To thine own self be true

the only/most important game in town. Full, unfettered consciousness is as good as it gets. Connecting under those circumstances, with irony and gentle humor even better.

live perpetually in fear and are constantly worried about how they look to others, worried about what others might think of them. Now how interesting and attractive are those characteristics? Why would anyone be interested in people that self-limited and limiting?

never appreciate. A fatal flaw in my books.

balance. Particularly as this refers to what you put into something vs. what you get out of it. I don’t think there’s anything worse than finding out that your ladder is up against the wrong wall, and that the work you have put into something in no way equals or comes close to equaling the success, acceptance, understanding, and appreciation that you deserve, but don’t necessarily get in return. (Bear in mind, incidentally, that love is not necessarily guaranteed as a reward for what you do in the work world and in relationships. Certainly, screens and technology will never love you.) Too often I have seen people working hard, slaving their guts out for not much or nothing in return. That is the way to physical exhaustion, health problems, nervous breakdowns, and meltdowns. People in these situations need a big change a.s.a.p.

(Mission Hill Winery, Westbank, B.C., June, 2016)

Everything hinges upon our realizing the essentially transitory possibilities.
–Viktor Frankl

Cherish your wildness.
–Maxine Kumin

We have only this moment, sparkling like a star in our hand.
–Marie Beynon Ray

Money is not required to buy one necessity of the soul.
–Henry David Thoreau

Technology will never love you. Screens will never love you.
–Richard Davies

Shallowness spreads.
–Daniel Liebert

Violence is suicide.
–Mahatma Gandhi

They intoxicate themselves with work so they won’t see how they really are.
–Aldous Huxley

The meaning of life is whatever you ascribe it to be.
–Joseph Campbell

If you risk nothing, you risk everything.
–Geena Davis

I have never wanted to live merely by the limits of others and limited expectations they have had of/set for me.
–Richard Davies

Serious reading is above all an agency of self-making.
–Sven Birkerts

Words are. of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.
–Rudyard Kipling

Art serves to rinse out our eyes.
–Karl Kraus

We all live in the hope that authentic meeting between human beings can still occur.
–R.D. Laing

Exuberance is beauty.
–William Blake

Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake.
–Anonymous

Happiness can only exist in acceptance.
–George Orwell

(A selection of quotes from my latest limited ed. publication Favourite Quotes, 2017)

(photo by RD)

(photo by RD)

The end of civility, civil discourse, politeness, good manners, decency, tolerance, temperance, forbearance, respect, balance, graciousness, tact, diplomacy, good taste, gentility, sensitivity, delicateness, refinement, modesty, humbleness, humility, reserve, constraint, patience, self-control, self-discipline, composure, restraint, poise, dignity, reasonableness, pity, compassion, mercy, and “the milk of human kindness”.

‘Tis The Age of the Trolls, folks. The Age of Unmitigated, Ubiquitous Nastiness, The Age of Blunt, Blind Arrogance, The Age of Shameless Bare-faced Corruption, The Age of the Self-Righteous Whammy, The Age of The Ugliest American+++. ‘Tis the Age of Trump.

Snakessss
invariably you’ve seen
them in a pile of junk
beside your bed.

In winter they slither
into vents of houses
seeking the warmth of
undercovers & fresh kills.

They doze on sofas
over the feet
of sleeping fathers
& strangle pet poodles.

Snakes like open
drawers & trails of
sugar leading to
dark kitchen cupboards.

Laundry baskets make
good homes for cold pythons
& closets are great
for boas to hang out in.

Snakes are the stuff
of children’s nightmares
The darkness under beds
is a den of coiling fearssss.

No matter how you cut it in Western society.
Breakfast or being starved and non-functional for the first half of the day. Why skip breakfast?
Lunch in order to address the growlies that emerge 4-6 hrs. predictably after breakfast.
Supper to address the late aft growlies.
How does one get away from having 3 meals a day 365 days a year?

The bane of all mothers–preparing 3 meals a day for family and self.
“And there’s Mrs. Gibbs and Mrs. Webb come down to make breakfast, just as though it were an ordinary day. I don’t have to point out to the women in my audience that those ladies they see before them, both of those ladies cooked three meals a day–one of ’em for twenty years, the other for forty…”–Thornton Wilder, Our Town

For anyone, everyone, any gender–the annoyance of having 3 meals to prepare for, often late, and often for others.
Being a slave to the stomach and the basic urge of hunger.
All one’s life. The main pattern beyond sleeping and waking.