No Expectations

Awareness it has been said, is the greatest gift we can give ourselves. Looking at what is around us with fresh eyes, but most of all looking at our internal selves. Not obsessively but with the same keen eye. Particularly when we are uncomfortable or dissatisfied or feeling downright whingey. Which I was last week. Because I forgot not to be surprised at all the mallarkey around me.

I try and stay away from the news these days. It is all rather rotten as depicted by the newspapers and websites I browse. I don't have teevee which is an enormous gift I gave myself over 20 years ago now as when I visit other houses with their housegod CNN, it is all about disasters and crime and drugs and rapes. Which is not the real news anyway, is it? Ne'er a one of those talking heads addresses the doomed economy, our oil addicted culture, and our consumerist lifestyles which has turned around and bitten us savagely in the nether regions.

Meanwhile the pols lie and scheme and more-lie and more-scheme to get the largest slices of the ever diminishing pie for their corporate overlords before their subjugated masses all go arse over teakettle. And I realize I am one of the 1% who are thoroughly ZOMG awake and see it so painfully clearly.

So I made a resolution to myself a few months ago. That I would no longer place any positive expectation on a person, a place or a thing in public life. When political patronage takes place I would just roll my eyes and say "Well, no surprises there, is there?" When the Gulf Oil so-called spill's (tsunami actually)aftermath is now resulting in horrific human health issues along with the fish, wildlife and mammal massacres, I am not shocked, I do not react, I didn't expect it to be better or fixed or cured or confessed. Or even for other insane drilling (and fracking, sweet Jaybuzz) to be stopped. It is just as I predicted. The world is being pillaged and despoiled and destroyed. And American Idol and their Survivory clones keep most sedated.

And maybe that's a good thing.

For who wants to be wide awake for the coming death throes of our once beautiful planet?

Call me a hardcore realist. Or cynical curmudgeon.

And quote of the day, added after original posting:

The place where optimism most flourishes is the lunatic asylum.
- Havelock Ellis

Oil Spoil

Their only crime was
To live unfettered.
Free on the water,
Soaring in the air,
Unprotected from those
Who would deny and
Dement. Destroy. Damn.
Deaden. Debase. Discard.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I too was turning away, sickened to weeping by this crime against the world and its helpless creatures.

I will no longer turn away. I want these images burned into my very being. I want those callous bastards brought to justice and those evil politicians who collude with them.

Turning away has enabled the invasions of Iraq, Afghanistan, Rwanda, Israeli death squads in Gaza and on relief ships.

Cartoon of the Week

Sorry, Mom.

Gulf Oil Spill Affecting Newfoundland Birds

The far-reaching oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is affecting one of my favourite places in the world - Cape St. Mary's, Newfoundland - where I spent my last few birthdays with my family. Cape St. Mary's in the spring hosts millions of sea-birds that winter in the Gulf of Mexico, the most famous being the gannets. I've written about them here.

Bill Montevecchi is a bird researcher and professor at Memorial University in St. John's. (CBC)Montevecchi and other bird scientists are planning to attach satellite tags to some birds in Newfoundland this summer in order to track them and see how they fare when they return to the Gulf next fall.

"You know, we can feel the long reach of that oil spill in Louisiana, Gulf of Mexico, here in Eastern Canada. What we do know is that some of our gannets are being oiled and the birds I've seen [pictures of from the Gulf of Mexico] are so heavily oiled that they are going to sink in a day or two."

"It seems to me it's just responsible to find out what's happening to our birds that are going back there from eastern Canada."

He worries birds that head south from Canada will land in oily water in the Gulf and die.

"The birds I've seen already, the most humane thing to do would be euthanasia. They are so covered with oil there is no way they are going to survive. It's a total assault on their body. It shuts down their oil glands. They ingest it. You can clean them on the outside but they are dying on the inside," said Montevecchi.

He said there is also fear that the oil spill in the Gulf may harm marine mammals, such as humpback whales, that come to Eastern Canada annually.

Read more here

My heart is breaking.