There's a Poem Here Today

Here's a poem I ran across that has some special significance for me. I first read it at a time in my life when I was recovering from critical illness and having doubts about my health and longevity. I take a lot less for granted these days. This poem is a good reminder to me that each day is special. 

Look to this day;

For it is life, the very life of life.

In its brief course

Lie all the verities and realities of your existence.

The bliss of growth,

The glory of action

The splendour of achievement

Are but experiences of time.

For yesterday is but a dream

And tomorrow is only a vision;

And today well-lived, makes

Yesterday a dream of happiness

And every tomorrow a vision of hope.

Look well therefore to this day;

Such is the salutation to the ever-new dawn.

Kalidasa

For extra credit you can look up the author in Wikipedia here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C4%81lid%C4%81sa

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Ride On and Carpe Diem my friends.

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A Perfect Balance

A recent post by Richard Machida got me thinking, and that's always dangerous.

Here's the Link:  http://blog.machida.us/2012/08/is-riding-unhealthy.html

After the driving restriction from my heart problems was lifted, my goal for getting to and from work was to ride Max, walk or take the famous Canadian Subaru (Monty) in roughly equal proportions. Lately though I have been failing miserably at attaining that goal. I was riding Max too much. (Is that even possible?) For the last 3 weeks I had ridden the scooter almost every day. The walking hadn't been entirely abandoned because I walk the dogs frequently. It was poor Monty (the famous Canadian Subaru) that was being ignored.

So today I took out on foot to maybe achieve "A Perfect Balance". To hell with the car, I wanted to walk.

East Central Avenue in the early morning. Not too much traffic yet on a Friday.

I track my exercise with a phone App called Endomondo. It uses the GPS device in the phone to compute distances, calories used and all sorts of not very useful information. But it's fun and it shows that I have walked almost 500 miles in the last year or so. Not spectacular, but not bad. I have to admit I feel better for it. When I walk, I think. It helps clear out the cobwebs in my mind. Today as I walked, I was thinking about Richard's post. I was considering the balance in my life. Almost a Zen feeling. It was a beautiful morning, not quite as hot today. As I walked along, I crossed over a creek with not much water in it.

This creek never has a lot of water in it, but it's damn near dry right now.

I was thinking that it would be more of "A Perfect Balance" to have a little more water in that creek. Not so much as to flood it, something more in the middle. We could sure use some rain.

Walking is an excellent form of exercise. Here's a pic of the dogs on a recent evening walk. After dinner and a short nap, they are always ready to go and see what has happened in the neighborhood. My wife and I alternate nights to walk them, but we do it almost every evening.It's good for them, too.

Madeline (in front) is 16 yrs old. Sophie is 3.

Recently we were in the Taos, New Mexico area and did a little hiking near a ski resort. Now there's some walking for you. Uphill at 7,800 ft elevation. The dogs loved it. The humans did too. (Even me, the Cyborg)

The dogs tried to be in charge of the route, but seemed more interested in chasing small creatures.

Now some people are interested in extreme sports. I own a Subaru and a motorcycle (scooter). The next picture has a Subaru and a motorcycle, could it be me?  Naaah. A little too extreme for me, not quite "A Perfect Balance".

Taken from UK's "Top Gear" website

But I admit to doing something a little more extreme lately. My daughter and her husband have been doing some riding on mountain bike trails and have encouraged me to try one of the courses out. So on a Sunday evening we headed out to Millers Meadow.

http://www.kansascyclist.com/trails/MillersMeadow.html

My daughter looking pretty fierce just after our ride. She's a helluva rider and was my guide for the evening.

Endomondo says we did the 5 mile course in about 44 minutes averaging about 6.7 mph. Now that may sound slow, and it was, but let me tell you, some of it was pretty gnarly. (Yes, I said Gnarly)
Some of the gullies that had very unsettling bottoms to them. At times the path was just wide enough for your handlebars, not to mention ruts from the parched earth.

Will I do the course again? Probably, but I think I prefer just a nice smooth bike path. Maybe something a little less extreme, but it was fun and I hadn't done anything like that since I was a kid. I never fell that evening, but I admit to stopping and walking the bike through a few really deep and scary gullies.

A little blood was the result, but it was a lot tamer than it looked. You see, taking heart medications, including a coagulant, makes it a little harder to stop bleeding. This was just from brushing up against a tree branch.

Now, you have to realize that there are at least two ways to achieve "A Perfect Balance" Balances can be achieved in both a physical and a spiritual sense. Take this next picture for instance:

Just like from "A Field of Dreams", having a dog and a beer at the ball park.

If you drank beer and ate hot dogs all the time, obviously that wouldn't be too good for you physically. But moderation is possible in my book. Spiritually, though, spending an evening at the ball park with my son can be very rewarding. Some hat, huh?

When I was in college, as an elective, I took a course in nutrition. Thought it would be easy, it wasn't. Thought it might be boring, it wasn't. The professor was really good and I learned a lot. One thing I always remember is that she used to say that your body has a tendency to know what it needs for you. It will make you hungry for things that it needs. Now some nutrients, like most sugars, in excess can be very bad for you. But in moderation, all things can be good.

As I walked this morning I went by this fast food restaurant, popular in this area. They have nice greasy hamburgers, shakes and fries. But they also have fairly healthy turkey on pita sandwiches. I bet they serve more burgers, but at least they maybe try to achieve "A Perfect Balance".

Fast greasy food here with a balance of some healthy options.

Then right across the street from the eatery and at the end of my morning walk is the ER where I spent some time 18 months ago. A lot of this "Balance" stuff is my attempt to try and avoid this place in the future.

A place to avoid if you can, but pretty fantastic people there if you really need them.

Maybe the best way to achieve "A Perfect Blance" is to spend time with your loved ones.

At the ball park with my wonderful wife. We tested out a few beers that night. Everything in moderation.

Ride On and Carpe Diem, my friends.

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A Road Trip as a Survival Mechanism

A book report on a 50,000 mile road trip

Ghost Rider

Travels on the Healing Road

Neil Peart

The moment I realized I could get this book in e-reader form it was only a matter of time before I would acquire it and read it. I had been reading some mysteries lately and when I discovered this book I knew I wanted to read it. And report on it. For I know very well who Neil Peart is. I didn't know he was also an author. My knowledge of the author goes back to the 1970's. A time when I used to play a little electric guitar. We used to put a record on the turntable, plug in our guitars and play along to the albums. We would dream of playing on the big stage. Most of all we would just have a lot of fun. Sometimes we would nail the music sequences. Sometimes we could hit the 'licks', other times not so much. One of the bands we liked to play along with was the Canadian Rock Band "Rush". I remember a couple of their early albums very well. After more than 30 years they are still Rockin', even though there was a couple of years where they took a break. The author of this book, Neil Peart, is the drummer for "Rush". I didn't know until just recently, that the author had experienced some personal tragedies in his life. The kind of tragedies you wouldn't want to wish upon anyone. First, his 19 year old daughter, his only child, was killed in an automobile accident. Then, not too long later, the love of his life and mother of his daughter died. She officially died of cancer, but as the author puts it, she really died of a broken heart. Damn! Now, I can't begin to even try and understand what I would do in a similar situation. I just hope that nothing like it ever happens to me. But the author, also an avid motorcyclist, decided he would try and deal with his grief by going for a ride. The author thought that maybe riding would help him get his mind off the pain and grief he was experiencing. In an almost Pirsig like expression he talks about how riding his motorcycle causes total concentration and attention to the road in front of him. That would help keep his mind occupied and even lull him into a tranquility caused by the the constant motion and vibration of the motorcycle as the world passed by him. We're talking a lot of miles, hopefully a lot of healing and a lot of months all over the north american continent.

Peart's weapon of choice. A BMW 1100GS

I believe the author calls himself the "ghost rider" in part because of the many demons, memories and monsters that travelled along with him. He mentions that the world around him doesn't seem quite real and that he experienced a disconnect with the world surrounding him.

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In the book, the author really bares his soul, his deepest thoughts and that is part of what made the book so fascinating to me. Some of the book is also a compilation of notes from the road and letters to friends and family during his "self imposed exile". The effect is to make the words more immediate to the moment being experienced and more real to the reader. There's some great stuff here.

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Did I mention Pirsig like phrases?

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"And sometimes there was music playing in my helmet, too, as my mental jukebox transformed the white noise of the wind passing into a soundtrack in richly detailed high fidelity ... When the riding became demanding, the music receded into the background, but when it was just me and the motorcycle on a pretty stretch of road, my brain would turn up the radio."

. Man, have I been there. I constantly have my "music" with me when I ride. There's no stereo on Max, just my mind.

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Part of the book talks about the author's love for literature. He mentions various authors that he admires or has enjoyed. Names like Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, Mark Twain, Jack London, Sinclair Lewis and even Truman Capote are mentioned in the book. He would buy books in bookstores, then mail them back to his home in Canada to be read later or given to a friend. He even stopped momemtarily in the town I was born, Garden City KS. He was interested in Truman Capote's book "In Cold Blood" about the murder of a farm family occuring in the late 1950's. He wanted to stop by and see if he could find the farmhouse of the Clutter family. He did.

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I took lots of notes as I read the book. I enjoyed it that much. The subject, yes, is a bit gloomy, but the insight into his mind is fascinating. At one point as I read, I imagined how the end of the book would turn out to be. The author gives a couple of hints. In a silly fashion I imagined sort of a Hollywood type of ending, which of course didn't turn out to be the case. The issues were much deeper than my mind was envisioning at the time. The ending is maybe a bit peculiar, but as I think back on it more and more, the better I like it.

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A final conclusion I drew from the book is that life is just what it is.

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It Just is, Deal With It!

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Alex Lifeson on the left, Geddy Lee in the center and the author, Neil Peart, in the background to the right.

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They first played together as a trio in 1974, the year I graduated from high school.

I just really like their "sound". I always have. I'm not sure they are the greatest rock group ever to be, but three and a half decades later, they still tour and play together. I have never seen them in concert and had a chance to this year, but we had already bought tickets to see the Dave Matthews Band (who rocked the house, btw), and the family budget for attending concerts isn't unlimited.

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But I will tell you that I have a little CD player at the office and the "Rush" CD's get played as much, if not more than a lot of the other CD's I have.

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I highly recommend this book for a bunch of reasons. Motorcycles, Rock n Roll, philosophy and life. How good can it get.

There's a Book Report Coming

You may just have to wait for it for a few days. I had told a few readers and friends that I hadn't been feeling very well for the past couple of months. I was pretty sure the problem was related to a drug I was taking to help me quit smoking. Chantix is a ridiculous creation of the drug companies, with all sorts of weird side effects, and only one benefit. It sometimes can help people quit the nicotine habit. I emphasize "sometimes" because I'm not convinced that the manufacturer knows exactly how it works. I'm just here to say that it makes you feel kind of shitty, and not even want to smoke. The good news is that the last cigarette I had was 2 days before Thanksgiving, and the last time I took the Chantix was about a week and a half ago. The bad news is that my symptoms of not feeling well were sort of masked by the effects of Chantix. There was another, more serious, set of symptoms involved that I mistook for the effects of the drug. I had a heart attack last Friday morning. I was incredibly lucky. The paramedics and ambulance arrived quickly. I got to ride "Hot" with sirens blaring in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. The people in the ER were waiting for me. The OR was ready. The cardiologist was "in the building". In a very short period of time, they had done a catherization and placed a stent in an artery supplying blood to me heart. A lot of very competent people saved my life. I was doing so well afterward that they released me on Sunday afternoon and I am back at home. No, I don't feel 100%, yet, but considering the circumstances, I can't do much better. I am taking a few days off of work, then gradually ease back into it a bit. With the time off I plan to finish up a book I have been reading on my Nook that will be the subject of a book report for the blog. I don't want to say what the book is yet, but I am enjoying the heck out of it and just need some to finish it up. I am doing fine and will try and finish the book this week. I do have a little extra time, now. There are even some possibly interesting parallels between the book and my own life that may get explored a bit. So, just hang tight and I'll be back soon with a book report.

Just a Wonderful Little Holiday Story

My wife looked like she might have had some tears in her eyes when she came to work today. Cathy and I were wondering what was up. We sometimes donate goods to a local Disabled American Veterans Thrift store near our home. They have a drive-thru dropoff dock at the back of the store. We had this old cuckoo clock that we retired from use in our home recently and Jayna wanted to drop it by the store on her way to work this morning. She had a busy morning with a couple of extra errands and was anxious to get to the office. When she arrived at the store, she realized it was a few minutes before 9:00 and she would have to wait a bit for the store to open and drop off the clock. Not only that, but in front of her in the lineup of cars was a pickup truck with a topper that had smoked glass that you couldn't see through. Feeling some impatience, she was feeling a bit frustrated at having to wait, especially because the truck in front of her looked like it might take awhile to unload. Eventually someone came out of the store and they opened up the back of the pickup truck in front of her. It was full of presents. Jam packed from top to bottom. Balls, bats, games and everything imaginable for kids. Some Santa had just done a very wonderful thing. The people at the store were very excited to receive the gifts, that they knew would fly off the shelves and make for a wonderful Christmas for somebody somewhere. Jayna watched all of this as she sat in the car and shed a few tears as she thought to herself, "And all I have is this silly old cuckoo clock". Her feelngs of impatience disappeared immediately. There was something much more important going on here. Ahhh......... It's the Season ! Stuff like this happens all over the place this time of year. It's really special when you can be on hand to see some of it happen.

It Might Rain, Or Maybe Not

To a commuter like me, sometimes there are days that you didn't ride to work and wished you had. I am serious about trying to commute to work with the scooter every day I can. Cold or hot weather usually doesn't stop me from riding. Some days the weather totally defeats the possibility of riding. Snow and ice are obvious reasons not to ride. Light rain I can handle, but I prefer to avoid thunderstorms, (I'm very afraid of lightning). We can regularly get some pretty violent thunderstorms here on the plains. Then there are days that the weather forecast might not look so good. On those days you might second guess the prediction of the forecasters. Maybe it's a day where the morning ride looks good, but the afternoon ride looks iffy. Or vice versa. Do you chance it? I sure hate those days when I decided not to chance it and the weather turned out to be nice. Some missed opportunities. Of course there are also days when the weather prediction looks good, but a surprise storm develops and you get caught in weather that you would rather have avoided. Can make for an interesting situation and possibly an exciting story. I personally don't get too crazy, but I do sometimes like to "push the envelope". Maybe I decide that the weather people don't have a clue. Sometimes the decision to get crazy and "go for it" just depends on whatever mood I am in. And then I fully admit that there are at least a very few days when I just don't feel like riding to work even if the weather cooperates. The reasons can vary. Sometimes I "wimp out" from just feeling lazy. Some days I might be tired (physically or mentally). If I'm tired, I get concerned about how alert I will be while riding. I seldom "wimp out" though. And on iffy days I am generally cautious. But riding energizes me. There is almost always at least a little rush of adrenaline. It's a great way to start and end a day. I hate to miss out on a ride. Hell, maybe I'm just preaching to the choir.

Commuting With A Dinosaur

As I was riding to work this morning I saw a bird lazily soaring along in the sky above me. His wings were spread out wide. He was just coasting along with the wind. It was beautiful. He maintained a speed that was almost as fast as the traffic below him. And as he was gliding along, his motions appeared to be almost effortless to him. I don't think he was a hawk, he wasn't big enough. I don't know that much about birds, so I am unsure exactly what he was. I wished that I could suspend having to look for traffic bogeys and just watch him for awhile. I just know that I was a bit jealous of his ability and opportunity to soar in the sky. What a marvelous feeling it must be. Riding is fun and the experience is so much more than driving a car, but not exactly the same as flight. I admire the freedom a bird must have. You could go in any direction you want to unimpeded by roadways and the limits they impose. You could join friends on a telephone wire and discuss the state of the world. You could also maybe dive bomb a cat or two if the mood suited you. Many scientists maintain that present day birds are the direct descendants of the great dinosaurs that once roamed our planet. They have discovered many similarities in bone structures and other features. It now seems that whatever potentially cataclysmic planetary event that caused the great dinosaurs to disappear may not have caused the demise for all of them. When I think about it, I realize that this is absolutely amazing. I am not really a big bird watcher, but birds do fascinate me. Over the millenia, they seemed to have adapted to many different conditions on this planet. Some have amazing intelligence. I am sure that life as a bird is challenging at times, but they are amazing as survivors on the evolutionary scale. It actually made me feel quite "small" and "humble" as I watched him fly. There was only a few moments that I had the pleasure of watching him as he eventually ended up taking a new course in the sky and I could not follow him any farther. I thought later that I probably would not have even noticed him if I had been driving the car to work that morning. Aahh, the benefits of riding!

Common Sense in Kansas

From a dictionary: Sage One venerated for experience, judgment, and wisdom. adj. sag·er, sag·est 1. Having or exhibiting wisdom and calm judgment. 2. Proceeding from or marked by wisdom and calm judgment: sag From a thesaurus: Sage - a mentor in spiritual and philosophical topics who is renowned for profound wisdom Hakham - a Hebrew title of respect for a wise and highly educated man mahatma - (Hinduism) term of respect for a brahmin sage mentor, wise man - a wise and trusted guide and advisor From Conchscooter: dear cpa : Spring in Kansas must mean there will soon be lots of people out protesting aginst common sense. Photos please. One day, quite innocently, I had left a comment on Conchscooter's fine blog, The Key West Diary. In my comment I had merely stated that it was just beginning to feel like spring here on the plains after a cold winter. What you just read above was part of his response. Little did I know how omniscient Conch was. That same day I received this notice. By E-Mail.

Yup! Spring is almost here!

. And Sarah is coming to town!

. Will she have notes on her hand?

Will she bring her rifle with her?

Will she sell out our new arena?

. Will parking be a problem?

. Will she be treated like a Rockstar?

Will she try to answer questions that she is not prepared for?

. Will she say "You Betcha"?

. Will she call for Jihad against all she finds offensive in the world? .

Will she come out swinging?

And finally;

. And the most important question;

. Will the "all knowing" Conchscooter, the Sage of The Key West Diary, suddenly emerge as the Messiah that the civilized world has been waiting for?

. How did Conch know that there would be a total abandonment of common sense in Kansas this spring? Makes me wonder!

. So many questions.

. I may miss the Sarah Palin event.

. I am going to go for a ride on Max!

. Your thoughts?

Native American Spirituality for the Holidays

The day before Thanksgiving I had a few errands to run and of course, I took the scooter. The sky had threatened to rain a bit, but didn't, and the temperature was in the low 40's. The sun eventually came out and it was a beautiful day to ride. One of my errands was to attend a civic club meeting at lunchtime. The club I belong to normally meets on Fridays, and we weren't going to meet this week because of the holiday. So, as we have done in past years, we meet with another club on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. The guest speaker that day was a Native American Storyteller. He has for many years told stories using oral traditions passed down through many generations. I assumed he would talk about the first Thanksgiving with the pilgrims from a native American standpoint. And that is part of what his talk was about, but there was a little more to it than just that. Native Americans have a very interesting, unique, and in my opinion, a very wonderful sense of spirituality. They have a keen intuition about our planet and all of its inhabitants. Life, in all its forms, is very sacred to them. The Storyteller started off by talking about the animal kingdom. Of course all the animals had the ability to talk with each other. The animals were having a meeting and discussing, of all things, water rights. Some of the animals were a bit perturbed because the beavers had put up a dam on the river and blocked some water flow.

The fish downstream said they could not swim as easily because of the dam. Other animals wanted to use some of the water for irrigation purposes. The discussion went on and on, but eventually some progress was made and compromises were made to everybody's satisfaction.

During this discussion, however, a small argument developed between a Grizzly Bear and a Turtle. The Grizzly was bragging about how fast he could run. The Turtle was boasting about how fast he could swim. Then they said they could outdo each other and eventually challenged each other to a race.

Now, you can imagine that this is similar to the fable about the tortoise and the hare, and it is, but with a twist. They had a bit of a problem in deciding about how to do the race, because it was beginning to be wintertime and the river had frozen over. How could you tell how fast the turtle was going underneath the ice?

They solved the problem by cutting some holes in the ice at regular intervals. The turtle could pop his head up through these holes and let the others know where he was. The Grizzly would just run along the bank of the river. To make the story short, the Grizzly obviously had a huge advantage, but was lazy and overconfident. He would stop occasionally to scratch his back against a tree. Or goof off when he felt like it. The turtle made slow but smooth progress down the river. You could occasionally see the turtle's head popping up in the holes. The turtle eventually got to be ahead of the Grizzly and eventually the turtle won the race. There was much surprise that the turtle had won, but much rejoicing also. The turtle was carried off on the shoulders of some of the other animals and a little party ensued. Eventually the celebration died down and the turtle made his way home and was greeted by the rest of his family. The family members gave each other high fives and hugs and laughed out loud, for they all knew one thing. They had all been in the river that morning, each of them assigned to a particular hole in the ice, and each had poked his head out of the hole at an appointed time. The Grizzly never stood a chance of winning the race. Now there are many potential morals to the story such as outsmarting your opponent, perseverence, etc, but the Storyteller's point was how important it was for families to stick together and support each other. At the holiday time of year as families get together for celebrations, this is a fun story to recall no matter what tradition or background your family comes from. And that diversity of backgrounds was part of his point. The early Thanksgiving celebration was not so much a celebration of a harvest, as much as it was maybe a celebration of diversity: the ability of two so different peoples to be able to get together and celebrate something very meaningful to both of them. He ended his discussion with a reminder that families are important to everybody. He emphasized that we are all human beings regardless of our religion, skin color or other potentially divisive way of identification. There is common ground between us all. I wish everybody a happy and joyous holiday season regardless of how you choose to celebrate it.

Stay Warm And Ride Safe!