Given

Yes, well…

hello, and out of the box you must know I am again with regular online and system capability through an extraordinary gift from an extraordinary friend (Becka, mentioned with hubby Ken down in “Idles of Joy” below).

And if I’ve somehow missed you, Happy New Year.

2010, so far, has been game nights, open mike nights, days @ the restaurant (Come to Nonna’s!), a brief cold, a new improv workshop on Saturdays…a whole BUNCH of late December/early January birthdays in my family (more than I could list – a LOT of Capricorns…and no, that explains nothing)…working with and watching the band Project Object, popping in on family, sound guy @ ABC, more days @ the restaurant (Come to Nonna’s!), and apart from that there’s a couple other things coming up…

Coming Up:  A Macbeth performance this morning, days @ the restaurant (Come t- yeah we get it) until Thursday when I begin a two-week tech run down @ the Pullo Center, a consideration of winter camping (tho my schedule is prohibitive, many are encouraging ‘party unity,’ whatever THAT may be)…and THEN Millenium Music on 2/19-20.  February will move quickly.

There is also April dates for Blurred Knuckles to compete in the 2010 US Air Guitar competition – preliminary information can be found at http://usairguitar.com.  April 8 in Philadelphia, April 9 in NYC, April 10 in Wash DC.  Blurred Knuckles – the legend lives on…

AND ALREADY, there are summer plans in the works which, once firmed up enough for public consumption, is something I’ll tell you I’m very excited o be doing!  More info when available.

AND SO, given that I am now given, and given that I am now online, and given that I’ve returned to FB, and given that my traffic here has risen just in that knowledge (methinks), I’m keen to tell you of something else:

A couple Thursdays agao, I went to the Amost Uptown Poetry Cartel open reading and read from some things I’d been writing.  It was, interestingly enough, centered around the word GIVEN.  I felt excited at having done so as well, since I’d been wanting to give my thoughts voice for some time in some manner or form.

In THIS MOMENT of this writing, I’m unable to go into exorbitant detail. I think it may be due a page versus a post – but in the meantime, I CAN tell you that the thoughts began all from the idea that ALL ideas must begin with some sense of “Given…” for not only is there the directly considered and the peripherally considered…there is ALL else that time and expediency cannot afford to be included in “what is considered” that is given…so much given, so often…in every instant, the universe affords you SO MANY guarantees (well, NEAR guarantees)………..mustn’t it ALL start from ALL that is given?

So I am excited because I can begin with the word “Given” and I can put voice to my thoughts…and maybe even begin the conversation…

Thanks for listening.

Philip

New Year, New Address

Happy Holidays to all!

I have moved into an apartment. Here’s my new mailing address:

1202 N. Second St, 3rd Floor
Harrisburg, PA 17102

The apartment is very close to the last three places I’ve lived, and I’m still within a minute of my beloved Citgo station and easy walking distance to the various places where I work.

Hoping all of you enjoy the rest of the year, and that 2010 will bring joy and safety to everyone.  Talk to you soon.

Thanks for listening.

Philip

turned on

This will eventually move to the Poetry page, but for now let us all revel in a third post in as many days…for it beckons…

Monday
it rains
upon this final idle
Shortly
my journey
will return me
to my daily
Daily
my brain dashes me
upon the rocks
my choices heap about me
Lay on
Macduff…
I will be beckoned again
and I will do as I am told
and I will do again
that which my earthen choices
insist be done
But now
here
now
I stand, still
failing
with each first person
singular
that needles me
mocks me
Oh…you’re for YOU
are you?
How noble!
How virtuous!
How selfless!
Wait
do you feel
the waves crashing
eroding
inexorably
endlessly?
Flee through instinct
Escape through empathy
a fiction, a story
safety, safely
until the restless shore
in its violet violence
unmoors, even there
and the place away
beckons and becomes
me today

The mist
will miss
and I amidst
will drip and splash
and be remiss
These drops of words
cannot dismiss
the world whose soul
I cannot kiss.

It uses less
nigh uselessness
pointing me
to pointlessness
It’s only me
that makes the mess
To find the mess
less
ness
depress the switch
to

OFF

Then
the journey
shall beckon
once again
to the daily
Daily

The tide will sigh
the rocks will dry
a glimmer will shimmer
to strike my eye
The sun gives all
it will draw
my still to fall
asleep

Idles of Joy Pt II

(To anyone checking in who hasn’t checked in for a bit – this is a follow-up to an earlier post composed on Saturday.  You can view Idles of Joy if you’re keen to latest entries – it’s more conventional than how this follow-up will likely unfold…)

Just when you think you’ve got some fair portion of things “figured out” -  however you may define it – the unexpected happens and demands a reconsideration.  No, really!  (“A moose once bit my sister!  No, really!”  That’s why I say that all the time…)

As you might guess, I am experiencing an example of this, and it’s happening right now.  Right as I type this…

The time of this typing is very late Sun night, actually the wee hours Monday.  This is where the magic happens, you see…for my mind’s voice has been working overtime today, and things must be uttered aloud…as it were…

…and I posted Idles of Joy on Saturday, my first post in over four months…
…and I checked back here much later to see whether my traffic happened to go beyond the 7-9 hits a day I’d been getting over these past four months of not-posting…
…and my hit rate skyrocketed (comparatively) to 34 hits…
…and TODAY it leapt over that number, currently sitting at 64 hits…
…and that NEVER has happened to me after a post.  Quite anomalous, in fact…
…and the hits have nothing to do with my latest post.  They’re almost all viewing my page God of Fear/God of Love…
…(the page contains a brief excerpt from Richard Moss’ book The Mandala of Being)
…and it’s all coming from e-mail links (I can tell they’re mail links, tho I cannot tell whom).

I find that extraordinary, and I can offer no explanation.  The instance of this, though, compels me to speak more…
So, in no particular order:

• Tonight – Sunday – I’ve spent a lot of time staring at the waxing gibbous moon, wondering whether anyone else was joining me in that moment, and whether that joining had any meaning.  I decided YES, there were others joining me, though it likely I did not know them…and I decided that YES, it was meaningful that so many of us (a not-unreasonable extrapolation) were staring at this orb whose only light is borrowed (a concept I myself borrowed from yet another Tool song) – just as we borrow all that we do from the same source.  And I wondered whether any of the other starers got the sense of thankfulness that I did not only for that, but for the clouds that covered parts of the night sky parts of the time, and for the wind that kept the clouds moving across my intersection with the moon and created such a dramatic effect; and I wondered how that light would appear in a location of less human density.  And all these thoughts of moon and connection and time and the collective leaning upon the sun…alll moving into vaporware with nowhere to share and nowhere to go until I chose to make this paragraph.
• Last night I educated my brother-in-law on a movie he’d never seen which was playing on television:  Casablanca.  and I smiled gently as we talked about the famous quotes both said and unsaid:
  - “Play it, Sam!  Play it!  If she can take it, so can I.”  (Bogart never says, “Play it again, Sam.)
  - “We’ll always have Paris.”
  - “Here’s looking at you, kid.”
  And I smiled at having sat through it yet again, letting it wash through me.
• I spoke to my niece & godchild Michele Saturday, explaining that I’d planned on finishing a long-overdue post and how it was not an act of purposeful silence that kept me quiet but a lack of anything inspiring or new to say.  “I’ve pretty much said it all, and I don’t want to be repetitive,” I would tell her, knowing full well of how the various pages of this site already contain much of my philosophy in one form or another, and many of the same ideas weave their way in different forms on these pages……AND YET, I am reminded through the extreme traffic on the God of Fear/God of Love page, and my own re-reading of the content on that page, how far removed I am in these days of my life FROM Dr. Moss’ considerations of fear and love that hummed so sweetly through my brain and through so many of my other writings, and how I would do well to read through my own content again and again, and remind myself again and again of how things could well be best served…

…for the milestone of this year – 2009 – is not lost on me.  Thirty years ago I had a life-altering autumn and winter – I’d forgotten about the specific anniversary date of late September (which was a happy occurrence in itself), but as I feel the light change and the days shorten, I know I require a girding of sorts.  So, sure, staring at the moon can’t necessarily by light therapy, but I know from whence its light comes, and I’ll take sunlight any way I can get it.  As relaxing as these past three days have been with my sister, I will return soon to Harrisburg and pick it all up again.

And I will continue the effort of living with honor and integrity.
And I will continue the effort to lead with love and patience.
And as I find myself sinking further and further into “what Philip wants” I will remind myself of fear and love, and I will continue the effort to live without fear and without assertion – to exist and live without insisting on my own behalf.
And I will forgive my inability to achieve perfection in this endeavor, knowing that I am human and fallible, and that I can create no expectations in me, for me, except to continue making my best effort, to accept the consequences of my actions, and to learn from my mistakes.
And when I falter (not ‘if’) I will return here to this site and remind myself of my best words and the inspirational words of others I have included here…

…for it’s not to be said once and then done…and then ignored…

It’s to be endorsed, reminded, nudged again to the fore, over and over…

…for we ARE mere mortals, and that which eludes our understanding will either suggest an opportunity or drive us away.  If we drive ourselves away, we will forget…and the reminders of love must again be brought and revered to help pull us towards itself.

Good night now.
(Hit count for that page jumped to 78 just in the time it took me to type this post.)
Thanks for listening.

Philip

The Idles of Joy

The Introduction

Hello.  Thank you for stopping by.  It’s likely that you’ve stopped by before (I rarely get new traffic), and you’ve noticed that I’ve not written anything new for my site in some time.  It’s possible, even, that you said something to me about it.

Well, for those times when you DID stop by and there was nothing new, you have my apologies.  You had reasonable expectations, and my failing to post anything new over the past four months did not meet those expectations.  I can only tell you, in explanation, that I lacked anything sufficiently pertinent or inspirational to write – my silence was NOT a conscious choice to remain quiet.

Even now, I’m still not 100% certain what I’m going to say.  But I must move ahead – I am compelled to try for all those that wondered aloud why I’d been quiet, and those who asked me to speak up.  A recent e-mail tipped the scales:

Dare I not speak out of the fear of being rhetorical.  Dare I not type out of fear of word misusage?  Dare I not write for fear of the power of words.  AND dare I do…

Where are your words?  Where is your blog I visited today out-of-perceptible-date?  Where is my inspiration and where is yours?

The deftness of this hewing cry demands 1] a humble nod to Tanya, who wrote and sent that (among other sentences – thank you, Tanya) and 2] in its representation of other voices that have similarly wondered and compelled (Myra, Brian, Bob the Cop, etc.), I must take steps.  Hence…

The Physical

or Where My Body’s Been & What It’s Been Doing

We briefly interrupt this post to suggest – to the suggestible listener – that part of what makes a long-overdue post so daunting is the amount of “catching up” that’s required, and the worry that the associated “news” would be redundant to many.  Should that be the case, I implore your understanding and forgiveness…

First, the Where …’cause that’s easy:  apart from attending the Fall ‘09 SHARE Festival in late September (a mere hour-plus away from Harrisburg) I have gone nowhere.  No car.  No carbon footprint, yes, but very little travel.

By sheer coincidence, Where I am @ the moment NOT in Harrisburg, but instead in Montgomery County, PA staying with my sister Cecilia for a couple of days.  The other driving force behind my lack of writing on this site (AND my choice to deactivate my Facebook account – horrors!) has been a combination of steady online access and idle time – I’d not had one or the other in a long time.  This weekend I have both…which likely would not have resulted in a post by itself, as most of – the reason – it is lack of inspiration.

…and now, facing the What portion of this, I yawn.  Must I, really?  This is DULLSville, man…who wants to read my little list of What I’ve Been Doing for the past four months?

Tell you what – I’ll get back to it.  It’ll look to you like it’s the next thing I type, but in MY time I’m creating the next topic header ’cause that’s more interesting to me and I think to you as well.

OK – now that THAT’S out of the way, here’s a brief recap of activities:

• Opened HSF’s 09-10 Educational Outreach version of Macbeth in late October and have performed it thrice with more coming.
• Functioned as Technical Director for HSF’s fall mainstage production of Richard III – I did not act in this production but instead was responsible for the set.  First time for everything – turns out that if you cut wood and screw it together, you can build things – who’da thunk it?
• Fall festival came and went in late September (and Rod really should be back at school)
• Many nights functioning as a sound guy – open mike nights @ ABC on Thursday’s and intermittent gigs @ Dragonfly
• Many open mike nights @ Stage on Herr, playing djembe
• Stagehand for Central PA Youth Ballet – Peter Pan in October, and The Nutcracker looms
• As an undercurrent to ALL of this, I am still enjoying my time at Nonna’s.

The Mental

comprising both The Intellectual and The Spiritual

The thought that’s been lingering with me since I was reminded of its existence:

Character is what you do when no one’s looking.

From a brief moment wheere I was cleaning the theatre and got frustrated at my primary tool’s lack of performance:

Don’t tell a lousy vacuum cleaner that it sucks – it’ll miss the point.

And YES, Virginia, I did deactivate my Facebook page.  With far less online access and finding it very difficult to begin or maintain a dialogue, I forewent its offers.  I AM thankful for the time I was there, though, for I found an oldtime friend that gave me closure on a topic near 30 years old.  It was one of the most glorious things to have happened to me in the past five years, no exaggeration – thank you forever, Anne.

Competitive Polysyllabic Punning.  It began while I was spending my days selling hot dogs for Nonna’s – I would send out a “hot dog joke” to nine different people each day…and my good friends Ken and Becka Jankura and I began sending odd puns about hot dogs, autumn, etc. back and forth to each other.  It evolved into a game:
- Select an obscure polysyllabic word
- Fit it into a sentence – somehow – without using the actual word
- The sentence must somehow convey the meaning of the word

Here’s a small selection of some of the highlights, with the chosen word italicized:
(otherwise there’s a chance you’ll miss it)

• (Becka) The lisping adolescent stood below the balcony and sang to his sweetheart, “Is there an aid, any balm to soothe my aching heart?”
• (Ken) Man, your facts sure ain’t straight! They sound fabricated.
• (Philip) You’re such a drip – you can’t tinkle away on a mono piano – stuff like that always lands with a thud.
• (Becka) Ava Gabor toured the Buddhist gardens at Varanasi. At a shrine under an old tree, she asked, “Vhere his body sat, vas zat vhere he reached enlightenment?”
• (Ken) I think the internet has spawned the worst music ever, some so bad you need the indie sputum bowl, no doubt about it.
• (Philip) The movie director ripped into his sound engineer, “You really have a knack, Ron – is ‘ticking’ something you’d NORMALLY hear in the 11th century???”
• Other words that were used:  maneuverability, prestidigitation, manifestation, sycophant, serendipity, obsequious…….and many others.
• We had a final entry – a closer, if you will, but modesty prevents my including it.  Suffice to say it won the syllable skirmish that was brewing…

The Closing

Thirty years ago, my life took a dramatic turn in a different direction – I went from a boy going to college to a boy taking odd jobs until he entered the military…..five years ago my life took a dramatic turn in a different direction when I chose to create and conduct Human, Being.  My life turns yet again – as I suppose it always does for everyone, though we may fail to notice.  A forceful and directed change, created by choice, will – if I can find that particular strength (of will, that is) – make for a very different life in terms of how the minutae is spent.  We’ll see what happens.

What You Don’t Know: I’m being very quiet.  I must be.  Inside, it is NOT quiet – it is a firmament, an orchestra, an engine…a very loud cup of coffee, as it were (you can tell it’s loud – it’s cacophonated).  It compels the evolution, the progression….

Thank for listening.

Philip