- Corner Lounging. Police picked us up more times than I can remember simply for hanging out and making a little too much noise, perhaps, with a little too much profanity.
- I didn’t. Use profanity. Not much. And when I did, I think it meant something. Not like today, when the “F” word is bantered around too freely. And way too often. And, that’s in so-called “polite society.”
Monthly Archives: August 2010
Radio Plays to My No. 1 Heart’s Desire
Music touched an emotional chord in me that may have been different from most folks.
Abraham, Martin & John Live On Within
Rain pours on me outside, while soft music warms me on the inside. “Abraham, Martin, and John,” the song, plays from this relatively new gadget called a portable, hand-held, transistor radio.
Guest Post’s Embarrassing Announcement
What’s the difference between Shame and Embarrassment? Are they joined at the hip? Like twins?
The shame of it all starts an upward ascent
Be careful what you wish for. You could get your heart’s desire and wish you had never asked for it in the first place.
Love Streams in All Good Consciousness
College Life repeats itself each generation
Sat next to a long hair, skinny, “Hippie” guy at an orientation in a community college yesterday, and felt thrown back to a time years ago, sitting cross-legged on the floor across from a similar fellow wondering what the hell I was doing there.
Attract Them to a Higher Calling in Life
St. Michael strikes and heals all at once
I felt like Alice falling in the hole after chasing a White Rabbit. But, falling “upwards” defying the laws of Gravity and Rational Sense.
Act of Contrition Helps Regain My Purity
Got Blanket Absolution yesterday. And, it felt so good, I became a 12-year-old again. Ready to face the world with a clear conscious and a pure heart.
I See You for the Very First Time, Don’t I?
I see You more and more each day. All I need do, is look for You. Kinda scrunch up my mind a bit, squint, and let my Self go.
Try to “feel” You. And I do! All Blessed You. In just the right amount to fill a soul that wishes it were bigger, larger to contain more and more of Your Love that’s omnipresent, all around me. And in me.
I ‘intend’ nothing but positive bestowals
How do you explain “unexplainable” events?
Willie, 20 years later, I still mourn you
Although you “passed on” after your 17th birthday, you’ll remain alive for me forever. I see you in my dreams. I “feel” your presence as I walk with you, watch you, and hear the footsteps on the steps leading from the dining room to the bedroom upstairs.
Suffocate? Let go of control & open up self
Grace suffocated and I retaliated by smashing my ego to help free up her passageway during group meditation this morning.
Pain endures from struggles in a ‘Back’ Life
The pain feels like someone thrust a spear in my back. That I was in battle. At the city of Troy. Fighting with fellow Greeks for the foolish prize of a minor King’s run-a-way, but lovely, wife, Helen. She with a face that will launch a thousand ships.
Hawk carries HSPs to their highest ideals
The hawk glides across the sky, soaring high above us as the first person to notice shouts, “there’s one.” Like children, we stare toward the heavens, at the beautiful blue sky. A normally humid August has graced us with a mild and glorious summer day, blending light breezes and the scent of flowers that drift our way from below the wooden platform we look out from.
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School boss drives Vietnam veteran nuts
Felt I was back in war maneuvering through a mine field called the new educational system yesterday.
Continue readingUnexplained ‘Pull’ leading me back Home
A gentle “pull” manifested in my Life recently. I noticed it last night while driving and wanted no more than to live in each passing moment.
‘I confess!’ I cut school with Franny O
I’m going to confess. I played hooky in seventh grade and refused to “squeal” on the kid I stayed out of class with that day.
Nature Provides Bird’s Eye View of Living
There’s a true “pecking order” that’s developing in my back yard. And all I have to do is be patient and watch it unfold moment by moment.
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Kabbalah ‘Receiving’ Helps Me in ‘Giving’
You can’t make promotions your life’s goal
You can keep the promotion. Wouldn’t take it, even if offered. Not if I have to make “achievements” my aim, to set a new “goal” in Life.
“Start Over’ the instant you feel a need to
Start over. That’s all I gotta do . . . Say it to myself and simply “START OVER!”
Lying in bed with one crazy, mixed up thought after another, I told myself to “start over.” Did not know what I meant. But I did mean it.
Angels Appear as Earthly Messengers
(This story was created in October 2009 but not published in its entirety until now.)
It’s just like heaven . . . Being here with you . . . You’re like an Angel. Too good to be true. When You are near me. My heart skips a beat. I can hardly stand on. My own two feet. Because I Love You; I Love You, I Do. ‘Angel Baby’. My ‘Angel Baby’. Oh, Ooh, I Love You, Oh, Ooh, I Do . . . No One Could Love You . . . Like I Do!
Union Activity Draws This Reporter Away
(Originally Cont’d Oct. 3, 2009, Angels Part V, Angels Appear as Earthly Messengers)
Career Paths Change Here and There
I also got involved with the Newspaper Guild and our local at the newspaper level. I took part in union negotiations, usually being one of the lone holdouts to ensure that some clerk or underpaid dispatcher could get a few extra dollars in their paycheck. I enjoyed the give and take and the high drama that developed at contract time. Will there be a strike? How much is the company willing to contribute to the pension? Will there be “givebacks” this time? How secure will I be with a new contract?
College Major Guided By a Little Mistake
(Originally Cont’d Oct. 3, 2009, as Angels Part IV, Angels Appear as Earthly Messengers)
What happened in the Vietnam War is another story, but my next Angel appeared as a burly Scottish neighbor of my parents, who had moved from the inner city of Philadelphia to one of its suburbs, Wayne, Pa. “What will you major in at college, Laddy?” the neighbor asked when I visited my folks advising them that I would be using their address to attend the Delaware County Community College. (I lived outside the county and would have had to pay double the amount if I didn’t fudge the location of my domicile.)
Shared My Music with a Younger Group
(Originally Cont’d from Oct. 3, 2009, as Angels Part III, Angels Appear as Earthly Messengers)
‘Oldies‘ Pave Way for My Singing Rock Group
That’s when I started to recruit guys my age, none of whom had been exposed to the Black neighborhoods where Jackie and I met others to sing. I introduced them to “oldies” they had never heard of, particularly from their mostly Lilly White AM Radio Stations like WIBG or WIP.
I was raised on WDAS with “Georgie Woods, the man with the Goods,” and Jocko Henderson, who played what, I later learned, was “race‘ music in the industry. Well, it was this “race” music that was crossing over from Blacks to Whites that caused Rock & Roll to skyrocket and carve a musical niche for teenagers where there was none before.
Billy Kane, and Carl Disler — both friends from more White neighborhoods — got into the music as I met up with the most talented of our future group, Joe Cleary, who would later go on to make records and appear at music shows. But it was the legacy of Jackie Toy that helped to bring this group together, a group that would eventually perform on television and be offered a minor record contract.
Jackie Toy touched me with the music and helped to direct me into a full appreciation of not only music but the cross-racial harmony we found with our Black friends, those who would sing their hearts out to passersby near old Columbia Avenue or at 29th and Girard. That appreciation of each other had broadened into other fields and has survived a lifetime, and I thank Jackie Toy for “being there” and helping me cross the color line.
Thanks for Being One of My Angels Jack
The whirlwind created through my meditation blew from one angel to another in my life. Next came my brother George, forced to join the army when caught burglarizing the Big Moose Bar in North Philly and carting away several cases of beer and soda. The blind lawyer retained by my father pleaded with an assistant district attorney and got a judge to render an alternative sentence: either join the army or go to jail. George went straight… to boot camp.
My brother, the high school dropout, ended up making a career in the army, obtaining his GED, and a full Army scholarship to complete college, and then he earned a master’s degree shortly before his retirement following 20 years of service.
But it was in 1968, shortly after the “Summer of Love,” that brother George donned his wings and an angelic ally whispered into my ears: “Go to OCS.”
Brother George Guided Me in the Military
OCS? What the hell is that I wondered. Officers Candidate School. A six-month program that groomed young men to be leaders of soldiers in battle. I was 19 at the time. No college, having barely gotten through trade school — Dobbins Tech — learning the printers’ trade. No background in athletics, hunting, or even one of the advanced levels of the Boy Scouts of America.
Yet, he helped direct me to the military school, where I became the second youngest to graduate in my class and found myself leading a combat infantry platoon in the Vietnam War shortly afterward. Thanks a lot, brother!
See Part IV at Angels 4
(See Beginning at: Angels Appear as Earthly Messengers)
Plato’s Alegory Calls to Me in the War Zone
Opening to Philosophy in a Bombed-Out Bunker
(Originally Cont’d Oct. 3, 2009, as Angels Part VII, Angels Appear as Earthly Messengers)
In a few days, my subconscious worked over my dream of Socrates. I can remember and once again say the name of the second gentleman as none other than Plato, the Greek teacher who dealt with reality, with the spirit, and with life beyond what our senses simply pick up.
Criminal Attorney Practice Calls Out to Me
Originally Cont’d Oct. 3, 2009, as Angels Part VI, Angels Appear as Earthly Messengers)
Experience Begins in the Courtroom
But by then, I had my first taste of courtroom advocacy and man did I become energized! Trial work involved cross-examination, closing arguments, and the ability to “argue” in front of a captive audience. Paul Messing, my advocacy instructor, became my next Angel when he directed me into becoming a “litigator,” presenting me with the award of “Barrister” for the best advocate and providing an “in” for an interview with the Philadelphia Defender Association, which had just been named the best in the country.
Angel Helps Me to Harmonize in a Group
Angels II (Originally continued on Oct.3, 2009, from Angels, Appear as Earthly Messengers)
Being In the Moment is Healthy for Everyone
I had suffered from a cold when I closed my eyes and settled into my seat for meditation. I was hurting and aching from the illness, perhaps even having a slight fever, when I rapidly descended into a deep zone. My thoughts came to a stop, my shoulders, neck, and other parts of a tense body grew limp and thoroughly relaxed. I slowly felt the mind and the body joining in a “slow down,” where I would find that state of nothingness that allows me to simply Be in The Moment.
Concealing & finding Self –a life-long effort
Hello! Anybody here? It sure is dark inside. Like a huge cavern with hardly any light.
Falling in love with the Love of Your Life
Fell head over heels in love the past few weeks. Didn’t want to do it. Had always gotten “hurt” in relationships, knowing from the start they’d come to an end one day. Love seemed to change that way. To peter out. End not with a “bang,” but with a “whimper.”
Nysiros holds secrets of life and death
I’ll never know what drove Anthoula to take her own life.
Angels re-enter when you’re open to ’em
I started seeing angels again. No, hold off on the straight jacket, don’t reserve a room at an asylum. I’m not totally crazy. Yet.
‘Open your eyes’ to journey of Lifetime
The snake slithered along the bed of the forest, winding its way beneath a pine tree. Climbing upwards, it twirled around the trunk, moving ever so slowly, centimeter after centimeter, as it sought the “higher ground” where it could shimmy onto a tree branch and make its way closer to my eye level.
My ‘Power Animal’ from the Spirit World was a Snake
There it was. My “power animal.” The one I entered the spirit realm to discover more of myself and my so-called guide. I didn’t care for him. He was a snake, for Christ’s sake. Tempter of Eve, manipulator of all manipulators, who was commanded by God Himself to forever crawl on his belly because of his part in getting two human beings ejected from Eden. What’s there to like about one of his kind?
But then the snake took on a different form. Still a reptile, it wound its body around a staff-like pole. You know, the one that doctors have as a symbol to help all persons in need of care. It might be called a “Rod of Asclepius,” or a “Caduceus.”
The snake worked its charm on me. Felt more comfortable with him, knowing he would assist in bringing comfort to others through what Buddhists ask all to do with “loving kindness and compassion.”
On a Shamanic Journey to the Lower World
The next thing I know, I was transported to the Middle Ages with trumpets blaring and banners of all colors flowing in the wind. Oh, I forgot to mention. I was on a Shamanic journey. Five of us Highly Sensitive Persons (HSPs) from the Philadelphia area got together on Friday for a trip led by a woman who was herself a Shaman in a previous life. She brought shakers to shake, sage to burn, and gave us papers to write our thoughts immediately upon coming out of our journey into the “Lower World.” Shamans tell us there are three worlds one can visit: the lower, the upper, and, I think, the middle, or the present, where one can kinda transport his or her spirit on our real-time plane.
After our “space” was cleared of any bad spirits with the burning of the sage, we were instructed to visualize a hole in the trunk of a tree. It’s better if you can focus on a real one, which I did, having read a book and being on the lookout for such an “entry door.” Had no idea the trunk in a tree I saw on Butler Pike between Ambler and Conshohocken, PA, was going to play such a prominent role.
Couldn’t get into it. The visualization trick, not the tree. Well, actually, the tree, also. Never did anything like this. Could not see the texture of a wall I was asked to look at. Damn. Couldn’t even see a wall. But I didn’t quit, and just as I “let go” I found myself coming out of a long tunnel, and “seeing‘ the exit hole behind me. Looked like a Hobbit hole, but one big enough for two or three guys to walk through abreast.
Trees Awaken a Mystical Feeling About the Snake
Backing up, I saw a forest with lots of greenery. So many trees, I felt I was outside the Land of OZ, where you’d expect trees to start talking to you and throwing red apples your way. Brown pine cones covered the ground beneath a tree. I could smell the richness of grass and the pine as if dew had just settled.
That’s when I saw movement. A slithering on the ground, which I paid no attention to at first, until I looked up and saw the snake twirling itself around a branch, awaiting my undivided attention. This was my power animal, the one that will guide me in the lower world? But, I don’t like snakes! Don’t think they like me, either.
———-
Didn’t have time to anguish over the partnership. We were paired up, and I felt the snake open up a valley where troubadours sang and minstrels played harps and other musical instruments. Music sounded from everywhere, behind every bush, tree, and small stream in this spacious land of my mind. Soon, ladies and their lords rode by me on some of the strongest and largest horses I had ever seen! All covered with colorful clothes; some with matching headgear. These were the horses I’m talking about. You can just imagine what the lords and ladies were decked out in.
Saw the King Gesturing that All Was Well!
And there came the king. Riding alone while raising his hand in a kingly gesture to assure his subjects that all was well in the land he ruled. But he wasn’t really a king. More like a Prince John from the days of Robin Hood. He was a usurper, one who tried to capture the crown while his brother, Richard the Lion-Hearted, was held prisoner in some Moorish jail near Jerusalem and the site of the latest crusade.
I became a doctor to the prince. An Advisor. One who could ride alongside this man, of whom I was wary and could not trust. We talked. I planted an idea in his mind. Suggested that what he was presenting to the people was not for their good. That there was a better way for all to live. That he needed to “open his eyes” to see it. I knew the path he should take, but for the rest of humanity to follow, the one in power must realize this Truth himself. He must see reality without the blinders imposed by the make-believe world.
“Come back,” I heard a voice call gently. “Return to the tunnel.” It was our Shaman recalling us to our world. I found the entrance and zipped right through, remembering subconsciously to “bring back” the rod or staff the snake had changed into. All was part of a dream, the creation of, perhaps, an imaginative mind. But, I am using that staff right now to bring you this tale for all to remember to “open your eyes.” There is another reality to live in and with.
Contoveros 