Same-sex weddings in California begin
California Supreme Court’s May decision legalizing same-sex marriage in California, took effect yesterday. One of the first couples married, Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin, had been partners for more than 50 years, an excellent example of commitment for all of us. From the San Francisco Chronicle:
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Same-sex weddings start with union of elderly San Francisco couple
By Marisa Lagos, Rachel Gordon, Chris Heredia, Jill Tucker, Chronicle Staff Writers
SAN FRANCISCO — Cheers filled San Francisco’s City Hall shortly after 5 p.m. as longtime lesbian activists Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin, partners for more than 50 years, began their second wedding - and their first legal union.
Mayor Gavin Newsom, who officiated the ceremony in the reception area of his office, said it was a fitting way to memorialize last month’s state Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage in California, which took effect at 5:01 p.m.
Lyon, 83, and Martin, 87, were the first couple married four years ago when Newsom told the county clerk’s office to start offering marriage certificates to same-sex couples. Eventually more than 4,000 same-sex couples were married in San Francisco that year, but those unions were later nullified by the court. Today, the couple, and dozens of others, had their first chance to make their unions truly legal.
In at least five counties around the state, other couples were pronounced “spouses for life” once the clock chimed 5. (more…)
Tuesday, June 17th, 2008My little girl turns 40
It’s a bit hard for me to believe, but last Wednesday, June 11, my daughter Lilla turned 40 years old. Below are some photos from her early life until the present.
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Lilla and her “sister” Landon, circa 1978
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Lilla with her mom Shannon, circa 1982
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Lilla and her kids, Molly and Jack, at the rodeo in 2007
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Brandon, Lilla, Molly and Jack at the beach
Saturday, June 14th, 2008Spending time in the natural world–a sure cure for what ails you
Depressed? Of course we’re all depressed. We’ve been so quickly, violently, and irreconcilably plucked from nature, from physical labor, from kinship and village mentality, from every natural and primordial antidepressant. The further society “progresses,” the grander the scale of imbalance. Just as fluoride is put in water to prevent dental cavities, we’ll soon find government mandating Prozac in our water to prevent mental cavities.
—M. Robin D’Antan
Going to the mountains is going home.
—John Muir
The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature.
—Anne Frank
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In these times, many of us spend very little time in the natural world and, thus, suffer from what some call nature deficit disorder. We tend to move from one human-made structure to another human-made structure, from one air-conditioned space to another. This is a radical departure from the way humans lived for tens of thousands of years, and it’s not without its consequences.
We need our time in nature to feel the rhythms of the seasons. We need it to let go of the overly-domesticated part of ourselves and remember who we really are. We need it be among the wildlife and to recall that we too are animals with our place in the web of life. We need it to retain our sense of wonder and awe.
To be happy, spend time outdoors as frequently as possible, at least for a few minutes each day. Then once a week, go into the wilderness for a few hours to commune quietly with nature. Check your happiness thermostat afterwards and see how it’s risen.
Saturday, June 14th, 2008The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard
So as we were getting rid of some extraneous stuff that doesn’t really fit in our 1000-square-foot townhouse (anyone need 
a laptop with Windows 98?), our friend Adrian sent us a link to The Story of Stuff. After watching the compelling and enlightening video, I decided I didn’t need those new jeans after all. From the website:
The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It’ll teach you something, it’ll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.
Click this link to watch The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard or cut and paste this URL into your browser: http://www.storyofstuff.com/index.html.
So religion really is the opiate of the people?
Personal growth blogger, writer, speaker Steve Pavalina offers ten reasons not to be a member of an organized religion.
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10 Reasons You Should Never Have a Religion
by Steve Pavalina
While consciously pursuing your spiritual development is commendable, joining an established religion such as Christianity, Islam, or Hinduism is one of the worst ways to go about it. In this article I’ll share 10 reasons why you must eventually abandon the baggage of organized religion if you wish to pursue conscious living in earnest.
Since Christianity is currently the world’s most popular religion, I’ll slant this article towards Christianity’s ubiquitous failings. However, you’ll find that most of these points apply equally well to other major religions (yes, even Buddhism).
1. Spirituality for dummies.
If you have the awareness level of a snail, and your thinking is mired in shame and guilt (with perhaps a twist of drug abuse or suicidal thinking), then subscribing to a religion can help you climb to a higher level of awareness. Your mindset, however, still remains incredibly dysfunctional; you’ve merely swapped one form of erroneous thinking for another.
For reasonably intelligent people who aren’t suffering from major issues with low self-esteem, religion is ridiculously consciousness-lowering. While some religious beliefs can be empowering, on the whole the decision to formally participate in a religion will merely burden your mind with a hefty load of false notions.
When you subscribe to a religion, you substitute nebulous group-think for focused, independent thought. Instead of learning to discern truth on your own, you’re told what to believe. This doesn’t accelerate your spiritual growth; on the contrary it puts the brakes on your continued conscious development. Religion is the off-switch of the human mind.
Leave the mythology behind, and learn to think for yourself. Your intellect is a better instrument of spiritual growth than any religious teachings.
2. Loss of spiritual depth perception.
One of the worst mistakes you can make in life is to attach your identity to any particular religion or philosophy, such as by saying “I am a Christian” or “I am a Buddhist.” This forces your mind into a fixed perspective, robbing you of spiritual depth perception and savagely curtailing your ability to perceive reality accurately. If that sounds like a good idea to you, you’ll probably want to gouge out one of your eyeballs too. Surely you’ll be better off with a single, fixed perspective instead of having to consider two separate image streams… unless of course you’ve become attached to stereo vision.
Religious “truths” are inherently rooted in a fixed perspective, but real truth is perspective-independent. When you substitute religious teachings for truth, you mistake shadows for light sources. Consequently, you doom yourself to stumble around in the dark, utterly confused. Clarity remains forever elusive, and the best answer you get is that life is one giant mystery. Religious mysteries, however, arise not from what is truly unknowable; they arise from the limitations of trying to understand reality from a fixed frame of reference.
A more intelligent approach is to consider reality through a variety of different perspectives without trying to force your perceptions into an artificial religious framework. If you wish to learn more about this approach, read Spiritual Depth Perception. (more…)
Friday, June 13th, 2008Kucinich presents Bush articles of impeachment
Gotta love the guy. Congressman Dennis Kucinich introduced 35 extensively documented Articles of Impeachment against President George W. Bush on the floor of the House of Representatives last night. Shonnie and I watched some of the proceedings on C-SPAN as the feisty Kucinich took several hours to read his list of high crimes and misdemeanors.
At The Huffington Post, political historian Joseph A. Palermo wrote, “Kucinich’s lengthy and detailed indictment of this wayward president is the most thorough and powerful case made to date. He outlined a litany of high crimes and misdemeanors and showed without a shadow of a doubt that George W. Bush deserves to be impeached and removed from office. Kucinich made clear that Bush has violated his oath of office and his Constitutional duty that the laws be ‘faithfully executed.’”
Read the Articles of Impeachment by clicking here.
Tuesday, June 10th, 2008Bobby and Barack by Tom Hayden
Bobby and Barack
By Tom Hayden
The Huffington Post
For one who has experienced both eras, the current movement for Barack Obama has achieved a living remembrance of Bobby Kennedy’s campaign in the week when RFK’s murder is painfully remembered.
On June 4, 1968, I watched from a New York townhouse the murder of a second Kennedy in five years. Martin Luther King already was gone, Vietnam and our cities were burning. I was in the midst of chaotic planning for anti-war demonstrations at the Democratic Convention coming in August.
I drifted off with friends to St. Patrick’s Cathedral where Kennedy staffers let us through the doors late at night. After sitting a while in silence, I found myself as a member of a makeshift honor guard standing next to his simple coffin. I was wearing a green Cuban hat and weeping. The last political hope of the Sixties vision — a movement-driven progressive government — was finished, whether by chance or plot, it mattered little. The violence I had resisted under white racism in the South was seeping into my veins. Like many who took their rage even farther, I was hardening, and never dared again to recover my young idealism. (more…)
Saturday, June 7th, 2008Let America Be America Again by Langston Hughes
Let America Be America Again
by Langston Hughes
Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.
(America never was America to me.)
Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed–
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.
(It never was America to me.)
O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.
(There’s never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)
Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek–
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one’s own greed!
I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean–
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today–O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.
Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That’s made America the land it has become.
O, I’m the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home–
For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,
And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa’s strand I came
To build a “homeland of the free.”
The free?
Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we’ve dreamed
And all the songs we’ve sung
And all the hopes we’ve held
And all the flags we’ve hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay–
Except the dream that’s almost dead today.
O, let America be America again–
The land that never has been yet–
And yet must be–the land where every man is free.
The land that’s mine–the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME–
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose–
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath–
America will be!
Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain–
All, all the stretch of these great green states–
And make America again!
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Written in 1938. From The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes, published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. Copyright © 1994 the Estate of Langston Hughes. Watch a video of “Let America Be America Again” by clicking here.
Thursday, June 5th, 2008
