shedding skins

I just listened to a talk by Jenny Odell where she talked about finding a snake skin while hiking Henry Coe park (around here). Shedding skins, something a snake does when it grows out of it. 

I've been keeping a few perishables in the kitchen as homage to my departed spouse, things connected to her in some way. Now it's 3 years hence her last breath. And these snake skins have to return to the earth as well.

check out the date:

she must have bought that when she was on some kind of dessert making jag.

And 

best by oct 30 , 2018, same month she passed.

Sat on the door of the fridge this whole time. A friend bought it for her when she was struggling with eating due to the chemo. I think I look at that and see the love with which it was purchased. And maybe a kind of unspoken declaration that she was worthy of such? 

It's a paradox no? As we start down the road of determining whether someone or something is worthy of being loved, isn't that the moment that love exits the room? But surely separating the wheat from the chaff can be an act of love, right?

Daily Stand Up Meeting

yesterday

• Deployed another copy of billing package

Fix issue with billing cycle on ul-demo2.
add public syns for SP_LOAD_CONSM_LOC_FRCST in next build (and grants).
fix interface properties on trellis-client. - change it from QUAL to BTGCLIENT

• For Jenkins db build automation - set it up on T: drive to demo for Rashmi

today

• demo the jenkins db build automation to Rashmi
• change the Active directory package for 5.1

Torture Accountability Day

today in my inbox I see that on Thursday there is torture accountability day where people will rally to hold people like UC Berkeley's John Yoo accountable for torture.

Up until a week ago when I was off at work camp, I had felt very strongly about the issue, but now I am beginning to wonder if the torturers didn't do us all a favor? I wonder on what "ground" we stand when we convict those torturers?

Would the prosecutions just be another form of "bailout"? In this case instead of an economic one, a a political bailout? Then today, Bernie Madoff gets long prison sentence, but isn't he just another fall guy?

The problem here is that we give up our own power and ability of discernment by engaging with the justice system, because the justice "system" is not consistent with a positive world vision. The justice system is another manifestation of the industrial civilization, earth destroying, machine.


Here's the largest flaw in the system: it presents all people as individuals, and ignores the fact that there is an obvious hiearachy in terms of damages to the community to different crimes.

I want a justice system that is willing to find facts and convict people, but suspend their sentence until such time that larger, related criminals can be brought to justice. How can one prosecute crime of robbing a bank while ignoring the crime of starting a bank?

Fake it 'till you make it

I first heard that bromide from a trainer when I was participating in this personal growth seminar program called "Lifespring". Which is a whole other story: EST, Lifespring, Sterling Men's Weekend.

Anyway, that one has always bothered me, and this morning I discovered why that advice is bad advice, at least for me, because it sidesteps the big question: what does "making it" mean? When do we get to stop "faking" it? Why should we so easily cede the high road, become another art-school poseur? Is that the path to painting our own masterpiece? I don't think so.

Searching for the secret sauce

About a year ago, I went to a birthday party for Dash, one of Yafa's friends
in San Francisco. While I was there I met a young woman who was the
niece of the Dash's mom. She seemed to be around 20.

I asked her where she lived and she told me in Milan, Italy, where she
was studying violin making. I remarked that making instruments seems
like a great way to have a relationship with music.

I didn't continue on to ask the typical "grown up" questions like: how long do you go for? What does it cost? How can you possible find a job in that field? The questions my mom would ask. I guess instead I just wanted to share silently in the spirit of her following her bliss.

I wouldn't want to dissuade anyone from following their bliss. I think what I
really liked though was the quiet way she was going about it. Just
the simple matter-of-fact way that she described what she was doing.
As if it were as easy as tying her shoes in the morning. No hint of
nervousness over having to master Italian to be able to take the classes
even though she had only been studying it for a few months. There was no sense from her of needing to justify her activity to the "grown ups from the real world".

But I wouldn't describe it as quiet confidence either. It was more like a
northern California birthright: we just go out and follow our dreams. Back when I first moved here, I had a roommate Andrea, who approached art school the same way.

I've been in the SF bay area for 16 years, admiring that California "secret sauce"
quality. Oh, but the wisdom of age, I start to see the flaws, my own the internal projections about that. Perhaps the "secret sauce", is just simply the conceit and perogative of economic privlege - no different then the sneer of the Fairfield County preppies of my childhood. Just far enough removed to seem exotic and "cultural", divorced from the distastefulness of caste and social class.

There's this guy John, a dad of one of Yafa's friends, who has that
same way, the same vibe, to him. He was raised in San Jose. It's taken me over a year long, in meeting and getting to know John,
to find the cracks in the facade.

Now consider, what I'm calling the secret sauce, is really a
projection of my own mind, parts of myself that seek expression and
integration into my whole self.

For me, it's the question raised in "It's a Wonderful Life". When
I reflect on that movie and it's happy ending, I want to raise my
hand and say "but wait". George never got to go! Now sure they show
how things would be much worse off if he _had_ left. But is that
enough to hang one's hat on? Perhaps that's just a personal question
we all have to answer for ourselves.

It's the tension between following your bliss and being your brother's
keeper that I'm struggling with. In Buddhism, this would perhaps correspond
to the concepts of wisdom and compassion. Clearly a balance is desirable,
however the exact percentages are going to vary widely by individual
and change as one moves through life [wow, this last sentence is such shit].

the unifying story

So, for the past few weeks, I've been saying "I don't believe in the unifying story". And it even prompted a friend to write a Sermon about that. It feels connected to my tentative support for Ron Paul and distaste for the rest of the presidential candidates.

Why? Because all of our stories, our individual stories, and collective stories, can be unifying stories. I was thinking about church, and how the minister's sermon seems lame because it has to appeal to a large group of people and those people may not all be in the same place. Somebody may be dealing with a newborn, and someone else may be dealing with a death of a loved one. Then I realized, if you put group into a circle, then either of those individual stories can be unifying stories.

This is the rejection of the "melting pot": the wonderful cultural evolution that has happened in this country, in my lifetime, which now allows for many cultures to have space at the table. In fact, come to think of it, that's perhaps the greatest achievement of my generation: multiculturalism. And what better possible opposition to fascism can there be than that?

When I was younger, I used to believe in the power of the majority. Now I see, that the majority has always been a large flock of sheep easily led by whatever rich clique is in power. Now that I am older, and have somthing, not much, but something, some assets, some livelihood, the threat of large government entitites steamrolling over me in the service of a grand social vision seems much more prescient then the other threats.

And that's not even it. I'd be fine with a Venueszuela system, where lots of local autonomy is being given out (or at least that's what I read).

You see, with Ron Paul, we eliminate federal taxes. And if we need to make up the costs of social services with local taxes, then great! Now the theory is that the amount of corruption should be less. As money gets more and more local, the amount of corruption should be less. Local control should mean more honest government.

Now of course, that means that some localities may do some pretty crappy rascist things. We don't have to approve of it, but we've let the fear of those isolated situations be used as an excuse to imprison us all. Just like the fear of terrorism imprisons us all through paying for a military industrial complex that is beyond the pale.

Building smell today

Today my coworkers and I were called "wimp", for exiting the office building when we smelled diesel fumes. I was the leader of the group on my floor. Or I'd say that I vocalized most loudly about the issue and announced that I was leaving, gathered up my things and left.

Turned out to be testing of the diesel generator on the roof, and after 1/2 an hour it cleared the building.

But you know, it takes something to stand in the face of that, but I'm not sure I'd call it courage. It's not my favorite word these days. I'm more enamored with people who choose to take a principled stance: I value my own health and choose not to compromise it. I guess today, in our empire, enlightened self interest is wimpy, while targeting and exploiting others for personal benefit (weapons manufacturers, sweatshops) is, I don't know, macho.

Hearing that word, "wimp", transports me back to the 6th grade schoolyard days. No boy wants have that label. Wimps get their lunch money stolen, they get beat up just for the pleasure of others. They are terrorized daily.

And now I just put something together. A connection here between my trip to India, and all my experience with Indian males, about maleness in India, that I liked, I sensed much less of the macho thing there.

So this macho thing is really about people projecting their fear of helplessness, their fear of despair, of death itself. Putting it outside of themselves. We known India has a better relationship with death than the US, the religions are stronger and more respectful of the dead. Of course the Indigenous people perhaps have the best relationship with death (huge generalization, yes, have to refine this statement). I just say that in knowing the tradition of inviting the dead to be present at ceremonies.

Because I have to ask myself why being called a wimp doesn't phase me now? I just laugh inside at the foolishness of the caller. It was very devastating to me a long time ago. What advice would I give to a young boy about this?

I think the answer isn't about advice, it's about values, about culture. There's no shortcut, no advice, to communicating this stuff. There's just the way we live and the hope that it rubs off on our loved ones.

For example, I was out walking with Yafa, saw a dead bird. I was willing to stop and look, willing to feel empathy towards the bird, we moved it to the side of the path and gave it a small burial. Just whatever we could to give it some dignity. I was willing to just be silent and just let my 4 year old have her own experience for 5 or 10 minutes, let her prod it with a stick (her idea).

Because some day, long after I'm gone, she may smell something, and her friends may laugh at her for choosing to seek safety, to investigate further, to distrust the "experts". And that could make all the difference. Don't fail to notice the metaphor of "smelling something".