Jump back, git out the way…

Jump back, a guy I knew used to say that, jump back, git out the way. He was referring to one of the twelve steps. The third if I’m not mistaken?

Anyway, I was thinking about that. I was thinking about a lot of things. Thinking, thinking, thinking. How on earth are we here? Jump back, look back, take back…it’s all back to the future.

In my life with my mother, in my growing up time, we spent all of our thinking and doing and being all about social justice causes. We stuffed envelopes and marched. We boycotted grapes and lettuce for the farm workers. I can remember standing out in front of the A&P passing out leaflets about the horrors of the lives of the farm workers. I still have photo of my mother with Cesar Chavez. There was the Vietnam war and the environmental movement. There were Willis Wagons and fair housing marches. There was Fair Play for Cuba. There was MS. magazine and the ERA and the Black Panthers, and a sit-in at my high school when Fred Hampton was murdered. There was union organizing and demonstrators sleeping on couches. At some point I thought, can’t we just stop for a second? And I think that’s what happened. We stopped for a second and now all hell has broken loose. While we were in ballet class and finding romance and careers. Saw a DeadHead Sticker on a Caddilac.

So the bottom line is we can never stop. We can never rest on our so called laurels. The machine keeps turning. Doesn’t matter that half the people want to have a life of relative contentment. In a strictly capitalist culture everything is for sale. So, we are conditioned to keep striving for more, and more and the constant battle to stay afloat robs your soul. It sucks the soul right out of a person. We are slaves to it.

I’m sure that I’m not the only one thinking about all of these things. I don’t really know where I’m going with all this thinking and thinking? I’m sure that I’ll find a way to tie it all together eventually.

Today I got up and stuck strictly to my routine. Made a cup of coffee. Read something inspirational. Then I worked the NYT puzzles and wrote my pages in long hand. I made the bed and ate some yogurt. Then I put on my bathing suit and went to the Y. I didn’t read any “news”. I mostly kept myself to myself. Hunkered down as it were.

We need to rest our nervous systems. Take everything as slow as you need to. Walk outside and look around. What are you noticing? How is your breathing? Check in on your inner weather often. Pause when agitated. Come back to this moment. Try to be very deliberate with your day. It’s time to gather our strength.