To thine own self be true

quietly turned over the AB teachers’ retirement fund to them to mismanage and lose that nest egg, too. Kenney is a stupid, greedy, corrupt, untrustworthy, tubby gangster running amok with AB people’s money. He’s love to get Albertan’s CPPs, too and have the experts at AIMCo mishandle even more public monies. He is Evil.

–Shakespeare.

Well, of course, we dream a lot at night, whether these dreams are remembered or not.

Then there are the daytime dreams, plans, and goals that we set for ourselves as we try to choose and control our futures.

(“People need dreams, there’s as much nourishment in ’em as food.”–Dorothy Gilman)

Now having reached a certain age, I look back and see that the many episodes and memories of the past all seem dream-like though they had a strong sense of here-and-now reality and presence when they were occurring before and long ago.

Often we reflect on the past and search to recover the many lost feelings and sensations of those moments and episodes, but they usually elude us like phantoms, illusions, or dreams.

I know also that there have been bad and good dreams both. I can remember moments of fear, cowardice or bad behavior. But I can also recall happy, pleasurable moments in the company of others, sharing experiences together. On average, I suspect most people look for the latter kinds of dreams from the past.

(“Dreams are…illustrations from the book your soul is writing about you.”–Marsha Norman)

As I look around me today, I see a lot of bad dreams happening. Covid. The isolation and separation of families and friends. The insanity that is the United States with a Trumpian dream to become lifelong dictator and the violent wet-dream of wanna-be terrorist-rebels who want to blow up the Capitol and kill politicians with impunity.

Fortunately, one can still recognize nutcases and the craziness that implodes itself in its limited, destructive processes, and say “That is not me. That is not what I choose. That is someone else’s nightmare, irrationally chosen and acted out.”

And so as I said in a recent blog entry, my dreams continue to be on a higher plane of more civilized things with creative, not destructive, possibilities. I still seek out Beauty and larger visions, whether they be humanistic, artistic, or spiritual. That is what I have repeatedly sought from grade 12/1967 on.

And I was very lucky. I got to live out my writing dreams, my music dreams, and my teaching dreams. I have gone to, seen, and experienced all the places I wanted to go.

And my dreams have been reduced to a precious few in this greatly changed and limited world. I dream of being reconnected to my son’s family and grandsons. I dream of publishing some more writing. I dream of recording and sharing more of my music.

(“When I dream I am always ageless.”–Elizabeth Coatsworth)

So I still continue to dream, to live in dreams like everyone else. Meantime, there is much of my past dreams that continue to give me much pleasure and spiritual sustenance. Life is a dream as Shakespeare and many others have speculated. Dreams are, finally, what we are, have been, and still might be some day.

(“I dream, therefore I become.”–Cheryl Grossman)

death-in-life existence for real.

was destined to do America in. Too many people armed and too many evil and looney-tunes types walking around with ample, available armaments. The act was a primitive, destructive anachronism which should have buried after WWII when the country had a better chance to do it.

there will soon be an epidemic nursing shortage. Who will want to work there, unheard, ignored, and abused for peanuts?

Decades of Canadian and provincial governments have totally taken these people for granted and bear the blame for low wages, not hiring more people, and not dealing with home and hospital crises. The politicians are mainly to blame for what is starting to happen. They destroyed these facilities.

I have long said that an elderly person should try to stay home and maintain a separate residence if given a choice as they age. Homes and hospitals are, repeatedly, places to go, to be neglected, and to die in for older people. People who believe they or their loved ones will be well-cared for and protected in homes are kidding themselves.

Empiricism matters. Facts matter. Truth matters. (He immediately set up mechanisms to remove climate change action and to debunk the authority of science in government.)

Lies and misrepresentations matter. (He racked up over 25,000 according to The Washington Post so far.)

From the above, chaos, anarchy, and widespread, out-of-control violence have ensued. Pure and simple.

In retrospect, Trump was Evil from the get-go and spawned an evil cult and evil enablers (Fox, Twitter) that were allowed to destroy America from within. Hemingway’s ‘Fifth Column’ bigtime. The forces of Evil and a brain-dead multitude have run amok in the States.

T.v. ad featuring hands-free driving. Why, you can put on your makeup, blow your nose, or floss your teeth while ‘driving’!

And don’t get me started on self-parking cars.

There is an insane over-trust and over-confidence about the safety of technology in our society that needs to be challenged, questioned, and refused, finally. Dangerous stuff giving consumers the lie that they are safe and not responsible for their actions and choices.

The Kennedy Center Honor in May.

The different art forms have produced many great images and visions, often expressed by remarkable individuals or groups and genius-creators.

In Architecture, there are the beautiful conceptions of Frank Lloyd Wright, America’s greatest architect as expressed in Fallingwater or the first Usonian houses.

In Painting, there are the intense canvases of van Gogh and the brilliant representations of Canadian landscape by the Group of 7.

In Sculpture, there is, of course, the outstanding brilliance of Michelangelo.

In Dance, there is the Vienna ballet dancers and many other fine global troupes.

In Literature, there is the Drama of Shakespeare, the Poetry of Wordsworth, and the Novels of Tolstoy. All large fashioners of splendid verbal envisionings.

In Music, there are the imagistic Song Lyrics of Bob Dylan and the Pure Music of the Strauss “On the Beautiful Danube”, the latter to lift the spirits of the multitudes.
In Film, there are the large canvases of Welles in Citizen Kane and Lean in Lawrence of Arabia. These days, many still turn to film for its theatre-screen-sized images and visions of enhanced understanding and consciousness.

So the Arts are vitally necessary for whatever inspiring, uplifting images and visions of possible human life experience and spiritual nourishment, quite frankly.

But looking beyond the Arts, there are other areas and aspects that provide Images and Visions. Nature is obviously one with its sublime scenery such as the Rockies or via animal life (our relationship with dogs, cats, and birds, for instance) and plant life (represented best perhaps by beautiful flowers and gardens).

A particularly uplifting time of year is Christmas during which everyone seems to be on their best behavior through January with the beauty of human kindness and charity work mixed in with all the amazing decorations and color.

Then there are beautiful people ranging from ordinary people to the greats who continue to inspire like Terry Fox to the Dalai Lama and Martin Luther King, Jr. Usually the heroes and Great Men and Women (Disney and Rachel Carson) are visionaries who make significant contributions to humankind all.

So here then are at least three other notable examples of images and visions beyond or allied with the Arts. Some thoughts now on images and visions.

Images are most obvious in visual form, but it does well to remind ourselves that we have 5 senses and that the imagery that positively affects us also includes sound, smell, taste, touch, and movement. Thus, we may be invigorated and enlivened by the smell and taste of good wine and food. Or spiritually moved by music like classical music, East Indian music, or jazz. Or physically, emotionally, and spiritual released and freed by touch as in therapeutic massage.

The visions that the Arts and other area give us affect our awareness, expand our consciousness and reveal the multitudes and creative possibilities of human beings. We ‘see’ and ‘feel’ more, moving beyond our self-encapsulated egos to empathize with, sympathize with, and connect with others. society, and the larger, global world, even so far as with those people long dead and gone or yet to born (as Whitman envisioned in his Brooklyn Ferry crossing poem).

I will just add one more element to the picture and that is of Voice. Each of these creators or great people and groups have a unique, eloquent Voice that speaks to us whether it be the voice of the sea crashing on a beach, the dark anguished voice of O’Neill in A Long Day’s Journey into Night, or the voice of the Butcharts who planned and designed their world-famous famous gardens in B.C.

So, behind whatever images and visions, there is also a voice that speak of its creative processes and expressions. I believe that human beings cannot survive without Beauty, the Arts, Nature, and the Great People and geniuses of history and culture. Without these, we are massively impoverished beyond belief and have far less to live for (with the exception of Family).

Sonnet 42

That thou hast her, it is not all my grief,
And yet it may be said I loved her dearly:
That she hath thee is of my wailing chief,
A loss in love that touches me more nearly.
Loving offenders, thus I will excuse ye:
Thou dost love her because thou know’st I love her;
And for my sake even so doth she abuse me,
Suffering my friend for my sake to approve her.
If lose thee, my loss is my love’s gain,
And losing her, my friend hath found that loss:
Both find each other, and I lose twain;
And both for my sake lay on me this cross.
But here’s the joy: my friend and I are one.
Sweet flattery! Then she loves but me alone!