Beware the Pure Spirit, Let the Flesh Instruct the Mind

Loganberries anyone?  Decay. Small, but not unnoticed.

Look who's back. I don't think these cicada's are part of the huge 17 year cycle ones, but at least on this side of town, I have noticed their distinctive buzz in the treetops for the last several days. I went walking this afternoon over at Winged Deer and look what I found. So many empty carapaces around, especially on the undersides of leaves. I used to love finding these discarded exoskeletons as a kid, and then scaring my sisters with them.  The last 17 year brood explosion was not that long ago. It's a wondrous sight to behold, they were literally everywhere. No avoiding them, my clearest memories was the excitement of the dogs. These pooches were anxious to go outside and crunch crunch crunch. They ate these things like I would eat M&Ms. Lots of wings and legs in their teeth.... and later on... very noticeable in their poop. I wonder what sort of cycle this year's brood is. All this time, they were underground feeding off of tree root sap. They decided at ...

I'm missing my connection to the earth, living in an apartment does not afford me to indulge in my gardening obsession. However, I do what I can. My porch is overflowing with pots. My voodoo lilies (a wonderful gift from David King) are happy and doing what they do best. Such odd plants, very phallic in nature (how lucky for me eh?) but very delicate and beautiful. I hope these follow suit with ones I had previously, that is, they were prodigious little fuckers... loved to make offset bulbs like crazy.  The Japanese Maple is a seedling I took from Atlanta. Wayne and Steven have two beautiful trees in their backyard and lots of tiny seedlings.  I could not easily find a seedling from the one tree (kind of a lacy leaf pattern), but this one is beautiful as well.  My cacti / euphorbias are happy outside now and the Opuntia varieties are blooming.  Night blooming cereus is still alive and kicking - it continues to send out shoots that will elongate into the flatten...

The following thoughts have been simmering in my mind as of late. I’ve had a lot of time to think during my recent bout of illness. I wasn’t feeling well enough to do anything else and so I had time to contemplate my current state of  internal affairs, that is, do a self inventory of sorts. I discovered that I was believing something that was no longer true, I was holding on to something that had passed, but in my mind, it was still something for me to latch onto and to “keep alive” and kicking so to speak. I know I shouldn’t believe everything I think, but was surprised when I examined this particular item. Perhaps I should say this was more of an assumption than anything, but I do think I have been cultivating this idea and giving it life, when in all reality, I should have released it some time ago.  A relationship that had come and gone, and yet, I found myself attached to this thought process that it was something still, and in thinking about this, I realized I was ...

I had the pleasure of attending a Transfaith panel discussion last night here on ETSU’s campus. There was a great deal of interest in this forum discussion, the room was packed. I had wondered whether this type of discussion was going to be well received by students on campus. This topic and the ensuing discussion were important to all of those attending. I find it amusing that the organizers of this event were atheist and agnostics ETSU’s own S.A.N.E. These fine students have presented in my undergraduate class for the past couple of years. My students are always astonished when they come to present, that is, they are not expecting such down-to-earth, laid back fellow students. I think that in their minds, they are expecting to see goth/emo students all dressed in black and spewing forth flames and nihilism from their various body orifices. SANE folks are generally disarming in their appearance and presentation style. But anyway, packed room and a small stage with various local re...