Brothers Karamazov and New York...

World Trade Financial Center

I walked past the World Trade Financial Center this afternoon. It has a little harbor which is beautiful.  I have seen the most spectacular boats there.  From Johnny Depp's boat to smaller, elegant, simple, sailing boats. There are also some boats that are so big they practically take over the small harbor.  If you read my blog you know I have a thing for boats.

I hang around the port hoping to be invited for a ride.  Someday...

I was just walking along the river and noticed there were a couple of things going on.  There are always things going on in New York.  There was a filming crew setting up near the volleyball court and then there was a band rehearsing closer to the World Trade Financial Center.  I asked what film was being filmed and seems that tomorrow Project Runway will be filmed there.  Project Runway is a TV show about aspiring clothes' designers.

I then walked back to where the band was rehearsing and found out that the wonderful River to River program had brought the band Ivan & Alyosha to New York from Seattle. River to River is a program that promotes the arts and provides all kinds of free activities to New Yorkers and tourists by the river.  It is sponsored by private companies associated with the World Trade Financial Center.  There are concerts, ballets, theater, etc., etc. throughout the summer.  It's a lot of fun.  I decided to stay and listen to Ivan & Alyosha even though the weather in New York has been deplorable.  It's been very humid with constant thunderstorms.  After having the worst winter ever it's hard to complain but hoping it improves!


The band's name was inspired by a conversation between Ivan and Alyosha in Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov during which they discuss the existence of God.  


For your pleasure:  


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40eP9Wsfphg


You may also go to their website for more music (www.ivan&alyosha.com) and download their songs via iTunes.  

Ivan & Alyosha — New York, June 22, 2011

Love II

Today I feel full of love.  I feel my heart has expanded to give to all.

First time I wrote about love was in my post on March 21st, on Love.  My attempt to write a poem.

This is not necessarily towards anyone in particular but it is towards everyone.  Much love and compassion to everyone out there.

It's so much easier in life to live in the kingdom of love.  It is a warm place.  It is cuddly.  It is so cozy. It makes me feel wonderful.  Powerful.  Infinite.  Generous.

Love has no boundaries.  It goes across religions, race, gender...any differences are inconsequential.  Love is pure and it touches all of us.

To the world at large, much love to you all.  We will all succeed at what we want to do. Keep the focus on your passions, identify clear goals, work hard to achieve them, have faith...and it will happen!

You can make it happen.  You will make it happen.  Most of all, have faith in yourself. 

Privacy

Writing about privacy is something I have thought about doing many times.  Today is the day.

I have been a devoted Internet user practically from its inception.  It is an easy way to access information and learn about all kinds of topics of interest.  However, I also find that the Internet has resulted in rampant violations of privacy by its millions of users whether they are government institutions, corporations or individuals.

I saw a video last week about a woman that had an angry reaction towards an employee of a transportation company.  Clearly she did not handle this interaction in a constructive and graceful manner.  Her name is now all over the Internet.  The worst part about this incident is that there are no standards to prevent her being maligned and slandered by people that use anonymous handles to speak their mind or just spread stories about her.  What resulted were insults about her nationality and her appearance that seem endless.  Very few comments have been constructive.  Today I read an article in the New York Times about someone being maligned by a competitor online.  While he sued the site for damaging his reputation, the court apparently upheld the notion that because the competitor owned the site but didn't write the content, he did not have grounds to sue.  At least the site apparently was shut down but that was after publishing what the plaintiff stated were lies about him and his employees.

It is telling of how little we have evolved as human beings and tools like the Internet are making that more apparent.  Where is compassion in all of this?

Regarding the video of this woman, what she said or how she said it is not the issue.  That is between the transportation authorities and her.  What is disturbing is the intrusion of having someone video tape you at a most unflattering moment and having that video go viral.  And having the entire world weighing in and sharing information about you.

What is privacy?  To me, it's those areas of your life that you choose not to share. It doesn't matter what these are, it's about being able to keep something to yourself for whatever reasons.  There is less and less of that nowadays.  Someone that is able to video tape me at whim should be illegal.  I know that would not make You Tube very pleased but there have to be some laws to protect one's privacy.  I have nothing against broadcasting with the proper level of permission from individuals.

Per www.privacy.org, the White House website now uses cookies that track users for up to two years (used to be single-session cookies which were deleted when users closed their browsers).  There is no way to opt out of receiving cookies.  This is despite the fact that (also per an article in www.privacy.org) a "new survey from the Center for the Digital Future at the University of Southern California found that almost half of Americans over 16 who use the Internet are worried about businesses watching their online activities. Only 38% worried about the Government doing so".  I am generally worried about anybody infringing on my privacy.  Anybody.  And that includes someone I know going through my drawers or reading my papers at home.

The Internet is a tool that provides everyone with a lot of power.  The US Senate (under the sponsorship of Senator Leahy) is proposing a bill that doesn't quite answer my privacy concerns but it's a start.  However, considering there is not proper legislation to truly protect privacy,  the alternative is to hope that people are compassionate and graceful to those whose mistakes become glaringly obvious to the world as a result of the Internet.

While the Internet gives each one of us a lot of power there is even more power within each and every one of us.   Using that power to help others and to shed the light around us is a way to make this world a better place.  I'm determined that if I make a comment on a blog or an article online it will be with that purpose in mind.  

Hands

There is something about the hands of people I love that inspires me to record those images in my memory bank.

I was taking a walk to get my favorite soup for lunch today and I started to think about the hands of my father.  He died a couple of years ago.  I don't know what triggered the memory.  His hands were absolutely beautiful.  He had very fair skin and they always were very clean.  I felt protected when I saw his hands although he didn't hold my hand very often. As I remembered his hands, I thought of how he did his best to be the head of the family and steer us all in the right direction.   All the pressure was on him because my mother also relied completely on him.  With such free spirits as his daughters, it was difficult for him to do much more than instill his values as the guiding light for our lives.  He definitely succeeded in doing that - although his bar was so high that sometimes my sister and I wonder whether we could be a little less strict and demanding of ourselves.

As I continued to walk, I also remembered my grandmother's hands.  She had warm and perfectly manicured hands always and, as I describe in my post titled The Ring on March 24th, she usually wore a ring that I thought was the most beautiful ring in the world.  I still think that.  Whenever I sat with her as a little girl, I would hold her hand and not let go of her hand for ours as we sat during family get togethers.  Being next to her, was the safest and most loving place to be in her entire house.

As I recalled my mother's hands, I felt sad.  She had hands that needed comfort and protection, especially since she was very ill during the last months of her life.  She had childlike hands, very expressive.  They were constantly moving.  She was very conscious that her intellect, her charm and her mannerisms could convince almost anyone of anything so she used her hands to her advantage.  She was the strongest person I ever met.  A nurse that came to visit her during the last month of her life said that my mother acted as if she was a queen.  I told the nurse, "She is a queen".  That's who she was.  As I looked at her hand in my hand a few hours before she died, I thought her life went by so fast.  It just flew by.  When I remember her hand that day it motivates me to think about my life and my priorities.

Nearing my delicious lunch place, I thought of Tim's hands.  He was my very best friend.  He had long fingers, a very elegant hand.  His hand was constantly tanned because he lived in a tropical city.  He had fingers of a pianist which is not coincidental because he wanted to play the piano his whole life.  He learnt to play as an adult out of sheer passion for the instrument and its sounds. Whenever he was in New York, we went to Carnegie Hall to hear Yevgeny Kissin or any other brilliant pianist in that league.  I can see his right hand distinctly, shifting gears, as he drove me everywhere when we started working together a few years ago.  Remembering his hand gives me peace.  It warms my heart to know that he can hear Beethoven and Mozart and many other amazing pianists whenever he wants to now.

I then thought of Lily's hands.  Lily is a little over a year old and she's my niece.  She's the most lively little girl I ever met.  She's already talking non-stop although no one can understand her.  She is also walking and dancing.  Always smiling and cajoling, much like my mother used to do.  She has very little hands which she is constantly clapping with joy.

I don't know why I thought about hands.  Maybe because they give and say so much even while remaining silent.     

Music and boats...

A boat in Punta del Este, Uruguay

I am very grateful that music exists.  Probably since anyone heard the wind and the sound of the waves for the first time, those sounds and others were the inspiration to create music.  It's also safe to assume that love inspired musicians early on to create something that would express their innermost feelings as they dealt with love in their lives.

Music has a way of stirring my emotions more easily than most artistic endeavors - I am able to appreciate the beauty of a painting or a sculpture but even the most beautiful works of art don't come close to what music makes me feel inside. Music is also evocative, it is able to take you back to memories that were seemingly under lock and key in the archive called "the past".

Last week I went to a live concert with a friend at The Mercury Lounge.  The Mercury Lounge is in the lower east side in New York City.  It's a very cool venue, very unassuming.  It doesn't try to be anything else than what it is - a place for live bands or solo singers to play their music.  Sometimes they are unknown artists and other times they bring very famous artists.  There are very few seats so most people stand in front of the stage for the various concerts which usually last a couple of hours.  The singer was James Vincent McMorrow.  A genius.  I'm buying his music through iTunes before the week is over.  One of the songs was about losing love...somehow, the lyrics and the music brought me back to a relationship I had a few years ago.

Peter and I were in New Zealand, traveling throughout the country and having a great time.  We had been going out for a few months and ours was definitely a relationship based on adventure.  We met in New York at the beginning of the summer and traveled almost every week-end to Cape Cod.  We went to Nantucket and to Martha's Vineyard.  We fell in love with Cape Cod but we weren't necessarily in love with each other. We loved being together but ours was a relationship in progress.

After a few months we decided to go to New Zealand and to Tahiti.  We met in New Zealand - he was assigned there for a few months after the project he ran in New York - and we traveled from Wellington to other towns.  I remember one day we decided to walk an absurd number of miles on a remote beach - I don't recall exactly how many miles we walked but we walked for one entire day.  Our relationship and our lives changed completely after that long walk.

I found out that Peter thought we could have an open relationship while he traveled all over the world on various assignments.  I knew that an open relationship would not be good for me.  I understood then and now that he needed to be free but while I wasn't ready to get engaged I also didn't want to be someone waiting for him to show up in New York as if I represented the next port of call.  I didn't know where our relationship was going  before this trip nor was I pressuring Peter to define it but that walk gave us the time and the space to talk about it.

When I heard James McMorrow sing one of his songs about losing love last night, I saw myself in the beach again, walking endlessly.  No one was in the beach except for Peter and me and maybe one or two other people at times while we kept walking.  It was the end of the fall but it was still a little chilly.  I remember there were reddish cliffs on one side and the endless beach in front of us.  The song brought me back to that moment.  It was a painful and beautiful experience at the same time.

The power of a song.  Brought back bittersweet memories.  Peter called me when he returned to New York a couple of years later but I wasn't interested in rekindling our relationship.  It was over for me.

Songs bring back a lot of memories and stir emotions for me.  Last week, one of James Vincent Morrow's songs was the catalyst for my memories of Peter in New Zealand.  I hope he's doing well and is happy...

Following is one of the two songs that reminded me of Peter,  "If I had a Boat".  Peter is a businessman who loves to sail.  Both the music and the lyrics are beyond beautiful.  All of the songs James Vincent McMorrow's played last week at The Mercury Lounge, were hauntingly beautiful.  Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iH5NAuHjzv8

Healing

Sand Mandala

Life presents a few twists and turns to us that we need to assimilate, process and heal from - sometimes healing takes a long time.

The more unexpected things happen to me the more I understand the need to take the time to heal.  It's not easy.  Sometimes it seems easier to sweep it under the proverbial rug but one day I know I'll wake up and see a mountain of dirt under the rug.  It's much more difficult to get rid of that than to confront all experiences even those that are tough.

I have focused on working on myself every time I have had a tough experience.  Some of those experiences are not as bad as others.  First, I assimilate the experience and that in itself takes time.  Just to be able to accept the new reality has its own process.  Then I try to figure it out, sometimes realizing that it's not an intellectual challenge, it's an emotional one.  Yet my mind tries to figure it out anyway.  Then I do yoga, I do meditations, I talk to my friends and family...I deal with it until I get tired of the subject and don't want to talk about it anymore.  Then I know that I've dealt with it sufficiently.  Sometimes I have leftover dreams - or more like nightmares because in some way I have to relive what happened - and I know it's my subconscious still working things out.

I also realize that everyone has different levels of bad experiences.  My bad experiences pale in comparison to horrendous experiences others have had.  But I am only able to measure the depth of my experiences based on what I have experienced in the past.  That is my measuring stick.

I'm healed.  I still have enough faith and innocence to not be cynical and to always expect the best in others and of life.  That's the gift that taking the time to heal yields.  Priceless.

Expanding

I went to a yoga class yesterday.  One of the exercises was to envision being in space.   The vastness of space reminded me how broad we really are and how we keep limiting ourselves.  I limit myself more often that I want to.  When I become aware of it, I focus on expanding.

Expanding sometimes involves just thinking of the opposite of what I think I want.  For example, as some of you know, I am weighing the option of staying in New York or moving to Brazil.  While I was originally strongly leaning towards New York I also let myself be open enough to entertain the thought of how much I would also enjoy Brazil.  Being the adventurer that I am, it is an attractive option.  I have very close friends in Brazil.  I love the language, I love the people, what's not to love?  However, right now, New York seems a better option in terms of getting a job offer in the near term.  Since I started out putting effort towards getting a job in Brazil and only recently New York seems to be on track to manifest, I feel I gave both cities equal chance.  I am letting the chips fall where they may.  

Expanding is about becoming more and more aware and conscious so that I may catch myself when I'm limiting myself unnecessarily.  Being close to nature helps me because I see how limitless nature is.  Nature keeps renewing, keeps growing, keeps changing...but its essence is always there.  Just like I do.  The ocean is constantly vast, keeps moving, keeps changing and is always there.  I'm very close to the ocean.  The ocean lives within me in the same way that space and the heavens do.

Expanding is also about being creative.  Engaging in creative activities no matter what they are.  I wrote about Inspiration on May 13th, and being inspired and creating something as a result of that is one way to touch the heavens.  To touch that aspect of ourselves that is not only limitless but where we may feel our pure and crystal spirits strongly.

I am limitless.  I just need to remind myself to use my soul to shine light on my path.

My World

It's an amazing world.  Not perfect, but it is mine.  It has almost everything one may want.  A great home, nature close by, a city where anything is possible and where culture abounds.  Friends and family in many cities close and far.  Food in the refrigerator is plentiful and the sun sets every day right in front of my eyes.  I am working on two major projects, getting a job and creating my own company and some limited engagements.  A life where I focus on living from my heart and mostly achieve that.  A life where I am able to pursue my passions and dreams if I give myself the time for it.  A life where I am free to think, say and do pretty much what I want on a daily basis.  Life is good.  No complaints from this corner.

To create a new world is a decision I could make at any point.  I have done that before and there were some good things but also great risk.  I love risk and adventure but somehow feel like putting a stake in the ground (unless I am windswept) and continue to build something in the world I am in already.

I can't help think about people that were literally windswept by a tornado recently or affected by an earthquake or a tsunami.  Their worlds changed in an instant.  From one moment to the next, they lost their homes, their loved ones, their neighbors...but they didn't lose themselves.

As we all go through major changes that's a very important thing to remember.  We may lose possessions, we may lose loved ones but we have ourselves.  We are strong, we are resilient, we will endure and overcome anything.  And we can teach others to do the same...until we can't do it any longer.  For now, we exist and we are at the core of our worlds irrespective of what surrounds us and what affects us.  We can get through everything and anything.

Faith. Strength. Courage.