this is not

the post I started to write, this one is better..even I couldn't bear the weight of the last one. There are some things turning around in my head that have to do with the idea of "legacy" that I just haven't quite...chewed on enough yet to be able to speak with my mouth full, you know?


and then I got distracted by a series of encounters with the...ill-informed...on a number of levels and areas  - from a book-publishing-professor-pundit who is quoting statistics that are no longer true (and haven't been for 10 years) yet is the go-to person to create policy on a certain issue to brand new faces with awe at discoveries about the realities of the world that have been very well known to just about any one with a TV for the past 20, to conversations with people I admire that admit to moments of weakness of loss of hope and belief that people will be willing to ever leave the comfort of illusion.


Add turkey and antipasta and pour several cups of coffee on that and I have spent the day in deep contemplation...and worry, honestly, worry that something I was trying to do would not work out and I have held on through the worry all day and just got the phone call that released it all into the air.


Often we are so quick to try and "disprove" any worry that we never allow ourselves to sit with it and not just look at whether or not it is realistic, but how even unrealistic worry can effect our lives.


Until you understand and can recognize how fear and worry effects you, you can't really make lasting changes. You'll be fine for a bit and then back in the same place again. The "fix-it" culture is so geared to trying to immediately change something that we don't get a chance to know its depth and from there, make choices that truly will create a change.


I remember the absolute shock, horror and battles I had when I was diagnosed with cancer and the immediate suggested treatment was to wait for several months. To first begin with some subtle life changes and gauge what my body did rather then rush to surgery et al, and how that was so unacceptable to people and difficult for me as well, because although I understood all the explanation about it - I had to live with the fear for two months. Easier to find out something is very wrong and just schedule a "fix-it" appointment or a pattern of curative treatments, but not altogether realistic when you realize you don't know the extent of what is wrong. And you never really have to sit in that mortal fear and have it revealed to you how deeply your life is effected by it.


Fear, worry and even anger have a way of protecting us for they reveal what it is that is important to us, if we take the time to understand them and do not immediately banish their presence from our emotional beings. But the majority of neuroses are derived from these three states being the most disallowed emotions, so we create ways to express them that are not healthy.


On a side note, I found it funny/sad the "news" about second hand smoke causing 600,000 deaths globally a year. I expect that will start a whole new wave of emphasis on not-smoking etc and so forth. Which is good and right, but in the face that there is a product that is a registered carcinogen that is the cause of or leading contributor to a much higher percent of all mortality that is just...ignored, kind of makes me less then a banner waver for all that. I get tired sometimes of the market trends in responsibility. After all, no one really seems that interested in addressing the fact that alcohol is a recognized carcinogenand is the direct cause of, or contributor to, over 4% of all global deaths per year. Funny to think that even one of the world's major faiths is centered and revolves around a ceremony involving a glass of wine. But I digress.


I am moving deeper into "the city of love" and it is...revealing. Although I know the story and the meaning, as I begin to get to know the actual characters and their language, there are moments I catch myself off guard and realize that I have so much more to learn in life.I keep going back to the sub poems I wrote for its development, where I explored certain characters and themes but by themselves and am slowly bringing them into the fullness of relating to each other. I write and then I wander for hours, somehow I am also getting my work done.


I have also begun to circle the new video again. I have a few things that I know I have to take care of first but it should be out by the new year. I think you will find it, something slightly different in some ways, and yet connected to the whole.


c.2010 Cassandra Tribe. All Rights Reserved.