Saturday, April 25, 2015

TOURIST OF DEATH



WHO AM I?
My wife and I were tourists on Grand Cayman because we were going to have our first baby and this was a way to celebrate, and probably was our last vacation alone for some time. She wanted me to go on the Sunset Cruise Catamaran sail that evening.
I wanted to go deep sea fishing. I could never afford the “Marlin’ Darlin” which was at that time $US 1,000 per HALF DAY. So, I asked around and a boat Captain who worked locally as a Volunteer Fireman (from New Jersey), and his First Mate (the Limbo dancer from the hotel) gave me their deal: if I brought $US 100 and a case of beer, I could go with he and his friend to fish for Marlin to sell to one of the chefs at a local hotel.
I told my wife I hoped I would be back by a romantic Sunset Cruise with her on a catamaran, but deep-sea fishing was something, well, guys like me dream of doing.

WHY AM I HERE?
On the way out to really deep water, the boat men caught Barracuda and cut them up for bait. That was our first blood of the day. Barracuda are flipping and flailing razor blades when caught. The captain cut their heads off and then stood back because they kept biting. We ran out to sea for several hours before they saw “drift”, a 4’X8’ plywood sheet, over which Dolphin fish (not Porpoises) were jumping. We stopped here so the boat men could catch something for home.
So, here I am watching them catch Dolphin fish with hand-lines when, suddenly, the Dolphin vanish. An 8-foot long, Black Tip shark has seen the drift and the Dolphin, too. The Captain says to me, “Hey tourista! You wanna be a fisherman?”
I say, “You bet!”
     The Captain dangles a huge marlin hook with a Barracuda head as bait over the side like my Auntie Ethel, my black Auntie, taught me how to catch Sunfish when I was 5-years old. Then the Captain feels the line as it tightens and the shark takes it in and suddenly, the Captain; a short, stocky man, leaps into the air, gives the rod a gigantic pump, and set the hook. The reel starts screaming, as the shark dives deep. The Captain starts laughing and hands the rod toward me. “Get in the chair!” he said. I climb into the fighting chair and seat-buckle myself in. “From tourista to fisherman! Gonna kill a BIG fish!” he laughs and hands me the rod. He and the limbo dancer unpack sandwiches and iced beers and sit in the shade for lunch.

WHAT DO I WANT?
     The shark has run deep is still ripping line from the reel. I try to tighten the drag and the Captain tells me to “Crank!” so I do. I put the rod in the rod holder. I lean back and lift the rod tip as high as I can and try to crank up the few inches of “slack” when I lower it. Over and over this goes: lift, crank in a few inches, lift, crank in a few inches. One hour. The Captain and First Mate nap. The shark is towing the boat.
Two hours I sit in the tropical sun. I realize I am not well protected on my back and the sun which also reflects off the water. I can feel my skin boiling.  I remember all the sunburns I had as a kid. I want to ask for help, but don’t want to be a wimp.
The Captain wakes and sees the shark is now actually visible below the boat. The shark and I are at a stand-off.
     “Get the flying gaff.” The Captain says to the Limbo dancer. The Captain takes the rod, pumps several times and brings the shark MUCH closer to the surface. I climb out of the chair and out of the way to watch.
The shark surfaces, exhausted. “Hit him!” he shouts to Limbo who swings the pole with the flying gaff and strikes the shark in mid-body. The gaff is a semi-circular blade which temporarily is on a long pole.  Limbo grabs the rope tied to the gaff hook, puts his feet on the side-rail and pulls mightily. The shark is being cut in half with the gaff hook and thrashes mightily throwing bloody water everywhere.
The hook pulls through. I watch as the shark drifts down and out of sight. “You killed a big ‘un! 8-foot! Mebbe 500-pounds!” the Captain says. “Here’s a beer!”
Limbo climbs into the chair. They bait-up for Marlin and head back. I sit in the shade. On the way in they catch a middling-size Marlin, 5-foot, to sell at the hotel.
When we get back, I help them carry the Marlin to their 2-door car and tie it on top. They drive off to a hotel to sell the fish. I miss the romantic Sunset Cruise. I am really cooked by the sun and have a touch of heat stroke. My wife is not sympathetic. “We came on vacation for romance.” She says. “Not for me to be a tourist of death.” My neck and back blisters and peels – even a few days later after I get home.
Our son is born a few months after we return home. Sixteen years later my son and I are swimming at our local YMCA and he reaches up to brush what he thinks is a “leaf” off my back. It is an oddly shaped dark patch – it doesn’t come off. It’s melanoma skin cancer.
Somewhere I imagine Death climbing into a fighting chair. He doesn’t need to buckle himself in. Will I run deep? “Hey tourista!” I say to myself.

© Copyright 2015, Jean W. Yeager
All Rights Reserved


ON SALE NOW
Jan – June 2014 threesimplequestions Blog Posts
Are Available In Book Form 
"Th3 Simple Questions: Slice Open Everyday Life" 
Available at
http:/www.th3simplequestions.com
Available at Internet Retailers 
By WestBow Press
6x9 Perfect Bound Softcover @ $11.95
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7124-0
6x9 Dust Jacket Hardcover @ $28.95
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7125-7
E-Book @ $3.99
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7123-3

Friday, April 17, 2015

UNFORTUNATE GARMENTS



WHO AM I?
From the moment we are born, we have experiences. We “wear” our experiences. Layer after layer your experiences in the form of memories, emotions like disappointments, muscle memories, injuries all affect how freely we move, are bound to us inwardly and outwardly. They are like unfortunate garments which belong to us and which we cannot remove without great effort. It’s like once you have an experience, you are changed. My new possibilities of new days, new ways of doing things, having new loves or discovering new friendship, exploring new adventures – is somehow affected by these unfortunate garments I must wear.  

     For example, I got this leather jacket years ago because I thought it was “cool” and I saved up a lot of money to get it. I thought it would protect me from things I hoped would never happen to me. It didn’t. It got me into trouble so to one group of people, I’m the goofy guy with the leather jacket.

Some garments are defensive. Yes, my belly does hang over these swimming trunks, but you can’t ever tell when you’ll need swimming trunks. I once did without them and a hot tub came into play. Anyway, I can’t take them off. If I take them off, I’d be naked and vulnerable. I’d be cold. I might be ridiculed. See? Layers of unfortunate decisions.

     Unfortunately, I can’t even think or dream now without being within the garments of my experiences. Everything now gets filtered through these layers. It’s like I’m swimming and I’m at the bottom and I look up and see people swimming above me in swimsuits – but here I am at the bottom in unfortunate garments. They swim away so freely.



WHY AM I HERE?

The world gives us the first layer of unfortunate garments. It’s what happens TO you beginning at birth. Where were you born? Was it hot or cold? Day or night? Were you healthy or not? These garments are given to you by life and your fortunes or misfortunes – your experiences. You’re born with your first sensual (or sentient) experiences. Were you touched? Loved? Held? I was born pre-maturely, adopted at birth, and spent the first 6-weeks in a metallic box incubator lined with a blanket. Not the usual first “layer” of experience. The guys I’ve taught in maximum security prisons had layers of experiences which were traumatic, chaotic, full of shouting, and blows. Quite the opposite of the isolating experience of a metallic box and a blanket. But, what is the “usual” first layer? Whatever we get, we get.

     This first layer is something we all are “given” by life. The next layer is what you do to yourself – your choices. Good choices, bad choices, good influences from friends, family or school; bad influences.

Unfortunate garments wrap us with an image or a version of reality which we can mistake for The Reality. These are OUR reality, but they are not THE reality. Casting them off takes a long time and is a struggle – like the literal struggle of getting out of an overly tight sweater or a butterfly out of a cocoon.



WHAT DO I WANT?

     Sometimes I’ve wondered if it would it be better to wear a uniform or a robe which reveals no individual mis-fortune and hides our personal fate? We could avoid being judged by others, but maybe it is better to wear our hearts on our sleeves?

     Now I feel that I am changing out some of my unfortunate garments – that this is getting easier to do.  I find that the “styles” are changing or that I am changing my own preconception and getting free of being who ever I was that wore that leater jacket.

This Madras shirt, for example, with colors that bleed together? This was an experiential gift from a woman who was too pushy and self-centered and we bled all over one another. I’ve avoided Madras from then on. Get it outta here!  These burnt socks? That was meeting at the writer’s circle where I felt like I had to walk across hot coals of embarrassment. Oh well. That’s one I won’t hang onto. Forgive but don’t forget. This tie is a Jerry Garcia brand and I love it. At least I have ONE not unfortunate garment. But, Jerry died, but a brand and a band lives on.



© Copyright 2015, Jean W. Yeager
All Rights Reserved


ON SALE NOW
Jan – June 2014 threesimplequestions Blog Posts
Are Available In Book Form 
"Th3 Simple Questions: Slice Open Everyday Life" 
Available at
http:/www.th3simplequestions.com
Available at Internet Retailers 
By WestBow Press
6x9 Perfect Bound Softcover @ $11.95
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7124-0
6x9 Dust Jacket Hardcover @ $28.95
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7125-7
E-Book @ $3.99
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7123-3

Saturday, April 11, 2015

SELECTING OMENS

WHO AM I?
I am an omen. You do not know who I am because you have not been taught about omens. Once all school children could recognize omens because they had read in Holy writ about omens which were integral to life as the ancient people knew it.

   This you now scoff at.

   Omens were and ARE signs for the future. We portend what will become. We are not created by men because we point to things men cannot imagine. We are not the “coming soon” signs. We are world-happenings, like eclipses, earthquakes, the darkening of the sun or moon, asteroids, falling of mountains, death of species created by the world-creator.

   There once were people who could experience these signs and explain their meaning – what they portended. And, once dreams could be interpreted.

   Now, “learned” people - or perhaps even entire cultures - can see no future. No omens exist any more. All dreams are relegated to personal psychic disturbances. Some cultures experience no Angels, believe that “global” anything” cannot be true and discount things so large as superstition. Only their scientists believe what they personally know to be true.

   Is this in itself an omen?



WHY AM I HERE?

You have always been presented with omens. All around you are signs “of the times” which you may ignore or not. You may only be aware of small omens for your own personal life. Can you even extend your gaze wide enough to see the generational omens, national omens, international omens?

   When you expand your gaze wide enough to include as much as you can, you may have feelings arise. Joy, gratitude, connection, concern, even fear or doubt. Consider a certain part of your world, of THE world, and note the feelings which arise. These are your intuitive feelings about that part of life. Perhaps you will even experience compassion.  You may even become aware of a specific “trigger” for these feelings. What does the future look like for this part of your life?

   In this way you participate in the world’s becoming. You de-isolate yourself. You may be able to connect in new ways with the world and find your way back to connection with the spiritual world.



WHAT DO I WANT?

The development or evolution of our consciousness has left us as “observers”, scientific thinkers, doubters and skeptics of anything not-physical or material -- essentially disconnected from the spiritual world. 
    In many ways, the spiritual world relies on we humans to be responsible for life. Omens arise in our consciousness when we have been able to “turn to an ancient principle” – “matter is never without spirit.”



Here is that ancient principle articulated by Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925):



"Seek the truly practical material life,

but seek it so that it does not numb you to the spirit which is active in it.

Seek the spirit, but seek it not in passion for the supersensible, out of supersensible egoism,

but seek it so that you wish to apply it selflessly

in the practical life in the practical world.



Turn to the ancient principle,

matter is never without spirit and spirit is never without matter,

in such a way that we say we will to do all material things in the light of the spirit

and we will so to seek the light of the spirit,

so that it evokes warmth for us in our practical activities."

© Copyright 2015, Jean W. Yeager
All Rights Reserved


ON SALE NOW
Jan – June 2014 threesimplequestions Blog Posts
Are Available In Book Form 
"Th3 Simple Questions: Slice Open Everyday Life" 
Available at
http:/www.th3simplequestions.com
Available at Internet Retailers 
By WestBow Press
6x9 Perfect Bound Softcover @ $11.95
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7124-0
6x9 Dust Jacket Hardcover @ $28.95
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7125-7
E-Book @ $3.99
ISBN: 978-1-4908-7123-3