"I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude."(Thoreau)

I recently started a business Facebook page for my dental office.
So I now basically have six online venues which I can ignore, especially while I am up here at the cabin: personal Facebook page, business Facebook page, blog, website, and e-mail (personal and work).
If I have left anything out, let me know. While I bought the cabin to inspire and energize me it has had the opposite effect (see blog entry "My Favorite Law").  All I want to do is either stare out at the stream or go hiking.   It's as if I become Henry David Thoreau minus the talent, intellectual curiosity, and calmness.  OK, sure I sometimes sit and stare at my laptop screen trying desperately to tap out a few words which will amuse someone in the blogosphere, but my overall level of commitment is "manana"  (I see there is a tilda key on my keyboard but it just does this;~).  It's not such a bad thing, contemplating nature while trying to ignore the greater world.  In fact, I think trying to always capture one's thoughts might detract from the overall "being in the moment" experience.  I found the same to be true of travel photography.  Sometimes the adventures became diluted in my zeal to "capture the moment" for later bragging rights.  It's true, life is about the trip, not the movie rights.

Guest Blog; A Feline Atonement

"Jail sucks"

I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.
I promise not to bite people even if they are sitting in my spot.

My Favorite Law

Helloooooo... Is anybody still out there?  I'm baaaaaack.  Maybe I will just try a "thought for the day" type of blog.  Short, sweet, and hopefully insightful.

One of my favorite laws is the Law of Unintended Consequences.  Not even the most well thought out process is immune from it.  And it is really the first law (well, maybe second, after the law of gravity), to make its mark in the world.  Think about this;  God creates a utopian world in seven days. He then sets up Adam and Eve in this Garden of Eden. Then, believing they can be good stewards, he grants them free will . And what happens on day nine, maybe ten?  They mismanage it.  In one bite, God's utopian paradise is irrevocably screwed up. If that is not the law of unintended consequences in action then I don't know what is.  What, he didn't see that coming from a mile away?  Apparently, no one is immune from it.

Fear and Marketing Seize the Day

The fickleness of the voter knows no bounds.
As Winston Churchill said  "the best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter".

Click on the title  and you may get frightened for America.  If only they realized that the founding fathers were a bunch of aristocrats, gentleman farmers, intellectual elitists, and pro slavery plantation owners, the exact caste the Tea Party rallies against. These great thinkers came up with the electoral college to very specifically guard against populist victories, and their worries ring true 225 years later.

Its a Small World Afterall

I do not consider myself particularly New Agey, but the Woodland Valley, in which my cabin resides, does have a spirituality about it that every visitor immediately feels.  A friend of ours has said that everyone who moves here eventually rekindles their spiritual side even if they are not particularly religious.   Tammy might disagree but I do feel calmer when I am here.  And isn't that one of the points of religious devotion, to feel calm with the world and your place in it?  No matter what one believes happens when we die, we are all here together on Earth so we better make the best of it.  And the exact specifics of how we got here may not be so important at this point since we are here and shouldn't we just try to do our best with what we have?  No coach ever told his young charges to go home because they stink and what's the point anyway.  Do your best and be a good sport is always the advice.  Amen.

But that is not what this post is about.  My first cousin once removed  (my Mom's cousin), Frank, was in  from California visiting his good friend, Steve, who happens to live in Woodstock.  My Mother told him we just bought a home in Phoenicia so he called and invited us to a pot luck dinner get together in Woodstock.  (A quick plug for my wife here; she threw together a very chic quinoa and bean salad with ten minutes notice).
It just so happens that Steve is good friends with our friend and neighbor down the street, Carol.  This, in and of itself, is not the most fascinating small world story but it is the second one we have been involved with this week.

Earlier this week I received an e-mail from an old high school classmate who had stumbled upon my blog via Facebook.  It turns out she spends summers in a rental house here in Woodland Valley. She recognized the picture of my backyard since she had also looked at the cabin when it was for sale.  Well, upon closer inspection of my Facebook profile picture, which includes Tammy, she realized that, one day while taking a walk, she and her husband had stopped to chat with Tammy when they came upon her gardening.  (I was probably inside on the pot).  She told me in her e-mail that they, like us, "love everything about the valley".  It is just one more story that reinforces my view of this place as very spiritual.  If you click on the title of this post you will be brought to the Wikipedia link about our mountain (Panther) and how our two creeks were formed by a meteor.  A rare geologic event.  If you Google Earth Panther Mountain and zoom out, you will see the perfect circle formed by the Esopus and Woodland Streams around Panther Mountain.  I am not saying this means anything but it is very cool and perhaps there is some crazy gravitational thing going on.

There are plenty of beautiful valleys in the world but we are lucky enough to call this one home;  Even though we are only here on weekends for now, every time I put the key in the door, I feel as if I am finally home.
And by the way, the dinner party was excellent and we were welcomed as old friends.  If, from an earlier blog post, any one misconstrues my opinion of Woodstock and its denizens, I apologize.

The Road Less Traveled

We took a road trip to the western side of the Catskills this weekend.  The trees were all dressed up for Fall.  Unfortunately, the sun was not cooperating so the photos are less than spectacular and the below photo, sadly, is not mine.  I did, however, manage to get Tammy to sign the purchase order for a new 12.5 megapixel digital SLR to replace my ancient 6 megapixel camera.  Blaming the camera for my artistic shortcomings is an argument I have been using since my first Kodak Brownie.   Intellectually I know the pixel count barely makes a difference (technique and composition are way more influential) in what the eye perceives,  but I am doing my part to stimulate the economy so the Tea Party can quietly disappear.  If we are all making money then what do they have to bitch about?  It certainly isn't the erosion of our civil liberties since many of them are apparently against the separation of church and state.  I don't know of any more fundamentally American civil liberty than our right to worship, or not worship, as we please, without an official endorsement from the government.

But driving along route 28 at the height of the fall foliage season diverts one's attention away from the physical self  to a more emotionally based peace of mind.  For most people anyway.  In spite of our common objectives, the other leaf peepers on the highway still manage to disturb my idyll as they motor along at a velocity significantly less than that which is clearly posted.  Of course to really enjoy the natural array, one must exit the car and proceed at a pedestrian's pace.  Motorcyclists (a favored mode of transport in the Catskills) like to think they are getting down and dirty with nature as they barrel along the highway, but at 50 miles per hour their conversation with the trees is more perfunctory than profound.

In fact there is a grave misconception in many natural areas around the United States  that one can actually enjoy the surroundings without exiting the vehicle.  Many tourists drive along the winding national park roads at a snail's pace snarling all the traffic behind them.  If they happen to notice a spectacular view do they pull over and get out of the car?  No. They slow up even further, roll down the window, and the passenger snaps the picture without even taking her bare feet off the dashboard!  The beautifully air brushed toe nails live to see another day.

I take a different tack.  I race along at 20 miles over the speed limit so that I waste little precious time in the car getting to my next scenic destination.  Plus, by barely slowing down around hairpin turns I am easing congestion and the resulting waste of expensive petroleum that comes from stop and go driving.  One time on Antelope Island in Utah I was practicing this technique when a park ranger happened to be on the very same road.  After a deliberative time period of examining my New Jersey driver's license he proceeded to lecture me about the importance of slowing down to enjoy the scenery "here in Utah".  Apparently he was not familiar with my above mentioned theory but in the interest of not further tainting his opinion of New Jersey drivers I decided to nod in quiet concordance.

Don't get me wrong.  I  love driving on blue highways.  It is being lectured by an officer of the law who doesn't understand the subtlety of  my perspective on life that irritates me.  He has it all wrong.  It is the destination, not the journey, when traveling through life........in a car.

Anniversary of September 11, 2001

These two speeches from the First World Parliament of Religion meeting in 1893 were published in my local newspaper.  When I read items like this I can't help but think of the old adage, "Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it".  If anything should go viral on the web today, I think it is this link:

Speech on religious tolerance

Regards,
Richard