"Times are difficult globally;
awakening is no longer a luxury or an ideal.
It’s becoming critical.
We don’t need to add more depression,
more discouragement,
or more anger to what’s already here.
It’s becoming essential that we learn
how to relate sanely with difficult times.
The earth seems to be beseeching us
to connect with joy
and discover our innermost essence.
This is the best way
that we can benefit others."
~ Pema Chodron

What Lucky People Do Differently than Unlucky People
By Adam Dachis | Lifehacker, 12 April 2011
http://ca.lifehacker.com/5791032/improve-your-luck-by-relaxing-keeping-an-open-mind-and-paying-attention-to-the-world-around-you
( text )

Here's his manifesto. Sounds pretty familiar. He was a good writer. He wants to wake up Americans. Maybe if enough people read this, they will realize that we the people are in similar situations for similar reasons. A little suicidality is certainly not out of the question when times are so hard for people. I heard the feds took down the original post so I was happy to find that it is out there. For posterity, here is ( Joe Stack's manifesto, text from link above. )

Mentally Ill Offenders Strain Juvenile System
As cash-starved states slash mental health programs in communities and schools, they are increasingly relying on the juvenile corrections system to handle a generation of young offenders with psychiatric disorders. About two-thirds of the nation’s juvenile inmates — who numbered 92,854 in 2006, down from 107,000 in 1999 — have at least one mental illness, according to surveys of youth prisons, and are more in need of therapy than punishment.
( notes )

Here I am eating my eggs and grits, and Suzanne is reading the headlines to me. Mexico drug wars: five human heads in a cooler. Germany: man in military garb opens fire at secondary school. The leading line in that story was that it looked like something that would happen in America. Alabama: 27 year old man with an Irish last name kills his whole family plus a few. The only survivor was 4 months old. If the news is right. Every source has a slightly different story.

Grits and garlic still taste good. I'm comfortable in my large apartment just blocks from the homeless hangout by the tracks. But the insanity is at our door. The desperation is building. I wonder about the Alabama man. Why kill one's entire family? That angry? Or could it have been in part a mercy killing? The news says that he was a mild mannered nice fellow. Being nice on the surface does not mean a person is happy on the inside. Times are hard and getting harder. More people are going to loose it. Drugs will be increasingly valuable. And porn. I read last night that one of the few markets that is showing great gains is the "adult entertainment" sector. This is just the end of the beginning.

Well I never thought I would live to report it, but today we had our second significant snowfall of the winter. This afternoon I was able to go cross country skiing in the streets of Portland. I covered our entire neighborhood. There was about 3" on the ground when I went, not quite enough to cover curbs but otherwise enough to ski freely in the street, sidewalks or grassy areas. There were quite a few other people out on XC skis, and in the park there were at least 100 people sliding down the hill on everything from plastic discs to cardboard boxes. I sat on a bench and watched for a while, laughing at the wrecks. Most people ignored me and the boys who wrecked the most spectacularly seemed embarrassed that I was laughing at them. I thought they did it to make a show.
( more )

Kitten is racing around the livingroom, batting bits of dirt on the slippery almost-wood floor. The lesbian neighbors are getting their yard done. Every week those guys are here trimming and mowing and making the place look like fantasyland. "Cierren la puerta" one of them yells, after the lady yells at him to close the gate, her dog might run away. I would run away too. I did run away. I was going to sunbathe up on the roof but her harsh voice and their mowing was incentive enough to come back inside and braindump instead.
( braindump )