DeLIGHT in You

Catch-up Saturday.

Eating Food

Eating my greens---at the restaurant/natural store, Tao Foods, started in 1968, when it was a "natural foods store".
It recently restyled itself a "Café and Herbery", with quotes from Rumi on the chalkboard. It markets itself as "Quaint and Magic", and I suppose it is.
What I love is, you can get a big bowl of sautéd kale  with sesame oil & seeds for $5:

You can still buy herbs in bulk there---glass jars ring the balcony in the other room.

What do ya'll think of Ozempic?
It looks like a miracle drug, and I hope it is, because so many people are drowning in suffering. There's no doubt about that.
If those people could get help, that would be excellent.

But I guess it makes me feel some overall ... 'disappointment', is that the word? in my species.
In solving huge and horrible problems like starvation (until the other day, a far worse problem than obesity), we have created other problems for us as a group that overwhelm us as individuals--we little beings are unable to resolve them.
Bring on pills and computers.

I still want to draw in the dirt with sticks.

And after all, I am free to do that for now [she writes on her computer, aware of the role of luck and double-dealing... ].

Meanwhile, vulnerable species like the golden frog can just disappear.
These frogs wave(d) at each other:

"Males attract females with visual displays, instead of calling like most male frogs and toads do. These attractive displays include leg and head twitching, stamping the ground and hopping in place. Male frogs often wave their arms to communicate with females whom will wave back if interested."

Waving, or Drowning? 

Our species has got some persistent problems there're no pills for.
"Sin" is out of favor as a word, but the Seven Deadly and their offspring are going strong.

Former Washington Post editor Marty Baron--the guy who helped expose the Catholic Church's systematic abuse of children (I'd just rewatched Spotlight, a movie about that)-- calls the WaPo's refusal yesterday to endorse Harris for president,
“Disturbing spinelessness at an institution famed for courage”.

Spinelessness would fall under the deadly sin of Sloth, I'd say. Or, also pride. And lust, greed and ...
All of them, they travel in a pack.

"Fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.” [1 John 4:18]

PS. Yeah, but Fear the A.I.

I searched "how many times does it say 'do not be afraid in the Bible?' and the FIRST thing that appears is AI saying "365 times."
The AI links to INSTAGRAM as a source!!!
. . . Where there's this cute idea that God said it 365 times so we could make calendars with one-a-day Bible verses!

This is not true.
"Anyone can jump over to BibleGateway.com and do a simple search of the phrase, 'Do Not Be Afraid' and see for themselves that it does NOT appear 365 times," says Keith Giles, progressive Christian. And he does the search.
Phrased in various ways, it does appear a lot--more than one hundred times? Cause we need to hear it?

"Even if it only appeared once, you could still wake up and read it to yourself every single day."

Heaven help us.
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Interlude

Afternoon at the art institute with Marz (& her college camera):
 

These are doll-sized! Two thousand years old! I love them!

Added face on a bus bench:

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The first night of the community ed Printing at Home class was fairly pointless--the teacher handed out easy-carve lino and one carver each and said "do what you want". Luckily I'd brought my carving tools.

I did not feel de-LIGHT-ful, and my print does not delight me.
It's okay though, and I hope it'll get me going again.

Scratching in the dirt, looking for the seed of light in the individual...

This weekend, I'm dog-sitting beautiful Burton, named after Richard, and didn't bring printmaking stuff.

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Return to Move

Man, am I sore this morning! Yesterday I worked my first shift back at the thrift store as a paid employee again.

It was just the sort of thing I love: Big Boss asked me to start by winnowing the housewares on the sales floor.
It hadn't been done thoroughly in months so it was very satisfying---I pulled tons of cracked plates, chipped glassware, broken tschotchkes, empty packages (contents stolen or separated into useless parts), faded and filmy plastic, and generally undesirable crap.
I started to reorganize too--but that will take longer.

I'm glad I have the weekend off to stretch out, and then I'll be working 5-hour shifts, Mon-Wed-Fri–days. I can recover from exertion in between.
I'm thrilled about this return to physical work. As I knew, I don't push myself as much as a job with built-in exercise.

Like with food--we've freed ourselves from onerous and dangerous physical situations (working or starving to death)–– THIS IS SO GOOD–– . . . but instead of becoming beautifully free, we've (I've!) become couch potatoes.

Ah, well.
This is the world we live in now.
And so, I appreciate the necessity of movement--if it's a job I generally like, for a cause I support (making excess stuff affordable and available). I'm not forced to plant potatoes or die.

I was (of course) already agitated by the energies around me at work---but that's the world we live in. I am willing and able (I think!) to be in it.
The agitation came from exposure to the larger social setting (poverty, mostly), not from coworkers.
I went around and told everyone I was rehired (I am prepared for the fact that management's communication style is "knowledge by osmosis" (not to say secretive?), and everyone was welcoming--even very happy I'm back.
And I am too.
[Watch this space for ranting and raging in the future, however.]

I do think it's funny I'm back. Marz said she'd thought I would be. "You love so much about it."
Like life (and one's self), it's full of annoyances and contradictions--and good.
I'm not done there.
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Side-by-sides I'd set up at the thrift store (previously, but never posted)

             And bookends: