Adventure 782: Day 5/Tucson/2023

Perception, or the ability to see, hear, and feel a thing through the senses, controls our view of life. Even a little change can make a difference. For example, take a copper spittoon. The very thought of slathering brown spittle dripping down the inside of the spittoon evinces disgust. It's only a little better if the copper is turned into a garbage can. There is no luster because even the shiniest garbage can is still a vehicle for refuse. But if that copper is turned into a fine piece of jewelry and placed around the neck or on the arm of some beautiful person, it's easy to see the worth of the copper. Better yet, turn the copper into all the pennies ever minted. It's easy to imagine great value. So what determines perception? Why is it that I see something one way, but another sees the same thing differently? Whose version is correct? Whose version has value? Whose version is just brown spittle, and whose is a glittering pendant slung around a beautiful neck? I think the answer to this paradox is that all views exist in time, and value is a construct we attach to help us cope. In ten days on her birthday, my first wife, Annie, had she lived, would have been 72. She is very much in my thoughts, and my memories are like burnished copper. When I remember the day she died, her lifeless eyes rolled back, heaving on our bed in mechanical staccato breaths, I perceive pain. I suffer the immediacy of that moment overwhelming me like a large wave swallowing a surfer near the shore. On the other hand, when I remember seeing her walking down the stairs in her senior prom dress, a lock of jet black hair gently caressing her forehead, I perceive a tingle I can only call love. So many opposing perceptions fill my mind, I often ask, "What should I feel?" Should I try to suppress the pain? Should I try and elevate the joys? The flat fact is that I'm unable to control either. In reality, both perceptions require acceptance. Simply put, I mustn't grasp for past joys, or recoil from past pain. Rather, I must accept each as it comes. If and when I do that, life becomes good, especially today.

Liberating the mind means accepting whatever comes.

That existence is joy is also true.

One of the signs on my classroom wall read: Pay attention. Everything matters.

 

Life must be treated with equanimity because the whole thing could blow up at any moment. 

Art shot of the day: Lady in suppose.

Selfie of the day: The joy of connection. That's me on the right-the luckiest guy on the planet.