Loose Leaf Notes

1. THIS is what happens when you drink the kool-aid.

2. Joe and I went to a Cosmic Charlie Grateful Dead tribute band concert at Chantilly Farm over the weekend. I couldn’t decide if it felt like I was at a rave or a gospel church service.

3. For me, going to Grateful Dead concerts – whether an actual show with Jerry Garcia and the rest or a great tribute band like Cosmic Charlie or The Kind –  is something like going to church. There is a following that knows all the words to the songs and sings out loud together.  It’s not like a sit down quiet church, but more like a revival or an African American gospel service of release and praise.  The light shows are transcendent. The lyrics range from good fun story-telling to philosophically Zen. – More from my post “One More Saturday Night” HERE.

4. Chantilly Farm is also a campground and there was a VW Bus Camp-out the same weekend as the Grateful Dead cover band, which fit well with the retro theme.

5. On the same weekend that we danced to Grateful Dead tunes, we started watching Ken Burns’ Vietnam War documentary, 10 years in the making and 18 hours in length. The soundtrack and scenes are nostalgically retro, familiar but also new.  it’s been good to view the period as an adult, learn more about the backstory and put it all together.  It’s heartbreaking to see the result of U.S. interventions/support of dictators (especially because we didn’t seem to learn from it). It’s hard to see how the truth was kept from the public so long and how the war was “prolonged because it seemed easier to muddle through than admit that it had been caused by tragic decisions.”

6. “Over the years, a number of iconic images have come to be associated with the Grateful Dead. Many of these images originated as artwork for concert posters or album covers. The dancing bears was drawn by Bob Thomas as part of the back cover for the album History of the Grateful Dead, Volume One (Bear’s Choice)(1973). The bear is a reference to Owsley “Bear” Stanley, who recorded and produced the album.” – From the Wikipedia

7. We may not have to lock our doors in the country but we do have to shut them for fear of real bears getting in.

8. My bed is the hearth of my home / where teacups gather like neighbors / and scribbled notes are brushed aside / to make room for friends who come to call / for foot rubs that follow the news… Read this poem, Pillow Talk, in its entirety HERE.

9. Funny, how I posted the above poem and got nearly 20 comments, but only one person picked up on the fact that my bed is the hearth of my home because, as someone who manages Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, I spend more time in bed than most people.

10. Yes, there is a fatigue factor.  There is also an underlying thread of depression that I’ve been aware of for a very long time.  But the depressive aspect exists along with curiosity, playfulness and an appreciation for the beauty and richness of life.  It’s a balancing act to hold both darkness and light at the same time, one that brings a sense of wonder. – More from my Essay “Dear Dread” HERE

11. A completely different take on Pillow Talk HERE. 

12. “It has been 40 years. . . . In war, no one wins or loses. There is only destruction. Only those who have never fought like to argue about who won and who lost.”  – Bao Ninh, a writer who fought for the communist North Vietnamese army, from The Vietnam War

13. “You’re either on the bus or off the bus.”  ― Tom Wolfe, from the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, a book by Ken Keesy that was one of my formative reads in the ‘70s.

13. “And they built a wall against the future but the future got past just the same.”  – My Dharmacratic friend Will

___________Thirteen Thursday