January 14, 2019

“Don’t keep searching for the truth. Just let go of your opinions.” Seng Ts’an

At a dinner party recently, I listened to some political views that eventually veered into conspiracy theories. I said nothing. Eventually I was asked about my perspective on the topic at hand, and I mentioned the complexity of the issue before changing the subject.

This week I rejoined Facebook after an absence of several years. Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised to see on that site a couple of old friends venting their political anger. I did not comment upon their posts.

I can be quite opinionated about politics and about a lot of things. In high school and college I wanted to become a career politician because in my idealistic naivete I thought that I could fix the world’s problems. Fortunately for me and for the world I never ran for office, because I realized that I would eventually have been corrupted by power, ego, and maybe money. I needed to fix myself before I would be qualified to fix society.

As my friend Phil once said, “Whenever there’s an argument about politics, it’s not really about politics. It’s about feeling powerless.”

So while I regularly vote and occasionally pontificate to a friend or two, I’m trying to minimize my social and political commentary, even in my own head. My judgments erupt frequently, but I try to just notice them and then let them go. Opinions seem to be mostly expressions of the ego, whereas wisdom and insight apparently arise from a deeper level of our psyche.

Perhaps the world isn’t broken after all, and maybe it doesn’t need fixing. True, there are serious environmental threats and social problems, and they must be addressed by all of us. That’s why I vote. And that’s why I write. But I believe that the planet and humanity are evolving, slowly and with much turmoil, but evolving nonetheless. Sometimes it seems that things are out of balance, and that there is great injustice in the world. But in the long term I think that the law of cause and effect will ensure that lessons will be learned by individuals and by the human race. Earth is our classroom, and our souls will learn what they came here to learn even if we do it the hard way.

Do I like population growth in this country or elsewhere? No. Do I think that war, racial tensions, poverty, and economic upheavals will continue indefinitely? Yes. But while I feel that political discourse and processes have their place in society, and I’m quite willing to put my two cents worth into the public sphere every once in awhile, I also need to remind myself that spending my energy and attention resisting certain politicians or political beliefs is not in my best interest. I would rather have compassion for my fellow deluded beings than attempt to convert them to my social or spiritual philosophies.

Dinner parties and Facebook are more fun when they aren’t battle zones. The truth of my life and the lives of others will emerge when I allow all of us to be just the way we are. But if I don’t, that’s OK too.

January 10, 2019

So here I was, asleep in bed a few minutes ago and minding my own business, when visions of change came to me. And the changes felt good, if a bit unsettling.

In the first dream, my old friend Joseph said to me, “Let’s get up at 3 a.m. and go exploring Mt. Tamalpais.” My first reaction was to resist such an outlandish suggestion. Joseph is not an early riser, and this idea was totally out of character for him. I came up with various reasons why we shouldn’t follow his impulse: it’s too early, I won’t get enough sleep, it’s too much effort. But then, as I thought about it, a sense of adventure began to appeal to me, and I started imagining all the places we could visit on the way to the mountain, and all the fun we could have hiking and the many great views we would enjoy. Even so, I wasn’t entirely convinced.

In the second dream, Joseph and I were at a lush green park at the coast, waiting to meet our friend Tom. I had been to this park before, but now it was greatly improved and much more interesting. Someone had spent a lot of money upgrading the attractions, and I spoke with a ranger about all the new things to see and do.

In the third dream, I was at my old high school, but instead of being all white and middle class as it was when I was a student, it was now very exotic. All the young people were wearing what appeared to be Afghani and/or Indian dress, as that was now the fashion, and they were all excited about their new clothing styles.

I woke up feeling stimulated and open to new perspectives.

When I was young I was far more open to changes of all kinds: social, political, personal. I used to laugh a lot more than I do now. Now, at 66, I’m more set in my ways, and sometimes feel resistant to the direction in which the world is heading. In fact, lately I’ve been feeling downright pessimistic about the human race. I’ve long considered myself to be a short term pessimist and a long term optimist.

But these dreams made me feel like an optimist, both short term and long term, if I can just learn to let go of fear and trust myself in the moment. Go with the flow, let go of resistance to what is, and allow people and the world to be the way they are, without worrying about how things will turn out in the future.

Easy for me to say. But hey – I’m sitting here naked at my computer, having come straight from bed. No shower or breakfast yet. Changing my ways! Little steps, to be sure. Don’t know if I’ll make any more changes to my behavior or attitudes. Don’t care. Right now, here I am, in this present moment, free to be whoever I want to be.

Yippee!

January 8, 2019

I enjoyed the Disney movie Pollyanna when it first came to theaters in 1960, and I enjoyed it again a couple years ago on a Netflix DVD. Filmed at the McDonald mansion in nearby Santa Rosa, it’s the charming story of an orphan girl who has a positive attitude that uplifts the people around her. I sometimes call myself a pollyanna because I try to have an upbeat mindset most of the time. Then I have days like today where my mood takes a dive.

I had a productive and rewarding morning at work, then met my friend Gus for a pleasant conversation and Vietnamese noodle soup. But later in the day, I allowed external influences to get me down. I made the mistake of reading too many articles in the New York Times, first about the political dysfunction in Washington and then the political dysfunction in Latin America. Depressing stuff. Then I watched a little TV news about the bickering in Washington, before shutting that off and feeling more depressed.

So I decided to watch a DVD of the HBO TV series, Insecure. It has gotten good reviews, and I thought that maybe getting a dose of black culture would be a fun antidote to the bad news on TV and in the newspaper. Wrong. I hated the show, and couldn’t watch any more than the first episode. Full of profanity and shallow, ugly behavior, I thought it portrayed African American culture in a negative, stereotypical light. It probably helps to be young or black or both to appreciate the hip hop culture, but since I’m neither I detested it. Interestingly, its audience is mostly white, and Oprah Winfrey and the Obamas, people I respect, are said to like it. So what do I know? All I can say is that after watching and reading the news and then seeing an episode of Insecure, I felt despair at the state of the human race.

Being the pollyanna that I am, I realized that I didn’t want to wallow in my state of hopelessness. So I did three things to lift my spirits.

First, I watched a five minute YouTube video called Where the Hell is Matt 2012. In it this young white guy travels the world, dancing with people from diverse cultures. His dancing is sometimes silly, but the music and the message of universal love of humanity are joyful and inspiring.

Second, I sat in front of my Buddhist altar and chanted prayers for inspiration and awakening for myself and for all humanity.

Third, I reviewed a wonderful book I’ve read several times, Proof of Heaven by Eben Alexander. He’s a neurosurgeon who had a near death experience, and his descriptions of the afterlife are wondrous indeed.

After the video, the prayers, and the book, I feel better. I don’t deny the darkness of the world, but I choose to focus on the light. It’s the only way I can keep my sanity in this crazy but beautiful world.

January 6, 2019

On a gray, rainy day in the hills of Sebastopol, I’m so grateful for my little cottage. Grateful for the fire in the fireplace, grateful for the good health to enjoy my country life. Grateful to have a home for my books, plants, family photos, and Buddhist altar. Grateful to live in northern California and in a country with such freedom and abundance. And I’m surprised that I’m still here.

In my house, that is. Not my body, though there will be a time to leave both before too long.

I’ve been renting this little place for 33 years, half of my lifetime. I never intended to be a renter for my entire adult life, and I never intended to stay here for so long. It just kinda happened. I wish I owned the place, because by now I’d own it free and clear and would have equity and with it greater financial security. And I would have installed hookups for a washer and dryer. Going to a laundromat several miles away for 33 years gets old. But it’s a small price to pay for living in paradise.

It’s mostly peaceful and quiet here, and the neighborhood is gorgeous. Redwoods, oaks, vineyards, apple orchards, and a goat farm. In the summer there are blackberries, apples, and pears, and in the winter, persimmons and lemons. In the morning I often enjoy sunrise over a sea of fog in the valley below. From my ridgetop perch I can see Mt. St. Helena and the hills and valleys of the wine country. Like Thoreau at Walden Pond, I don’t own any property legally, but I own it visually. So because I appreciate all that I can see, I’m a very rich man.

I’m well aware that I live far better than most of humanity. I’ve seen people living and dying on the streets of Delhi, and living in poverty in the slums of Bombay, Mexico City, and Cairo. And I felt terrible for many of my friends who lost their homes in last year’s wine country wildfires. It just goes to show that, renter or homeowner, rich or poor, life is transient, and there is no true security in the physical realm.

But there is appreciation. And I appreciate my humble two-room cottage. It reminds me of the huts once built as summer cabins in the mountains of Ireland. These stone dwellings were built by farmers to live in during the summer months when they would graze their cattle in the high meadows. Called booley houses, they were sometimes the setting for nighttime storytelling, music, and songs. And sometimes they were said to shelter raparees, or outlaws hiding out from English oppressors.

I’m not an outlaw raparee, but I do like to sing and dance by myself at night on occasion. And I sit at my computer and tell stories to whoever might be reading this blog. So life is very good in my booley house. I don’t know how long I’ll be here, and I don’t know how long I’ll continue to enjoy excellent health. But for now, I’m filled with wonder at my good fortune.

January 5, 2019

On January 2 I wrote that I want to be more like an exuberant puppy. And I do. But even puppies need boundaries.

When I was 18, I lived in an apartment on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley. Then, as now, there were lots of homeless people in that neighborhood, though we didn’t call them that. The politically correct term in Berkeley was “street people.” Many of the street people were also beggars, though we called them panhandlers.

At first I gave spare change to the panhandlers, even though I was making $3 an hour as a dishwasher. After awhile I stopped giving away my money when I recognized the same panhandlers week after week, month after month. I figured that if they really needed money that badly they could get a job washing dishes too.

One day I met a street person at nearby People’s Park and attempted to convince him to join our Buddhist movement. When he showed some openness to my message, I invited him to my apartment to have something to eat and take a shower and spend the night for a few days. But after a couple of days my Buddhist roommates (whom I had not consulted before making the invitation) let me know that they didn’t want a stranger sleeping on the floor in our two bedroom apartment, so I had to tell him that he could no longer stay with us. But he was still welcome to join us in attaining enlightenment and world peace.

I was reminded of that episode a few days ago when my friends Jim and Linda and I spent part of New Year’s day exploring the charming Central Valley farm town of Woodland, California. As we walked around a pretty neighborhood featuring lots of beautiful old Victorian homes, we came across a lawn sign in English and Spanish. It said something like this: We don’t care what your legal status is. You are welcome in our neighborhood.

I’ve seen signs like this before. And while I admire and respect sentiments of kindness and welcoming generosity, I can’t help picking up a sense of smugness and moral superiority emanating from such public advertising of similar political beliefs. Maybe a holier than thou vibe.

Not long after seeing the sign, we were walking a few blocks away on Main Street when a pickup truck drove by blaring Mexican music. I laughed, and told Jim that I wonder how the homeowners with the welcoming sign would feel if a Mexican family playing similar loud music moved in next door to them.

I personally don’t mind loud Mexican music – when I’m in Mexico. Do I want it in my neighborhood? No. I’m all in favor of unconditional love, as long as whoever lives next door to me isn’t noisy. Oh wait – I guess that’s conditional.

I’m sure that the people with the lawn sign are well meaning folks. And I share their desire for tolerance and egalitarianism. But sometimes those noble goals can be naive if not implemented wisely. Diversity is wonderful except when it leads to friction and violence. Multiculturalism is great, but not when it adversely affects public schools or public safety.

When Jim and I and his Nicaraguan wife stayed with her family for two weeks in 1989, we visited their nearby capital, Managua. When Jim’s wife expressed surprise at seeing a large slum in Managua that hadn’t been there before, her relative explained that the leftist Sandinista government had foolishly invited peasants to move to the capital, and so they did, by the tens and maybe hundreds of thousands. But there was no infrastructure waiting for them – no housing, running water, sewers, schools, health clinics. So now there were thousands of people living in poverty and squalor, with rising crime and other social problems. A welcoming policy not thought through, with unintended consequences.

Yes, I want to be loving and friendly like a puppy. But I haven’t invited any more homeless people to stay with me. Paradoxically, I feel more open-hearted when my home and country have secure boundaries. I want world peace, but on my terms. Play by my rules, and you can live next to me.

I guess my days of puppy bliss might be further away than I had hoped.

December 28, 2018

Yesterday I had a meltdown. It wasn’t pretty. But I suppose meltdowns never are.

My supervisor had called me for a routine report call, and our civil exchange of information quickly deteriorated into a rant by yours truly. I wasn’t angry at her, because we get along well and she had done nothing to provoke me. I was angry at our project management for ongoing software problems which had stressed me out the night before. I guess I just wanted to vent to her, but my frustration boiled over and I indulged in an expletive-laden tirade which so upset her that I quickly realized I had gone too far and apologized profusely for crossing a line that I hadn’t intended to cross. To her credit, she was gracious in expressing her understanding and her empathy with my complaints. But I thought, wow, my behavior was ugly – where did that negative emotion come from?

Today while driving to an interview appointment for my job, I was listening to a talk radio show on NPR. Its guests were African Americans discussing the hostility they feel toward police. Their rage and bitterness were toxic, and I shut off the radio. But I couldn’t help but realize that, for different reasons, I too sometimes feel similar emotions, just as I did yesterday in my brief but spectacular volcanic eruption.

Where does all this anger come from? Some people would argue that it’s caused by outside forces such as social injustice, workplace tensions, or economic or political stressors. While there may be some truth to those explanations, I’m inclined to think that internal psychological dynamics are a deeper source of the pain.

Coincidentally or not, today I just happened to bring with me to work a book by the Vietnamese writer and monk Thich Nhat Hanh entitled Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames. It’s a book I’ve been meaning to re-read for some time. One of the perks of my job is that I get to read while my respondents are answering our survey questionnaire on my laptop.

The author states that there are various origins for our anger, among them external influences such as toxic TV and newspapers or parents transmitting their wounds to their children. But he also says that anger is a natural and inevitable part of the human experience, and that we shouldn’t suppress it. Rather, we should embrace it by breathing mindfully or walking mindfully outdoors or being more present in the moment. He says we can transform anger into understanding, compassion, and positive energy. But first we need to love ourselves before we can love others.

Nothing that I haven’t heard before. But he says it so simply and sweetly that he makes me want to slow down and savor each moment so that, when anger arises, I have the wisdom to turn inward and turn my inner garbage into compost for a field of flowers.

Will I remember to do this the next time my anger starts to erupt? I don’t know. All I can ever do is just keep practicing being mindful and keep practicing forgiveness of self and others. And keep listening to and aligning with my inner being. Someday I hope to heal the war within, thereby bringing peace on earth or at least peace in my little corner of the planet. Luckily I don’t think I have to do all that in one lifetime. And that takes the pressure off. So I might as well have fun now. After all, we only live ten thousand times.

December 25, 2018

I was born in Oakland. My family has been in the Bay Area for about a century, first in the farmlands of San Jose and Hayward and later in the hills of Berkeley, Walnut Creek, and Lafayette. For the last 35 years I’ve lived in the North Bay, first in Marin and now in Sonoma County. The Bay Area has been home to generations of my family, and I’ve known all of them, including the first to arrive here around 1920: my great grandparents. So spending Christmas with my family is a big deal.

And it was probably more than a century ago when my mother’s mother first learned the words to a strange campfire song that has become part of our family Christmas tradition. Mr Donnerybeck is a song that has nothing to do with Christmas, but we’ve been singing it on Christmas Eve all of my life and probably well before my time. It’s a song about a man who has a sausage machine that grinds up rats, cats, and eventually himself.

Yeah, I know – merry Christmas. How it ended up being sung along with Jingle Bells and Silent Night is a bit of a mystery, but now its quirkiness is a source of perverse pride in our extended Irish clan. It makes us different, unique, and silly. It allows us to laugh at ourselves while carrying on the customs of the Kenneys. In a world of constant change, we always have Mr Donnerybeck on Christmas Eve. And we always have each other.

My family has so much to be grateful for. We live in the beautiful Bay Area, we’re all enjoying our very different lives, and we’re all blessed with excellent health. Well, almost all of us.

Today was a gorgeous day around the Bay, and this morning some of us walked around the lovely Lafayette Reservoir as part of another family Christmas tradition. But not my mom.

After our walk we gathered around her bedside to wish her well and spend the holiday with her. She has no specific illness, but at 87 she has seen better days. She put up a cheerful front, laughing and exchanging stories and gifts and being amused by the birds and squirrels outside her window. She’s a trooper, as my stepfather says. It felt good to savor each moment with her.

I left my family home to drive to my home in Sebastopol, and along the way I was treated to the wonders of the Bay Area. Emerging from the Caldecott tunnel in the Oakland/Berkeley hills, a panorama: the silvery Bay crossed by the graceful towers and cables of the Bay Bridge; the pewter-colored erector set design of the Richmond/San Rafael Bridge; and at the edge of the horizon, the vermillion magnificence of the Bridge Over the Golden Gate. The spires of the City By The Bay gleamed white in the sunlight, and the flanks of Mt Tamalpais and the hills and islands around the Bay are turning green after the recent rains. Shangri La. My home. My family.

Merry Christmas, Mom. I love you.

December 23, 2018

Recently while driving south on Highway 101 toward San Francisco I saw a bumpersticker that I didn’t understand at first. It said, “It’s not a religion, it’s a relationship.” Relationship with what, or with whom? After a few moments I had a hunch that the message was a Christian one, so I caught up with the car to see if the bumper or vehicle had any further clues about the beliefs of the driver. Sure enough, at the other side of the bumper was a fish symbol.

I have to give credit to the sticker designer and to the driver: their message got my attention. If the sticker had said something like “Jesus saves” or “God is my co-pilot” I wouldn’t have given it a second thought. Instead the sticker made me think. But what I think may or may not be what the Christian designer and driver intended.

If their message is a narrow one; that is, if they believe that one must have a relationship with a man/god who lived 2,000 years ago in Israel, then they’ve lost me. I don’t know whether Jesus died on the cross – I wasn’t there (or if I was, I don’t remember it). I do respect Jesus and what I think (hope?) was his message of love and kindness. But I don’t limit God to one historical figure, be he Jesus, Buddha, or Mohammed.

However, if their message is a broader one; that is, if they believe that the relationship is with God and whatever God means to me, then yes, I agree – that relationship is of the utmost importance. In fact, it is by far the most important relationship I have in this world.

I sometimes refer to God as my inner being, my higher self, my soul, or Buddha Dave. I see it as my creator, the eternal part of me that created the temporary personality and body that I currently inhabit. If someone else wants to refer to that energy as the Christ consciousness, the Goddess, Allah, or the Great Spirit, that’s fine with me. A key distinction, though, is that for me this creator is not separate from me, it is within me.

Whatever one calls it, I try to listen to it. I don’t always succeed, but slowly I’m getting better at listening. I still give too much attention to my opinions and selfish desires. But my Friend understands. We’re working on our connectedness. After all, it’s not a religion, it’s a relationship.

Merry solstice. Happy Christmas. And may the Force be with you.

December 20, 2018

Yesterday I went hiking with friends at Sugarloaf Ridge State Park in Sonoma County. It’s a beautiful hilly park in the wine country, with views of ridge after ridge of the Coast Range mountains. On a clear day you can see San Francisco, various Bay Area mountain peaks, and local vineyards. But yesterday was a foggy day, and as we climbed the steep trail we found ourselves walking through a vast misty landscape of death and destruction.

What we witnessed was the consequence of the deadly Sonoma/Napa wildfires of October 2017. At least 4600 homes were destroyed in Santa Rosa alone, and thousands of acres were burnt to a crisp. Eighty percent of Sugarloaf was incinerated. Our trail made its way through hillsides of charred black carcasses of trees, vertical skeletons of bay, oak, madrone, and Douglas fir. What was once pastoral backcountry now looked, as one of my companions noted, as if it was the aftermath of a nuclear bomb.

But amid the depressing graveyard of trees, there were signs of renewal. New green shoots at the base of bay and oak corpses were reaching skyward. Trees and chaparral were being reborn.

Among my hiking buddies yesterday were two women who lost their Santa Rosa homes in the conflagration. Each of them escaped with their husbands at 2 am with 10 minutes of warning. In addition to those two individuals, I also know many other fellow hikers whose homes were destroyed by the wildfires. All of them were traumatized by their sudden, devastating loss, but they all seem to be moving on with their lives with varying degrees of acceptance and healing.

I’ve never had such a dramatic loss. I was deeply saddened by my father’s death, but it wasn’t unexpected. I’ve lost other family members and friends, but again, their loss wasn’t usually shocking. I imagine that my reaction to precipitous emotional desolation would be comparable to the reactions of my hiking friends to their psychic blows: shock, denial, grief, anger, depression. And eventually, a coming to terms with the vagaries of life and death.

After the sudden and violent death of her husband, my previous landlady had the following haiku on her refrigerator door until she herself died suddenly and violently:

Barn’s burnt down – now I can see the moon.

Disaster, followed by epiphany. Tragedy, then opportunity. After calamity, new growth. Firestorm, succeeded by green shoots from blackened trees. Death, and rebirth. Grief. And eventually, laughter.