It's Said That The Spirit Is Willing

     

Tucson Weather Today

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A while back I wrote briefly about my inability to understand the concept of spirituality, but it was not much more than a mere statement and not an in depth examination of the subject.

According to Wikipedia, "Social scientists have defined spirituality as the search for the sacred, for that which is set apart from the ordinary and worthy of veneration, a transcendent dimension within human experience, discovered in moments in which the individual questions the meaning of personal existence and attempts to place the self within a broader ontological context."

It is no wonder that I have trouble grasping the meaning of spirituality; I can't even grok the meaning of the above paragraph.

From my point of view, it seems that there are men (and maybe women) who are striving mightily to convince the people of the Earth that there exists an all-knowing and all-powerful being they call God, a magnificent being who created from nothing the entire universe for the purpose of housing a species of biological protoplasm known as Mankind.

And that is called spirituality, the search for the sacred. But the search is over. Man has found God

These teachers, preachers, priests, rabbis and assorted philosophers, these spiritual guides all profess to know this God, know his aims and intentions, know what must be done by His sheep in order to please Him. Many even claim to have seen God in all his glory,  which is strange indeed, because within the pages of The King James bible this very God decrees: "And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live." -- yet the preachers go on living.

Spirituality.

Curious.

Curiouser and curiouser.

Is spirituality related to the term spirit?'

I have read  that a the human spirit is an incorporeal but ubiquitous, non-quantifiable substance or energy present individually in all living things. Unlike the concept of souls (often regarded as eternal and sometimes believed to pre-exist the body) a spirit develops and grows as an integral aspect of a living being. If that be so, then it is the spirit of a human being that searches for the sacred, perhaps searching for something greater than the questing  spirit itself.

Great Caesar's Ghost!

I'm going to give myself a headache if I don't give up this silliness.

I don't really care about it anyway.

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During my morning walk I saw the end of existence for the long-abandoned gas station on the Southwest corner of the intersection at Speedway Boulevard and Pantano Road. After a year or more of sitting empty, the building, the underground fuel storage tanks, and even the tarmac were all yielding to the insistence of bulldozers, and unconditionally surrendered to total demolition.

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TRIVIA

R. L. Stine, the author of the Goosebumps series, has sold more books than any other author, more than 220 million books since 1992, when his first book, Welcome to the Dead House, was published.

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HISTORICAL EVENT

On this day, September 7, 1911, French poet Guillaume Apollinaire was arrested and jailed on suspicion of stealing Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa from the Louvre museum in Paris. The 31-year-old poet was known for his radical views and support for extreme avant-garde art movements.

Apollinaire's mysterious background and radical views led authorities to view him as a dangerous foreigner and prime suspect in the Mona Lisa heist, which took place August 22. No evidence surfaced, and Apollinaire was released after five days. Apollinaire implicated his friend Pablo Picasso, who was also brought in for questioning in the theft of Mona Lisa, but he was also exonerated.

Two years later, a former employee of the Louvre, Vincenzo Perggia, was arrested while trying to sell the famous painting to an art dealer.

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WORD FOR TODAY

praxis [prak'-sihs]
noun
1. Practical application or exercise of a branch of learning.
2. Habitual or established practice; custom.

Praxis is the process by which a theory, lesson, or skill is enacted, practiced, embodied, or realised.

Praxis may also refer to the act of engaging, applying, exercising, realizing, or practicing ideas.

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CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS

Julie Deborah Kavner

(born September 7, 1950)

Julie Kavner is an American film and television actress, comedian and voice artist. Noted for her role as Marge Simpson on the animated television series The Simpsons, she also voices other characters for the show, including Jacqueline Bouvier, and Patty and Selma Bouvier. 

Kavner was cast in her first professional acting role as Brenda Morgenstern in Rhoda in 1974. Following Rhoda, Kavner was cast in The Tracey Ullman Show, which debuted in 1987. The Tracey Ullman Show included a series of animated shorts about a dysfunctional family. Voices were needed for the shorts, so the producers decided to ask Kavner to voice Marge. The shorts would eventually be spun off into The Simpsons.

In 1992, she starred in This Is My Life, her first leading role in a feature film. Kavner has also appeared in live-action roles in seven films written by Woody Allen, and in the Adam Sandler comedy Click.

Michael Emerson

(born September 7, 1954)

Michael Emerson is an American film and television character actor who is perhaps best known for his roles as serial killer William Hinks in The Practice, Benjamin Linus on Lost, and as Harold Finch on the CBS series Person of Interest.

Margaret Ellen "Peggy" Noonan

(born September 7, 1950)

Peggy Noonan is an American author of seven books on politics, religion, and culture, and a weekly columnist for The Wall Street Journal. She was a primary speech writer and Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan and in her political writings is considered a Republican. Five of Noonan's books have been New York Times bestsellers. Noonan is a trustee of the Manhattan Institute.  She was nominated for an Emmy Award for her work on America: A Tribute to Heroes. She has also been widely recognized for her regular appearances on ABC's This Week and NBC's Meet The Press.

Shannon Elizabeth

(born September 7, 1973)

Shannon Elizabeth is an American actress and former fashion model. Elizabeth is well known for her roles in comedy films such as American Pie, Scary Movie and Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back. She is also known for her work in horror films such as Thirteen Ghosts, Cursed, and Night of the Demons. She became widely known as a sex symbol for her role in the 1999 comedy film American Pie.

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It's a kind of spiritual snobbery that makes people think they can be happy without money.
--Albert Camus

NASA TV

This Is Who I Am

   

I Read Somewhere That . . .

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Martin Luther King, Jr.

January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968

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Recently, I read somewhere (don't remember where) the description: "Sister Lynn, who is in her thirties and has a warm, librarian-like voice..." and I thought about this, wondering what a "warm, librarian like voice" sounds like. I tried to recall the voices of the many librarians I've encountered throughout my lifetime, but could not identify a single one of them as being especially 'warm' or in any way similar to all the other librarians' voices I'd heard.

I still don't know what a warm librarian-like voice sounds like. My lack of identification with the adjectives is quite likely due to my often displayed admissions of cultural ignorance.

But, the panegyric must have some validity.

Panegyric
(noun)
A public speech or published text in praise of someone or something.


In an interview with Michael Neilsen I read the following: "We don’t yet have a group da Vinci. We can’t take a thousand people and get something like the Mona Lisa." -- "Oh yeah," I said aloud (even though I was alone at the time) -- and I asked myself, "How can you possibly know that?"

Have a thousand people ever actually come together and conspired to create a potential work of art? If so, even if they failed have there been other attempts by other thousand-member groups to do so? How many? Were there attempts by a sufficient number of such groups to (even statistically) prove that the desired result could not be eventually obtained?

Or is this merely an example of, "Oh, everybody knows that."

And what's so special about the Mona Lisa? Because it is 'Great Art?' Because it's a 'Masterpiece?" simply because someone once declared it to be a Masterpiece of Great Art? and other people took up that opinion and finally enough people agreed with the original evaluation that it became accepted as Truth?

What's my point?

My point is that the statement, "We can't take a thousand people and get something like the Mona Lisa." is a baseless personal opinion.

That's my point.

Mona Lisa

Besides, what's so great about the Mona Lisa, anyway? I've heard and read the popular opinions that have praised, for instance, the mysterious smile of the painted lady.

To me, the praise is overblown. To me, all women at times smile in a mysterious manner. The Mona Lisa does not move me. Never has. I see in it nothing superior to any other image of a seated lady, be they paintings, drawings, or modern photographs.

Just because I have been bombarded all my life with proclamations extolling the greatness of the DaVinci painting does not mean I have to accept it as being so. The Mona Lisa, is nothing special. To me, it is just an old painting of a lady. That's all.

So that makes me an ignorant lout?

Oh yeah? So who's arguing?

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I just want to do God's will.
--Martin Luther King, Jr.

Ramblin' On . . .

To my regret, I foolishly allowed myself to watch one of yesterday's TV News half-hours.

Brian Williams on NBC Nightly News, while reporting on some Hillary Clinton story, described something as being, "...very unique". The word unique means 'one of a kind'. And the educated Mr.Williams surely knows better, knows how stupid it would sound to say, "...very one-of-a-kind".

But, there I go again.

I often chide myself for my penchant for micro-editing. Who am I to find fault with the speech or the writings of others? But I do so constantly.

For example:

When I read an information piece reporting that Vikram Chandra supposedly said (or perhaps wrote), "I think it's very true when you're a writer and you sometimes you have to spend time poking at part of yourself that normal, sane people leave alone."

Something struck a sour note. I didn't at first know what it was. Then I re-read the sentence, and found a mistake in the text: "...and you sometimes you..."

See what I mean? I would be much happier (in blissful ignorance) if I had just let it pass instead of dwelling on some copy editor's negligence.

But... nooooo. Not me. Not Mister Perfection.

. . .

Mike pointed me to a link for an article titled French Scientists Crack Secrets Of Mona Lisa . It is an AP news article that art enthusiasts might like to read.

. . .

During my fitness walk I snapped some pictures. Below are four of them.

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I composed a tentative opening sentence for my novel: While a child Micah Malachi Mitchell secretly consumed earthworms and Box Elder bugs.

The sentence pleases me.

At this moment in time.

Will it eventually evolve?

Who knows?