{"id":20768,"date":"2018-12-07T06:43:31","date_gmt":"2018-12-07T11:43:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=20768"},"modified":"2018-12-07T06:43:31","modified_gmt":"2018-12-07T11:43:31","slug":"filling-a-life-isnt-the-half-of-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2018\/12\/filling-a-life-isnt-the-half-of-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Filling a Life Isn’t the Half of It"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Image:<\/a><\/p>\n

[Image: “Judy’s Husband’s Stuffed Pickles,” by John E. Simpson. (Shared here under a Creative Commons License; for more information, see this page<\/a> at <\/em>RAMH).\u00a0 Taken at the North Florida Fair in November 2018; the husband was not in evidence, but the wife and the pickles did a fine job of representing the enterprise.]<\/em><\/p>\n

From whiskey river<\/em><\/a>:<\/p>\n

Choosing to Think of It<\/strong><\/p>\n

Today, ten thousand people will die
\nand their small replacements will bring joy
\nand this will make sense to someone
\nremoved from any sense of loss.
\nI, too, will die a little and carry on,
\ndoing some paperwork, driving myself
\nhome. The sky is simply overcast,
\nnothing is any less than it was
\nyesterday or the day before. In short,
\nthere’s no reason or every reason
\nwhy I’m choosing to think of this now.
\nThe short-lived holiness
\ntrue lovers know, making them unaccountable
\nexcept to spirit and themselves – suddenly
\nI want to be that insufferable and selfish,
\nthat sharpened and tuned.
\nI’m going to think of what it means
\nto be an animal crossing a highway,
\nto be a human without a useful prayer
\nsetting off on one of those journeys
\nwe humans take. I don’t expect anything
\nto change. I just want to be filled up
\na little more with what exists,
\ntipped toward the laughter which understands
\nI’m nothing and all there is.
\nBy evening, the promised storm
\nwill arrive. A few in small boats
\nwill be taken by surprise.
\nThere will be survivors, and even they will die.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Stephen Dunn [source unknown, but probably here<\/a>; appearing here<\/a><\/em>])<\/p>\n

…and<\/a> (italicized portion):<\/p>\n

You cannot write by thinking. You have plenty of time to think in between times. The period in between is when you stuff<\/em> your eyeballs, when you read diversified multitudes of material in every field. I absolutely demand of you and everyone I know that they be widely read in every damn field there is: in every religion and every art form and don\u2019t<\/em> tell me you haven\u2019t got time! There\u2019s plenty of time. You need all of these cross-references. You never know when your head is going to use this fuel, this food for its purposes. Stuff yourself with serious subjects, with comic strips and motion pictures and radio and music; with symphonies, with rock, with everything! What we often forget is that thought is to be used to correct life. It’s <\/em>not a way of life. If you make thought the center of your life, you’re not going to live it. So, what you have to do is be this kind of hysterical, emotional, vibrant creature who lives at the top of his lungs for a lifetime and then corrects around the edges so that he doesn’t go insane or drive his friends mad. Thought is the skin around the organ. The organ is full of blood and a beating heart, a soul and the exaltation of being alive!<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Ray Bradbury [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Not from whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n

We have everything in us that Buddha has, that Christ has—we\u2019ve got it all. But only when we start to acknowledge it is it going to get interesting. Our problem is we\u2019re afraid to acknowledge our own beauty. We\u2019re too busy holding on to our own unworthiness. We\u2019d rather be a schnook sitting before some great man. That fits in more with who we think we are. Well, enough already. We are beautiful.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Ram Dass [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

The Way It Is<\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a thread you follow. It goes among
\nthings that change. But it doesn\u2019t change.
\nPeople wonder about what you are pursuing.
\nYou have to explain about the thread.
\nBut it is hard for others to see.
\nWhile you hold it you can\u2019t get lost.
\nTragedies happen; people get hurt
\nor die; and you suffer and get old.
\nNothing you do can stop time\u2019s unfolding.
\nYou don\u2019t ever let go of the thread.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(William Stafford [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

Maybe you’re right, boss. It all depends on the way you look at it… Look, one day I had gone to a little village. An old grandfather of ninety was busy planting an almond tree. “What, grandad! I exclaimed. “Planting an almond tree?” And he, bent as he was, turned round and said: “My son, I carry on as if I should never die.” I replied: “And I carry on as if I was going to die any minute.” Which of us was right, boss?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Nikos Kazantzakis [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Image: “Judy’s Husband’s Stuffed Pickles,” by John E. Simpson. (Shared here under a Creative Commons License; for more information, see this page at RAMH).\u00a0 Taken at the North Florida Fair in November 2018; the husband was not in evidence, but the wife and the pickles did a fine job of representing the enterprise.] From whiskey […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20772,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Ram Dass, Ray Bradbury, et al.: 'Filling a Life Isn't the Half of It'","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[247,1393,4701,250,251,4159],"tags":[179,1345,3165,4835,4836,4837,4838],"class_list":{"0":"post-20768","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ruminations","8":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","9":"category-my-photography","10":"category-art","11":"category-poetry-writing_cat","12":"category-essays","13":"tag-stephen-dunn","14":"tag-william-stafford","15":"tag-ray-bradbury","16":"tag-ram-dass","17":"tag-nikos-kazantzakis","18":"tag-a-full-life","19":"tag-a-full-life-vs-a-complete-life","20":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/judyshusbandsstuffedpickles_johnesimpson_thumb.jpg?fit=640%2C361&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-5oY","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20768"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20768\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20774,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20768\/revisions\/20774"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20772"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}