What goes thump?

There are many things that make noise,
crickets, cats, and cicada and boys
but few of them make a thump in the night.

Now even if you allow
for the occasional growl
there are few things that go thump.

But that is exactly what awoke me at four in the morn,
a thump that sounded as loud as a horn.

The thump was that of a tree as it fell,
more accurately as it's crashing death's knell.

With a strong summer blow,
the trees twisted to and fro
and one did go thump in the night.

As I launched from the door
to see ever so more,
I spied what had given me such a fright.

'twas a branch and a limb and two trunks did fall,
for when one tree fell
it took them all.

Now I know the answer
of what goes thump in the night.
It's the sound of a tree
attempting to flee
and forgetting that trees can't take flight.

(This post brought to you because I can't get that damn 'Hippy Grandma' out of my head)

-Tom

Happy B-Day

Happy Bryian Day,

UNDER a spreading chestnut tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.

His hair is crisp, and black, and long,
His face is like the tan;
His brow is wet with honest sweat,
He earns whate'er he can,
And looks the whole world in the face,
For he owes not any man.

Week in, week out, from morn till night,
You can hear his bellows blow;
You can hear him swing his heavy sledge
With measured beat and slow,
Like a sexton ringing the village bell,
When the evening sun is low.

Happy Birthday Bryian.

Pilgrim / Seeker

While doing a search for lanterns last night, I came across this image of a medieval watchman. There was no reference given to where the image came from on the site and I doubt that I'll be able to track down the mysterious author of the painting by the symbol in the bottom left corner. However, I'll be sure to keep an eye out for it.

The image of the watchman in his cloak and carrying a staff and lantern is mixture of symbolism. The cloak protects him from the wind, cold and the rain. The lantern allows him to see through the darkness - as he is charged to seek out any crime in the city - but also it proclaims his location like a ship's lantern. The staff, a simple object, is also a form of protection in that it can be used to defend one's self from attackers or the occasional large rat.

So the image conveys PROTECTION, SEARCHING, and ASSURANCE.

Because of his search, people can feel assured that they are marginally safer with people like this watchman doing his job. Though given the simplest of tools to aid him in his search (Lantern, cloak and staff), it is none-the-less a Quest. It could be a quest for crime, or fire or just anything out of the ordinary. I would imagine that the nightly quests of the Watch were quite boring, but if they weren't out there there would be little sense of assurance or protection. This lead me to the writings of Edmund Burke.

"All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing."
-- Edmund Burke

I would take Burke's idea and expand upon it to say:

When people speak of evil, they speak of all the bad forces that affect our life. Fear, Doubt, Anger, etc. Evil is then the collective effect of those things which we can't control in our lives and that limit our choices. Freedom to make one's own choices is a cornerstone of most works concerning civil rights. The restriction of freedom, slavery, has brought nations to its knees. So i simplified the association to state: "If freedom is Good, then restriction as it's opposite, must be Evil." And what, generally, restricts our choices more often than any other force if not Fear. Fear of the unknown, or fear of an unwelcome eventuality.

Therefore, I can begin to re-interpret Burke's maxim about evil to read:

"All that is necessary for fear to succeed is that good men do nothing."
-- Edmund Burke (modified)

To continue my interpretation of Burke's work, I examined the last phrase: "Do nothing". According to Burke, all we (good men) need to do to defeat fear (evil) is to do something. Well, how do you conquer fear? There are far more things in this world that we do not understand than what science and religion have attempted to answer. Therefore, fear of the unknown would seem to be the most crippling, the most limiting, the most powerful form of evil.

Knowledge is the best weapon against fear. As children we are afraid of the dark because we don't know what's "out there". Our vivid imaginations crawl with media-induced phantoms and specters and we succeed in terrorizing ourselves with vagaries of perception. To combat this fear, it is important to learn from ourselves and our environment. A tree which terrorizes our dreams by night can be seen to be little more than a twisted-trunk by day.

So educating ourselves about our world and our own minds is the key to combating these phantoms of shadow and crumpled jeans. Many different religions and philosophies would describe the process of educating one's self as the process of Enlightenment. The path to enlightenment, an understanding of yourself and your world, is the quest for awareness.

"All that is necessary for fear to be defeated is to encourage the search for enlightenment."
-- Thomas Riley

Or, to be put simply:

"Always, the Quest."

or in another sense, "Always seek Enlightenment"

My gods, I think I just said I'm a Buddhist.

From the book

Real Winter

Morning

Well, it's in the single digits today as the post below will tell you. 1 degree when I got up. Ugh.

When I got on campus the wind was freezing the last bit of water left by the snow that melted yesterday. It seems as though everyone I know is sick with some kind of flu or bronchitis. Thankfully, I haven't caught anything too severe this season. Being away from human contact for the past year may have either helped me or will condemn me to a fate worse than death.

When I was talking to friends of mine about winter they had different views. One wanted one real good snow just so it's not ice and rain all the time. Everytime we have gotten hit here in Portsmouth, he's got nothing down in Huntington. Another friend talked about how when she lived in D.C. and how they have "real winters" up there. Real is opposed to the faint concept of winter we have around here these days.

When I thought about it a bit more, I thought about some of the information that I've read about the 'mini ice-age' and how there's a cycle of weather that seems to settle that kind of pre-historical weather on the Northern Hemisphere every six hundred years or so. I think that we're do again if I remember correctly, but I don't remember if they had an actual prediction for when it would come of if they're theorizing a ten-year period for when they think it might happen.

That would be a 'real winter', I think. Crops would freeze and fail, people would have to adapt their thinking to a whole new level of climatic survival.

11:40 a.m. I'm back in the Faculty Lounge. The lecture today was short and there weren't that many people in class. I'm guessing that they didn't feel like coming in today. The Army Reservist guy wasn't there today either. He was gone last Wednesday too so I'm wondering if he's pulled himself out for something or perhaps was recalled.

I've decided to switch my workouts to the afternoon. I like the extra time I have to get my act together in the morning and I don't have the urgency to rush to get it done and then run off to class. So, after Sociology, I'll be heading over to enjoy the heat of the sauna and the workout. I just hope that there's no swim meet this time.



Real Winter

These are the days when
the Wind has Teeth,
and the Cold is Hungry.

It remembers when it covered the world
and the sun was a memory.

Always the Quest

My friends will know that I have used the phrase, "Always the Quest" to embody my continual search for answers. Recently, a friend of mine - who had lost contact with me - did a search for that phrase to see if he could find an email address. Once I heard about this, I had to repeat the search to see what I would come up with. One of the links took me to a Navy Seals Workout site.

As a Navy SEAL Instructor I lead daily PT for almost 12 years. Each day I did my best to switch things up to keep things interesting and motivating. I do the same thing in the workouts that I have provided for you the Americian Public. Promoting fitness is my passion, it is what I am meant to do. My goal is to teach as many people as possible that your body is your gym. As long as have yourself you will always have your gym.

Always the quest,

Scott Helvenston

So I think it was interesting that a Navy Seal and a company who helped people with losing weight chose to use the same quote and probably for the same reasons.

Lonely Road

Pilgrim's Promise

I started a new journal today and had to put something on the inside-front cover. The first thing that came to mind was the Pilgrim's Promise. It's something I wrote up a while back.

-T