Monday, January 20, 2025

Good to know

It's Martin Luther King Jr Day, and we in the U-S-of-A are inaugurating our new head honcho attended by his crew--all denizens of a Star Wars cantina, "a wretched hive of scum and villainy". *
Are you ready?


ABOVE: Maurice Sendak illustration
for Open House for Butterflies by Ruth Krauss
"A screaming song is good to know
in case you need to scream"
________________

STORY IDEA: The world's richest and most powerful bad men (r&mpbm) are gathered on a platform for a ceremony.
Due to what is later determined to be an accidental but catastrophic failure of the screws supporting the structure, the platform collapses.
Miraculously most people survive with barely a scratch,
but the r&mpbm are crushed to death.
What next?
____________________

Such catastrophe is unlikely.
We're more likely in for the continuing slog along "the arc of the moral universe", which, MLK said, "is long, but it bends toward justice.”

I used to think that MLK quote was mere wishful thinking.
But it came to me last night as I was falling asleep:
no, that's right.

I keep marveling at my (our) experience of being a Blip o' Carbon that gained Consciousness.
It is the nature of Consciousness to expand beyond Self-awareness to Other-awareness:
As it is for me, so it is for thee.

A concomitant result of the expansion of consciousness is what we call justice. Justice is not an emotion, it is a response to the rain that falls on all.
The Golden Rule, applied, can look more like engineering:
if you don't like to get
rained on at the bus stop,
build a bus shelter.

The growth of the species is like the growth of a child.
Consciousness expands, like a stretchy web.
First it becomes self-aware, and it cares for its own survival. And the survival of the other people it depends on, and later, its own offspring.
Gradually it (the child, the species) builds up awareness that Other People Are Real too--other people beyond the immediate family and tribe.
And the consciousness expands outward, for some, to include all of existence.

So yeah, I think 'the moral arc bends toward justice' is a way of saying that. It's not guaranteed--MLK doesn't even say it will reach justice--but it is like a plant growing toward the sun--it wants to go that way.
It helps if we clear the stuff that blocks the light, that warps the arc--of our own personal life, our hearts, 
and onward, outward to our neighborhoods and beyond.

Let us hold hands and keep on going. 

How long, oh Lord, how long?

Long, and very long.

 
__________________

* The quoted words from Star Wars are Obi Wan-Kenobi's.
The idea of DT's cabinet picks being from a Star Wars cantina is Robert Reich's, former US secretary of labor.
I had snapped a photo of the Sendak illustrations weeks ago--and saved it for today.

8 comments:

  1. Our stars are aligned; I bought a copy of "Open House for Butterflies" recently for a 3 year old friend who is currently enjoying screaming.

    Ceci

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    1. We’re alright when we’re three! 😆❤️

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  2. Good to read this today. And Ruth Krauss is aces, in children's books and poetry for "grown-ups."

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    1. I’m extra grateful for old blog friends today, Michael.

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  3. For me, screaming takes too much effort- humming loudly may be more my style- Paying no attention to anything today, staying in, messing with enamel paint and glue (?) The cantina is safety, I go there in my mind and wish a "Journey well , may the spires keep you" to every individual. Among the freaks today, feeling at home.

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    1. Along the lines of humming—a friend said she thought any screaming songs she’d be singing today would sound more like underwater whale song.

      Glue and paint! There’s the ticket. 😀❤️

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