Guns, drones, & dreams.

I had a dream in which a person that I believed to be a terrible villain was later revealed to be an angel of the highest order and this revelation brought me to my knees and broke my heart open.  I was astonished by how wrong I had been.  A little while after I awoke from this dream, I checked my facebook page where I'd posted this:

"Having worked in police dispatch for the past 17 years and being married to a police officer and being friends with countless other police officers, this article (New York Times OpEd piece, "I Carried a Gun, and It Was Heavy" by a retired Chicago police officer) brought tears to my eyes, just thinking about the weight and responsibility they carry with them every day, so I don't have to. I honor and thank them, because I don't want to have to carry a gun with me to the movie theater or the grocery store or while I go for a walk on my lunch break in order to feel safe. It would just be too heavy, in more ways than one."

and a comment with a link to this other New York Times OpEd piece, "A Way Out of the Gun Stalemate".

Of course, debate ensued.  One of the things that I like about written debates is that they seem to encourage me to really think about what I want to say before I say it. 

After carefully reading and rereading the comments that were posted by people I know and love, I thought, and thought, and thought.  And felt.  And meditated.  And sang.  And cried.  and then gave it some more thought.

What is this debate really about?  Personal freedom?  The esoteric, hypothetical need to defend ourselves from a future government that is overstepping it's bounds and treading on our personal freedoms? 

I don't want to take away the right to have a hunting rifle or handgun from anyone who uses them responsibly, but the argument about needing mega weapons and tons of ammo to defend ourselves from the government leaves me cold and brings to mind scenes like the standoff at Waco and the bombing of the federal building in Okahoma City. 

I can't wrap my head around how a gun or bomb or any number of guns or bombs could help me defend my personal freedoms from my government.  WE are supposed to BE the government, but even if that goes wrong and our government no longer actually represents the people, who are you going to go to war with?  The police?  I hope not.  My husband is one of those protect and serve guys and he sure doesn't deserve to get shot for enforcing the laws that we have tasked him with upholding.  The local elected officials?  Even if we aren't friends with them, they are our neighbors, members or our community.  How could we go to war with them?  Even at a state and national level, members of the government are people, human beings, someone's baby, someone's mom or dad or best friend, this includes every member of every military organization on the planet.  I can't see how shooting any of them could help keep the government in check and I can easily see how things could quickly devolve into anarchy where whoever has the biggest gun wins.

Because speaking of big guns....   That government, the one people say I might need big guns to defend myself against?  I have a feeling that no amount of rapid fire guns or rounds of ammunition is going to stop them if they really want to do me harm.  They have DRONES.  They are already raining death from the sky, illegally. "The ACLU estimates that as many as 4,000 people have been killed in US drone strikes since 2002 in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. Of those, a significant proportion were civilians."

Having guns of any size or number is not going to stop a government that can have a guy across the world kill you with a drone. 

So how DO we stop our government from treading on our freedoms or killing innocent people? 

I'll say it again, WE ARE our government. The way we STOP the insanity is to STOP allowing our hard earned dollars to be spent on weapons that could easily be used against us just as they are currently being used against innocent human beings on the other side of the world. 

The members of all levels of our government are someone's friends and family members.  The police are members of our communities.  The soldiers in the military are our sons and daughters, yes, even the ones using the drones.  Even the people in the mercenary private police force, Blackwater, are someone's kids.  Even the "evil" bank CEOs and heads of Oil and Gas companies are human beings.

We have to use our wits, not our proverbial swords, to sort out this problem.  We have reached the age when ever bigger weapons can only destroy us all, utterly.  We have evolved beyond the time when might makes right.

What we need is to BE a more educated, awake, and engaged citizenry and to switch our national priorities from defense (fear based) to education, sustainability, diplomacy, & social justice (love based).

I am willing to die for the rights of my friends, family, and neighbors and yes, even for the rights of strangers, but I am not willing to kill for them.  Because on this planet, today, every single human is my neighbor. There are no more strangers. 

So, after all that thought, I'll stand by my assertion that I wish guns and ammunition would be heavily regulated.  No, I don't want to take away anyone's hunting rifles or guns that they use for target practice, but I do think that they should have to go through very thorough training and register their guns and update those registrations yearly and I don't think anyone needs to have machine guns that can kill hundreds of people in minutes.  The argument that a car or kitchen knife can be used as a deadly weapon doesn't stand up to the request for an assault weapons ban because it's very, very difficult to kill many, many people in seconds with a car or knife before someone stops you.  And yes, people do kill people, but some things make it easier for them to do so.  It would be pretty hard for me to kill someone with my bare hands, but with a gun, not so physically challenging.  I'm all for personal freedom, right up to the point that it infringes on someone else's personal freedom.  If I understand the case correctly, the shooter in Aurora had no criminal history and bought all of the things he used on the legal market.  I also disagree with the argument that if we outlaw certain guns only criminals will have them.  Does this mean we should not have laws against killing people or raping people, because only immoral people would do those things anyway?  If there are laws against owning assault weapons and you see a crazy or suspicious person with one, the police can do something about it, but if there is no law against it, there is nothing they can do about it. 

Ultimately, I agree with this sentiment of my friend, Paul, "Call me whatever you will, but I dream of a day when a lunatic can walk into a theatre with only some gravel and a tree branch at most."  I wouldn't attempt to legislate it, but I can still dream it.

Which brings me full circle to the dream I started with, the one in which the person I had thought was a terrible villain was revealed to me to be an angel.  What if I'd shot him while believing I was defending myself or my loved ones against some evil?  I'm not religious and don't even know if I believe in angels, but I cannot imagine the anguish of wrongfully killing another human being, let alone a pure, perfect being of love, and I can't really understand what rightfully killing could possibly be.  Isn't it the Bible that says, "Thou shalt not kill."?  And doesn't that sentence end in a period?  Thou shalt not kill, period.  Or was I just dreaming in Sunday school?

Pause

What if I don't pause?  What if I hurry too much and forget to notice when the sky is a perfect shade of dusty plum?  What if I cannot see into the depths of the shadows?  What if I don't notice that you are there, waiting for me?

grove

I stood in a grove of Aspen trees one clear night in early spring. I felt my feet on the ground. I felt myself surrounded by their quiet grace. I listened to my own breath, listened for their breath. I looked up through their naked branches, leaned into a smooth, white trunk, saw the moon a little more than half full, a few stars twinkling, and I knew deep gratitude for this Earth home, for the silent unending work of the trees.

"9-1-1, What is the address of the emergency?" "Third planet from the Sun, Milky Way. Hurry!!!"

Ten after six, walking to the bus stop, cup of tea in hand, I notice that it's warmer than it has been in so many, many months.  The sky is barely light.  At the bus stop, next to the busy highway, between groups of cars passing, I hear the tiny chirps of birds coming from the field.

I get on the bus, use my phone to post a facebook update about the sky and the birds and see a post from a friend, "smash indiffrince with nina...." and a link to Ms. Simone's song, "Feelin' Good", one of my all time favorites.  It's in a playlist on my phone and I decide to listen to it on the bus on the way to work.

All of my senses and my heart are so wide open this morning. Is it because of my renewed practice of yoga every single day?  Is it because of springtime in the mountains?  Is it because of a good night's sleep, molecules all entangled with his?  Is it because I have been thinking a lot about how best to continue sharing the tools and joys of yoga during the class I've been teaching in the jail each week, with that bodhisattva mantra becoming a part of my DNA?  "I am not free until all are free."  Perhaps the why of it doesn't matter as much as the simple truth of it.  I am raw.  I am wide open.  I am madly in love with life, the universe, & everything, madly and peacefully in the same moment.

Nina's voice reaches my ears through 46 years and some impressive technology.  She sings, "Birds flying high you know how I feel.  Sun in the sky, you know how I feel....."  I know this song better than I know my own body and it always affects me deeply.  I know even before hearing it again that it is a song about newfound freedom, about the joy of being alive.  As those words, "birds flying high" vibrate through me, as my eyes see the outline of the mountains against the steadily lightening sky through the bus window, my soul soars high with the birds of this morning and the birds of Nina's morning so long ago, and simultaneously, my eyes fill with tears at the memory of a news story of hundreds of birds falling dead from the sky-- no explanation.

Nina continues caressing my consciousness through all these years, through these headphones, through my ear drums, "Breeze drifting on by, you know how I feel.  It's a new dawn.  It's a new day.  It's a new life for me, yeah.  It's a new dawn.  It's a new day.  It's a new life for me. and I'm feelin' good."  She recorded this song before I was born.  Was it possible in 1965 for people somewhere on earth to wake up to a breeze so dangerous, so laden with radiation from a broken nuclear plant that they had to leave their homes?  It's such a beautiful morning here.  I do feel so good and yet, so sorrowful.  A tear rolls down my cheek.

"Fish in the sea, you know how I feel.  River runnin' free, you know how I feel.  Blossom on the tree, you know how I feel.  It's a new dawn.  It's a new day.  It's a new life for me.  And I'm feelin' good."  Her voice, those words, the instruments accompanying her, my own name in the lyrics, all move me in inexplicable ways. Through the window I can see the sparkling ribbon of the Roaring Fork River.  Here it is near the start of its long journey toward the Pacific.  Thirty miles from here it will meet the Colorado River and I know that the Colorado is damned and diverted so much that the water here will not make it to the sea.  The estuaries in the delta are now but shadows of their former selves.  Only cracked, dried, and in many places, toxic, mud remains.  This river is no longer free.  And what of the fish in the sea?  Do they know that their tissues are laden with mercury?  Do they now try to avoid the Pacific Garbage Patch the way we humans try to avoid traffic jams in smog clogged cities?  Blossom On The Tree, do you know how I feel, today?  Are you, too, overjoyed to be alive and yet bereft at the carelessness with which we humans have treated our shared and only home?

Nina goes on, oblivious to my tears, (or is she?)  "Dragonfly out in the sun, you know what I mean, don't you know?  Butterflies all havin' fun, you know what I mean.  Sleep in peace when day is done, that's what I mean.  And this old world is a new world and a bold world, for me."  The tears are flowing freely now.  How often do we actually sleep in peace when day is done?  How often do I toss, turn, dream turbulent dreams after having watched the news of the day before bed?  "Stars when you shine, you know how I feel.  Scent of the pine, you know how I feel.  Freedom is mine.  And I know how I feel.  It's a new dawn.  It's a new day.  It's a new life, for me."  Is there another star out there like our Sun?  Is there another planet out there like our Earth?  Do the stars ever fear for the health of their home, the universe?  Or do they only burn, burn, burn, mindlessly burn?  Is freedom mine?  I feel free and yet I do not.  The mantra tickles the edges of my awareness, as Nina sings and the music soars, "Freedom is mine." dances with "I am not free until all are free."   Oh Nina, did you know that one day my heart would break open over and over and over again while listening to your song?  How could you?  A silent sob shakes me to the bone.  Does anyone on the bus notice my emotion? No, it seems, they do not.

The playlist is on shuffle, so I don't know what song is coming next.  As Macy Gray begins to sing I catch my breath, "I know you're fed up. Life don't let up, for us. All they talk about, is what is going down, and what's been messed up, for us.  When I look around, I see blue skies, I see butterflies, for us.  Listen to the sound, and lose it, in sweet music, and dance with me.  'Cause there is beauty in the world."  I know, Macy, I know.  It's true.  You're so right.  There is SO much beauty in the world.  So much.  And / but, Macy, there is so much suffering, too.  So much.  She replies, "We need more lovin'.  We need more learnin'.  They say.  Change is gonna come, like the weather, they say forever.  They say.  So baby, in between, notice the blue skies.  Notice the butterflies.  Notice me.  Stop and smell the flowers and lose it, in sweet music, and dance with me.  'Cause there is beauty in the world."  How can I dance when others suffer?  How dare I lose myself in this sweet music, in this sweet sunrise, in this inhale, this exhale, when others suffer and die?  And how dare I not? How dare I not hold this moment of peace in my life in deep gratitude and revel in it?  I know what you're saying Macy.  I know.  You're right.  I can see it, I catch a glimpse, this second, as the bus turns out of the Intercept Lot, up Brush Creek Canyon, the sky--- it's deep pink & purple & blue, like a painting, over the snow capped mountains to the south.  Breathtaking.  She sings, "When you don't know what to do, don't know if you'll make it through, remember God is giving you, beauty in the world, so love."  Love.  Love.  Love.  I think, gratitude is a synonym for love.  "Hey babe, I'm lookin' at you now.  I know in fact it's true now.  There's love.  There's hope for us and there's beauty in the world."  More tears fall.  Tears of joy.  Tears of gratitude. Thank you, Macy, for reminding us all, to be thankful for the beauty, even, and especially, in the face of sorrow.

Next song:  Michael Franti sings, "The more I see the less I know, but I know, one thing, that I love you."  I smile, inside and out.  In gratitude again, for love.  It's true.... the more I see, the less I know.  but I know one thing.  I love.  Is it true that everyone loves someone?

Ah, the Pixies, La La Love You.  "All I'm saying pretty baby, la la love you, don't mean maybe."   Butterflies in the stomach.  Goosebumps on the arms.  Even my liver smiles.  My heart dances.  I wriggle, just subtly, in my seat, on the bus.  Don't want to disturb the fellow commuters.

We're headed into town, going through the roundabout, when Jack Johnson starts singing, "It's always more fun to share with everyone."  My smile is refreshed as I look east, past the town, toward the Continental Divide.  "If you have one, here is something you can learn, you can still share, just by taking turns." "If you've got one sandwich, cut that thing in half.  If you know a secret joke, tell it and share a laugh."  Why don't the leaders of the world have the same common sense as the kids in preschool?  This song needs to be translated into every language and played at the start of every meeting of every Congress and Parliament and U.N.  & G-8 meeting in the world.

soon the Luminaries are asking me, "Do you believe in miracles?"  and I think I have to.  I have no choice.  They sing, "Peace worldwide, starts from inside, the answer and solution always start with me."  I'm walking from the place where I exit the bus to my workplace.  The sun will peak over the mountains any minute.  The fluffy clouds are lit bright pink from below.  A bird flies between me and the clouds, so gracefully.  The buds on a tree branch that reaches across the sidewalk stand out in stark contrast to the sky.  I renew my resolve that every time I find my body in warrior pose it will be a prayer for peace. I am a yogi warrior for peace, a protector of beauty, a lover of life.

I take off the headphones and step through the door into the workplace where I will spend the next 10 hours surrounded by computer screens, answering the phones, sending help, breathing in, breathing out.

"Peace world wide starts from inside, if you wanna save the world, be the change you wanna see."

Am I walking my talk today?  All day?  Every minute?  Am I trying to see things from another perspective if there is a disagreement?  Am I using more than my fair share?  Am I doing my best?  Am I being the best I can be?  Who am I to be great?  Actually, who am I not to be?  How dare I not live up to every iota of my potential?  Are you being your best today?  Can we save this world?  Can we BE the change we want to see?  Can we come together for peace?  Can we hold the deep sorrows and the deep joys all in the same moment?  Can we stay awake?  Take care of each other?  Share all we have with all who need?  Are we strong enough?

Last week I read about a study in which they put a bunch of people at the bottom of a hill wearing heavy backpacks and asked them each to estimate how steep the hill was.  The ones who were standing with other people tended to perceive the hill as less steep than the ones who were standing alone.  The ones who were standing with someone they had known for a long time perceived the hill as even less steep.  What I got out of reading that is that we need each other.  Let's be all on the same team - for the greater good of all -- all for one and one for all.  Together, we can do it.  We can turn this thing around.  Who's in?

going back to the things that melt my ice....

did you ever listen to the same song over and over and over again, melting into it?

did you ever go back to the same sweet place over and over and over again, breathing into it?

did you ever get so tangled up in another human being that you didn't know where you ended and they began?  did you struggle to disentangle yourself?  or did you luxuriate in the closeness?

did you ever long to climb into a storybook and stay there forever, wandering with the brightly drawn butterflies in the perfectly distant mountains?

did you ever fall asleep in a sunbeam on the couch with a book (or a baby) resting on your chest and gladness in your heart for a perfect moment of peace & quiet?

I didn't make a new year's resolution this year because it's my pattern to set BIG goals for myself and make BIG plans, but it's not the BIG things that make me deeply happy.   it's the songs, the ones that melt me.  and the sweet quiet secret places.  and there are a few humans that I just love being tangled up with.  oh, and storybooks, stories period.  and let's don't even talk about couches and sunbeams and books and babies.

I think this blog should be called "breathe love sleep work play listen".....  or not I guess.

but I am thinking that it will start to be about things that I deeply cherish and people that I deeply respect and the good, good, good stuff.

I need to lighten up a bit this year as compared to the second half of 2010.  I need to slow down and breathe really, really deeply, not just in yoga class or while I'm meditating, but every minute.  but I'm not resolving to lighten up or slow down....  I'm not resolving anything.  and that makes it easier to breathe.

follow the link to see some photos that were taken by me while I was breathing deeply and easily.  http://www.flickr.com/photos/synonymforlight/sets/72157625758853616/   if you see one that you like and want to own, let me know.  if you make a donation of any amount to any cause that is dear to you, it's yours.  and if you need some ideas...  I have a few. 

tonight I heard Terry Tempest Williams speak and she was awe inspiring and also just plain inspiring.  http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/mag/contributor/61/

and today I received a letter from a friend telling me about an endeavor she is beginning.  I can't think of a better person for the job and I want to support her in any way possible, so if you have an extra $10 in your pocketbook, consider donating it to her effort:  http://breatheloveplay.blogspot.com/p/chip-in-here.html

the song that played over and over again as I typed this blog tonight was Fiona Apple's "Pale September".   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKA1tVb4u0g

who are you? (originally posted in february 2010 on gaia.com)

I am the hero of my story.  I walk through this phantasmagoria.  I go the places I must go.  I do the things I must do.  I feel that I am waiting or searching for something, but I do not know what the something is.  I wait.  I search.  I wander.  I sit still and listen.  One day, your path crosses mine.  You smile at me.  I smile at you.  You give me a key.  You give me a clue.  You give me a gift.  You give me a blessing.  Perhaps, for awhile we walk together, you & I.  Someday, you go your own way.  Your ship sets sail.  I bid you adieu, with a tear in my eye and a smile in my heart.  They tell me you are gone, but I still feel you.  They tell me you are beyond my reach, but I know, that it is only illusion.  You are still here because you have become a part of me.

You are the hero of your story.  You walk through this strange world looking high and low, inside and out.  You listen.  You wander.  You laugh and cry.  You wonder if you are waiting for something.  You wonder.  One day, my path crosses yours.  I smile at you.  You smile at me.  I give you a key, a clue, a gift, a blessing.  We walk together.  We play.  We dance.  We laugh and sing.  Sometimes we just sit together quietly.  One day I go my own way.  I fly with butterflies and multicolored birds high into the sky.  For a little while you believe that I am gone.  You search the sky for me.  You wonder when I will return.  And then you realize that I am not far from you.  You know that I became a part of you with that first smile and more again when I wiped a tear from your eye.  You remember that we are not separate.

She is the hero of her story.  She has a path to walk, a song to sing.  She goes along.  She wanders.  One day our paths cross.  We give each other hope, friendship, fortitude.  We give one another affection, inspiration.  We walk together for a time and then we go on separate paths to look in other places, perhaps other times.  We think of one another.  We wonder.  And we know, that we are not alone on our journeys.  We have the gifts from one another, carried in our hearts.  We are not alone.  We are one.  I am you and you are me and we are she and she is he and we are all together.

He is the hero of his story.  He has ambitions, tasks to carry out.  He is on a mission.  Perhaps to rescue you or me or she.  One of us crosses his path.  We give him a wink and a smile.  We show him a hidden way.  We give him nourishment for his journey.  He continues on.  We do not know how his story will end.  But he takes a part of us with him and leaves a part of himself behind.  Our colors blend.  Our tastes create some new taste.  Our textures are changed because of a momentary meeting.  We are quantumly entangled.  There is no he without me or you or she.  We remember and so we are free of the pain of the illusion.

(Can you tell I have been listening to heartbreakingly beautiful songs, sung by one who has left this plane?  Can you tell I have been reading, "A Blue Hand, the Beats in India"?  Can you tell that I have been wandering through dream land in between episodes of Lost and Interview with the Vampire, The Last Emperor, The Ellen Degeneres Show and Slumdog Millionaire?)

Can you tell that I think life is beautiful?  I offer you whatever gifts have been given me and I accept those gifts that you have shared with me.  We are the heroes of our stories.  We walk our paths and sing our songs.  We dance our dances.  We dream our dreams.  We watch.  We listen.  We work.  We rest.  We become sick or injured and we heal or die.  As we live and die, we weave the tapestry, each a thread.  Without each of us, the tapestry would be incomplete.  Without the dark, how would we know the light?  What adventure will you have today?  What color your thread in the tapestry today?  What taste have you to offer to the mix?  Bitter, sweet, salty, bland?  What song do you sing?  In which tongue do you speak?  Which step do you dance?  How do you alter the lives yours touches?  It has occurred to me once again that I am not responsible for the entire tapestry all alone and that yet, by contrasting and mixing with the threads next to mine, I do indeed change the whole.  There is no me without you.  Today my deepest purple needs the contrast of your bright yellow and your cobalt blue, her blood red, his emerald green.  I thank you for being, for touching my heart.

bedtime stories on the radio and a prayer for peace

headlights move along a lonely stretch of 3 am highway somewhere in the western United States.  behind the wheel of a vehicle that burns gasoline to propel it forward a girl listens to the radio.  she hears stories told by men and women with strong BBC accents of a fight for democracy in Burma, disputed territory in the West Bank, election speculation in Ireland, an exhibit about the evolving English language at the National Library in London, and also a story about the President of Uganda rapping a children's story.  snow falls softly on the frozen highway, not enough to need the windshield wipers.  the individual flakes sparkle in the headlight beams.  the girl marvels at the strange beauty of the world and prays for peace.