Entry for August 31, 2007

I put some new flowers down at the grave today.
I just felt like it.

Entry for August 27, 2007

This guy at the meditation center used to call me Fast Eddie. Today I thought of being fast on the draw, like in the old westerns I’ve been watching lately. I got a big kick out of Support Your Local Gunfighter a few weeks ago and today I saw a film starring Yul Brynner as a gunfighter. You know, I’ve also been thinking about that Virginia Tech thing. Better look out!
I was turned down for another job today. Makes you feel like that Virginia Tech guy when you don’t get hired, nobody calls or even drops by. I think, I never expected this in Florida. New York, yes, that’s where it belongs and it makes me feel like there is really no hope. Obama can talk about hope’s audaciousness, but I think I question hope’s veracity.
I understand that new movie, Shoot ’em Up is kind of a farce. Actually an anti-gun movie is what Paul Giamatti said on TV last night. Clive Owen, the other star was quite in agreement. I think I would like to see it. I wonder would anyone go with me?

Entry for August 13, 2007

My big sister has been down for a little over a week. She came to see mom’s grave and she noticed a slight problem on the stone with mom’s dates. Her birth date in particular seemed to have been put 1911 and then changed to 1917. It has always been that way but it is interesting because if she was born in 1911 she would have been just one year younger than dad. Sometimes it seemed that’s the way he thought it was, but she was actually quite a bit younger than her. I suppose that’s a useful bit of information, too.
Barbara stayed at a friend’s house in the area. I had thought she was going to stay with me.
It was okay with me though if she wanted to stay with her friend. Her friend had a very nice house. She met her in Alanon. Barbara has been very affected by alcoholics in her life. My father and her father in-law were especially painful for her. She was very generous to me when she visited, taking me to movies and out to eat. It was fun.

Why Am I Singing?

“Why am I singing?” I think to myself.

I’m listening to Yusuf Islam sing. I imagine myself singing and dancing while “I think I see the Light” plays.

I think of Jellaludin Rumi while the former Cat Stevens sings “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood.” Rumi was a Muslim, you know. A poet, too. Yusuf Islam is said to have supported the death notice sent out by Ayatollah Khomeini to assasinate Salamon Rushdie. He turned a beautiful playmate away from his heart (they were to be married) when he decided her career violated the tenets of the Koran. It was cold stuff, but we didn’t really know him, did we? Bob Dylan, David Bowie and the old Beatles got more airplay than his soft rock music. He and Carole King didn’t rock like the rock stations needed to.

I’m glad he’s back.

There’s a new Paul Simon record out, too. It’s called Surprise. After listening to Yusuf it’s kind of hard to make out a lot of Paul’s lyrics. I downloaded the 2 new albums, Surprise and An Other Cup. Baba’s magazine DARSHAN had many articles on Rumi and his tradition, Sufism, and he taught about this sense of otherness. The sense of otherness is suffering. Recognition should be given also to Ram Butler who wrote the Siddha Yoga Correspondence Course for many years.