Snow revisited

I was reminded today of this post from nearly two years ago. It's one of my favorites and I thought I'd share it again with a few minor changes...

Today it snowed. More than was expected I expect.

After lunch I'm walking back into the building. It's still snowing. I yield to the tendency to be annoyed as soon as the first bits get down my neck. Then I'm surprised that it didn’t stick. The annoyance, that is. I find that I'm happy and I can't help it. It's the snow.

Oh the snow! It's always tickled me. First snows are best, but any snow will do - gentle, playful downward dances. I could be coaxed into verse. 

Remember standing at the rail of a bridge looking into the passing water and getting the feeling that it's you moving? Ever notice how falling snow can do the same? Only instead of riding forward, you are lifted up? That’s just one of snow’s gifts. Snow is beauty. It is quiet. It is change.

How many artists have been inspired by snow covered hills, mountains and forests? Snow clashes with nothing and fits everything. Snow is nature and it falls upon God’s creations and mans. A grimy street, a meadow, a battlefield - all are blessed by this barren beauty.

Healing moments, enlightened thoughts and treasured memories all emerge as blankets of snow steal away the distracting sounds. Snow is cleanser that reveals the silence beneath. The clamors of wind and beast and machine - all prove weak against this patient power.

If I left tracks every day as I returned to work, normal days would see a strait, steady, solid set of foot prints . Today was different. Some solid lines, a few curved lines, and two abruptly interrupted lines were left in the snow as I did a little dance. Snow changes our walk, changes our mind, it turns us around, and it urges us home.

Snow is also a message. It reminds us to go slow, to look around, to enjoy ourselves - to play a little. Let’s listen. It’s in that delightful, mild, quiet little crunch – more felt than heard - beneath your feet.

Dear Cyberspace

I want to virtually walk into my news room (cnn, fox, drudge, blogs) from my main room which I decorated with the gadgets of my choice. My social networking room (facebook/twitter/linkedin) is accross the hall next to my library (goodreads) which is at the top of the grand staircase which leads down into my music/game room (pandora) which itself leads into my theater room (netflix etc). Afterward I'd relax in my study (stumbleupon/google) avoiding my office (banks/bill/mint/blogspot/google docs) and work rooms (live mesh/vpn).

At my side, I want my eAssistant who will update me on my friends activities, recommend interesting sites and useful tools, deliver my mail, remind me of tasks and events AND collect and push memories to me all without being annoying. 

(the collected and pushed memories would be things like "Don't forget that you vowed never to eat at sonic drive-in again because..." that don't work with the calendar or task list.)

Hasten the day!

Hamster

Check out my new pet! And would you mind feeding him while you're here? (Just click)

Bad Dreams

Kind readers, allow me a sober purge of last night’s terrible dream.

I’m very near the conclusion that I’m destined to be at the scene of a terrible airliner accident. Last night I dreamt again that I witnessed a crash. I’ve had these dreams for years. Sometimes they recur for weeks and sometimes years will go by without one, but each time they are the most vivid dreams I ever have. This was the first in at least a year, but maybe one of the most real.

I was the passenger in a car moving in slow traffic toward an unidentified international airport. The roads were clean and white and the cars were small giving the impression that I was in Europe or South America. The driver and I had been watching passenger jets pass directly overhead as they made their landing approaches in the same direction we were moving. Then one came over at an unusual speed. Just as it came into view through the front windshield its nose began to lift and its tail sagged unnaturally. The full stall occurred about 3 or 4 city blocks ahead of us. The fall was swift and sure and began at what I figure to be around a thousand feet. The nose was still inclined as it began its fall and it twisted to its right during the fall such that the rear and right wing hit first. The impact looked to be into 3 to 4 story apartment and office buildings. The sound of the crash itself was wrenching and unlike movie sound effects; more of a deep thudding and scrapping than a banging, wrenching explosion. The ground shuddered just before the sound arrived. There was no explosion, but white and grey smoke did begin to billow moments after.

As it became obvious that the plane would stall, I thought in a dark stun, “No way… this is it… just like my dreams. It’s actually happening now.” With those thoughts and gaze fixed on the falling plane, I numbly opened the door and stepped out onto the road and up on to the sidewalk. That’s where I was at impact. Moments later people began screaming and I starting realizing how paralyzed with fear I was. I knew I should approach the scene and help out in some way, but I did not want to see the carnage and the thought of the carnage kept me glued to my spot on the sidewalk as humanity blurred around me.

When my urge to help dominated I would shuffle or even jog forward, but often the fear would draw me back to a stop. I made it as far as a block before the dream ended. I wanted so much to help and I was deeply angry at myself for being so afraid. I tried to hide or justify my fear and slow approach by offering the question, “What should we do?” to passersby.

This wasn’t the first of these dreams dominated by fear, but there have also been those where I bravely rush to the scene barely aware of any fear. Always though there is intolerable dread. Lord, keep these things in my dreams.

I can interpret my own feelings thank you

I'm one of the many for whom the man spoke the other day at a McCain rally when he said, "I'm mad...". Well, now I'm doubly mad because I've been seeing on the news for the last few days that the media has interpreted my anger to be against Obama and stirred up by McCain rhetoric. They're stone cold wrong on both points and I'm tired of being told what and why I think and feel. Which may be the root of the problem with liberals anyway.

First of all, this anger isn't at Obama, it's at McCain! Is the media so deaf as to not hear the words that are coming out of the mouths of these people? We're mad at McCain for not standing up for us. We're trying to tell him that we are angry that socialism is getting a foothold in America and that he is failing in the responsibility he's taken upon himself to point it out and prevent it. We're probably also a little mad at ourselves for letting such a possible failure represent us. So... Wrong on why we're mad and Wrong on who we're mad at! We're not mad because of what McCain is saying. If anything, we're mad because of what he's NOT saying!

The point about Ayres shouldn't be simply that he and Obama palled around or that we think Obama wants to blow up buildings. It's that it helps reveal a pattern of associates who openly and directly counter our conservative beliefs. But I doubt we even need that pattern to show the point. We have Obama's own voting record - one of the most liberal in congress. Is McCain even pointing that out though? Not so much. Something is wrong with McCain and we don't know what it is. We're starting to feel like we've been sold out. Thus the anger. Get a clue media types.

I took a Political Science class in college from which I picked up two great life lessons. First that passion for a cause is one of the great things. Second and more relevant here is that liberals are not for the little guy like the little guy thinks they are. In that class we were taught that we were the elite and that we would be responsible for leading the 'little guy' who, it was inferred, was incapable of thinking for and helping himself. At first that thought made me feel good about myself, but soon I saw it for what it is. Liberals are not trying to help the 'little guy', they're simply pointing out the difference between them and the 'little guy' in their minds so that they can keep that superior feeling. In short, liberals need the poor and down trodden to stay poor and down trodden and dependent and they work hard to that end. It's more complex than that, but that gets close to the point.

The first time I knew I couldn't vote for Obama (and I really wanted to from the moment he took stage at the 2004 democratic national convention) was when I saw him tell a crowd attending one of his rallies that they were tired of being told to pull themselves up by their boot straps. That they were there because they wanted the government to help them out. The crowed cheered. I saw the shame in that as well as the manipulation.

Obama and fellow liberals try to inject us with interpretations of our thoughts and feelings constantly. Just listen to a single rally. Well, I'm tired of it and wont have it. I'm capable of interpreting my own thoughts and feelings thank you and here's another of the great things I've learned: that I'm not so different from other people. We'd all be well advised to live by that principle.

Another thing I hate is being labeled uncaring and unfeeling just because I don't believe in stealing from Peter (excess taxes) to pay Paul (excess welfare). I donate a very large percentage of my net income to the needy along with my time and energy as do large numbers of other conservatives so give up on that ugly lie!

And another thing! Just because I understand who it is that keeps our unemployment numbers low (large and small business) does not mean that I am, desire to be, or approve of corrupt, power hungry robber barons. Get over that one too and bask in the sunlight of your lower ignorance level.