From an Upper Floor

As I See It . . . .

There are no more answers anywhere except those written within the individual on his heart.  It is all there for him to discover and what he discovers will be adequate for this time.  It works to cover tracks and to discover just one more truth which will enlighten what has already been learned.  For one it will be fine.  For another, it is nothing but a way station.

Everyone has a piece of the rock.  A piece of the truth.  The justification for each life is in the person and no place else.  Not in the life of their god or their spouse or their children.  But in themselves.  There is no other place than the place of the individual heart.

To be able to ensnare all knowledge in one fell swoop would be to discourage and dismantle the psyche.  It can be done but it would undo us all.  The psychological trauma would put the psyche on the shelf forever.  For who would have the courage to attempt another  journey?

Our need determines our intent.  And the caliber of teacher we require.  To strive toward the highest and best we can be will of itself bring to our side those who also strive to do best and those who yearn to touch the highest.  The divine within is called into conference and the work begins.  The journey only begins when the present becomes unbearable and the future unthinkable.

I hold two views within me.  That the universe is benign and at the same time it is ultimately good.  Benign because the rain falls on the just and the unjust and ultimately good because if it were not,  it would long ago have self destructed.  Can one hold two opposing views and live?  I hold the two at the core of me and at 85 I still breathe.

What can be born and borne in this world?  The knowledge that all reality is a preferential viewpoint.  That all reality is a preferred judgement and yet so incredibly real and so compatible that it all works.  Painful?  Of course.  Worthwhile?  We get to know the awesome power of individual thought.   That we can make Peace on Earth an actuality and not just a hope.

photo by John Holmes

The Mind set to turn a particular way
is already bent. . .
The Teacher

It is a benign universe in which we are, always just, always fair to the extreme.  If it does not appear so, our view of it may be  in need of adjustment.  Perhaps, just perhaps our focus is too narrow.

The divinity which resides in man puts him in the driver’s seat.  What happens in this lush planet will have recourse in universal seas.  What happens on one hearth,  happens on all hearths giving warmth or not.  What happens in one market place,  happens in all marketplaces.

What man does or undoes, will rebound.  Every act must be one of holy obligation.

The erstwhile professors claim their inadequacy and who are we not to believe them?  The clerics proclaim their great faith in a just God and yet bridle at the injustices and claim their humanity in not knowing the answers.  Can we not believe them?  Who knows them better than they do themselves?

When one proclaims his ignorance, he also proclaims his negligence in the obligation of thinking.  Thinking is a 24/7 work.  Hard work.  And this was not meant to be Paradise.   Wars and catastrophes are started by thought.  One man and one thought.  Think Holocaust.  Can we not think Peace?  Think on it.  And start on ourselves.

When we settle in for the night and put the light out, we are reminded  that night class is down the hall to the right.  The class is Ethics and Man.   The last class was cancelled.  No one showed up.  What is wanted is the heart to carry the argument of the right thing to do, complete with commitment, to put priority on what will sustain humankind, what will give life and not take life.

Do we qualify?

Photo by
Kathy Qualiana

A Matter Of Heart. . .

The terminal was unbearably hot.  The crowd was gathered ready to embark the train for points East.  The luggage crowded the children who were crowding the legs of the adults.  Handbags swayed menacingly as little children strayed too close.  It was a hot and sweaty atmosphere and not at all pleasant.  The air conditioning would be overworked long into the night, even as the number of people decreased.

The wait was interrupted by the loudspeaker intoning that begging our pardons of course, there would be a slight delay in embarking because the train had not arrived.  But as soon as it was in the depot and unloaded, we would be granted status as passengers.

The groans were echoed throughout the caverns of the terminal tracks and it was one groan.

In front of me a relatively young man, perhaps nearing forty and dressed in shorts, polo shirt and typical running shoes, stood by the ruby velvet rope, the only sign of elegance in a scene showing none.  Until that moment.

A young boy child, estimated to be six or so, came to the young man and leaned against him.  This was a husky one, but possibly was younger that what I thought.  He looked though to be in training for some contact sport.

The young man bent down and in one gesture, obviously long practiced, gathered the child up.  I watched in amazement, fully expecting to hear, ‘stand on your own two feet, you’re big enough!’

But what I saw was an act of love, obviously also not universal, because it was not what I expected.

I saw the child put his arms around the young man’s neck with such sureness that I knew it too was long practiced.  And the young man buried his face in the neck of the child and pressed his lips close to the child’s ear.  The look on the older face I could see for he was not 2 full feet away.  And the look was one of unadulterated love, the purest measure of devotion.

As the larger arms held the child effortlessly, I heard the Teacher’s voice saying again, ‘only a father can make a son but other men make brothers just like themselves.’

And I saw what for these two was evident.  At some point in time in the older man’s history, however far back each man’s history goes, this father had known a father’s love and had been a son.

And whether or not this young boy-child would choose to father, he could, because he was truly a son.

And this particular element, so often divisive in the lives of men, was forever in these two, reconciled.  It was lovingly demonstrated.  And no word passed between them.

artwork by Claudia Hallissey

A reader wrote and asked how to make a difference.  Teaching was his profession and of course his talents would be appreciated.  As Americans, our first reaction has always been what can I do.  Do being the operative word.  How can we break this down to sizeable chunks to be effective.  My first response is Be.  Not do, or do by Being.

One is no doubt a spouse, or a sibling, or a son or daughter, or parent.  Not necessarily in order,  but one of these.  Or simply single human.  This is where we begin. In a world which shrinks not only because of space as we grow in numbers but because as our children marry and discard familial cultures or combine belief systems,  we need to absorb unfamiliar and prejudicial behaviors that we think threaten our security. What I see as necessary is a substantive broadening of what needs to be embraced.  (What came through as dictation is in italics.  Since all time is simultaneous, it is valid yet.)‘ Growth is with oneself.  Growth is with the knowledge that humanities’ progress must begin with oneself.  And to be able to see the infirmities of humankind in the wider scope of behavioral and genetic structures allows a compassion to be directed at the individual.  We learn much at the parents’ knees.  And much is not good and here it is we can change.’  When I wrote the post,  Who Will Teach The Children?  we assume of course the young child.   But children come in all sizes.  As I wrote many times,  ‘some too large to sit on your lap, but not too large to sit on your heart.’  And sadly,  I say sadly from this vantage point of my eighth decade,  that I have seen too many of my generation go to the end of their lives as prime cases of arrested development.  Growing up is not easy to do.  Many things restrict our development.  We are not the prime interest in everyone’s life when we are born and survival of oneself is everyone’s goal.  The world is not out to get us so to speak,  we may just be in the way of someone else’s life.

‘All things are not said and done with malice aforethought.  Some things are said simply because they have been heard all of one’s life and one has not thought them through sufficiently to change one’s thinking.  And there’s the rub.  To think through sufficiently.  The dastardly job of thinking through is given away, like some vile disease.  Yet the process of thinking, the gift of thought, the joy of thinking, the remarkable process of thinking, is what man is all about.  It is a birthright of greatest value and is scorned as odious work.  It is man’s liberation from a life of drudgery and here we talk of the tediousness of the day’s duties with no respite.  Thought does this.  Thought will take one from the humdrum of every day and lift one to the heavens where imagination originates and dreams are spun.  It will be the wings upon which man will fly.  It will be the culmination of a life’s work and there is nothing else.

We will ask of him how did you spend your days?  And man will say, I work at such and such and have accomplished great things.  But we will say, what did you think?  And what will man answer?  For the heavens know, do they not, what transpires in the mind of man.  The heavens know.  To resolve issues which plague the heart is the work of man.  We pester the mind with that which has not been resolved and bring forward the issues until man feels possessed.  Try, we say, try.  Resolve them and bring some peace to your life.  But thought, that marvelous process which separates man from the unthinking and no vision creature,  when we see that man disparages this active tool which is his gift,  then heaven laments.’

When we teach a person to read, we open them to worlds of thought, both ancient and contemporary.   When we create a safe place to speak our thoughts,  and someone listens, we grow.  Many of us are unable because of physical issues to do much but we can listen.  We can Be.  We can be the listener for the child, no matter the age. We can guide the stumbling thoughts to wider vision.   If we cling to what our parents believed,  our question should be ‘why?’  If we cling to our preferred prejudices,  our question is ‘why?’  If we are quick to rush to judgement,  our questions should be many.   What we require are those whose thoughts do not necessarily agree with ours, but who show us a direction where we can adjust our thinking and grow.  This is a necessity. Our world,  our planet, our Earth and its survival,  demands it.  Our churches and synagogues should be that place where arms would hammock the growing knowledge, but they are not.  They have a vested interest in positions of power and are impervious to change.  We must find that place for thoughts no longer appropriate to change in safety.  To be shown how by those whose knowledge of differing cultures can be a good beginning.  Just a thought.   But perhaps then those of us who close shop this night will ensure an enthusiastic incoming class in the morning.

photo by Joe Hallissey Sr.