Trance States and Peach Fuzz in Everyday Ramblings

I took this yesterday in freezing wind as I waited for the bus across from “the pink house” that I would love to buy. It is still for sale, this previous Masonic Lodge, telephone switching station. It doesn’t look pink here. It looks like the Pantone’s color of the year…Peach Fuzz. My desires are totally on trend, don’t you know.

The discussion at the coffee group was a bit diffuse yesterday. We talked about AI and how conspiracy theories are created and why people believe in them. We talked about how there is some debate these days about facts. What is one?

We talked, amazingly, and tentatively about how to talk about the war between Israel and Hamas. And how what is important is not killing children on any side anywhere. We talked about the places in history where folks have built structures that pinpoint the sun at the solstices. We talked about Kerala (one of the guys is going on a photo expedition there in the new year, and) a bunch of the other guys were there as callow youths.

Walt did try to get us to talk about our beliefs, what we believe in, but I think in some ways it is a bit too personal. There was discussion about living by one’s values, not so much one’s beliefs.

Last weekend in Bibliophiles, our book group there were only three of us and the topic was “wisdom”. We all kind of agreed that we had less of it as we got older and that there is great wisdom in silence. Certainly, in finding ways to silence the constant chatter in our minds.

The plan today was to try a new chocolate dipped orange butter cookies recipe. I have all the things. But there was no there there after teaching and shopping and walking. I will make them tomorrow.

Since when did they stop putting powdered sugar in boxes and start putting it in plastic bags? And Crisco (vegetable shortening) in cubes like butter instead of round cans? Palm oil, ughh, as bad for climate change as pork fat? We certainly are civilization in transition when it comes to climate change.

I wrote a poem the other morning for “peace, love, happiness & understanding” our monthly dialogue newsletter thing. I had made notes for it last week when I was feeling inspired. But because I had a deadline I just sat down and made myself assemble it.

It made me aware that I was in a bit of a trance state when I was working on it. Enough of one that hours later I left the house without my backpack because I was still preoccupied with it. My backpack with my grocery bags. Sigh. I have been thinking about trance states because of the class on Theosophy.

The other day I watched the Q&A with the other folks taking the class. A very international group but a couple of people stood out, (by the way everybody who asked questions was smart, this material is challenging) including the guy in a white geodesic dome clearly high on something that resembled psychedelics having a fine old time and the tiny little woman with a bushel of white hair tinged on the top with blue.

In theosophy they call it self-mesmerization. I wonder if that is what happened when I was working on the poem.

It is a state I know well from the time I spent with Mr. Finch. Then I had him to bounce things off of. Now it is…send the poem out into the world and maybe get no response ever still knowing that a couple of hundred people read it.

With that in mind, one of the other poet type people that was entreated for a poem wrote this which I think is clean and clear and beautiful and I just sent him an email telling him so…

There is a ribbon
so deep in shadowed rubble
it is colorless.

You can find the rest of the dialogue here. Enjoy.

Last updated December 08, 2023