My huckleberry friend

Is it part of the human condition that we desire to be cruel when we feel attacked? I woke up pondering this. I struggle to be in a constant state of loving kindness (I wrestle with it, I should say, manfully) when perhaps being true to one's authentic self would be to say "F**k this sh*t" (trademark: @minkyhonor).

Nil desperandum -- we are but one good night's sleep away from bliss.

My oldest dog, Dotsie, the dalmatian with the lumpy bottom, is in the habit of growling at (and biting, given half a chance) any new dog she encounters. It is severely antisocial behaviour and believe me, it doesn't make us any friends. But I've realized that she is protecting herself, attacking before she is attacked. And so it is with the human desire to be cruel.

Mr Albert Williams of Little Gaddesden CofE School, a man I learned more from than any of my other teachers, wrote this in my golden autograph book:

“This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.”

I stared at it, written in his calligraphic script -- beautiful penmanship I've always tried to emulate -- and tried to understand, age 10 what it meant. No-one really explained it to me. And then, slowly, every year it took on more meaning. And every year the meaning becomes more personal.

Don't let the bastards get you down.
We all want to be big, open, loving beings, unguarded, elevated, transcendent, and yet sometimes we are thwarted. So, lift up your head and listen to Pete Townsend:



Sometimes it feels that opening one's heart is a futile act; something we do only so we can close it again. This is why people are guarded and bent over and sad, their eyes dark, because they've opened their hearts one too many times, and they just can't take the pain any more. But yet we still do it, again and again and again...this too is part of the human condition. Possibly the most beautiful thing about being human.

(Audrey Hepburn is singing Moon River: a lovely distraction.)

Time brings objectivity: it is the one thing I've learned in the last two years. On the other end of two years of recovery from loss, there is light and brightness and a sweet, sweet objectivity. Suddenly it's not about you. Not at all. It's never about you. That is the relief. If there were more rain in Los Angeles, we'd all know this in our bones.

And so another day starts. There is tea and Debussy and the crows and the still greyness of the canyon. There is a text from my boy. Pictures of the beach at Sag Harbor. There is the naughty dog who can't stop herself from gallumphing down the fence barking at the neighbor dogs in glee.  There are Tibetan prayer flags and beautiful birthday orchids and Rich Tea biscuits on the counter. And I've listened to Hallelujah by Jocelyn Pook seven times in a row (please listen: it's a startlingly beautiful piece of music):




Do not be afraid, my huckleberry friend. There is a whole world out there. It's all connected to you, it's all part of you, but it is not you.

This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man. - See more at: http://quotationsbook.com/quote/35797/#sthash.LGfikFqL.dpuf