and January and Janus
January 1st New Year's Day. Some say this is the only World Wide Holiday.
January is named for Janus God of 2 faces, the God that looks back and the God that looks forward.
The symbology of an Old Man representing the old year and a baby representing the New Year weaves seamlessly into the pagan Solstice and Stregheria rituals and celebrations, the ever changing, ever dying god. Janus encompasses both Lupercus the Wolf God who rules this time and Kern the Stag God whose rule begins at the Spring Equinox and ends at the Fall Equinox. Janus is the God who is present when the Child of Promise is born at Lupercus.
According to Wikipedia: "January is named after Janus (Ianuarius), the god of the doorway; the name has its beginnings in Roman mythology, coming from the Latin word for door (ianua) – January is the door to the year."
Again according to Wikipedia January has been the first month of the year for Romans since at least 153 BC, perhaps as far back as 450 BC or 713 BC depending on which account you prefer.
I prefer the 713 BC account which credits Numa Pompilius because I like his affliation with Egeria and Egeria's affliation with Lake Nemi. But I digress.
There is a great site that talks about how the Romans tracked days based on the Moon before they settled on a Solar Calendar. The excerpt below is taken from this site.
"January was named after Janus, a sky-god who was ancient even at the time of Rome’s founding. Ovid quoted Janus as saying "The ancients called me chaos, for a being from of old am I." After describing the world’s creation, he again quoted Janus: "It was then that I, till that time a mere ball, a shapeless lump, assumed the face and members of a god." A Lydian named Joannes identified Janus as a planet when he wrote: "Our own Philadelphia still preserves a trace of the ancient belief. On the first day of the month there goes in procession no less a personage than Janus himself, dressed up in a two-faced mask, and people call him Saturnus, identifying him with Kronos."
Early Romans believed that the beginning of each day, month and year were sacred to Janus. They thought he opened the gates of heaven at dawn to let out the morning, and that he closed them at dusk. This eventually led to his worship as the god of all doors, gates, and entrances."
January is named for Janus God of 2 faces, the God that looks back and the God that looks forward.
The symbology of an Old Man representing the old year and a baby representing the New Year weaves seamlessly into the pagan Solstice and Stregheria rituals and celebrations, the ever changing, ever dying god. Janus encompasses both Lupercus the Wolf God who rules this time and Kern the Stag God whose rule begins at the Spring Equinox and ends at the Fall Equinox. Janus is the God who is present when the Child of Promise is born at Lupercus.
According to Wikipedia: "January is named after Janus (Ianuarius), the god of the doorway; the name has its beginnings in Roman mythology, coming from the Latin word for door (ianua) – January is the door to the year."
Again according to Wikipedia January has been the first month of the year for Romans since at least 153 BC, perhaps as far back as 450 BC or 713 BC depending on which account you prefer.
I prefer the 713 BC account which credits Numa Pompilius because I like his affliation with Egeria and Egeria's affliation with Lake Nemi. But I digress.
There is a great site that talks about how the Romans tracked days based on the Moon before they settled on a Solar Calendar. The excerpt below is taken from this site.
"January was named after Janus, a sky-god who was ancient even at the time of Rome’s founding. Ovid quoted Janus as saying "The ancients called me chaos, for a being from of old am I." After describing the world’s creation, he again quoted Janus: "It was then that I, till that time a mere ball, a shapeless lump, assumed the face and members of a god." A Lydian named Joannes identified Janus as a planet when he wrote: "Our own Philadelphia still preserves a trace of the ancient belief. On the first day of the month there goes in procession no less a personage than Janus himself, dressed up in a two-faced mask, and people call him Saturnus, identifying him with Kronos."
Early Romans believed that the beginning of each day, month and year were sacred to Janus. They thought he opened the gates of heaven at dawn to let out the morning, and that he closed them at dusk. This eventually led to his worship as the god of all doors, gates, and entrances."
Sunday, December 30, 2012
The New Year's Kiss... or any kiss
A kiss to build a year on - if your brain's chemistry agrees
By Sheril Kirshenbaum
Thursday, December 23, 2010
A kiss at midnight to ring in the new year. That's what Friday night should bring, right?
It's tradition, compulsion, festive duty. An excuse to make a bold move with someone new, a reason to be anxious about finding a date or a chance to celebrate with a longtime love. And there's pressure to get it right.
There ia a scientific basis for those high stakes. Whom you kiss can set the course for a good year. Really. It's not magic - it's chemistry and neuroscience. And no matter how painstakingly you set the scene, in the end chemistry trumps mood music. From a scientific perspective, a kiss is a natural litmus test to help us identify a good partner. Start the first moments of 2011 with the right one, and you're beginning the year on a natural high.
Just what is it that makes kissing such a powerful and significant part of the human experience?
A kiss influences important chemicals in our brains and bodies responsible for promoting social bonding. According to the work of Rutgers University anthropologist Helen Fisher, kissing evolved to facilitate three essential needs: sex drive, romantic love and attachment. Each is involved in promoting reproduction, and kissing bolsters all three. In that view, locking lips helps us find partners, commit to one person and keep couples together long enough to have a child.
Humans have evolved to use a number of signals - including taste, smell and possibly silent chemical messengers called pheromones - to help us figure out whether someone is a suitable partner and a good person to reproduce with. A kiss means getting close to someone - close enough to suss out important clues about chemistry and genetics. At this range, our noses can detect valuable information about another person's health and perhaps even his or her DNA. Biologist Claus Wedekind has found, for instance, that women are most attracted to the scents of men with a different set of genetic coding for immunity than their own. This is probably because when there is greater genetic diversity between parents in this area, their children will have more versatile immune systems. The assessment occurs at a subconscious level, yet a bad initial kiss may be a result of a genetically star-crossed pair. (Which is something else to worry about during a new encounter: "What if the girl of my dreams rejects my genes?")
During a passionate kiss, our blood vessels dilate and our brains receive more oxygen than normal. Our breathing can become irregular and deepen. Our cheeks flush, our pulse quickens, and our pupils dilate (which may be one reason that so many of us close our eyes). A long, open-mouthed exchange allows us to sample another person's taste, which can reveal clues about his or her health and fertility. Our tongues - covered with little bumps called papillae that feature our 9,000 to 10,000 taste buds - are ideally designed to gather such information.
When we kiss, all five of our senses are busy transmitting messages to our brain. Billions of nerve connections are firing away and distributing signals around our bodies. Eventually, these signals reach the somatosenory cortex, the region of the brain that processes feelings of touch, temperature, pain and more.
Our brains respond by producing chemicals that help us decide our next move. A good kiss can work like a drug, influencing the hormones and neurotransmitters coursing through our bodies. It can send two people on a natural high by stimulating pleasure centers in the brain. The feeling has much to do with a neurotransmitter called dopamine, which is responsible for craving and desire and associated with "falling in love." When it's really pumping, dopamine spurs us to take things further.
Kissing also promotes the "love hormone," oxytocin, which works to maintain a special connection between two people; kissing can keep love alive when a relationship has survived decades, long after novelty has waned. In other words, kissing influences the uptake of hormones and neurotransmitters beyond our conscious control, and these signals play a huge part in how we feel about each other.
A bad kiss, alternatively, can lead to chemical chaos. An uncomfortable environment or a poor match can stimulate the "stress hormone" cortisol, discouraging both partners from continuing. Evolutionary psychologist Gordon Gallup of the University at Albany reports that 59 percent of men and 66 percent of women say they have ended a budding relationship because of a kiss that did not go well.
Whether it's magic or a disaster, there is one thing that a first kiss is very likely to be: unforgettable. Psychologist John Bohannon of Butler University and his research team surveyed 500 people to compare their recollections of a variety of significant life experiences - such as a first kiss and the loss of virginity - to find out what made the most dramatic impression. A first kiss trumped everything: It was the most vivid memory in the minds of those being surveyed.
In fact, when asked about specifics, Bohannon reported that most people could recall up to 90 percent of the details of the moment - where they were, who made the first move - no matter how long ago the exchange took place.
Which is not to say that sharing a New Year's Eve kiss with someone new will necessarily be a memory worth savoring for a lifetime. If midnight's buss is a bust, remember that you can't control everything about the situation and that your body (or your partner's) may be saying something very important: Look elsewhere. If the chemistry is wrong, there's not much you can do. But take heart. Valentine's Day is less than two months away.
Sheril Kirshenbaum is a research scientist at the University of Texas and the author of the new book "The Science of Kissing."
By Sheril Kirshenbaum
Thursday, December 23, 2010
A kiss at midnight to ring in the new year. That's what Friday night should bring, right?
It's tradition, compulsion, festive duty. An excuse to make a bold move with someone new, a reason to be anxious about finding a date or a chance to celebrate with a longtime love. And there's pressure to get it right.
There ia a scientific basis for those high stakes. Whom you kiss can set the course for a good year. Really. It's not magic - it's chemistry and neuroscience. And no matter how painstakingly you set the scene, in the end chemistry trumps mood music. From a scientific perspective, a kiss is a natural litmus test to help us identify a good partner. Start the first moments of 2011 with the right one, and you're beginning the year on a natural high.
Just what is it that makes kissing such a powerful and significant part of the human experience?
A kiss influences important chemicals in our brains and bodies responsible for promoting social bonding. According to the work of Rutgers University anthropologist Helen Fisher, kissing evolved to facilitate three essential needs: sex drive, romantic love and attachment. Each is involved in promoting reproduction, and kissing bolsters all three. In that view, locking lips helps us find partners, commit to one person and keep couples together long enough to have a child.
Humans have evolved to use a number of signals - including taste, smell and possibly silent chemical messengers called pheromones - to help us figure out whether someone is a suitable partner and a good person to reproduce with. A kiss means getting close to someone - close enough to suss out important clues about chemistry and genetics. At this range, our noses can detect valuable information about another person's health and perhaps even his or her DNA. Biologist Claus Wedekind has found, for instance, that women are most attracted to the scents of men with a different set of genetic coding for immunity than their own. This is probably because when there is greater genetic diversity between parents in this area, their children will have more versatile immune systems. The assessment occurs at a subconscious level, yet a bad initial kiss may be a result of a genetically star-crossed pair. (Which is something else to worry about during a new encounter: "What if the girl of my dreams rejects my genes?")
During a passionate kiss, our blood vessels dilate and our brains receive more oxygen than normal. Our breathing can become irregular and deepen. Our cheeks flush, our pulse quickens, and our pupils dilate (which may be one reason that so many of us close our eyes). A long, open-mouthed exchange allows us to sample another person's taste, which can reveal clues about his or her health and fertility. Our tongues - covered with little bumps called papillae that feature our 9,000 to 10,000 taste buds - are ideally designed to gather such information.
When we kiss, all five of our senses are busy transmitting messages to our brain. Billions of nerve connections are firing away and distributing signals around our bodies. Eventually, these signals reach the somatosenory cortex, the region of the brain that processes feelings of touch, temperature, pain and more.
Our brains respond by producing chemicals that help us decide our next move. A good kiss can work like a drug, influencing the hormones and neurotransmitters coursing through our bodies. It can send two people on a natural high by stimulating pleasure centers in the brain. The feeling has much to do with a neurotransmitter called dopamine, which is responsible for craving and desire and associated with "falling in love." When it's really pumping, dopamine spurs us to take things further.
Kissing also promotes the "love hormone," oxytocin, which works to maintain a special connection between two people; kissing can keep love alive when a relationship has survived decades, long after novelty has waned. In other words, kissing influences the uptake of hormones and neurotransmitters beyond our conscious control, and these signals play a huge part in how we feel about each other.
A bad kiss, alternatively, can lead to chemical chaos. An uncomfortable environment or a poor match can stimulate the "stress hormone" cortisol, discouraging both partners from continuing. Evolutionary psychologist Gordon Gallup of the University at Albany reports that 59 percent of men and 66 percent of women say they have ended a budding relationship because of a kiss that did not go well.
Whether it's magic or a disaster, there is one thing that a first kiss is very likely to be: unforgettable. Psychologist John Bohannon of Butler University and his research team surveyed 500 people to compare their recollections of a variety of significant life experiences - such as a first kiss and the loss of virginity - to find out what made the most dramatic impression. A first kiss trumped everything: It was the most vivid memory in the minds of those being surveyed.
In fact, when asked about specifics, Bohannon reported that most people could recall up to 90 percent of the details of the moment - where they were, who made the first move - no matter how long ago the exchange took place.
Which is not to say that sharing a New Year's Eve kiss with someone new will necessarily be a memory worth savoring for a lifetime. If midnight's buss is a bust, remember that you can't control everything about the situation and that your body (or your partner's) may be saying something very important: Look elsewhere. If the chemistry is wrong, there's not much you can do. But take heart. Valentine's Day is less than two months away.
Sheril Kirshenbaum is a research scientist at the University of Texas and the author of the new book "The Science of Kissing."
Friday, December 21, 2012
Where is the House of the Rising Sun?
Thanks to Blake Ponchartrain of New Orleans Gambit Magazine. Blake is one of the best history researchers on the planet. He answers questions sent into him from readers wondering about their history and their environment. And what's not to like about that?
Where is the House of the Rising Sun?
Blake Pontchartrain
Hey Blake,
I have some questions about a song written about New Orleans, "House of the Rising Sun." Was there a real House of the Rising Sun in New Orleans, and where was it? Who wrote the song?
Cynthia
Dear Cynthia,
There probably were several buildings in New Orleans called House of the Rising Sun over the years, but it's likely most would have been named after the song, not served as the inspiration for it.
Back in the 1980s, Record Ron, whose Record Ron's Good & Plenty Records regularly won "best used record store" honors in reader polls, said he was told his record shop at 1129 Decatur St. occupied the original House of the Rising Sun. Ron, who died in 1996, never could authenticate that claim.
A Jan. 29, 1821, issue of the Louisiana Gazette ran an advertisement announcing L.S. Hotchkiss and Co. had bought John Hull and Co.'s interests in the Rising Sun Hotel at 535 Conti St. That hotel opened in 1801 and was destroyed by fire in 1822.
Another story proffers the famed house was at 826-830 St. Louis St. and was a brothel originally run by Madam Marianne LeSoleil Levant, whose surname is French for "rising sun."
Today, the three-story white building on St. Louis Street is owned by attorney Darlene Jacobs Levy and houses her Home Finders International real estate company. She inherited the building when her husband died in the late 1980s, and she began renovating the front apartment of the derelict building as a place for her father to live. Workmen at the site discovered risque postcards of half-dressed women from the 1800s behind a wall and uncovered fancy fluted columns and a ceiling mural of a golden rising sun surrounded by three cherubs. Levy says the house was a bordello operated by a succession of different madams for many years before her husband bought the building.
Eric Burdon, the vocalist for The Animals, which scored a huge hit with "House of the Rising Sun" in 1964, wrote in his book Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood about meeting Levy and touring the St. Louis Street house.
"It was all I'd dreamt it would be," Burdon wrote. "A palace in the New Orleans heat. It was a wondrous feeling learning that the place I'd fantasized about for thirty years wasn't some run-down shack but was in fact a place of beauty."
Levy says she has no legal documents to prove the building's history. "It has been passed down in history and folklore as being the House of the Rising Sun," she says. "It doesn't really matter to me whether it is or not. It's not open to the public."
Levy restored the house out of a duty to conserve historic structures, she says. "What you see now is what we feel is the original house as it was in the 1800s."
As for the author of "House of the Rising Sun," that is unknown. Musicologists have traced the song's origins back as far as the 18th century to a traditional English ballad. Like many ballads and folk songs, the lyrics have changed over the years to suit the singer and the audience. No one can claim rights to the song, so anyone can alter it, record it or sell it royalty-free.
Where is the House of the Rising Sun?
Blake Pontchartrain
Hey Blake,
I have some questions about a song written about New Orleans, "House of the Rising Sun." Was there a real House of the Rising Sun in New Orleans, and where was it? Who wrote the song?
Cynthia
Dear Cynthia,
There probably were several buildings in New Orleans called House of the Rising Sun over the years, but it's likely most would have been named after the song, not served as the inspiration for it.
Back in the 1980s, Record Ron, whose Record Ron's Good & Plenty Records regularly won "best used record store" honors in reader polls, said he was told his record shop at 1129 Decatur St. occupied the original House of the Rising Sun. Ron, who died in 1996, never could authenticate that claim.
A Jan. 29, 1821, issue of the Louisiana Gazette ran an advertisement announcing L.S. Hotchkiss and Co. had bought John Hull and Co.'s interests in the Rising Sun Hotel at 535 Conti St. That hotel opened in 1801 and was destroyed by fire in 1822.
Another story proffers the famed house was at 826-830 St. Louis St. and was a brothel originally run by Madam Marianne LeSoleil Levant, whose surname is French for "rising sun."
Today, the three-story white building on St. Louis Street is owned by attorney Darlene Jacobs Levy and houses her Home Finders International real estate company. She inherited the building when her husband died in the late 1980s, and she began renovating the front apartment of the derelict building as a place for her father to live. Workmen at the site discovered risque postcards of half-dressed women from the 1800s behind a wall and uncovered fancy fluted columns and a ceiling mural of a golden rising sun surrounded by three cherubs. Levy says the house was a bordello operated by a succession of different madams for many years before her husband bought the building.
Eric Burdon, the vocalist for The Animals, which scored a huge hit with "House of the Rising Sun" in 1964, wrote in his book Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood about meeting Levy and touring the St. Louis Street house.
"It was all I'd dreamt it would be," Burdon wrote. "A palace in the New Orleans heat. It was a wondrous feeling learning that the place I'd fantasized about for thirty years wasn't some run-down shack but was in fact a place of beauty."
Levy says she has no legal documents to prove the building's history. "It has been passed down in history and folklore as being the House of the Rising Sun," she says. "It doesn't really matter to me whether it is or not. It's not open to the public."
Levy restored the house out of a duty to conserve historic structures, she says. "What you see now is what we feel is the original house as it was in the 1800s."
As for the author of "House of the Rising Sun," that is unknown. Musicologists have traced the song's origins back as far as the 18th century to a traditional English ballad. Like many ballads and folk songs, the lyrics have changed over the years to suit the singer and the audience. No one can claim rights to the song, so anyone can alter it, record it or sell it royalty-free.
Thursday, December 20, 2012
Solar Power
Pagans generally want to weave their value system into how we live our lives and we generally see things as more interconnected than non-Pagans. This combined with the recent presidential election and the state of our economy has caused me to chase worldly, but oh so connected, things..... like Solar Panels
By the end of the month of October 2012 (instead of September as orginally planned due to delays related to Hurricane Isaac) my house was generating its our own Solar Power. The Federal tax credits for this expire in 2016. If you own your own home, don't wait. Do it now. Yes it does take investment dollars from you. BUT you can get ALL of the dollars that will be reimbursed from the Feds (and your state) can be financed for 0% interest for 12 months. The company I used Solar Universe does all the hard work. They connect you to the lender, complete all the paperwork; all you have to do is file the forms with your taxes. With the Federal and State rebates we had to come up with less than 20% of the cost. With "netmetering" this will annually ZERO out our power bill. My carbon footprint goes WAY down and I am living more lightly on the earth, woven into the web of life, even if this weave is using technology and involves plugging into our city grid.
Ok so how do you come up with 20%? Assuming that you have a job/provable income, find a local bank and refinance your house. That's what I did. And along with the refinance we got what was needed to put Solar Panels on the house.
I know. I know.
Not everyone can do this. The economy sucks and some people are upside down on their mortgages. BUT if you can, it perfectly aligns with pagan value system.
Another thing to think about. Our mortgage was with one of the large, national corporations that provide mortgages to most Americans. And I figured that it would be easy to re-finance. After all they had watched me pay the bills (even through the chaotic aftermath of Katrina) for years. All they did was waste my time. So in July 2012 I ended up working with a local bank and the refi (at not quite 2% less interest than the mortgage I had) went through in a month. A month! It took almost that long for the big corporation to tell me what they needed from me. And here is the ultimate irony. These days, even if you do the refi work with a local bank, they are going to "sell your mortgage" (Yep!) to one of the large corporations that provide the bulk of mortgage lending in this country. Weird. But true. Yet at the local bank I spoke to a person, who walked me through the paperwork and made sure the timing (I was leaving town for 2 weeks) worked out.
This is only one of the physical, practical, grounded things that I kept me busy in 2012.
But I'm glad I did it because Solar Power fits my Value System.
By the end of the month of October 2012 (instead of September as orginally planned due to delays related to Hurricane Isaac) my house was generating its our own Solar Power. The Federal tax credits for this expire in 2016. If you own your own home, don't wait. Do it now. Yes it does take investment dollars from you. BUT you can get ALL of the dollars that will be reimbursed from the Feds (and your state) can be financed for 0% interest for 12 months. The company I used Solar Universe does all the hard work. They connect you to the lender, complete all the paperwork; all you have to do is file the forms with your taxes. With the Federal and State rebates we had to come up with less than 20% of the cost. With "netmetering" this will annually ZERO out our power bill. My carbon footprint goes WAY down and I am living more lightly on the earth, woven into the web of life, even if this weave is using technology and involves plugging into our city grid.
Ok so how do you come up with 20%? Assuming that you have a job/provable income, find a local bank and refinance your house. That's what I did. And along with the refinance we got what was needed to put Solar Panels on the house.
I know. I know.
Not everyone can do this. The economy sucks and some people are upside down on their mortgages. BUT if you can, it perfectly aligns with pagan value system.
Another thing to think about. Our mortgage was with one of the large, national corporations that provide mortgages to most Americans. And I figured that it would be easy to re-finance. After all they had watched me pay the bills (even through the chaotic aftermath of Katrina) for years. All they did was waste my time. So in July 2012 I ended up working with a local bank and the refi (at not quite 2% less interest than the mortgage I had) went through in a month. A month! It took almost that long for the big corporation to tell me what they needed from me. And here is the ultimate irony. These days, even if you do the refi work with a local bank, they are going to "sell your mortgage" (Yep!) to one of the large corporations that provide the bulk of mortgage lending in this country. Weird. But true. Yet at the local bank I spoke to a person, who walked me through the paperwork and made sure the timing (I was leaving town for 2 weeks) worked out.
This is only one of the physical, practical, grounded things that I kept me busy in 2012.
But I'm glad I did it because Solar Power fits my Value System.
Thursday, November 22, 2012
Remembering the 1st Thanksgiving
"The first Thanksgiving Day did occur in the year 1637, but it
was nothing like our Thanksgiving today. On that day the
Massachusetts Colony Governor, John Winthrop, proclaimed
such a "Thanksgiving" to celebrate the safe return of a band
of heavily armed hunters, all colonial volunteers. They had just
returned from their journey to what is now Mystic, Connecticut
where they massacred 700 Pequot Indians. Seven hundred Indians
- men, women and children - all murdered." Richard Greener
Read the Richard Greener 2010 article from the Huffington Post ( and below).
The idea of the American Thanksgiving feast is a fairly recent fiction. The idyllic partnership of 17th Century European Pilgrims and New England Indians sharing a celebratory meal appears to be less than 120 years-old. And it was only after the First World War that a version of such a Puritan-Indian partnership took hold in elementary schools across the American landscape. We can thank the invention of textbooks and their mass purchase by public schools for embedding this "Thanksgiving" image in our modern minds. It was, of course, a complete invention, a cleverly created slice of cultural propaganda, just another in a long line of inspired nationalistic myths.
The first Thanksgiving Day did occur in the year 1637, but it was nothing like our Thanksgiving today. On that day the Massachusetts Colony Governor, John Winthrop, proclaimed such a "Thanksgiving" to celebrate the safe return of a band of heavily armed hunters, all colonial volunteers. They had just returned from their journey to what is now Mystic, Connecticut where they massacred 700 Pequot Indians. Seven hundred Indians - men, women and children - all murdered.
This day is still remembered today, 373 years later. No, it's been long forgotten by white people, by European Christians. But it is still fresh in the mind of many Indians. A group calling themselves the United American Indians of New England meet each year at Plymouth Rock on Cole's Hill for what they say is a Day of Mourning. They gather at the feet of a stature of Chief Massasoit of the Wampanoag to remember the long gone Pequot. They do not call it Thanksgiving. There is no football game afterward.
How then did our modern, festive Thanksgiving come to be? It began with the greatest of misunderstandings, a true clash of cultural values and fundamental principles. What are we thankful for if not - being here, living on this land, surviving and prospering? But in our thankfulness might we have overlooked something? Look what happened to the original residents who lived in the area of New York we have come to call Brooklyn. A group of them called Canarsees obligingly, perhaps even eagerly, accepted various pieces of pretty colored junk from the Dutchman Peter Minuet in 1626. These trinkets have long since been estimated to be worth no more than 60 Dutch guilders at the time - $24 dollars in modern American money. In exchange, the Canarsees "gave" Peter Minuet the island of Manhattan. What did they care? They were living in Brooklyn.
Of course, all things - especially commercial transactions - need to be viewed in perspective. The nearly two-dozen tribes of Native Americans living in the New York area in those days had a distinctly non-European concept of territorial rights. They were strangers to the idea of "real property." It was common for one tribe to grant permission to another to hunt and fish nearby themselves on a regular basis. Fences, real and imagined, were not a part of their culture. Naturally, it was polite to ask before setting up operations too close to where others lived, but refusal in matters of this sort was considered rude. As a sign of gratitude, small trinkets were usually offered by the tribe seeking temporary admission and cheerfully accepted by those already there. It was clearly understood to be a sort of short-term rental arrangement. Sad to say, the unfortunate Canarsees apparently had no idea the Dutch meant to settle in. Worse yet for them, it must have been unthinkable that they would also be unwelcome in Manhattan after their deal. One thing we can be sure of. Their equivalent of today's buyer's remorse brought the Canarsees nothing but grief, humiliation and violence.
Many Indians lived on Long Island in those days. Another Dutchman, Adrian Block, was the first European to come upon them in 1619. Block was also eager to introduce European commercialism and the Christian concept of "real estate" to these unfortunate innocents. Without exception, these Indians too came out on the short end in their dealings with the Dutch.
The market savvy unleashed by the Europeans upon the Indians constituted the first land use policies in the New World. In the 17th Century it was not urban but rather rural renewal. The result was of course the same. People of color with no money to speak of got booted out and the neighborhood which was subsequently gentrified and overrun by white people.
Not far from Manhattan, one tribe of about 10,000 Indians lived peacefully in a lovely spot on a peninsula directly along the ocean. There they fished in the open sea and inland bay. They hunted across the pristine shoreline and they were quite happy until they met a man - another Dutchman - named Willem Kieft. He was the Governor of New Netherland in 1639. These poor bastards were called the Rechaweygh (pronounced Rockaway). Soon after meeting Governor Kieft, they became the very first of New York's homeless.
The people of New Netherland had a lot in common with the people of Plymouth Colony. At least it appears so from the way both of these groups of displaced and dissatisfied Europeans interacted with the local Indians. The Pilgrims in Plymouth had a hard time for the first couple of years. While nature was no friend, their troubles were mostly their own doing. Poor planning was their downfall. These mostly city dwelling Europeans failed to include among them persons with the skills needed in settling the North American wilderness. Having reached the forests and fields of Massachusetts they turned out to be pathetic hunters and incompetent butchers. With game everywhere, they went hungry. First, they couldn't catch and kill it. Then they couldn't cut it up, prepare it, preserve it and create a storehouse for those days when fresh supplies would run low. To compensate for their shortage of essential protein they turned to their European ways and their Christian culture. They instituted a series of religious observances. They could not hunt or farm well, but they seemed skilled at praying.
They developed a taste for something both religious and useful. They called it a Day of Fasting. Without food it seemed like a good idea. From necessity, that single Day became multiple Days. As food supplies dwindled the Days of Fasting came in bunches. Each of these episodes was eventually and thankfully followed by a meal. Appropriately enough, the Puritans credited God for this good fortune. They referred to the fact they were allowed to eat again as a "Thanksgiving." And they wrote it down. Thus, the first mention of the word - "Thanksgiving." Let there be no mistake here. On that first Thanksgiving there was no turkey, no corn, no cranberries, no stuffing. And no dessert. Those fortunate Pilgrims were lucky to get a piece of fish and a potato. All things considered, it was a Thanksgiving feast.
Did the Pilgrims share their Thanksgiving meal with the local Indians, the Wampanoag and Pequot? No. That never happened. That is, until its inclusion in the "Thanksgiving Story" in 1890.
Let the Wampanoag be a lesson to us especially in these troubled economic times. These particular Indians, with a bent for colorful jewelry, had their tribal name altered slightly by the Dutch, who then used it as a reference for all Indian payments. Hence, wampum. Contrary to what we've been shown in our Western movies, this word - wampum - and its economic meaning never made it out of New England.
Unlike wampum, Thanksgiving Day has indeed spread across the continent. It would serve us well to remember that it wasn't until the victorious colonial militia returned from their slaughter of the Pequot that the New Americans began their now time-honored and cherished Thanksgiving.
Enjoy your turkey.
was nothing like our Thanksgiving today. On that day the
Massachusetts Colony Governor, John Winthrop, proclaimed
such a "Thanksgiving" to celebrate the safe return of a band
of heavily armed hunters, all colonial volunteers. They had just
returned from their journey to what is now Mystic, Connecticut
where they massacred 700 Pequot Indians. Seven hundred Indians
- men, women and children - all murdered." Richard Greener
Read the Richard Greener 2010 article from the Huffington Post ( and below).
The idea of the American Thanksgiving feast is a fairly recent fiction. The idyllic partnership of 17th Century European Pilgrims and New England Indians sharing a celebratory meal appears to be less than 120 years-old. And it was only after the First World War that a version of such a Puritan-Indian partnership took hold in elementary schools across the American landscape. We can thank the invention of textbooks and their mass purchase by public schools for embedding this "Thanksgiving" image in our modern minds. It was, of course, a complete invention, a cleverly created slice of cultural propaganda, just another in a long line of inspired nationalistic myths.
The first Thanksgiving Day did occur in the year 1637, but it was nothing like our Thanksgiving today. On that day the Massachusetts Colony Governor, John Winthrop, proclaimed such a "Thanksgiving" to celebrate the safe return of a band of heavily armed hunters, all colonial volunteers. They had just returned from their journey to what is now Mystic, Connecticut where they massacred 700 Pequot Indians. Seven hundred Indians - men, women and children - all murdered.
This day is still remembered today, 373 years later. No, it's been long forgotten by white people, by European Christians. But it is still fresh in the mind of many Indians. A group calling themselves the United American Indians of New England meet each year at Plymouth Rock on Cole's Hill for what they say is a Day of Mourning. They gather at the feet of a stature of Chief Massasoit of the Wampanoag to remember the long gone Pequot. They do not call it Thanksgiving. There is no football game afterward.
How then did our modern, festive Thanksgiving come to be? It began with the greatest of misunderstandings, a true clash of cultural values and fundamental principles. What are we thankful for if not - being here, living on this land, surviving and prospering? But in our thankfulness might we have overlooked something? Look what happened to the original residents who lived in the area of New York we have come to call Brooklyn. A group of them called Canarsees obligingly, perhaps even eagerly, accepted various pieces of pretty colored junk from the Dutchman Peter Minuet in 1626. These trinkets have long since been estimated to be worth no more than 60 Dutch guilders at the time - $24 dollars in modern American money. In exchange, the Canarsees "gave" Peter Minuet the island of Manhattan. What did they care? They were living in Brooklyn.
Of course, all things - especially commercial transactions - need to be viewed in perspective. The nearly two-dozen tribes of Native Americans living in the New York area in those days had a distinctly non-European concept of territorial rights. They were strangers to the idea of "real property." It was common for one tribe to grant permission to another to hunt and fish nearby themselves on a regular basis. Fences, real and imagined, were not a part of their culture. Naturally, it was polite to ask before setting up operations too close to where others lived, but refusal in matters of this sort was considered rude. As a sign of gratitude, small trinkets were usually offered by the tribe seeking temporary admission and cheerfully accepted by those already there. It was clearly understood to be a sort of short-term rental arrangement. Sad to say, the unfortunate Canarsees apparently had no idea the Dutch meant to settle in. Worse yet for them, it must have been unthinkable that they would also be unwelcome in Manhattan after their deal. One thing we can be sure of. Their equivalent of today's buyer's remorse brought the Canarsees nothing but grief, humiliation and violence.
Many Indians lived on Long Island in those days. Another Dutchman, Adrian Block, was the first European to come upon them in 1619. Block was also eager to introduce European commercialism and the Christian concept of "real estate" to these unfortunate innocents. Without exception, these Indians too came out on the short end in their dealings with the Dutch.
The market savvy unleashed by the Europeans upon the Indians constituted the first land use policies in the New World. In the 17th Century it was not urban but rather rural renewal. The result was of course the same. People of color with no money to speak of got booted out and the neighborhood which was subsequently gentrified and overrun by white people.
Not far from Manhattan, one tribe of about 10,000 Indians lived peacefully in a lovely spot on a peninsula directly along the ocean. There they fished in the open sea and inland bay. They hunted across the pristine shoreline and they were quite happy until they met a man - another Dutchman - named Willem Kieft. He was the Governor of New Netherland in 1639. These poor bastards were called the Rechaweygh (pronounced Rockaway). Soon after meeting Governor Kieft, they became the very first of New York's homeless.
The people of New Netherland had a lot in common with the people of Plymouth Colony. At least it appears so from the way both of these groups of displaced and dissatisfied Europeans interacted with the local Indians. The Pilgrims in Plymouth had a hard time for the first couple of years. While nature was no friend, their troubles were mostly their own doing. Poor planning was their downfall. These mostly city dwelling Europeans failed to include among them persons with the skills needed in settling the North American wilderness. Having reached the forests and fields of Massachusetts they turned out to be pathetic hunters and incompetent butchers. With game everywhere, they went hungry. First, they couldn't catch and kill it. Then they couldn't cut it up, prepare it, preserve it and create a storehouse for those days when fresh supplies would run low. To compensate for their shortage of essential protein they turned to their European ways and their Christian culture. They instituted a series of religious observances. They could not hunt or farm well, but they seemed skilled at praying.
They developed a taste for something both religious and useful. They called it a Day of Fasting. Without food it seemed like a good idea. From necessity, that single Day became multiple Days. As food supplies dwindled the Days of Fasting came in bunches. Each of these episodes was eventually and thankfully followed by a meal. Appropriately enough, the Puritans credited God for this good fortune. They referred to the fact they were allowed to eat again as a "Thanksgiving." And they wrote it down. Thus, the first mention of the word - "Thanksgiving." Let there be no mistake here. On that first Thanksgiving there was no turkey, no corn, no cranberries, no stuffing. And no dessert. Those fortunate Pilgrims were lucky to get a piece of fish and a potato. All things considered, it was a Thanksgiving feast.
Did the Pilgrims share their Thanksgiving meal with the local Indians, the Wampanoag and Pequot? No. That never happened. That is, until its inclusion in the "Thanksgiving Story" in 1890.
Let the Wampanoag be a lesson to us especially in these troubled economic times. These particular Indians, with a bent for colorful jewelry, had their tribal name altered slightly by the Dutch, who then used it as a reference for all Indian payments. Hence, wampum. Contrary to what we've been shown in our Western movies, this word - wampum - and its economic meaning never made it out of New England.
Unlike wampum, Thanksgiving Day has indeed spread across the continent. It would serve us well to remember that it wasn't until the victorious colonial militia returned from their slaughter of the Pequot that the New Americans began their now time-honored and cherished Thanksgiving.
Enjoy your turkey.
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Words of Aradia: Concerning Tana & Tanus
These words are taken from Italian Witchcraft by Raven Grimassi:
Tana is the sacred name of the Great Goddess, She who is all Goddesses. Upon the Earth She is known as Fana, in the heavens She is Diana (the Moon) and in the universe she is Tana (containing them all).
Tana is the sacred name of the Great Goddess, She who is all Goddesses. Upon the Earth She is known as Fana, in the heavens She is Diana (the Moon) and in the universe she is Tana (containing them all).
Lakes, hills, streams and beaches are sacred places to Tana. The animals which are sacred to Her are dogs, owls and cats. Her sacred plants are MoonFlowers and willows. Lemons and apples are sacred to Tana.
Tana is all that is feminine. She is total beauty and love. She is the Divine Lover, Enchantress, Temptress and Mother. At times She is the Eternal Virgin, at times the Mother but truly, She is free, loving, sexual, independent and powerful. Tana loves her followers with unequaled passion. She never forgets nor neglects Her own. She is generous and protective of all who love Her.
Tanus is the Great God, who is all Gods. On Earth He is Fanus, in the heavens he is Janus (the Sun) and in the Universe he is Tanus.
All mountains are sacred to Tanus. His sacred animals are horses, wolves, woodpeckers and ravens. His sacred plants are the fig tree, oak, dogwood, laurel and the bean plant.
Tanus is the Great God, who is all Gods. On Earth He is Fanus, in the heavens he is Janus (the Sun) and in the Universe he is Tanus.
All mountains are sacred to Tanus. His sacred animals are horses, wolves, woodpeckers and ravens. His sacred plants are the fig tree, oak, dogwood, laurel and the bean plant.
Tanus is all that is masculine. He is strength and will. He is the power of fertility (which is shared with Tana) and the desire behind all creation. Tana is the source of all creation.
At times He is the hunter and provider and at times He is the destroyer. But truly He is wise and powerful. He is the freedom of things that are wild. He is loving and sexual, independent and powerful. Tanus loves His followers with a demanding love. He protects and provides but He is stern and judgmental. He expects strict adherence to His ways and His laws. But He is always fair and just.
Faunus is the Eternal Child, for we see Him in the frolicsome Pan. Yet the noble side if Faunus can be seen in the grace of a beautiful stag in the forest. We can see His spiritual nature in the circling of a hawk. And in the playful bunting of young goats can we see the lighthearted Faunus. All these are lesser reflections of Janus and Tanus in their own natures.
Tana is the balance to Tanus and He is the balance to Her. Without Tana, the God would be a judge without compassion. He would be stern without understanding. He would control without loving.
Without Tanus, the Goddess would have compassion without direction, understanding without foundation, love without form.
The God and Goddess complete each other, and together they are the One True Creator and Maintainer of the Universe.
Sunday, November 4, 2012
Raven Grimassi on Tradition
"It seems appropriate to say a few words about the Tradition, and about Tradition itself.
I believe in the tenacity of nature. Look at a sidewalk with a crack in it, and most often there will be some grass there. Paved streets and cement sidewalks are pushed up by the roots of trees. The modern ways of human kind cannot, in the end, prevail against nature.
I believe this also about nature religion. It is the soul of nature and it will live on, even if only in the hands of the chosen ones of the secret few.
When I think about all the generations that have passed on the Old Ways through times of great adversity and even danger to their own lives, I am determined that the Old Religion will not end in our time. For decades I have planted seeds. Some have fallen on fertile soil, some have not, and some have been thrown away. But I have seen some sprout, and I admire the beauty of what has grown from them.
The Old Ways are about companionship with the forces of nature, and about honoring our ancestors who kept the Ways before us. The Old Religion reminds us that we are part of the whole, part of something greater than ourselves. This is important to remember, particularly in this time of New Age philosophies that elevate the self over all else. But what works uniquely for one person, perishes when that person dies. They have left nothing behind, and they have not been a part of anything greater than themselves.
People pass away, but traditions can survive. And we as initiates are part of that survival. We are remembered and we possess honor throughout time for we are part of the living legacy.
With all good wishes,
Raven "
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
Reflections on the Hurricane
Take a look at one New Orleanian's view of living without, electricity.
http://b.rox.com/2012/09/04/revelations-in-blackout/
I'm beginning to think that the next decade is going to be one
where we learn to choose what we do without
by learning to ask ourselves questions like:
- Do I need X? (with the emphasis on need and not want)
- How does X serve me or my "ecosystem"/relationship with the rest of the world?
- Is there another option?
- Is there another way to get what I need (or want) that better serves me and my "ecosystem"/relationship with the rest of the world?
The effects of the Hurricane make it easier to reflect on these questions.
I like the freedom my petroleum provided vehicle provides.
I like my AirConditioning.
I like what "the internet and all it's options" offers me.
That's why I'm putting Solar Panels on my home and acquiring a Solar Generator.
These things allow me to have the benefits of electricity but change how I get it and has already begun encouraging others to think about doing the same.
These choices are not just about going back to the "good ole days"
but about making smarter long term decisions
instead of simply feeding the "consumer beast".
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
"Thanks Nature"
I'm sure you heard about the recent evidence for the long anticipated "Higgs Boson".
It was of course announced as the "Discovery" of "The God Particle".
To Quote the article referenced in the link above:
"Thanks, nature!" Gianotti said to laughs, giving thanks for the discovery.
Later, she told reporters that "the standard model (of physics) is not complete" but that "the dream is to find an ultimate theory that explains everything -- we are far from that."
And there you have it Nature as the Great Teacher acknowledged by one of the lead physicsts on the team that found evidence of "The God Particle".
It was of course announced as the "Discovery" of "The God Particle".
To Quote the article referenced in the link above:
"Thanks, nature!" Gianotti said to laughs, giving thanks for the discovery.
Later, she told reporters that "the standard model (of physics) is not complete" but that "the dream is to find an ultimate theory that explains everything -- we are far from that."
And there you have it Nature as the Great Teacher acknowledged by one of the lead physicsts on the team that found evidence of "The God Particle".
Sunday, July 1, 2012
Lazy... maybe not
I've listened to people from cooler climates bemoan the slow pace of life in the south... These days I'm hearing more people from (formerly) cooler climes complain about the heat, saying they want to stay inside, saying they are going to "do nothing". If culture had any heat dependencies... and I think it does... then perhaps *it is* the heat.... well... and the humidity.
Summer is our Winter. It is when we slow down and stay indoors.
But given the climate, we also adjust *when* we go outside. Am I lazy when I am inside with something cool by 10AM? Or smart? My outdoor work hours tend to be 5:30AM-9AM or after 7PM. Small windows, which is why I am glad for my day job... in the air conditioning.
An exerpt by C. W. Cannon below gives you more information to ponder... in the heat.
Approach to leisure is a happy habit: C.W. Cannon
Published: Friday, April 15, 2011, 10:17 AM
Louisiana and these national ranking lists. Now the state is the "most violent," according to the Institute for Economics and Peace. Last summer, the label was "lazy."
Of course, data can be spun different ways, be attached to different words.
If "lazy" means actually enjoying leisure time and not working too much, why not call Louisiana the "happiest" state? Oh, yeah, we won that one the previous year, in a study by the Centers for Disease Control.
Sadly, the most recent thorny laurel -- most "violent" -- is a less spinnable word than "lazy" or "happy." More sadly, Louisiana's long history is replete with unspinnable evidence that the violence is not a new phenomenon here.
"Lazy," though, we might be able to dodge. It depends on what it means. Certainly the word has been associated with Louisiana for a long time. "Dose Creole' is lezzy,"Aurora Nancanou says of her own people, in George Washington Cable's 1880 saga of old New Orleans, "The Grandisimmes."
Indeed, Bienville himself complained of the laziness of the settlers sent by the mother country. However, if it's true that Louisiana has an approach to work and leisure that distinguishes it from the average American state, could the earliest cultural formation of the region be a factor?
I've spent the past year searching for clues to whatever cultural residues might remain from the earliest generations of New Orleanians, residing first in France, then in Senegal. I've come across some very concrete parallels, such as Senegal's soupu kandia, a spicy seafood stew distinguished by inclusion of a vegetable they call "gumbo" (okra).
But lifestyle approaches are more difficult to generalize about. Even scientific-seeming surveys reveal highly subjective judgments upon closer inspection. As it turns out, the "lazy" ranking Bloomberg put together included time "working" (presumably at one's job, for money) and how leisure time was spent, whether in physically strenuous activities or in sedentary ones. Sedentary leisure activities covered not only watching TV, but also "thinking" and socializing.
Louisianians spent a big chunk of their time socializing, coming in at the third-most social state in the country. Most importantly, time spent "working" was very low. Maybe those bumper stickers proclaiming, "Work is for people who don't know how to fish," say it best.
The idea of challenging the pre-eminent status of work as the raison d'être of our identities is sacrilege for many Americans. However, one does get a very different sense of the value of work -- in perspective -- in both France and Senegal. The way the French demand leisure as a right and insist on actual legal limits to time and days worked per year is well known. Their leisure habits, too, revolve very much around unrushed meals and conversation with friends and family.
Senegal, too, approaches the idea of work differently than in the United States. It's a highly entrepreneurial culture, much more than France. Vendors of everything from phone cards to shoes and clothes energetically trudge the streets in the driven pursuit of a sale (to the great irritation of many foreigners). And there's a craftsmanly work ethic of doing the job right, from carpentry or tailoring to peeling an orange or putting the straw in a bag of cold fruit juice in just the right way.
But there's also a sense that work can't be rushed, that time working needs to be leavened with breaks for rest, family and friends, contemplation, prayer. You want the job done by 5? Maybe, incha Allah (God willing).
While this approach to the customer's demands is famously annoying to many a Westerner, it does preserve a salutary degree of autonomy to the guy on the other end of the transaction. And if he gets the job done, and done well, and makes enough money to enjoy life with friends and family, what's the problem?
It may be that Louisianians' approaches to work and leisure have roots in the first generations from Europe and Africa, but the comparison does not extend to violence. Both France and Senegal have far more peaceable societies than even the average American state can boast. Apparently, the causes of the real problem in Louisiana will have to be searched for closer to home.
............................
C.W. Cannon is the 2010-11 Fulbright Professor of American Civilization at Universite Cheikh Anta Diop, Dakar, Senegal. He returns to the Loyola University English Department in the fall.
Summer is our Winter. It is when we slow down and stay indoors.
But given the climate, we also adjust *when* we go outside. Am I lazy when I am inside with something cool by 10AM? Or smart? My outdoor work hours tend to be 5:30AM-9AM or after 7PM. Small windows, which is why I am glad for my day job... in the air conditioning.
An exerpt by C. W. Cannon below gives you more information to ponder... in the heat.
Approach to leisure is a happy habit: C.W. Cannon
Published: Friday, April 15, 2011, 10:17 AM
Louisiana and these national ranking lists. Now the state is the "most violent," according to the Institute for Economics and Peace. Last summer, the label was "lazy."
Of course, data can be spun different ways, be attached to different words.
If "lazy" means actually enjoying leisure time and not working too much, why not call Louisiana the "happiest" state? Oh, yeah, we won that one the previous year, in a study by the Centers for Disease Control.
Sadly, the most recent thorny laurel -- most "violent" -- is a less spinnable word than "lazy" or "happy." More sadly, Louisiana's long history is replete with unspinnable evidence that the violence is not a new phenomenon here.
"Lazy," though, we might be able to dodge. It depends on what it means. Certainly the word has been associated with Louisiana for a long time. "Dose Creole' is lezzy,"Aurora Nancanou says of her own people, in George Washington Cable's 1880 saga of old New Orleans, "The Grandisimmes."
Indeed, Bienville himself complained of the laziness of the settlers sent by the mother country. However, if it's true that Louisiana has an approach to work and leisure that distinguishes it from the average American state, could the earliest cultural formation of the region be a factor?
I've spent the past year searching for clues to whatever cultural residues might remain from the earliest generations of New Orleanians, residing first in France, then in Senegal. I've come across some very concrete parallels, such as Senegal's soupu kandia, a spicy seafood stew distinguished by inclusion of a vegetable they call "gumbo" (okra).
But lifestyle approaches are more difficult to generalize about. Even scientific-seeming surveys reveal highly subjective judgments upon closer inspection. As it turns out, the "lazy" ranking Bloomberg put together included time "working" (presumably at one's job, for money) and how leisure time was spent, whether in physically strenuous activities or in sedentary ones. Sedentary leisure activities covered not only watching TV, but also "thinking" and socializing.
Louisianians spent a big chunk of their time socializing, coming in at the third-most social state in the country. Most importantly, time spent "working" was very low. Maybe those bumper stickers proclaiming, "Work is for people who don't know how to fish," say it best.
The idea of challenging the pre-eminent status of work as the raison d'être of our identities is sacrilege for many Americans. However, one does get a very different sense of the value of work -- in perspective -- in both France and Senegal. The way the French demand leisure as a right and insist on actual legal limits to time and days worked per year is well known. Their leisure habits, too, revolve very much around unrushed meals and conversation with friends and family.
Senegal, too, approaches the idea of work differently than in the United States. It's a highly entrepreneurial culture, much more than France. Vendors of everything from phone cards to shoes and clothes energetically trudge the streets in the driven pursuit of a sale (to the great irritation of many foreigners). And there's a craftsmanly work ethic of doing the job right, from carpentry or tailoring to peeling an orange or putting the straw in a bag of cold fruit juice in just the right way.
But there's also a sense that work can't be rushed, that time working needs to be leavened with breaks for rest, family and friends, contemplation, prayer. You want the job done by 5? Maybe, incha Allah (God willing).
While this approach to the customer's demands is famously annoying to many a Westerner, it does preserve a salutary degree of autonomy to the guy on the other end of the transaction. And if he gets the job done, and done well, and makes enough money to enjoy life with friends and family, what's the problem?
It may be that Louisianians' approaches to work and leisure have roots in the first generations from Europe and Africa, but the comparison does not extend to violence. Both France and Senegal have far more peaceable societies than even the average American state can boast. Apparently, the causes of the real problem in Louisiana will have to be searched for closer to home.
............................
C.W. Cannon is the 2010-11 Fulbright Professor of American Civilization at Universite Cheikh Anta Diop, Dakar, Senegal. He returns to the Loyola University English Department in the fall.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
"Early" Solstice
Feel the wheel turn.... be aware... so that you can learn from Nature.
http://www.hudsonvalleyalmanacweekly.com/2012/06/17/a-sooner-solstice/
Information below taken from the Link above:
This Wednesday, June 20, is the Solstice. It happens at 7:09 p.m. What’s so special about it? It’s the earliest summer since 1896: the earliest start of summer that you have ever experienced. Let’s see if the media pick up on this, or even realize it. So far as I know, it has not been published anywhere.
Anyway, summer: great. Bring it on.
Even in normal times, the Solstice is one of the few links between sky and Earth that’s popularly celebrated. Ask friends what happens and they’re likely to get it right, mostly. Longest day: check. Sun highest up: check. Sun moves through the sky along its most curving path: hmm, what? That one’s not widely known.
Still, people do pretty well with the Solstice. Yet most folks fail miserably when it comes to everything else about the sky. Even those with PhDs bomb when asked the stone-simple sky-stuff that every village idiot would have known 200 years ago. Go ahead: Test your friends. As the Sun is setting, does it move straight down, down and to the left, or down to the right? Most get this wrong. A century ago, everyone would have picked the latter choice without a moment’s hesitation.
Perhaps modern people are less observant. More finish college than ever before, but you don’t need a classroom to learn the basics of nature. It stares you in the face. But if you’re not looking, you won’t see it.
We could offer a hundred pages about the Solstice and its fascinating history, mythology and science, but let’s settle on ten goodies:
The word solstice comes from the two Latin words for “Sun” and “stoppage.” Makes sense: The Sun stops moving north that day.
The Solstice Sun hovers straight over the Tropic of Cancer, just south of Key West.
It’s when the Sun reaches its highest of the year, but it’s getting less high over time. That’s because Earth’s tilt is decreasing.
The Solstice is when the Sun is lowest in the sky for those at the Equator.
It arrives earlier as each century wears on. It’ll occur on June 19 in many places by century’s end. It was exclusively June 21 for all of our lives, until now.
In India, the Summer Solstice ends the six-month period when spiritual growth is supposedly easiest. Better hurry up and meditate (yes, that’s a joke): You’ve got less than a week left.
That day, the Sun rises farthest left on the horizon, and sets at its rightmost possible spot.
Sunlight strikes places in rooms that get illuminated at no other time.
In ancient Greece, the solstitial Sun happened in Cancer. But it has been in Gemini since around the time of Christ. In 1989 it shifted into Taurus, where it will remain until the fifth millennium.
But with all these goodies, the nicest fact may simply be that the Sun is now so wonderfully high. It’s 72 degrees up at 1 p.m., and won’t change much the next few weeks. It misses the zenith by a paltry 18 degrees. Look how short your shadow is.
With all that, given the world’s short attention span nowadays, TV announcers merely grant it two seconds: “It’s the start of summer!”
http://www.hudsonvalleyalmanacweekly.com/2012/06/17/a-sooner-solstice/
Information below taken from the Link above:
This Wednesday, June 20, is the Solstice. It happens at 7:09 p.m. What’s so special about it? It’s the earliest summer since 1896: the earliest start of summer that you have ever experienced. Let’s see if the media pick up on this, or even realize it. So far as I know, it has not been published anywhere.
Anyway, summer: great. Bring it on.
Even in normal times, the Solstice is one of the few links between sky and Earth that’s popularly celebrated. Ask friends what happens and they’re likely to get it right, mostly. Longest day: check. Sun highest up: check. Sun moves through the sky along its most curving path: hmm, what? That one’s not widely known.
Still, people do pretty well with the Solstice. Yet most folks fail miserably when it comes to everything else about the sky. Even those with PhDs bomb when asked the stone-simple sky-stuff that every village idiot would have known 200 years ago. Go ahead: Test your friends. As the Sun is setting, does it move straight down, down and to the left, or down to the right? Most get this wrong. A century ago, everyone would have picked the latter choice without a moment’s hesitation.
Perhaps modern people are less observant. More finish college than ever before, but you don’t need a classroom to learn the basics of nature. It stares you in the face. But if you’re not looking, you won’t see it.
We could offer a hundred pages about the Solstice and its fascinating history, mythology and science, but let’s settle on ten goodies:
The word solstice comes from the two Latin words for “Sun” and “stoppage.” Makes sense: The Sun stops moving north that day.
The Solstice Sun hovers straight over the Tropic of Cancer, just south of Key West.
It’s when the Sun reaches its highest of the year, but it’s getting less high over time. That’s because Earth’s tilt is decreasing.
The Solstice is when the Sun is lowest in the sky for those at the Equator.
It arrives earlier as each century wears on. It’ll occur on June 19 in many places by century’s end. It was exclusively June 21 for all of our lives, until now.
In India, the Summer Solstice ends the six-month period when spiritual growth is supposedly easiest. Better hurry up and meditate (yes, that’s a joke): You’ve got less than a week left.
That day, the Sun rises farthest left on the horizon, and sets at its rightmost possible spot.
Sunlight strikes places in rooms that get illuminated at no other time.
In ancient Greece, the solstitial Sun happened in Cancer. But it has been in Gemini since around the time of Christ. In 1989 it shifted into Taurus, where it will remain until the fifth millennium.
But with all these goodies, the nicest fact may simply be that the Sun is now so wonderfully high. It’s 72 degrees up at 1 p.m., and won’t change much the next few weeks. It misses the zenith by a paltry 18 degrees. Look how short your shadow is.
With all that, given the world’s short attention span nowadays, TV announcers merely grant it two seconds: “It’s the start of summer!”
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Friday, March 16, 2012
Spring in New Orleans
Posted at Nola.com by Brett Will Taylor... local blogger.
"Because I think there's a really awesome lesson to learn in the way that Spring really does bust out all over around here. The lesson is this: We live in a time when man actually thinks he is the master of Mother Earth. And, when it's spring in New Orleans, you can actually hear Mother Earth laugh at the foolishness of that notion!"
"Because I think there's a really awesome lesson to learn in the way that Spring really does bust out all over around here. The lesson is this: We live in a time when man actually thinks he is the master of Mother Earth. And, when it's spring in New Orleans, you can actually hear Mother Earth laugh at the foolishness of that notion!"
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Italian Immigrants in New Orleans
They recently published a list of 175 Events, People & Things that shaped New Orleans.
The article below by Laura Maggi on Italian Immigrants was one of the 175.
The tourists waiting patiently for muffulettas in the aisles of Central Grocery likely have no idea they are surrounded by what was once a standard fixture of many New Orleans neighborhoods: the Italian-owned corner store.
These grocery stores once dotted the city’s landscape, built by immigrants who flocked to New Orleans and surrounding parishes beginning in the late 1800s. Unlike Italian immigrants to other major American cities — who hailed from all over the then recently unified country — New Orleans’ immigrants came almost entirely from the poverty-stricken island of Sicily.
The Sicilian transplants found work on sugar plantations upriver or toiling on New Orleans docks. Many who stayed in the city settled in the lower French Quarter, creating what was known at one point as Little Palermo. Macaroni factories popped up around the neighborhood, while Italian vendors sold fruit at the French Market.
Eventually, some immigrants were able to open small businesses, such as corner stores or restaurants. Some didn’t stay small, such as Progresso Foods, the soup and condiment giant, which began as a New Orleans import company.
As Italians prospered, many followed the path of earlier immigrants, leaving the city for suburban parishes. Their culinary traditions, New Orleans twists on Italian food, can be seen all over the metropolitan region. These traditions include, of course, the muffuletta: a sandwich of deli meat and cheeses smothered in olive salad. Many local kitchens offer up red gravy, a long-simmered tomato sauce.
Each March, local families descended from Sicilian immigrants erect elaborate altars laden with bread, cookies and other food in honor of St. Joseph’s Day. St. Joseph’s has also been adopted as one of the few non-Carnival days of celebration for the city’s Mardi Gras Indian tribes, which don their elaborate suits in the evening and parade in the streets.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Time and Direction and Circle Casting
We pagans put emphasis on the cardinal directions and meanings associated with directions.
East is where the sun rises and where seasons begun and from where new life and possibilities spring.
West is where the sun sets and where the path to the underworld begins. North is a position of power.
NorthEast an especialy important position for Streghe. This is where we enter our circles and where we interface with the gods.
Time and direction are woven together in our circles and our rituals. When we set our circle and move through our rituals we are mirroring and influencing and interacting with "Time".
East is where the sun rises and where seasons begun and from where new life and possibilities spring.
West is where the sun sets and where the path to the underworld begins. North is a position of power.
NorthEast an especialy important position for Streghe. This is where we enter our circles and where we interface with the gods.
Time and direction are woven together in our circles and our rituals. When we set our circle and move through our rituals we are mirroring and influencing and interacting with "Time".
We pagans view the solar year as cyclical year, not quite linear time.The streghe view time as cyclical following the cycles inside of cycles approach. We have both the repeating annual solar cycle, monthly lunar cycle and the Ages which (I think) are stellar.
A 2010 study looked at time and direction and shows that what we do in our rituals is essentially an innate tendency of humantiy but is also influenced by culture. The Science News article below talks about this study and is interesting in the way is shows different peoples will view time and direction differently. Time and direction are influenced by culture and these days technology.
To quote from the article below:
For the Pormpuraawans {from a remote community in Australia}
"... time flows from left to right when facing south, from right to left when facing north, toward the body when facing east and away from the body when facing west."
"... studies have indicated that people use their bodies as a reference to lay out time."
Isn't that what we are doing when we lay out a circle?
"In the United States, time is generally thought of as running from left to right. Other populations arrange time from right to left, back to front, or front to back."
Aboriginal time runs east to west
Sun’s trajectory may channel time’s flow for one remote groupBy Bruce Bower December 4th, 2010; Vol.178 #12 (p. 11)
Time rises in the east and sets in the west in a remote part of Australia. Aborigines living there assume that time moves westward, apparently in accord with the sun’s daily arc across the sky, say Stanford University psychologist Lera Boroditsky and linguist Alice Gaby of the University of California, Berkeley.
Unlike any other group studied to date, these hardy foragers think about the day after tomorrow as two days to the west, the olden days as times far to the east, and the progression of a person’s life from infancy to old age as running from east to west, Boroditsky and Gaby report in an upcoming Psychological Science.
Grounding time in absolute directions makes it imperative for these people, called Pormpuraawans, to know which way they’re facing at all times. For them, time flows from left to right when facing south, from right to left when facing north, toward the body when facing east and away from the body when facing west.
Pormpuraawans rarely use terms for right and left and instead refer to absolute directions, making statements such as “Move your cup over to the north-northwest a little bit.”
Culture powerfully influences how people conceive of time, in Boroditsky’s view. “Pormpuraawans think about time in ways that other groups cannot, because those groups lack the necessary spatial knowledge,” she says.
Previous studies have indicated that people use their bodies as a reference to lay out time. In the United States, time is generally thought of as running from left to right. Other populations arrange time from right to left, back to front, or front to back.
“This new finding is of great significance since cognitive scientists have assumed that time representations must be body-based,” remarks psychologist Asifa Majid of the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in Nijmegen, the Netherlands.
Cultural differences in thinking about spatial orientation shape time representations, proposes psychologist Daniel Haun, also of the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics. In 2009, Haun reported that Namibian hunter-gatherers remember dance steps and other body movements according to absolute directions. Time perception has yet to be studied in this group.
Some evidence suggests that an innate tendency to navigate by consulting external landmarks and absolute directions gets transformed into a body-centered viewpoint in certain cultures (SN: 2/10/07, p. 89).
Boroditsky and Gaby studied 14 Pormpuraawans and 14 Stanford students. Each group contained seven men and seven women. Aborigines ranged in age from the late 40s to the mid 70s.
In one task, participants examined six to 12 sets of cards. Each four-card set depicted a progression over time, such as a man at different ages. On each trial, participants received a shuffled deck and were asked to lay the cards out in the correct order.
In a second task, an experimenter placed a marker on the ground and asked volunteers to denote time periods with their own markers. If the experimenter’s stone represented today, volunteers indicated spots for yesterday and tomorrow. In other trials, volunteers arranged markers for morning, noon and evening, and for olden days, nowadays and far in the future.
Halfway through each task, each participant switched his or her sitting position to face in a different direction.
U.S. students always portrayed time as moving from left to right. Most Pormpuraawans depicted time as moving from east to west, so time’s flow systematically shifted course as the direction they faced changed.
The few body-based responses among Aborigines may reflect increasing exposure to television and other facets of Western life, as well as unfamiliarity with arranging objects in sequences, Boroditsky suggests.
Monday, March 12, 2012
Natural Resiliance
Below is an article published in the Times Picayune that talks about a community's resiliance. If you've read any news in the past 6 years you've probably heard about at least 2 of the disasters that affected the Barataria community: Katrina & the BP Oil Spill. While the article is short on detail the fact that these communities are made up of individuals who live close to nature and who understand how they are interdependent on nature *and* each other is at the core of their capacity to survive.
It makes a unique kind of South Louisiana sense when you come from an area named after the immeniently adaptable Pirate, Jean Lafitte, when you live in an area named for the Pirate Jean Lafitte will you get someone saying that the secret to their success is that they are like a Pirate, Jean Laffite.
“They were able to adapt and change in order to continue,” Peterson said. “It’s kind of the lessons from what we can learn from Jean Lafitte.”
Full Article captured for reference below:
Barataria area is model of resiliance.
Allen Powell II - March 11, 2011 - Times Picayune
Most communities couldn’t survive six natural disasters in six consecutive years, particularly if they destroyed hundreds of homes and cost hundreds of people their jobs. But if you ask residents of Lafitte, Barataria and Crown Point, they’ll tell you they aren’t most people, and according to a recent study from the University of New Orleans’ Center for Hazards Assessment, Response and Technology, they’re right.
Researchers found that residents of the fishing enclave are extremely resilient, which is evident in how quickly their communities have rebounded from hurricanes, floods and the BP oil spill, said Kristina Peterson, a senior researcher with CHART. The group studied those communities to determine the root cause of their resiliency in the hope that it might help others.
“They were able to adapt and change in order to continue,” Peterson said. “It’s kind of the lessons from what we can learn from Jean Lafitte.”
Researchers used “participatory action research,” a method that lets residents drive the focus of the study. Peterson said researchers spent four years meeting with residents and developed an oral history of the communities. They discovered the skill sets and practices that made the areas stronger and made residents more willing to reinvest despite the damage caused by hurricanes like Katrina, Rita and Ike.
Peterson said researchers presented their findings to residents several times, and then residents would tell them whether those findings were accurate to provide a complete picture. She said this type of research is more valuable than simple surveys or data mined from the U.S. Census Bureau.
“They told us their story,” Peterson said.
What researchers found was that despite the lack of outstanding public infrastructure, the communities had intense and extensive private bonds that provided a helpful social network. In addition, certain skills that were essential to disaster recovery, like carpentry, were often tied to the livelihoods of many residents. Residents said they had a close relationship with public officials, and that allowed them to minimize or eliminate the red tape that slowed recovery in other areas, she said.
Jean Lafitte Mayor Tim Kerner said the study validates what he already knew about the area. Residents in those communities are willing and able to do their part to recover, but they do need a helping hand from politicians to make certain that things are not too difficult.
Lafitte, Barataria and Crown Point, Kerner said, play an important role in the Louisiana economy as well as the nation because of its fishers, and oil and gas workers. He said he hopes the study will stand as testament to the will of those individuals.
“I think what they saw is that the people here bounce back faster and stronger than some other areas,” Kerner said. “If you look, we’ve been through six disasters in six years, and if you drive through Jean Lafitte, Crown Point and Barataria, it doesn’t look like we’ve had one.”
Allen Powell II can be reached at apowell@timespicayune.com or 504.826.3793.
It makes a unique kind of South Louisiana sense when you come from an area named after the immeniently adaptable Pirate, Jean Lafitte, when you live in an area named for the Pirate Jean Lafitte will you get someone saying that the secret to their success is that they are like a Pirate, Jean Laffite.
“They were able to adapt and change in order to continue,” Peterson said. “It’s kind of the lessons from what we can learn from Jean Lafitte.”
Full Article captured for reference below:
Barataria area is model of resiliance.
Allen Powell II - March 11, 2011 - Times Picayune
Most communities couldn’t survive six natural disasters in six consecutive years, particularly if they destroyed hundreds of homes and cost hundreds of people their jobs. But if you ask residents of Lafitte, Barataria and Crown Point, they’ll tell you they aren’t most people, and according to a recent study from the University of New Orleans’ Center for Hazards Assessment, Response and Technology, they’re right.
Researchers found that residents of the fishing enclave are extremely resilient, which is evident in how quickly their communities have rebounded from hurricanes, floods and the BP oil spill, said Kristina Peterson, a senior researcher with CHART. The group studied those communities to determine the root cause of their resiliency in the hope that it might help others.
“They were able to adapt and change in order to continue,” Peterson said. “It’s kind of the lessons from what we can learn from Jean Lafitte.”
Researchers used “participatory action research,” a method that lets residents drive the focus of the study. Peterson said researchers spent four years meeting with residents and developed an oral history of the communities. They discovered the skill sets and practices that made the areas stronger and made residents more willing to reinvest despite the damage caused by hurricanes like Katrina, Rita and Ike.
Peterson said researchers presented their findings to residents several times, and then residents would tell them whether those findings were accurate to provide a complete picture. She said this type of research is more valuable than simple surveys or data mined from the U.S. Census Bureau.
“They told us their story,” Peterson said.
What researchers found was that despite the lack of outstanding public infrastructure, the communities had intense and extensive private bonds that provided a helpful social network. In addition, certain skills that were essential to disaster recovery, like carpentry, were often tied to the livelihoods of many residents. Residents said they had a close relationship with public officials, and that allowed them to minimize or eliminate the red tape that slowed recovery in other areas, she said.
Jean Lafitte Mayor Tim Kerner said the study validates what he already knew about the area. Residents in those communities are willing and able to do their part to recover, but they do need a helping hand from politicians to make certain that things are not too difficult.
Lafitte, Barataria and Crown Point, Kerner said, play an important role in the Louisiana economy as well as the nation because of its fishers, and oil and gas workers. He said he hopes the study will stand as testament to the will of those individuals.
“I think what they saw is that the people here bounce back faster and stronger than some other areas,” Kerner said. “If you look, we’ve been through six disasters in six years, and if you drive through Jean Lafitte, Crown Point and Barataria, it doesn’t look like we’ve had one.”
Allen Powell II can be reached at apowell@timespicayune.com or 504.826.3793.
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Nature Deficit Disorder
Click the link and read about Richard Louv and how critical it is to connect with Nature.
It makes me glad I have spent time this weekend with my hands in the dirt, planting and weeding. This always centers and calms me.
It always seems to come back "Nature is the Great Teacher."
Or as Richard Louv says it:
"Simply put, the Nature Principle maintains that a reconnection with the natural world is fundamental to human health, well-being and survival."
Read more in Richard Louv's "The Nature Principle"
It makes me glad I have spent time this weekend with my hands in the dirt, planting and weeding. This always centers and calms me.
It always seems to come back "Nature is the Great Teacher."
Or as Richard Louv says it:
"Simply put, the Nature Principle maintains that a reconnection with the natural world is fundamental to human health, well-being and survival."
Read more in Richard Louv's "The Nature Principle"
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
The stars and our connection...
Astrophysicist Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson was asked in an interview with TIME magazine, "What is the most astounding fact you can share with us about the Universe?" This is his answer.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
