Home
Directory
Frontier
DaveNet
Mail
Search
System
Ads

News and commentary from the cross-platform scripting community.
cactus Mail Starting 9/8/98

From: dougb@chilehead.com (Doug Baron);
Sent at Tue, 8 Sep 1998 10:25:51 -0700;
Re:The Baseball God is Laughing Again

Obviously, there are many answers to this question, but Judi and I discovered one for ourselves when we were in Greece on our Honeymoon: take the bus.

Not a tour bus, of course; just the bus. We wanted to go from Athens to this nearby beach town. Our first notion was to take a taxi. Feh! Let's just take the bus, we decided.

We were the only non-Greek people on the bus. It was filled with housewives, business people, fishermen and grandmothers. Real people, locals, going about their day's work. It was cool! We definitely felt like we were getting an "insider" look at the community we were visiting.

From: pholmes@UCSD.Edu (Preston Holmes);
Sent at Tue, 8 Sep 1998 09:26:54 -0700;
Really Being there

Interesting to read what people are saying on your news page.

To me, really being there is about saturation of the senses, as Brian noted extreme weather is one sure way of this, but also travelling to places where the sounds, smells, and language are all novel has a like effect.

For me no other activity is better at putting me in the moment better than kayaking, at least for the past couple years.

Here is one picture from earlier in the summer where I was about as much in the moment as possible.

http://siolibrary.ucsd.edu/Preston/kayak/CherryFalls/

From: james@designframe.com (James Spahr);
Sent at Tue, 8 Sep 98 11:03:53 -0400;
Re:"Baseball gods"

People in New York do go to the Museums and the plays, we just avoid the Statue of Liberty, Rockefeller Center, and the South Street Seaport like the plague. (And do not go anywhere near 5th avenue, Midtown, during the hoilday season.)

From: "Amy Wohl" ;
Sent at Tue, 8 Sep 1998 10:42:59 -0400;
Re:The Baseball God is Laughing Again

Dave, I loved this piece.

First, New Orleans is our (my husband's and my) favorite city in the world. We've traveled most everywhere, so we have lots to compare it with. The reason we like it so much is that the people there are SO REAL. They look right at you and talk to you. Not like tourists, but just like neighbors. We love it! We wander all over NO (and some of the rest of LA) and enjoy every minute.

But that's because someone taught me, a few years ago, the special grace of Living in the Moment. I think this relates to your Reality. When you're living in the Moment, you're really all there, just doing the thing you're doing, not thinking about how you got there or where you're going or what people are thinking about how you look.

Living in the Moment means you can see that it's beautiful day and forget who much you have to do for a few minutes and just appreciate how beautiful it is.

It means you can look at a New Mexican sunset (as we did on vacation last month) and be transformed by how strange and familiar it looks, all at once. You don't have to worry about whether you want to move to New Mexico, whether you could find a job there, or whether you'd like it. You can just revel in the beautiful colors and strange and unfamiliar shapes of the desert at night.

It's the best thing I've ever learned.

I think it must be akin to the line in Chariots of Fire when the Presbyterian guy who runs says that when he runs especially well he can"feel God's pleasure" and it makes him happy. When I can feel the moment -- all of it -- I feel like I am one with the world.

I hope Mark McGwire makes 62 today!

From: bdbuck@interport.net (Brian D. Buck);
Sent at Tue, 08 Sep 1998 10:39:37 -0400;
Re:""really being there""

I just got back from two weeks on the Florida Gulf Coast. A lot happened. We weathered hurricane Earl. I watched it on the Weather Channel, saw the footage, and walked out onto our deck which was fifty yards away from the biggest breakers I've ever seen on the Gulf. TV doesn't tell half the story! Not even close!

A few hours before landfall, before it was too dark to take a picture, I walked the boardwalk over the dunes and stepped down onto the beach. The sand was mushy and wet from all the rain and the occasional wave that would spill up that far. I was sinking in up to my ankles, and the wind was blowing so hard I was in a crouch most of the time. I couldn't see anything because I had my eyes closed from the spray and sandblasts. In all, I snapped about twenty blind pictures with my waterproof camera.

The whole time I was out there, I was scared, awed, and feeling really stupid. After all, nobody else was out on the beach with me. But I couldn't help myself. I had to have the picture. I don't know why. Maybe it was so I could remember in ten years what a 80 mile-an-hour wind feels like. Today, I can still feel the cold rush of the water getting blown down my shirt and bathing suit. The sand stinging into my face, legs, and ears. But in ten years, who knows? Was I really there? You Bet! Were the Weather Channel viewers? Nope. I've got the proof! I was there.

If the pictures come out, I'll put them on my site and send you an URL.

This page was last built on Tuesday, September 8, 1998 at 12:47:50 PM, with Frontier version 5.1.3. Mail to: dave@scripting.com. © copyright 1997-98 UserLand Software.