My Summer Work-cation

Been away from the keyboard lately as life has me performing as a "human doing" rather than Being. Two things on my mind that are worth writing about. One is the unrest in Iran. Protesters being dealt with harshly by the rulers.

As I drove past a "click it or ticket" billboard (you know, the message being if we don't wear our seat belts the nice officer will write us a $200. citation) I thought of the people of Iran who wish to express dissatisfaction with the recent elections. They might be looking at billboards that say: "complain in vain" - years of torture and imprisonment await demonstrators". I'm sure whatever passes for ad agencies would put a cute little public service message together to help remind the masses to tow the line.

And two.

I played a little warm up for a Scientology meeting (of sorts) last weekend. It was just about 15 minutes to build up some energy, and then bang! into the program. Lady singer and I stayed behind to see what it might all be about.

Well, it turned out nothing earth-shaking, it was just a marketing ploy to get the faithful to come to Clearwater Florida to do their "work". I did learn they have a wonderful hotel to stay in, and the best processors on the planet. A long-time friend of mine is there now, he's one of those processors.

Friend and I have always largely agreed on many things, although currently we don't agree on politics. I meant the bigger things: life, the universe and everything. We have trod different paths, but have nonetheless arrived at many of the same conclusions.

FYI, I am not interested in Scientology, I have read a great deal of third-party information that offers a different story from the "church" presentation. I would never give over my judgement to someone else, no matter how much they claimed to be on my side.

The organizations that have done the greatest damage are the same ones that believe they are "saving" the world. No thanks.

Is Your Check Engine Light On?

I was catching up with an acquaintance the other day, in particular, asking about car problems she had been having. Excitedly, she said, "I got the major repairs done, and now for the first time in months, my check engine light is not on!".

Since we were in church, and I so often am inspired in church, I made a mental note:

Good title for sermon: Is your check engine light on?

We all keep lists of words and phrases right? My longest list is "good names for a band".

But back to the check engine light thing.

It's a great code because it says so much while saying so little.

Just like a Check Engine Light (from now on let's say even less: CEL).

What does it mean when when it suddenly comes on? Well, nobody knows, but it's how we react that tells the real tale. Let's face it; it could mean anything from:

We want you to come in to pay us money to Your engine is about to blow up.

If a personal check engine light comes on, what might it be?

Well, I read an interesting article this week on the subject of "What is Health?" http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/28/health/views/28essa.html

Great subject. Used to be when you were sick, you saw a doctor. Now they want you in to test a ton of things to see if they can find something wrong. Is it me or is this like the car? I used to bring in the car for reason:

• it doesn't start


• It doesn't stop


• It make screeching noises
  

You get the idea. Now it goes in when there is nothing actually wrong with it. I think it gets a massage and a manicure.

Here's another odd thing: it works this way with pets too. Oops, I mean animal companions.

Up until recently, my dogs annual medical bills were 6 times higher than my own. AND THEY ARE HEALTHY! Well, so am I.

I say healthy; one has Restless Leg Syndrome. There. I said it. Poor thing, she pretends she's scratching, but she's not fooling anyone. Don't laugh, my last dog died of it. Well, that and heart disease.

What were we talking about? Oh yes, your CEL. (5 points if you remember what that means).

Wouldn't Restless Leg Syndrome be a great name for a band?

Puppies and Kittens

Are Not What This Episode Is About.


In the on-going discussion of health care, death and dieing, I listened to a conservative pundit on the radio ridicule President Obama for saying we needed to think about changing our attitudes (as a culture) toward death. Throwing six-figures of life-prolonging technology and hospital stays at each person during their last year of life, is two things:

1. Not a dignified approach to death.

2. Unsustainable financially.

Let's see, where have I heard that before? Oh yeah . . . here!

I don't know if this Laura Ingram person was speaking for herself or the Conservative Movement in her shrill taunting of the president for bringing up the idea of a search for an alternative to our present approach to death. But it was clear that she and her loved ones were going to use every available means to assure they would continue to wake up in the morning. Or if not wake up, have a machine breath for their comatose bodies.


I'm a bit sensitive to this because in the final year of my mother's life, I had to make decisions like the Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) order. This was when she first went into the nursing home and seemed as normal as anybody (well, for 2-3 minutes). At that time, it seemed she would live another 10 batty years.

Less than a year later her mental condition worsened, and that was enough to lead to a status of her not being really conscious for a several month period. Being immobile in bed created an infected bedsore of hellish proportions, and that was the cause of death.

At one point I had to decide to install a feeding tube since she was no longer eating. After much consideration, I signed off on it. In hindsight, I should have turned it down and moved her to hospice. This wouldn't have been a financial decision, but a moral one.

When death comes calling, our part is to greet it with dignity and courage.

Or leave the driving to someone that really understands what that means.

Gran Torino

NOT!

This Clint Eastwood film was recommended to me by a co-worker, a young man born in another land, living here since late teen-age. If you have seen the movie, you can probably guess why he liked it so much and wanted me to see it.

We all have memories of Clint's film life shooting bad guys, delivering lines that have wedged themselves into the lexicon. The advertising (of his greatest hits) on the DVD reminds you in case you were off the planet the past 30 years or so.

Sometimes the best way to see a film is to know as close to nothing about it as possible. In this case I was eminently qualified. I will not get into nitty-gritty with details, because I want to share the joy of surprise about it.

I will say this for it's themes; "Gran Torino" has:

Sin

Redemption

Salvation

Martyrdom

and a host of other broad, reaching lessons.


BONUS! My main man Jami Cullum sings the theme tune.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoLc43YuuTw

Mr Manners

A wise person once said "deliver criticism verbally, compliments in writing".

As The Green Movement gathers more and more steam (renewable of course), I would like to propose we promote a web-based Social Green Movement of our own; one that

• prohibits the use of name calling


• Encourages encouragement


• promotes speaking your mind in a way that does not diminish others


• Insists you use spell-check
  

Something I enjoy in reading the newspapers online is the comments. Something I hate about the comments is the unbridled language and attitude the posters use in relating to others.

Hey folks, here's my rule of thumb for civilized posting: Pretend you are posting to a loved one.

For you folks who can't relate to that, try this: Pretend you are posting to Mike Tyson with whom you will be sharing a jail cell for the next 3 months.

More Religion According to Cubil

You can always tell when a person has too much time on their hands, their thoughts start going esoteric. This often leads to trouble. Being currently under-employeed, this describes me.

'Woke up with a "This I Believe" thing going on (thanks a lot Amy!). So here we go.

Most of the reader know I have been in the Unitarian Universalist church for all my adult life. You might also know UU's are always defining themselves by what they do not believe. We find this far easier than nailing down a real personal theology. Yet this is what we are called to do.

I'll get the easy part out of the way first.

What I Don't Believe

The Bible is the flawless word of God
You Must Believe in Jesus or go to hell
God wants us to rank our fellow beings
The Earth is ours to conquer and subdue

Wow that list was a lot shorter than I thought it would be.

In case I didn't get my point across, let me say it like this: Mainstream Christian Doctrine is not on my support list. From that, feel free to assume the various wing-nuts that off-shoot the mainstream are also not on my support list.


Many people have a strong aversion to the concept of church or religion feel as I do, and wonder how people like myself continue to attend and support a church. I've spent many a decade wrestling with that same question.

What I Do Believe

We all are born with a mountain to climb
There are many paths up the mountain
The great religious concepts are timeless and of value

Churchy Terms

Here are some terms that run off many a non-believer. I've made friends with them by enlarging the context. You can also plug in your own substitute words to play in your head when you hear them. I believe as humans we are born seeking validation, and are in a struggle to find and be our true authentic selves.

Salvation - liberation from ignorance or illusion.
Redemption - The act that earns freedom
Prayer - To focus on a person, place or thing
Holy - A moment, a place, a person occupying a mindful reverence
God - A power greater than our own
I am not interested in creating a glossary here, there is a great one at http://www.religioustolerance.org/
Feel free to throw your nickel-ninetyeight in comments. Love me, hate me, but don't ignore me!

My Personal Theology

This thought has been banging around in my head for a while now, I've been wondering when it would complete itself where I could take a good look at it. Sometimes these things take their time.

It's a sort of unifying theory about God that explains all the contradictions, and oddities surrounding this timeless Superstar. Instead of going into a series of unrelated stories (as you have become accustom), I'll get right to it:

God is a job.

All this misconception about there being a supreme being or 3 supreme beings (what IS Diana Ross doing these days?) or whatever, are all right, and all wrong.

This explains the weird behavior in so much of the old scripture; God flying off the handle smiting whole races regarding multi-cultural ism, God sending an angel to beat up people, playing favorites, etc. That was just the guy who had the gig back then. I suspect he eventually reincarnated into Tony Soprano.

We've always known this, but somehow missed it.

Like when you start getting too bossy? And your friend says "who died and made you God?"

Although I have been a member of the Unitarian Church all my life, I am ready to accept the Trinity now. I see it as an improvement to turn the God gig into an intergenerational committee. Hopefully if they get a hothead in the chair, the other two can calm him/her down some.

The Pagans are probably on the right track, a whole bureaucracy of gods. This appeals because then we wouldn't have to be concerned about having one God so powerful that we couldn't afford for her to fail.

Even the Obama administration couldn't bail out that problem.