Real Church

     I watched "Jesus Camp" for the second time the other day, and in it there's this little girl who talks about how some people go to "dead churches", as in churches that God doesn't visit because the people's hearts aren't in the right place.  (It's in this section, 4:05.)
     But I think... I think they're ALL dead churches.  Opal Whitely at 5 years old wrote in her journal, "To me all God's out-of-doors is one grand cathedral."  I think she's right.  You have to find church.  Good places to look include under fir trees and near creek beds.  

     What made me think of dead churches and Opal Whitely's real churches was reading some Ralph Waldo Emmerson.  When he was young he began as a minister, but then he left it writing in his journal, "I have sometimes thought that, in order to be a good minister, it was necessary to leave the ministry. The profession is antiquated. In an altered age, we worship in the dead forms of our forefathers."  I think he is right too.

     I love Opal Whitely by the way.  Her writing is absolutely the most heart warming stuff.  Here's an excerpt I found online:

By and by, I came to a log. It was a nice little log. It was as long as three pigs as long as Peter Paul Rubens. [Peter Paul Rubens is the name of her pet pig] I climbed upon it. I so did to look more looks about. The wind did blow in a real quick way -- he made music all around. I danced on the log. It is so much a big amount of joy to dance on a log when the wind does play the harps in the forest. Then do I dance on tiptoe. I wave greetings to the plant-bush folks that do dance all about. Today a grand pine tree did wave its arms to me, and the bush branches patted my cheek in a friendly way. The wind again did blow back my curls -- they clasped the fingers of the bush-people most near. I did turn around to untangle them. It is most difficult to dance on tiptoe on a log when one's curls are in a tangle with the branches of a friendly bush that grew near unto the log, and does make bows to one while the wind doth blow. When I did turn to untangle my curls, I saw a silken cradle in a hazel branch. I have thinks that the wind did just tangle my curls so I would have seeing of that cradle. It was cream, with a hazel leaf halfway round it. I put it to my ear, and I did listen. It had a little voice. It was not a tone voice; it was a heart voice. While I did listen, I did feel its feels. It had lovely ones. And then I did hurry away in the way that does lead to the house of the girl that has no seeing. I went that way so she too might know its feels, and hear its heart voice. She does so like to feel things as she has seeing by feels.

     Oh and speaking of incredible journals, I just bought a book of excerpts from Edward Abbey's journal called Confessions of a Barbarian.  Good Gracious!  It was $7, which is far more than I like to spend at Half Price Books for a single book, but it's sooooooooooooo good!  It's like riveting and gut-wrenchingly personal, witty and eloquent in this uncouth way.  :D  I'm in love with him.  I mean if he wasn't so terrible with women (and 20 years dead) I would write love letters to his uncivilized ass.

Come Hell or High Water

Things Lauren Loves:

1) Hanging peach rings off her erect nipples

2) Taking giant shits

.... that's all I really know to list right now.

If I was a barbie with a pull string that made me say things, I think one of my phrases would be, "Let's decorate!" Imagine it.

Food Queries:

1) Are Klondike Bars just like York Peppermint Patties but freezing cold?

2) Why don't they make pear sauce? Like apple sauce but with pears?

Other Questions:

1) How come only cats and grandpas have whiskers?

2) Is the founder of Jack in the Box just really ugly? Why does he have to wear that giant balloon all the time?

3) Will you buy me a Webkins for my birthday?

4) What about occidental rugs? Like rugs from the Americas.

I'm pretty sure it's illegal to eat a human corpse in the US, which I find disappointing. I really want to eat my future mate's body when he dies, or have him eat my body when I die. Since I don't believe in heaven or an afterworld where we can meet up again, this would be like my alternative consolation prize. Even though he had died, he would still be alive as part of me.

I don't see what's so revolting about it. Christians claim to eat Jesus's corpse every Sunday, and he's been dead for like 2,000 years!

Cops need to fucking step off my tits. I've gotten three tickets in the past month. I had never received any before that.

Age is relative, but in another way, it's absolute.

All of civilization is a giant fiber optic cable. We're all single fibers, together millions of billions of fibers, all pointing towards universal truth. My fiber is slightly purple.

Man sometimes I REALLY want to roll in grass and play in the dirt. Dogs have it so good. If I was a dog, I'd dig holes all the time.

I think everyone needs to try out a book by Charles Bukowski

Glory be to the best motherfucking co-op in the whole fucking world. God I love this place. This is an incredibly happy time in my life, possibly the happiest I've ever been, and a lot of that happiness is due to living at 21st St.

This is the first time I’ve felt truly free in America, where I can go naked as often as I please, and do as many drugs as I please without anyone hassling me. I can say what I think and wear or not wear whatever I want without any real fear of reproach. I feel uncensored, unrestrained, like I can be my authentic self and have people see me for who I am and it is glorious. It feels good to my soul. I never want to leave.

The democracy ideal which I think is a crapshoot on a large scale, really works in this setting and I feel like I have the power to change things I care about. I especially love the way people voluntarily cooperate to get things done due to their own vested interest in this place. Occasionally I find some choice examples of why socialism is a shit show, tragedy of the commons and all of that, but I've decided that is healthier for people to live in close-knit groups taking care of one another and suffering the slightly squalid consequences, rather than to isolate themselves in an apartment and expend energy on having lots of nice things. Well, different lifestyles may just make different people happy, but I sure am glad I found what works best for me! :D Actually, living in this quasi-socialist cooperative living situation, is a testament to the free market in my opinion. The fact that people have choices in capitalism - to live as an individualist laboring only for yourself and family, or to live cooperatively, laboring for the benefit of the people in your surroundings - is really wonderful. It certainly doesn't work the other way around. In a communist country, you don't really get that choice.

People care about one another here. People here care about me. I'll give you an example. Yesterday I was taking the trash out of the Commons (where we have parties), and as I was walking by the back porch, my foot slipped off of my flip flop (freak accident) and a piece of broken glass stabbed my heel. I got cut really bad and started bleeding all over the place. Immediately like 5 people became incredibly concerned about my welfare. Alfredo helped carry me over to the mop shed so I could wash off my foot and my sandal which was covered in blood, and then 30 seconds later Garrett was there with his fully stocked first aid kit. They helped me to a bench and Garrett cleaned up my foot and did a first-rate job of dressing my wound. There was even an EMT present explaining how I would know if there was still glass in my foot. While all of that was going on, Alfredo hosed all of my blood off the sidewalk. (Garrett actually even re-dressed my wound again and also superglued me back together later after I busted my cut open hobbling around in Twin Liquors and HEB with Alfredo - I rode around in a motorized wheelchair. Yea! But Garrett - man, what a guy! :D ) Anyway, moral of the story: I'm so grateful to have such great friends watching out for me.

UPDATE: This is my foot two days after Garrett fixed me up. The cut's like half the size it was when it happened.

On another note, caring for one another in a cooperative living situation really fits with my made-up religion also. Like that there is divinity within all of us, and we have this collective consciousness because we are parts of God, which allows us to sense the suffering (or joy or peace or love) of others. This makes it such that when people pray, those who recognize their divinity and acknowledge that they are a part of God, those people can hear prayers and share in their joy, or love, or suffering, or render aid to that person, etc. You can't help others and be joyful with them and take care of them if you are isolated from them. So being around co-opers and helping out and sharing in people's experiences, is really... I don't know... divinity affirming I guess - it sits right with my beliefs.

This song will always make me think of the co-op:http://listen.grooveshark.com/#/song/Kids_Album_Version_/23111624

In other news, I've found my calling - http://pornfortheblind.org/ I'm going to start doing voice descriptions of various porn scenes so that blind people can jerk off/buff the muff to things on the Internet like able-bodied people. It's a non-profit charity so I feel pretty good about lending my voice to making some great narrations. As it is, most of the contributors are male, which I think would kind of suck if I were a blind guy, don't you agree? Plus, I think I could do sexier descriptions - like here's a direct quote from one clip - hilarious in it's dettachedness, "... Gaping anus being stretched open, presumably after being plugged by a large European penis." More: "Another man in a soccer jersey is doing his part in the double penetration (hesitation) to a woman... who is also kissing another woman... The two men are wearing shirts, but the shirts have no sleeves." Haha. Oh dear! So I'm open to requests people - what are some favorite scenes I should narrations of?

"So may the sunrise bring hope where it once was forgotten.."

"... Sons are like birds, flying upwards over the mountain..."

I love summer from the very very bottom of my heart. Summertime is the best time.

I wish I could kiss every blade of grass, every cloud, every ray of sun, and every petal I see and touch. Things smell better in the summer, maybe not people exactly, but the wooden swing at the co-op, the leather interior of my car, the air outside, everything that's in the sun smells so good.

I saw Morgan and another girl picking a bouquet of flowers outside the co-op as I was on my way to work today. They had blue and pink and lavender and yellow flowers. I felt jealous, but in an un-malicious way. I wanted to pick flowers too.

Sometimes I'm sad that I don't believe in God. If I did I would have so much to thank him for. I get overwhelmed by how beautiful it all is, and the magical complexity of you and I. Sometimes all those thank yous pile on top of each other because I don't have anyone to give them to, and they fill my heart up, and it makes me want to cry. My face gets all hot and I have to drink really cold water to calm down again. I don't really know what to do about all that ...