Lynn Sislo is a blogger I have a lot in common with, despite the fact that at some moments we might seem to have a lot to disagree about. She is passionate about her politics, a music lover, interested in engaging the world and she is generous enough to first of all keep a blog, and secondly respond to email. I like to call her out when she posts something that seems “reactionary” or reductionist, and she like to let me have it right back. I am probably the exact opposite politically of her (i.e. soft left to her soft right) but that hasn’t stopped me from reading her blog regularly and learning from it.
Recently, in a discussion on weapons of mass destruction, I pleaded my case that the US was taking the world’s support for granted. I talked about how the US asked for (and received) our support, troops and commitments for the “war on terror” but then slapped massive (questionably illegal) duties on our softwood lumber exports just before the Iraq invasion began. Our country chose not to participate in that military exercise, and many Americans openly wondered why we would abandon a neighbour in a time of need. Truth be told, many of us here wondered the same thing about them, but softwood lumber just doesn’t hit the radar when there’s a war on. To the devastated communities in coastal British Columbia though, it seemed a strange reward for helping out in Afghanistan.
Lynn has quoted me in a post today on this adding:
Anyway, the point of all this is that the U.S. should really treat our friends much better and of all nations we should be especially concerned about maintaining good relations with Canada. Canada is like a shy, quiet sister, always ignored and taken for granted. It is difficult to even think of Canada as a separate country. It ranks slightly higher than North Dakota in our thoughts. It’s there but it doesn’t give us much trouble so it never occurs to most of us that we should give it any thought. We ordinary Americans should be as concerned about politics in Canada as we are about politics in California, even if they’re usually not quite as entertaining.
That’s nice to see.
My friend Michael Herman (definitely an American!) has described conflict as “passion that hasn’t yet grown to encompass the whole.” North Americans are pretty passionate about the countries they have scraped out on this continent. But it’s a big place and sometimes that passion doesn’t get big enough and “anti-Americanism” breaks out or some haywire fundamentalist American preacher calls us “Soviet Canuckistan.” Then we lose our heads and things get ugly. But when we can extend our passion to encompass the whole, wonderful things happen, as I have found working and learning with the many Americans I am privileged to call friends and colleagues. We cannot on the one hand say “I like you as a person” and then say “your country sucks.” We can learn from the constructive and peaceful dialogues between us and imagine extending that to our common future. We don’t expect Americans to worry too much about our politics, nor do we expect the American government to be everything to everyone. But a little courtesy and consistency goes a long way, in personal relationships as well as in the highest diplomatic realms. That’s the kind of thing I learn from reading and engaging with Lynn.
Some images just speak for themselves. This is the current cloud cover and sunlit portions of the earth at 2248 PDT today. The World Sunlight Map website updates this image every time you check it.
Thanks to KIPlog for the link.
I am learning Taekwondo. Tuesday was my first class, and as I tied my white belt on for the first time, I had that old Suzuki quote in my mind:
“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.”
I have forgotten what it is like to learn something about which I know nothing. As I have moved through my life, I realize that I have focused on learning things for which there is at least some foundation. More often I find myself in learning situations where I don’t challenge my ignorance, as my ego intrudes in my ability to learn something. We all have a need to seem like we know what we are doing.
So it is with some glee that I have abandoned myself to taekwondo. I know nothing of fighting, have only flirted with martial arts in the past through an introduction to ta’i chi, and my body is, at 35, becoming stiff and less supple as I enter middle age. Today, as I get ready for my second ever class, my hamstrings are tight, my back is aching and there are sore ligaments in my arms that I never knew I had. And yet, the activity is exhilarating.
What I cherished from my first class is the focus that reminds me of what it’s like to play music and be in the groove, the workout, and the teaching. My teacher, Master Kook, is a former Canadian team member and a brilliant teacher. He is young, kind and demanding, and he teaches with care and precision.
I think now that the real value in all of this is both the physical exercise and the mental challenge of doing something completely strange to me. It’s good practice for the ego, letting go of having to be an expert, and surrendering to the joy of being a beginner.
Michael Herman has left Bowen Island, recuperated in Chicago for a wekk and is now in Nepal. His blog, the more and more aptly named “Global Chicago” is being maintained at the Global Chicago Wiki, in a place called GlobalChicago: PracticingInNepal. Saves on bandwidth and dialup charges.
His journey to Asia promises to be worth keeping tabs on.
Moon and Mars together
Photo by Allan Gould
This is a photo of Mars out beyond the limb of the Moon. It took me years of looking into the sky to convince my mind that when I look up there I am not seeing a two dimensional surface. Sometimes it helps to really focus on the moon as a sphere, and then it becomes clear, once one astronomical body has depth, that everything else lies in a field that extends away from us.
I think we are somehow conditioned to see the sky as a roof, a sensation that cathedral architects have played with for centuries. It’s a strangely liberating feeling when you realize that the objects in the sky are not “up there” but rather “out there.” This photo is a nice reminder of that perspective.