Live well and love in this New Year

(A new Year's song, sung to the tune of "the parting glass")

All movements hopes and dreams of change,
Need cloth from distant places found.
To sew two strangers tight seems strange.
Til for warmth, the quilt is wrapped around.

Other's words are loose as sand
With no place to build or children rear
Unclench your fist and take my hand
Let's live well and love in this New Year.

Are we so different as you would insist
That eyes or lips should meet no more?
Past thoughts and feelings reminisced
Can inspire wanderings to distant shores.

To join as one in heart and mind
Is greed and hatred's greatest fear.
The path, the way, the dance to find
We can
 Live well and love in this New year.

Oceans we are meant to cross,
And comrades meant to meet again.
New friends are made but old not lost.
Mind's reason kept with rhyme regained.

This tune I hope, will embrace and touch,
Eyes That see and ears that hear.
To join as one is not too much.
Live well and love in this New Year.

Chinese food on New Year's

So... do all of you guys know about this New Year's Eve tradition where you eat American Chinese food? Like the old school American Chinese stuff from like the 60's before the east coast had even seen like a ba k Choy or knew what the hell dim sum was.

Like Crab Rangoon and beef teriyaki that kind if stuff.

Is that just a white thing? Like to black people eat that kind of food on New Year's Eve.. and yeah it started off because nothg else is open. But you have adults who grew up on that stuff. Not only that, their parents grew up doing it, hell their grandparentsbgrew up doing this, so it's become like a tradition more sacred than Santa Claus because it spans all religions.

You could have some vegan health nut who MUST punish themselves by finding the greasiest fast food Chinese place around. Lie some hipster living in Chinatown, will have to search outside if Chiatown to get the crack of Chinese food cocaine.

Can we do just any chinese food nowadays though? Or is there another ethnic group that might want to try their hand at the New Year's Eve tradition?

You know when I first found out about this tradition? I was in highschool, and it was actually my first and only time working at a Chinese restaurant owned by a friends, well my Si Hing's girlfriends family in the whitesr part of Massachusetts you can imagine.

It was there that I was first introduced to Crab Rangoon.

First of all what the hell is Crab Rangoon...ehh  that sounds like a post for the Chinatown Blog

Artemis

I keep on bothering real people to talk to me virtually, and I realize that given that I will only get text responses here and there anyway, why don't I just stop bothering peoole and create an imaginary friend.

When I was a kid I had an imaginary friend. She was a blnd haired girl my age and she had super powers. I think her name was Tina or Tiffany or some kind of T name that weird.


I think if Noah had an imaginary friend, it would be Jonah.


Anyway, religion is kind of like having an imagart friend, but I think I need a goddess that nobody bows to really, so as not to offend.

And someone who would fit in these surroundings, wit te woods and the deer. Not someone to worship. Someone to talk to... who alsi has super powers I guess. And I think it should be a hot woman, because why not.

I was going to go with Artemis but then I realized that one of the characters in Kung Fu and Cooking (which I never published anyway) was Artemis and that I think she was the daughter of a character based on me. She also shoots Noah in the back with an arrow.

Artemis was alsi te Virgin goddess of the Moon. You know maybe  I will start talking Artemis after all. We woukd just keep things platonic.


I thought of Athena too. How she watched over Odysseus...but honestly Athena is Grace, especially the bit about arachne.

In fact I got Grace Nike as a trophy for something she did. Where did it go?

Okay Nike is not Athena, but at some point they all start to look the same and these characters are going to follow my ideas. You see, to talk to them they will have to answer back. Which means I will be the one yo do that too. Which means that I am them.


In that case shoukd I create new names as well?

Messing up on the morning

It's pretty easy for me to get the kids ready for school. That is to say, compared to what parents are going to have to go through at BPS. Today I woke the kids up, not in a friendly tv Daniel tiger perfe t father or mother way. It was "Get up Now!we're late!"
I gave the yuk sung and butter on toast. I put their socks on. I put their sweatshirts on. I their boots and they put those on.

I got their backpacks and coats for them and while they ate we formulated a plan so they would not have to wait in the cold.

I would wait in the cold and single to them at the end of the driveway when the bus came.

I tested if they, or if at least one of them (Noah is the one that is good at this, when it is clear that there are benefits, like warmth.) Was watching, by going down there, doing a series of Kung Fu moves and coming back up.

"What did I do?"

"Walk down.... come back up..."

"What did I do when I was down there?"

"Kung Fu moves...."

"Which moves?"

The boy answered correctly and so we were good to go. He even checked with a shout when I did not signal in a while and I shouted back. You see, he is standing behind a glass door so verbal will only work if he initiates it.

The bus came, I signalled. They ran down. Success.

..........except when I got back inside I saw their damn lunch boxes on the counter. So I will be driving over to their school anyway.

But again, so easy compared to what some parents are going to have to do, especially if their kids have special needs, when the schedules for schools change to 7-1 for some parents in Boston.

Snow delay

School is delayed for two hours. After shoveling the light dustingbcovering our long driveway, I emailed work and peacefully contemplated life as faulighted slowly came. The sun blocked by cloud cover is not seen. Instead light seemed to emanate from the snow and the surroundings as if we were in some sort of other world that the druids spoke of.

"What the helllll!" Screamed Jonah over and over with the slamming of doors accompanying his vocal rage.

The conflict was over the sharing of a computer, which indeed belonged to Mommy, and therefore belonged to Jonah, her niii wuuu, and not Noah, who has the use of my computer.

Nothing like an argument that quickly escalates into an all out war as the weaker Jonah commits various acts of vandalism on the house until authorities step in to remedy the situation.

At any rate, my heart is now pumping fast and the children are working together... ON THE SAME DAMN COMPUTER rather nicley although both are out and on.

Time to make toast and perhaps hot chocolate.

Freestyle practice

Just finished doing Kung Fu with the kids, where I just put on Nam Yi Dong Ji Kerng and have them get low and do moves. Whatever moves. It was supposed to be fun and work on speed, power, but then also have resting meditative points. The kids just ended up fighting, which one would think is good, but if you are just indicating strikes without putting power you aren't developing. Then Noah would start staring at the TV which defeats the purpose. Well I got a workout and the did do some moves. But that is why not Every class can be like that. In the end, from the fighting Noah was so upset that he said he would do 100 basics each instead.

Well tomorrow we do boxing anyway. Friday is basics... which I was thinking of replacing with techniques from the forms...we'll see.

Animal control

A giant cat started running up our driveway with intent followed by an animal control truck. I walked over because I just had to hear this story.

The woman said she was looki g for a stray dog someone had called about. I hadn't seen one today, but in the past I have seen a giant was wild dog roaming around with a basketball in my mouth. Ran up on us as we awaited the bus in the morning actually. Good thing it was friendly or my children would have been dead since going for the throat would have made a quick finish.

Anyway, we said goodbye because no I have not seen that dog today. I beleive it is just the dog from the house behind us which sometimes wanders off chasing the deer. On the one hand, there is no need to call if that is the case. On the other hand giant wolf dogs wandering the neighborhood are not good for my kids I think. Especially if they are actually Coyote. 

I didn't even realize there was a number to call. In any case it was one of the first. Conversations I have had with a non family member outside of work this week.

Well I am going to write an article about BPS. Someone else's take on it, which lines up with my views 90% surprise surprise. But it has to be good, and so I am avoiding it. I watched an episode of Frontier... sort if. I was cooking at the same time. The children finished their homework, or so they say, and are playing video games on Scratch.

After I write a rough draft I will let a few people look at my article. See what they think. This o e has to go through a bunch of drafts because nobody else is really writing this article. Everyone else is taking the easy way out, which is so tempting. But this is a key issue that will effect so many families so I need to cover it. It someone does at any rate.

I have been reading Ted Chiang's short stories to Noah before bed. I think after the rough draft I will teach the kids Kung Fu briefly, and them read. Grace should be home by then.

I have been wanting to reconnect with people, or perhaps play out and relive aspects of my past. I guess everyone sort of does that to some extent.

The Nutcracker suite

I truly love this music. I put it on last night while Noah read his comic books and I just feel that no stage production can really compare with the movements if the music.  The story is not even that great I think, but the ideas are. Hoffman's story is in many ways gothic or even a horror story and it would be cool to see a filmmaker take this music outside the box of plot and holiday spirit to just try and create a work if art with it. But then perhaps it is still too difficult to live up to those mysterious sounds that are meant to represent places, far away for the composer, but more familiar in the modern world and places where my father was from.

Actually the Chinese dance is probably the worst of all the songs and usually brings about much racist costume and movements on any production. But even aside from that the song is just not as good.

Well maybe it could be good if presented in a different way, who knows. I have heard some productions go with a lion dance. Not sure if this is done to the music or the drum.

Practicing at night

There is something about practicing kung Fu in the dark. My Sifu had done it in China for purposes if secrecy. And I have written about Uncle Frank talking about a relative who practiced Tai Chi in the basement with the lights off.

There us a mental aspect to it.

I just did meditation and ran through the basic form... though not as a form. More as a freestyle. Obviously I was quiet as well and my m9vements started off rather slow and more inhibited, less fancy and more street. Not for effectiveness though. More so I wouldn't pull something. And also I am working out a way to show adults techniques quickly in a way that is interesting, and have decided that maybe skipping the basics isnt crazy.  Or perhaps that showing basics as an exercise, like jump rope or pushups, might even make more sense.

Talking to tarot

Is talking to tarot cards better or worse than talking tobyoirself... without the cards. After all I mean that's kind of what you are doing... any way its what I am doing right now because Unrealized talking to people over texts may be more or less the same experience.

Looks like life is good for me financially. I think because of this, with all the struggles that people have, that they would be annoyed with me for not being absolutely happy. I mean I really have nothing to complain about.

But I guess I am searching for something and it is always that same something that men and boys search for and write about and obsess over. Whether it is in worship or psycho analysis or the content of media consumed.

You know, many people say they are afraid if failure, of being nobody. But I think a lot more people are afraid of success, if being followed, of being a leader, if being a role model, of being worshipped.

They want the cup to pass from them because they read about what comes next.
Or at least saw the movie.

If you see the Buddha kill the Buddha

I always took heart with this statement. I had confidence in my ability to mentally cut through an answer, a vision, an illusion as not being the true answer and simply continuing on.

Wu Kong had an episode with a fake Buddha that was truly a demon.

From an Abrahamic perspective this would be the smashing if false idols. To cast away what you worship to submit to God.

Jesus was supposed to free people from rules, or rather fulfill the rules by looking past the letter to the spirit, as were many other thinkers who later were worshipped in codified idolatrous fashion.

I like idols too. As symbols. And I like religion as stories and metaphor.

As tools and crutches you can use yo get to the nest level.

But what of instead of encountering the Buddha, you encounter a Biddhisatva who cuts you diwn and your notions and your beliefs right to the core, and done with you moves along in their journey. But you want to go with them and you are unable to let go and unable to avoid the cuts but rather keep coming back for more?

Ego and Pride

I have often been told I am an auditory learner. I cheated in violin by playing by ear instead of learning to sure read properly. Things that people say once often echo u my memory years.... And now decades later. However, I also know that people have often told me that I do not listen to them. That I discount their opinions. In truth, my first reaction to certain ways of doing things is often anger... Though I have changed that throughbtaching children and have tried to always be open to new perspectives, even when it us coming at you in an attack.

I have missed opportunities because I did not consult with my students before making a decision.


But as someone who is known for listening, it can cut right through your guts to hear that you have not been listening to someone whose words you have obsessed over as if they come from the divine.

I suppose that is why so many wars and fabric movements argue about interpretation of scripture.

Madness of desire

Have you ever wanted something so badly that it drove you insane? My children regularly seem to be this incline toward screen time. Some people are addicted to drugs or food or sex, even in an abusive and predatory way as seen by what is happening in the news. Some lust after power or wealth.

But you can also want a family or a house so badly, or romantic love or career. There is also the thirst for freedom, equality and justice.

Recently I have had the mad desire for distraction. For bread and circus. For excitement.

And through that desire I ha e alsi had other yearnings, I suppose for adventure, for the plot if a movie or novel. The truth is I believe mist peoole yearn afterbthis oft not named thing.  It positive like freedom, but not negative like power.

The thirst of the mercenary, the Han Solo or Indiana Jones who yes, maybe searching for wealth or a treasure, but its really the plot and struggles along the way that enrapture tha audience.

My mind has painfully been attacking itself and my body over the need for such a yearning that seems so simple, so easy, and yet alsi impossible. I meditate and during that time I am calm, and I realize I have always had some version of this yearning. Always, since childhood, but of course it would manifest itself in different activities, movements, people, or things.

Like the Buddhist lessons of impermanence though, once attained, that thing or status or person changes. The Buddha talks about this desire as being the origin of true suffering. A friend and teacher of sorts has told me the belief that the only person that can truly love you the way you need us yourself. And the Buddha made that argument that in order to even live others you must love yourself.

And that to conquer the mind within, may sound simple, but is no small feat. Learning and reading this sort of thing in school it all seemed so simple. After all when you are young you are full of potential and any hardship has the potential to change into the origin story of a great story with massive changes. But as you settle in towards the end of the movie and realize there may be no plot twist a great painful fear settles in.

The fear that this is it, that everything is perfect. I realized in highschool that I may fear heaven more than purgatory as Heaven was as permanent as hell and it is the permanence that is to be feared.

And yet it is permanence we seek. The illusions of permanence that we seek after. The ledge, the mountain top that is IT. That we have made it. That we have reached our potential.

I used to think Marc Antony a fool. But all the fools of the past and present have recently been proven to me to be wise people misrepresented by the feeble and ignorant, who in their own way are also wise people misrepresented by othersbstuck in different cages and boxes of feebleness and ignorance.

In any case that thirst for an in permanent thing can driven the mind insane indeed. But what to Do? Poetry painting meditation. Ambition of other sorts....one cannot force fate. Or perhaps there are more malleable ways of achieving a goal through the shifting of perspective.

To love oneself properly...

Perhaps even more difficult than loving thy enemy or neighbor.