Adventures Sail

 

Waves beat relentless upon the shore

Like a soft knock on adventures door

 

Beckoning us to set sail out to sea

To places unknown for you and me

 

Leave the hustle of world behind

Look to the sea to really unwind

 

The wind, the waves, the salt air

Challenge the weather bad or fair

 

The wind and wire and sail singing

The feel of the tiller shudder and ringing

 

The tilt, the spray, the waves bounce

Going nowhere, and everywhere all at once

 

Controlling chaos, the wind obeys my will

Onward to adventure, until I get my fill

 

Then the alarm wakes me and I know

Just a dream I see, and back to work I go

 Mike

Time Change Imagined

 

Such an idea, daylight savings time

As if to control worlds rhythm and rhyme

 

Mother Earth cares not of our silly notions

Of time forward or back, matters not in her motions

 

At break of dawn, birds stir and sing

Not a care about when alarm will ring

 

Time is one of our human obsessions

To schedule trains, planes, school, work and social sessions

 

En masse we spring forward, an imagined hour lost

And in fall we’ll get that hour back, and its imagined cost

 

All we do and all we are in time is imagined!

Mike 

Another Night on the Road

 

Good night sleep 100 feet above the ground

7^th floor for another night on road I’m found

 

Morning sun peeks in windows not shaded I see

I’m liking the gentle way the light wakes me

 

I hear the highway with thousands of chariots

… carrying working warriors to the fight

I hear the din of nearby rail yard and workers 

….working trains that passed by screaming in the night

 

I think of my day and so many like this before

I think of the next and next and so much more

 

Join the rush just get out of bed

Shower and coffee will clear my head

I recently heard some experts talking about why China’s economic woes shouldn’t matter as it relates to performance of the US economy.  The argument made was that China is a very small portion of our GDP from an export standpoint, so a weakened China economy has a very small effect on profitability of US corporations and hence the US stock market.  Secondarily the Chinese debt problem is an internal debt issue.  The US has very little exposure in this regard.  So in their opinion the US market’s response to China economic woes is outsized relative to the true influence on US economy.  US corporate performance is good, and employment is up, so the stock market impact due to China is overstated.  However as I listened, I felt that they missed the largest strategic threat that China poses.  If their authoritarian regime is threatened internally due to economic recession then I worry about a regime that may act out on nationalistic adventures to move the populations attention away from their failing economy.  They are already showing an aggressive hand in the South Pacific, also called the South China Sea, claiming islands, shipping and fishing waters that are in international waters.  I worry and anticipate Chinese aggressive behavior toward Taiwan, toward Japan, and other Asian nations and consequently to the US.  Additionally acts of omission are of concern, maybe they don’t reign in North Korea as they otherwise might.  We must worry about the Chinese government responding to economic issues with nationalistic adventures.   US Stocks may suffer more broadly in the coming weeks from the uncertainties around international threats in the Asia as well as those in the Middle East because of the effect that authoritarian nationalistic (or in case of Middle East – Sectarian) adventures might have on the global economy.

Mike

 

Yesterday we watched a play called Ragtime, its good, not great, but it was interesting in that its placed in our history about a hundred years ago, at a time when racial and class prejudices and injustices were prevalent.  In reality it is unfortunately too relevant at our current time.  Its amazing how so much has changed and yet so little has changed in social thought.  Are we doomed to be wrapped in the prejudices and injustices of the past in the next hundred years, or will our children, and grandchildren as our legacy find a way toward wisdom, truth and love?

Of Wisdom, Truth and Love

Born to this world with all hope and possibility

Nurtured and developed with love of family

Dependent on all and we grow in passion

 

Passion for all we need and want and smiles shared

Giving way in time to hope and desire of what’s to be

We determine our way, our path in life and love

 

Or rather is our path set before us with options here and there

Are the directions and decisions determined by our wisdom

Or are they choices driven by the collective push of society

 

Does humanity develop a collective wisdom aged and advanced generationally

What be that social fabric that conveys that wisdom – religion, science, art, literature

That fabric wears and tears and requires repair and renewal in time

 

We connect our inner being and soul to this fabric, this wisdom

It’s easier to find comfort in this all knowing wisdom without reason

When we wander though and test the fabric do we advance or damage

 

I rather believe that wonderment and open hearts make for wise souls

Worn and torn fabric is obligated our attention and repair

But it is easy to be content with histrionic protections of failed fabric

 

Learning is a wonderful way to pursue the corners of wisdom for value

Yet to learn along the paths set before us throughout the fabric of humanity

Or better yet to advance learning beyond the fabric and into creation

 

Our children, our future generations will be opened to a greater wisdom

Our understanding of social fabrics that carry ideas, thoughts and passion

We play a role that is beyond our horizon of sight, beyond our life and love

 

Our logic and reasons cannot reconcile with the areas of the social fabric at times

Thus pushing us as far as hate of such dullards of humanity that embrace this fabric

We forget that this same fabric is part of our weave too and for many their only comfort

 

In our mind, logic screams this must change!

We desire to improve and repair as we can in our corner of mankind

Yet the others hold to that blanket with a maniacal unreasoned grip

 

The truths they hold in their unreasoned grip seem absolute to the believer

The investigator sees these truths to be relative to the perspective of observer

Seeking to uncover that core value and wisdom that drove need for absolutism

 

These truths then create a prison of absolutism that restricts freedom

Choking life, love and thought from adherents of mismanaged fabric

Yet giving false power and judgmental superiority to the advocators and enforcers

 

Shall we embrace these challenges to logic as they are encountered

Shall we tolerate what is comfort to others, allow to live and let live

Doesn’t reason drive us to compassionate learning and tolerance of their comfort

 

We have a responsibility to learn, teach and nurture compassionately

To advance the fabric or to leave it unmolested requires application of wisdom

To act without thought and to base on prejudice is an act against wisdom and love

 

Freeing our minds and hearts allows passions of imagination beyond constraints

The social fabric of our reasoned soul cannot constrain our imagination

Love like a dove soars easily above the fabric of convention and tradition

 

As a dove released from the weighted constraints of local monochromatic fabric

We soar above the quilted plane and see the many colors and textures of life

This gift of living perspective allows us to grow in wisdom, love and truth

 

With wisdom we build a legacy of smiles by bring new worlds to those we influence

We can expand thought and help each other see beauty with perspective

We can point out beauty, point to the moon and sunrise and say appreciate it my friend

 

With truth we know nothing is more beautiful than Gods gift of this world

We enjoy our star, our support system, and all those that came before

Continually building our society, our language, the arts, and science

 

With love we know we are entertained and have more time than any before us

We share an obligation to contemplate and investigate our fabric and our legacy

How we share, how we love determines what “legacy” we leave this world

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Funny smell in the garage… looked everywhere, there must be spilled mineral spirits or paint… did the girls spill nail polish cleaner, or throw it in the garbage? Why does it smell… search and search, and I hear a slight hiss, its in the corner, its on a shelf, but what can?  Something under pressure, so must be a spray can.  Process of elimination, take one can off after another…. its the Rust-o-leum!  How does a Rust-o-leum can rust?  Rust through and then start leaking.  Can’t say much for this product’s purported and intended use 🙂

Our country discusses immigration in terms of security and numbers and yet what is it for those that are poor, that live to work because they must?  I fortunate of education and opportunity enjoy the time of leisure, time of contemplation, even when I struggled to find success, there was always time for being one with myself.  Can I imagine the honor, the duty to family, to a life as an immigrant itinerant worker, and yet how as intelligent soulful beings they must struggle with the ‘todays’ existence and defer those thoughts of being one in body, mind and soul. 

Body Mind and Soul

 My body and mind is thrown into this toil

Tied by duty, honor and life to this soil

 

I’ve been here before a thousand times

My body works to a certain rhythm and rhyme

 

I know the field, I know the tools, and soil so well

My hands, my head are one at work with no tell

 

It bends, it aches, life poured into todays existence

Yet the soul and heart knows life at a distance

 

Let my mind, my heart, my soul drift free

Let them not interfere with what I must do and be

 

Hold on through this day, hold on to all small victories won

Hold on for the time when heart, mind and soul are one

 

Feel the rain, hear the thunder, its part of a plan

Fight on, toil on, this is a must, because we can

 

Heart and soul are where they must be

Because these things are born to be free

 

Hold on to me Lord, hold on till kingdom come

Where once again heart, mind, body and soul are one

Mike 

 

 

 

Christmas Morning

 

Christmas morning quiet and slow

The clock ticks softly on the mantel

Santa’s work in stockings hang just below

 

In this hour of quiet solitude of thought

About meanings of His promised peace

So more important than what we bought

 

In a world of turmoil, strife and pain

He was born to bring us joy and peace

Its time we seek His miracle once again

 

Be like children in heart, faith and yearn

He taught with a smile not long ago

See the children’s smiles today and learn

 

I hope to be like a child and see

A world with faith in message of peace

And see how beautiful this world can be

 

Mike