Day: May 13, 2018

If you wish to pre-order a laminated 10″ by 3″ The  Army Of Good bumpersticker for $10, please send a check or cash for $10 (no charge for shipping in the U.S.) to The Gus Fund, c/o Jon Katz, P.O.Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816. I can’t take e-mail or Paypal orders.

When the bumper stickers arrive, you will also be able to purchase them on Maria’s Etsy page. I expect them to be ready during the coming week. And thanks, I am eager to post photos of the bumper stickers on your cars and on the road. I’ve ordered 500 stickers, and if they fly out of here, I can order some more.

If someone asks me what the bumper stickers mean, I will say, they are meant to help keep good alive.

I enjoyed taking a portrait of Hannah, an especially sweet dog, the mother of  Gus, and hopefully, the mother of our next puppy.

In the country, taking possessions to the dump is a last  resort. This is a world of thrift and consignment stories, lawn sales, and the use of curbs as marketing opportunities. A friend asked us to store these plastic bins when she moved, and they have been gathering dust in the barn for some weeks.

We had baskets of extra dahlia bulbs that we had no room for in our gardens. All of this went onto the curb in front of the house, everything but one basket of bulbs was gone within minutes. We line everything up, post “free” signs on the bins and wait an hour or two.

People stop and look at  stuff like that around here, and if it isn’t broken or filthy – we don’t put out anything that is broken or filthy, that’s part of the honor system of the underground economy. If there is any chance it can be used by anyone, put it out on the curb.

 

The Dalai Lama was asked by a reporter once what surprised him the most about humanity, and he said without hesitating it  was man.

He sacrifices his health in order to make money, he said.

Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health.

And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present.

The result is that he does not live in the present or the future. 

He lives as if he is never going to die, 

and then dies without having ever really lived.

I don’t want to die without every having really lived. I don’t want to sacrifice my health in order to make money. I wish to live in the present.

 

When we got up this morning, we looked out the window and saw some dots popping up int he march and we couldn’t figure out what they are. We got closer and saw they were the heads of some geese who used our pasture as a motel for the night, fading into the tall grass and resting for the night.

At first light, their heads all came out, there was a lot of honking. Then they were gone. It is nice, thought, to see that out of the window.