- warned me to "Stay right where you are! I'll be right back."
- advised me, "Oh, you in trouble now."
- directed me to, "move, move, move," and when I reminded him of "excuse me please," he responded with, "move, move, move, excuse me please."
- asked me, "Where is Daddy-cakes?" and I replied, "California. He'll be back tomorrow," he reaffirmed, "Daddy-cakes home tomorrow. Weasel-ball, please. I want Weasel-ball, please."
- I said, "but Gammy and Grandpa will come over this afternoon, he sang, "Grandpa, Grandpa, Grandpa! Frog, frog, frog!" I'm not really sure of the connection there or if there is one.
26 September 2010
Talking up a storm
We have been up for just over 2 hours this morning. So far, the Bumble Bean has:
Comments
I have not really explored the whole "blogger" site due to limited time, attention and the Bumble Bean's opposition to my using the computer. Also, to be perfectly honest, beacuse I haven't cared that much. However, just now, I clicked the comments tab to see what it would do. (Yes, the Bumble Bean does get some of his investigatory techniques from me.) Thank you for your comments. I appreciate the feedback.
25 September 2010
Hats and Weasel-balls
This morning while I was priming the back stairs, fixing the door and figuring out how to replace the window, the Bumble Bean went exploring in the basement. He found a stack of empty boxes which have no reason for being there except that they have not been thrown away. He found a lot of spider webs. He found the box of extremely ugly tiles for our first floor kitchen. He also found the Little Tykes basketball hoop. We dragged it out into the backyard. He threw the ball through the hoop. Once. Then he experimented with different ways of knocking it over. Finally, he called, "Hat, hat, hat. Mommy, hat, hat, hat!" I looked out the door I was trying to fix and there he was with whole thing leaning against his head. He was very pleased with himself.
Once we came in and showered we went exploring through his old toys. We found many things, but most especially the Weasel-ball which he is now crawling around after calling "Here, kitty kitty!" Off to the What the Fluff? Festival! I wonder what adventures we will find there.
Once we came in and showered we went exploring through his old toys. We found many things, but most especially the Weasel-ball which he is now crawling around after calling "Here, kitty kitty!" Off to the What the Fluff? Festival! I wonder what adventures we will find there.
Why is life so utterly full of s__t?
The back stairs have needed to be patched and painted since before the Bumble Bean was born. We are working on the 4th year with no light over our table. The house is a disaster. Spell check isn't working; no surprise since the computer isn't working either. I suspect that our bathtub is about to fall into the clinic. Still no dehumidifier in the basement which makes anything that goes there become trash. Did I mention the house is filthy, the yard is full of weeds and general detritus, nothing is ever put away, thrown away, cleaned, fixed, maintained. Argh! I think I'll move to Australia.
It's all a crock
I am 99.9% sure that diagnoses for the Bumble Bean are useless. The sad part is, he can't get services without a diagnosis, the worse the diagnosis the better. On the other hand, since the services tend to be one size fits all and the specialists agree that they have never encountered a little boy like the Bumble Bean how useful can the services be? Can they actually be harmful? Can they shake his confidence that he is perfect the way he is? Can they make him feel like there is something wrong with him? Of course they can!
I have complete and absolute faith in the Bumble Bean. He is an amazing little boy and he will grow into an amazing man: tall and strong, wise and kind. It will be a journey not a destination as we have journeyed to where we are. We will keep on.
The Guest House
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
I have complete and absolute faith in the Bumble Bean. He is an amazing little boy and he will grow into an amazing man: tall and strong, wise and kind. It will be a journey not a destination as we have journeyed to where we are. We will keep on.
The Guest House
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
~ Rumi ~
(The Essential Rumi, versions by Coleman Barks)
24 September 2010
My Urban Gardening efforts to date
- 1 very healthy rosemary plant
- A couple dozen healthy Nasturtiums
- 3 very sad and droopy lettuces planted from a paper strip of seeds (KMart)
- 2 green peppers from 4 orange and yellow pepper plants (also KMart)
- 2 dozen tiny tomatos (delicious!)
- A parsley hedge
- Spearmint monster growth
- 2 4" eggplants (still growing)
By the time of our first frost (a few weeks away) I should be able to make a tiny meal of eggplant parmesan!
I think that next year I will hang my tomatoes from the second floor windows where they will get a lot more sun. Meanwhile, this fall, I am going to spread some manure on the 2 raised beds in my front yard so it can winter-in. I may seed clover for the first crop.
21 September 2010
19 September 2010
Amphibians
I am on idea 4 for designing a mass-producible octopus. I threw away the first 2. The Bumble Bean has been bashing the 3rd one around. The poor thing has needed first aid on many occasions since he was a test and I had not expected him to need to stand up to the Bumble Standard. The problem is that I have no time, the Bumble hates the sound of the sewing machine, and I want to design a fish, frog, lizard, sting ray, and any number of small leggy ocean critters thanks to Ponyo. With problems like those, I can't get started so I sit and write about it instead. I may attempt to post pictures one of these days.
Ambiguous, agnostic, ambidextrous
Friday night I dreamed I was working for the Red Lentil taking care of her pet goat. When I awoke, I thought, "It makes sense that the Red Lentil would have a pet goat. No way in hell would I ever work for her."
I related this dream to the Big Bad Bean and the String Bean. After their initial expressions of horror, Big Bad Bean asked, "Aren't goats exceedingly stubborn?"
To which I replied, "And smart and tricky."
Big Bad Bean shared a LOOK with String Bean and said, "You've just described the Red Lentil."
"I know. That's why I think she would do well with a pet goat. They'd get along like a house on fire."
The conversation veered on from there as conversations in our house tend to. We covered such points as:
I related this dream to the Big Bad Bean and the String Bean. After their initial expressions of horror, Big Bad Bean asked, "Aren't goats exceedingly stubborn?"
To which I replied, "And smart and tricky."
Big Bad Bean shared a LOOK with String Bean and said, "You've just described the Red Lentil."
"I know. That's why I think she would do well with a pet goat. They'd get along like a house on fire."
The conversation veered on from there as conversations in our house tend to. We covered such points as:
- Goats are very loyal to ONE person.
- Dibble, the goat I grew up with, adored my dad and hated the rest of us. She would snuggle up with him and climb into this lap: a lap goat.
- She once chased me into the narrow space between our house and her barn, knocked me down and trampled me. I was three.
- We ate her children. Twice.
09 September 2010
First chapter, part 2
The man was a teacher and a healer, a philosopher and a poet. His eyebrows bristled like a pair of animals leading a separate existence on his face. He was terrible punny and an excellent dancer. His name was Asterloa and he had an uncle twice removed named Artemis.
The woman was a librarian and a sculptor, a handyman and a klutz. She played the mandolin and had a habit of quacking like a duck when she was happy or excited. She danced with the man, but not as well. Her name was Lulu and she had an uncle twice removed named Winter.
The boy was their son named Artemis Winter after his two uncles three times removed. He was long and lean, strong and sweet, and he was happy. Everything he did, he did with exuberance and intensity. He was as tall as people twice his age. He could wrestle grown men. He loved to snuggle and hug and give kisses. He had no brothers or sisters and didn't spend much time around other children. Which is not to say that he was solitary. He had three best friends, all girls.
Lily Marvel was one year older than Artemis Winter and almost as tall, though not as strong. She was smart and peppery and just as fond of GI Joe as she was of Princesses, though she liked Fairies best of all. She talked without stopping and always thought she knew everything.
Clementine Gaia Leila Moonshine Saghirah was the same age as Artemis Winter and stood as tall as his armpit. She was solid and pointy and wiggled and giggled and squirmed, even when she was asleep. She was enormously silly and never stopped asking "Why?" unless it was to ask "Why not?"
Aislinn O'Toole was not quite a year younger than Artemis Winter and not quite as tall, but had an unruly mop of brown curls and bright green eyes. She liked to run and run and run and jump and wrestle and tickle and do flips. She talked and talked and talked, but she would stop talking if someone else had something to say.
Artemis Winter, it should be made clear, hardly ever talked at all. He taught himself to read when he was 2 and would read bedtime stories aloud to his parents to avoid going to bed himself. He taught himself to write as well and would play very silly word games with his mother. But words of his own from his own mouth he used most sparingly.
The woman was a librarian and a sculptor, a handyman and a klutz. She played the mandolin and had a habit of quacking like a duck when she was happy or excited. She danced with the man, but not as well. Her name was Lulu and she had an uncle twice removed named Winter.
The boy was their son named Artemis Winter after his two uncles three times removed. He was long and lean, strong and sweet, and he was happy. Everything he did, he did with exuberance and intensity. He was as tall as people twice his age. He could wrestle grown men. He loved to snuggle and hug and give kisses. He had no brothers or sisters and didn't spend much time around other children. Which is not to say that he was solitary. He had three best friends, all girls.
Lily Marvel was one year older than Artemis Winter and almost as tall, though not as strong. She was smart and peppery and just as fond of GI Joe as she was of Princesses, though she liked Fairies best of all. She talked without stopping and always thought she knew everything.
Clementine Gaia Leila Moonshine Saghirah was the same age as Artemis Winter and stood as tall as his armpit. She was solid and pointy and wiggled and giggled and squirmed, even when she was asleep. She was enormously silly and never stopped asking "Why?" unless it was to ask "Why not?"
Aislinn O'Toole was not quite a year younger than Artemis Winter and not quite as tall, but had an unruly mop of brown curls and bright green eyes. She liked to run and run and run and jump and wrestle and tickle and do flips. She talked and talked and talked, but she would stop talking if someone else had something to say.
Artemis Winter, it should be made clear, hardly ever talked at all. He taught himself to read when he was 2 and would read bedtime stories aloud to his parents to avoid going to bed himself. He taught himself to write as well and would play very silly word games with his mother. But words of his own from his own mouth he used most sparingly.
The world is full of bad jokes
I was walking past a staircase that I have walked past at least a hundred times before, and every time I walk past those stairs I notice that the last step is twice as high as all of the others. What I had never noticed until today is that the stairs lead to the Braille Press. That seems unnecessarily cruel.
07 September 2010
Losing fat
Tonight for supper I am having a martini. I am having a martini because it is fun to have a martini after a ridiculous day at work after a blissful long weekend with the Bumble Bean. Going back to work sucks. I am having only a martini because I am trying to lose fat. I don't really give a damn how much I weigh, I want to lose fat because I don't want to have to buy new bras. At this point I am sticking out over the top, under the bottom and around the sides of my bras and I'm talking about a double D here. I'm also talking about run-on sentences but if you reference the earlier martini you will see why I don't try to edit this post. My boobs are now so large that when I roll over in bed I pinch them between me and the mattress. I have switched to water now so that I can continue to play with the Bean and not pass out in a heap of enormous boobage.
06 September 2010
Structure
It is commonly understood to be true that children need structure to thrive. I wonder where this came from. Is it like the understanding of a century or more ago that children were naturally bad and had to be beaten to turn out good? Spare the rod and spoil the child?
I was lying in bed thinking about it. I couldn't stop so I got up to write this down and hopefully I will be able to go back to sleep since I have to drive 2 hours tomorrow to visit the Bean's friend and then who knows how long home in Labor Day traffic.
I think the idea that children need structure to thrive is partially true, especially in today's world. So many of the parts of their lives are structured that if the whole thing wasn't structured, the children would completely fall apart. Also, parents need children to be structured so they can go about the business of making enough money to pay the bills. If I didn't have to go to work in the mornings, I could stay awake with the Bean until he was ready to go to sleep around midnight, sleep in with him 'til 10 then gradually start our day.
However, if we accept that structure is necessary to some degree, the next questions we should be asking are "what kind?" and "how much/", not just accept that structure is always good regardless of its quality. I think that "how much?" can be easily answered as "never more than strictly necessary." On the other hand "what kind?" moves very quickly into the realm of discipline and what we, as individual parents, feel our role is. Personally, I feel that all of the structure should be supportive rather than restrictive, should be developed rather than enforced. This is a tough line since children, lacking key components necessary to use good judgement, need to be kept alive long enough to develop those components.
It also means that parents have to be much more involved with their children. They have to stay in tune with changes in ability and growing needs for autonomy. They have to be sufficiently aware to stand back and let the child become entangled in the rose bush and then be there to untangle him when he realizes it is beyond him. They also have to reinforce the lesson they want the child to learn. In my case, the lesson I want the Bumble Bean to learn is: Try it and see. If you can't do it, ask for help.
I'm not sure any of this makes sense, but I'm feeling sleepy again, so I will leave it for now. There is something here between Attachment Parenting and John Holt's admonishment to TRUST CHILDREN.
I was lying in bed thinking about it. I couldn't stop so I got up to write this down and hopefully I will be able to go back to sleep since I have to drive 2 hours tomorrow to visit the Bean's friend and then who knows how long home in Labor Day traffic.
I think the idea that children need structure to thrive is partially true, especially in today's world. So many of the parts of their lives are structured that if the whole thing wasn't structured, the children would completely fall apart. Also, parents need children to be structured so they can go about the business of making enough money to pay the bills. If I didn't have to go to work in the mornings, I could stay awake with the Bean until he was ready to go to sleep around midnight, sleep in with him 'til 10 then gradually start our day.
However, if we accept that structure is necessary to some degree, the next questions we should be asking are "what kind?" and "how much/", not just accept that structure is always good regardless of its quality. I think that "how much?" can be easily answered as "never more than strictly necessary." On the other hand "what kind?" moves very quickly into the realm of discipline and what we, as individual parents, feel our role is. Personally, I feel that all of the structure should be supportive rather than restrictive, should be developed rather than enforced. This is a tough line since children, lacking key components necessary to use good judgement, need to be kept alive long enough to develop those components.
It also means that parents have to be much more involved with their children. They have to stay in tune with changes in ability and growing needs for autonomy. They have to be sufficiently aware to stand back and let the child become entangled in the rose bush and then be there to untangle him when he realizes it is beyond him. They also have to reinforce the lesson they want the child to learn. In my case, the lesson I want the Bumble Bean to learn is: Try it and see. If you can't do it, ask for help.
I'm not sure any of this makes sense, but I'm feeling sleepy again, so I will leave it for now. There is something here between Attachment Parenting and John Holt's admonishment to TRUST CHILDREN.
Is that a pig? No, it's a dog!
The Bumble Bean and I went to Beaver Brook Reservation on Saturday and then again on Sunday at his insistence. There is a very nice sprinkler deck there, one of the best we've seen. It has natural rocks secured in the cement and is not painted a hideous antiseptic greeny-white. The water is chlorinated and it all makes a nice balance between being natural and being sanitary. There is also a playground structure and bathrooms. Most of the children gather there.
However...
Just down the hill is the actual Beaver Brook. It is not at all sanitary partially because it is natural despite its urban existence and partially because of the dogs who, also leading an urban existence, let off the leash in a huge field with lots of other dogs and a brook go a little insane and engage in the doggy equivalent of a royal rumpus. It is good practice for the Bean to get over being afraid of dogs, not because they are particularly well behaved, but because they are sublimely not interested in human beings in the midst of their little doggy bliss.
Naturally, the Bumble Bean is attracted to the stream. There are many rocks to throw, many slippery spots to fall down and get wet and covered with slime, and of course many opportunities to experiment with physics. This means that we always spend several hours ankle deep in the brook. But this weekend, after the "hurricane" the stream was particularly high and either because of that or because his world view and spirit of adventure are growing, the Bumble Bean decided that we had to walk all the way up stream. This is actually not an easy thing to do. There are many signs that other people simply don't do it.
Not that such a thing would ever stop the Bean since Mommy will figure out the logistics for him, never interfere with him getting filthy and save Kermit when he slips over waterfalls and gets tangled in debris. Mommy of course does this because she feels guilty that she is raising him in a confined urban environment (see the doggy bliss above) and her childhood adventures and magic were centered almost exclusively around the stream that ran along the bottom of her hill. When the time comes, she will undoubtedly foster the Bean in tree-climbing.
I think the urge to go up stream, the urge to find the source is actually much stronger in humans than the urge to go down-stream and find where it ends. There may be some deep mystical reason for this concerning our own mortality, our seeking for union with something greater or maybe it's just that things get more civilized down-stream and we're not very good at civilized.
On Saturday, there was a whole flock of dogs from extremely large Saint Bernard type dogs to Corgies and Jack Russells. There was also a hairless dog which the Bean regarded with horrified fascination for quite awhile and then turned to me and suggested "pig?" I replied with "No, it's a dog" at which he promptly started barking at it. The dog was small enough that he could have probably launched it half way across the field, but for the entire visit (except when we were lost in the tangle up-stream) he was especially wary of the hairless one. I wonder if he will try barking at pigs the next time we see them?
A couple of years ago when he had made another leap in some aspect of mental development, we went to the Museum of Science via the T and came past the T. Rex. We had come that way before, but he had never noticed the giant lizard. On this particular occasion, he saw it, stopped and considered it for quite some time before turning to me and saying (as if he really didn't believe it but was going to give it a try) "Kitty cat?" Thereafter, for almost a year, he would say "meow" when gazing upon a dinosaur.
However...
Just down the hill is the actual Beaver Brook. It is not at all sanitary partially because it is natural despite its urban existence and partially because of the dogs who, also leading an urban existence, let off the leash in a huge field with lots of other dogs and a brook go a little insane and engage in the doggy equivalent of a royal rumpus. It is good practice for the Bean to get over being afraid of dogs, not because they are particularly well behaved, but because they are sublimely not interested in human beings in the midst of their little doggy bliss.
Naturally, the Bumble Bean is attracted to the stream. There are many rocks to throw, many slippery spots to fall down and get wet and covered with slime, and of course many opportunities to experiment with physics. This means that we always spend several hours ankle deep in the brook. But this weekend, after the "hurricane" the stream was particularly high and either because of that or because his world view and spirit of adventure are growing, the Bumble Bean decided that we had to walk all the way up stream. This is actually not an easy thing to do. There are many signs that other people simply don't do it.
Not that such a thing would ever stop the Bean since Mommy will figure out the logistics for him, never interfere with him getting filthy and save Kermit when he slips over waterfalls and gets tangled in debris. Mommy of course does this because she feels guilty that she is raising him in a confined urban environment (see the doggy bliss above) and her childhood adventures and magic were centered almost exclusively around the stream that ran along the bottom of her hill. When the time comes, she will undoubtedly foster the Bean in tree-climbing.
I think the urge to go up stream, the urge to find the source is actually much stronger in humans than the urge to go down-stream and find where it ends. There may be some deep mystical reason for this concerning our own mortality, our seeking for union with something greater or maybe it's just that things get more civilized down-stream and we're not very good at civilized.
On Saturday, there was a whole flock of dogs from extremely large Saint Bernard type dogs to Corgies and Jack Russells. There was also a hairless dog which the Bean regarded with horrified fascination for quite awhile and then turned to me and suggested "pig?" I replied with "No, it's a dog" at which he promptly started barking at it. The dog was small enough that he could have probably launched it half way across the field, but for the entire visit (except when we were lost in the tangle up-stream) he was especially wary of the hairless one. I wonder if he will try barking at pigs the next time we see them?
A couple of years ago when he had made another leap in some aspect of mental development, we went to the Museum of Science via the T and came past the T. Rex. We had come that way before, but he had never noticed the giant lizard. On this particular occasion, he saw it, stopped and considered it for quite some time before turning to me and saying (as if he really didn't believe it but was going to give it a try) "Kitty cat?" Thereafter, for almost a year, he would say "meow" when gazing upon a dinosaur.
04 September 2010
Once upon a time
Once upon a time there was a house. It was a rambling house that rambled in a rambly, though not ramshackle, way in its very small park in a largish though friendly city. This house had a lot of character which means that you could see places where the walls had been patched and places where the walls had not been patched; some rooms had been renovated and some just had grand plans; people going down the stairs from one floor to another often found themselves facing at least 90 degrees from the direction they felt they should be facing. Going up was a similar experience, sometimes in the opposite direction depending on the confused state of the person climbing.
The house was furnished in a very eclectic style, most closely resembling one of those used bookstores in which the sole clerk seems unwilling to ever sell anything. This house had more space and more light than such places but just as many books just as determined to stay, stacked any which way, and just as many cats determined to do whatever was least convenient at any time.
The people who lived in the house were varied and constantly changing but not in a hectic way. The house was owned by a man and a woman, married to each other, who lived there with their son. They shared the house with two cats, a ferret, a cockatiel and a bluish-red fish in a bowl as well as an ongoing assortment of boarders and guests. The borders were mostly international students, or students of the man or friends or (when it couldn't be avoided) family. The guests were friends and students and teachers, sometimes all three in one person. It was a very happy house, didn't make much sense, but happy and the people in it were happy too.
None of the rooms was very large, so all of these people were rarely all together at any one time. If they all decided to eat together, at Thanksgiving for instance, there was no place where a large grand table with the fine china and silver could be set up. Therefore, they got rid of the table and silver and consistently refused the efforts of family and friends to give them fine china. Instead they made food that people enjoy eating and ate it off of paper plates usually with their fingers while standing or sitting around in an ever changing organic sort of flow. Dull people tended to all end up together in one place with not much conversation and usually did not come back which served everyone well: the dull people didn't feel excluded and the interesting, engaged people didn't feel glumpily dutiful about trying to include them.
This may be the book I am writing. We will see. Perhaps I will only write it while I am drinking martinis and call it the Martini Manuscript in a very pretentious sort of way. I already see the influence of Winnie the Pooh and Mistress Masham's Repose, also Dr. Doolittle.
The house was furnished in a very eclectic style, most closely resembling one of those used bookstores in which the sole clerk seems unwilling to ever sell anything. This house had more space and more light than such places but just as many books just as determined to stay, stacked any which way, and just as many cats determined to do whatever was least convenient at any time.
The people who lived in the house were varied and constantly changing but not in a hectic way. The house was owned by a man and a woman, married to each other, who lived there with their son. They shared the house with two cats, a ferret, a cockatiel and a bluish-red fish in a bowl as well as an ongoing assortment of boarders and guests. The borders were mostly international students, or students of the man or friends or (when it couldn't be avoided) family. The guests were friends and students and teachers, sometimes all three in one person. It was a very happy house, didn't make much sense, but happy and the people in it were happy too.
None of the rooms was very large, so all of these people were rarely all together at any one time. If they all decided to eat together, at Thanksgiving for instance, there was no place where a large grand table with the fine china and silver could be set up. Therefore, they got rid of the table and silver and consistently refused the efforts of family and friends to give them fine china. Instead they made food that people enjoy eating and ate it off of paper plates usually with their fingers while standing or sitting around in an ever changing organic sort of flow. Dull people tended to all end up together in one place with not much conversation and usually did not come back which served everyone well: the dull people didn't feel excluded and the interesting, engaged people didn't feel glumpily dutiful about trying to include them.
This may be the book I am writing. We will see. Perhaps I will only write it while I am drinking martinis and call it the Martini Manuscript in a very pretentious sort of way. I already see the influence of Winnie the Pooh and Mistress Masham's Repose, also Dr. Doolittle.
02 September 2010
Epistemology
Prefatory note: Epistemology is the study of how we know what we know (what we know is NOT to be confused with scholarship). Episiotomy is a surgical intervention for pregnant women in which a doctor cuts the flesh between the vaginal sphincter and the anus to keep it from tearing during birth. I always confuse these two words: the knowing and the mutilation. I wonder if that means anything?
Some people, mostly scholars, are now saying that Lao Tzu (popularly understood to be the founder of Taoism) is mythical and the work attributed to him, the Tao Te Ching, apocryphal.
Some people, mostly most people, are still saying that Georges Bataille (author of Story of the Eye and Blue of Noon) was one very sick puppy. Though some scholars are willing to admit that his work has more merit than originally granted.
Most people are willing to agree that both the mythical mystic and the actual deviant were archivists or librarians. Some people are born sociopaths, some people are born librarians, and librarians spend their lives recording, preserving, organizing, cataloging and sometimes indexing anything they can get their hands on. They have even been known to cross-reference! Librarians stand on a shifting, devious landscape between all that has been endeavored by the human intellect and all that is unknown. It is no wonder then that people of this persuasion would turn to philosophy, be rendered cryptic and have an abiding interest in transformation.
If one accepts that the Tao Te Ching was written, and most people do, then it requires no great leap to assume that the person who recorded it and made copies was of the librarian persuasion. It is therefore no surprise that an archivist, faced with the ephemeral quality of a spoken tradition, would write something down and organize it. Whether the archivist in question was the mythical Lao Tzu who took off into the desert or another archivist with the same name is probably not of very great importance.
What is of importance is that it was preserved and we have it today to read. And read it we do because it gives us the feeling of being in an E. H. Shepherd painting, drifting happily down a river in a dream where anything can happen and everything does all at once but not in a hectic way. Just reading it, even in translation, slows down the brain, empties the head and leaves a feeling of alert euphoria behind.
On the other hand, reading Bataille is viscerally wrenching, emotionally devastating and has the long lasting effect of making one wonder, years later, what it really would feel like to sit on an eyeball fresh from its skull.
Conclusion: What do knowing and mutilation have in common? They are both transformative.
Some people, mostly scholars, are now saying that Lao Tzu (popularly understood to be the founder of Taoism) is mythical and the work attributed to him, the Tao Te Ching, apocryphal.
Some people, mostly most people, are still saying that Georges Bataille (author of Story of the Eye and Blue of Noon) was one very sick puppy. Though some scholars are willing to admit that his work has more merit than originally granted.
Most people are willing to agree that both the mythical mystic and the actual deviant were archivists or librarians. Some people are born sociopaths, some people are born librarians, and librarians spend their lives recording, preserving, organizing, cataloging and sometimes indexing anything they can get their hands on. They have even been known to cross-reference! Librarians stand on a shifting, devious landscape between all that has been endeavored by the human intellect and all that is unknown. It is no wonder then that people of this persuasion would turn to philosophy, be rendered cryptic and have an abiding interest in transformation.
If one accepts that the Tao Te Ching was written, and most people do, then it requires no great leap to assume that the person who recorded it and made copies was of the librarian persuasion. It is therefore no surprise that an archivist, faced with the ephemeral quality of a spoken tradition, would write something down and organize it. Whether the archivist in question was the mythical Lao Tzu who took off into the desert or another archivist with the same name is probably not of very great importance.
What is of importance is that it was preserved and we have it today to read. And read it we do because it gives us the feeling of being in an E. H. Shepherd painting, drifting happily down a river in a dream where anything can happen and everything does all at once but not in a hectic way. Just reading it, even in translation, slows down the brain, empties the head and leaves a feeling of alert euphoria behind.
On the other hand, reading Bataille is viscerally wrenching, emotionally devastating and has the long lasting effect of making one wonder, years later, what it really would feel like to sit on an eyeball fresh from its skull.
Conclusion: What do knowing and mutilation have in common? They are both transformative.
Co-sleeping = World Championship Wrestling
The Bumble Bean was in rare form last night. He fell unconscious horizontally across the bed, which is not unusual, but shortly after two in the morning he sat bolt upright, scanned the bed topography and whumpled to me. He had to climb over the herd of pillows that I routinely sleep with, but climb he did until he was wedged between me and the slumbering beasts. Then he started hurling them over one another until he had enough to room to start what turned out to be a monumental sparring experiment.
He tried the heart-to-heart snuggle in every possible arm and leg configuration. He rolled over and tried the spoon snuggle in every possible and some impossible arm and leg positions. He tried various drape-over-mommy snuggles across my side, then rolled me onto my back and tried the various drapes across my tummy. He rolled me the rest of the way over and went back to the heart-to-heart, both of us on our other sides. Finally, after several hours, he settled into the ball-snuggle, nestled in my arms with his knees tucked up into my tummy, my thighs under his feet, my knees supporting his bottom, wrapped around the little Bean with my heart.
He tried the heart-to-heart snuggle in every possible arm and leg configuration. He rolled over and tried the spoon snuggle in every possible and some impossible arm and leg positions. He tried various drape-over-mommy snuggles across my side, then rolled me onto my back and tried the various drapes across my tummy. He rolled me the rest of the way over and went back to the heart-to-heart, both of us on our other sides. Finally, after several hours, he settled into the ball-snuggle, nestled in my arms with his knees tucked up into my tummy, my thighs under his feet, my knees supporting his bottom, wrapped around the little Bean with my heart.
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