Pinecone

 

Die Welt muß romantisiert werden . . . Indem ich dem Gemeinen einen hohen Sinn, dem Gewöhnlichen ein geheimnisvolles Ansehn, dem Bekannten die Würde des Unbekannten, dem Endlichen einen unendlichen Schein gebe, so romantisiere ich es. 

The world must be romanticized . . . By giving the common a lofty meaning, the ordinary a mysterious status, the known, the dignity of the unknown, the finite an infinite appearance, I romanticize it.

                                                                    --Novalis, Logologische Fragmente I

I remember the first time I studied a pinecone, when I was just a small child.  It was in a city park.  I had never seen one before, and I was awed by its beauty, symmetry, combination of simplicity and intricacy, its patterns and colors, its perfection.  This wonderful object of nature embodied all the miraculous mystery and the magnificence of life that only a child would understand.  It mirrored the entire creation, all that was seen and unseen, said and unsaid.  A pinecone--or the universe.

God, Singing

The Lord has removed the judgment against you,

he has turned away your enemies;

The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst,

you have no further misfortune to fear.

 

On that day, it shall be said to Jerusalem:

Do not fear, Zion,

do not be discouraged!

The Lord, your God, is in your midst,

a mighty savior,

Who will rejoice over you with gladness,

and renew you in his love,

Who will sing joyfully because of you,

as on festival days.      

                       Zephaniah 3:15-18a

Hiroshima Day

 Whenever I remember Hiroshima, the first image that comes to mind is of my four-year-old nephew, Eiji – his little body transformed into an unrecognizable melted chunk of flesh. He kept begging for water in a faint voice until his death released him from agony.

     To me, he came to represent all the innocent children of the world, threatened as they are at this very moment by nuclear weapons. Every second of every day, nuclear weapons endanger everyone we love and everything we hold dear. We must not tolerate this insanity any longer.

     Through our agony and the sheer struggle to survive – and to rebuild our lives from the ashes – we hibakusha became convinced that we must warn the world about these apocalyptic weapons. Time and again, we shared our testimonies.

      . . . Nine nations still threaten to incinerate entire cities, to destroy life on earth, to make our beautiful world uninhabitable for future generations. The development of nuclear weapons signifies not a country’s elevation to greatness, but its descent to the darkest depths of depravity. These weapons are not a necessary evil; they are the ultimate evil.

--Setsuko Thurlow, Hiroshima survivor, Nobel Prize acceptance speech on behalf of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons

Mid-Summer Evening

For when one considers the universe, can anyone be so simple-minded as not to believe that the Divine is present in everything, pervading, embracing and penetrating it?

--St. Gregory of Nyssa

The mid-summer evening light, inexpressibly golden, blue shadows, the radiance of red and yellow sunflowers and the solemn, conciliatory cypresses.  Ripeness, after the rains, under a dappled sky.  As if kindness shades nature itself: all the simple shapes of the garden, the neighborhood.  A time of healing, of forgiveness, of restoration.  A time for believing all things, trusting in all things, hoping all things.  A time of silence and contemplation, emptiness, and the fullness of grace.  Silence.

The Sweet Potato

The sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) is a member of the bindweed or morning glory family, the Convolvulaceae, and only distantly related to the white potato.  It has long been revered for its medicinal properties, both in the ancient Americas where it was first domesticated and now worldwide.  It is rich in vitamins and minerals as as well as antioxidants called carotenoids.  As part of a healthy diet, it may reduce the risk of some cancers and help regulate blood sugar in type 2 diabetes.  Its high beta carotene content (which the body converts to vitamin A) may help to prevent ulcers and even aid in healing them, though overconsumption can cause mild digestive problems in some people because it contains the polyol mannitol.  Cooked or raw sweet potatoes can also be used externally as a poultice to reduce inflammation related to small wounds or insect stings.

     If you’ve only eaten canned sweet potatoes, you’ll find that dishes made from fresh sweet potatoes are a thousand times better!

A Philosopher's Viewpoint

The best writer is one who writes from a wide background of experience.  Plotinus didn't start until he was 50.

                                                        --Robert J. Kreyche, Love is a Therapy

Urban Wildlife (Besides the Feral Cats)

Arroyo with a permanent water source

 Although we live in the inner city, just a few blocks from downtown El Paso, there are several wild corridors that connect our neighborhood with the Franklin Mountains.  These mountains run like a spine through our city.  The South Franklins adjacent to us are rather barren, but the North Franklins, though still technically desert, really green up after the monsoon rains.  These wild corridors mean that a huge variety of wildlife can be found in the undeveloped portions of our neighborhood connected to these corridors.   Along with the resident foxes, coyotes, ground and grey squirrels, packrats, quail, roadrunners, turkey vultures, kestrels and hawks, the recent drought has increased the number of transitory wildlife visitors, which include mule deer, bobcats, ringtails, and (maybe) a puma or two as well (one was controversially shot by police in our neighborhood a few years ago).  There are sources of water and lots of greenery which attract them, especially a tiny stream created by runoff from a storage reservoir that is surrounded by a lush arroyo on undeveloped, city-owned land.  It’s quite wonderful to see groups of large, healthy deer casually wandering through the little strip of wild desert that divides our neighborhood from the more upscale Kern Place district.  Fortunately, this little reserve is pretty secluded and undiscovered—although it’s just blocks from our house and others houses and apartments—and the people who use it to walk their dogs (the only people I’ve ever seen up there besides water company employees and kids on their way to the nearby baseball and softball fields) seem mostly considerate and supportive of the visiting and resident wildlife, both large and small.

My wife, Libby, took this picture of a doe with two fawns on her phone