Whoring Myself For Kev

This is an old Mr. Id that I updated to post on my new Myspace friend's page - Kevin Smith!
'Course now I'm kind of worried about the "pill" reference (which I changed because I wanted to do it, but I didn't think of it until after I'd posted it the first time) since Jay wasn't at the Cannes film premier of "Clerks II."
Now if only Meg and Ebert would join myspace, then my Myspace self would be content.

Dad's Microfilm

I don't know how long ago this was made, but my Dad found it lying on a sidewalk in Washington DC at about 35-40 years ago. He was always somewhat of a conspiracy fellow, so he kept it. It was in his jewelry box, which I have, and as I was going through it the other day, I realized that I now have the technology to look at it. I have no idea what it is. But it's pretty damn cool looking.

No words, just "hi"

Didja see my new pants and shoes? Sweet.

On the Answer That God Gives

05/19/2006 7:27 AM – 7:55 AM

The Answer of God is Silence. There are no varying degrees, only varying degrees to which we listen. The Answer that God gives is absolute and full. What should I do with my life? What color slacks should I wear to my interview? Could you please make it not rain? Can you give me this day my daily bread? Why do children starve to death? How could you let that happen to me when I was just a kid? Did I do something wrong before I was even born?

We close the windows and the doors. We stop up our ears. But we can still hear some noise that filters in. The sound of the breath. The beat of the heart. So we calm ourselves and focus on the breath and listen to the sound it makes. We listen until we can no longer hear it. We approach the Answer of God, but we can never quite get there. There’s still too much noise. This noise doesn’t come from outside, though. It comes from our mind. So we focus on the breath and the thoughts grow less and less. But we never quite get to the Answer. We approach it. We can feel it somehow creeping into our bones, but we can never quite grasp it.

Can we draw any conclusions from the Answer? Does the Silence tell us anything about the One that speaks It? No. If you draw some conclusion from the Answer, you weren’t listening to it. This is your face before your grandparents were born. This is the sound of one hand clapping. This is the Answer to all of the vain days of all of your vain life. We are not beings of Silence. Even when we were primordial ectoplasm, floating in a Pangeaic tidepool, we were still of the substance of noise. Even the gift of the ultimate resource did not teach us Silence, but it did let us know that it was there. Then the Silence was made flesh, and dwelt among us, but we did not comprehend Him. We pestered him for answers in words, but words cannot capture Silence. They can, when used well, point us to it, but they are not the Silence. The finger that points to the moon is not the moon. But it’s time to shower and dress and get ready for work. Don’t stop asking God your questions, but for God’s sake, listen to His Answer. Listen to it. Just listen, O Spikey Jim. Wherever you are. Remember it. Remember that there is nothing better.

Which Is to Say That Only the Stillness Will Not Disappoint Because in Makes No Promises

05/17/2006 6:50 AM – 7:10 AM

What is it that’s flying you away from the stillness? Have you considered where it will drop you? What is so desirable that it can tempt you away from peace? Your country is run by fools and will for the foreseeable future? It always has been. It always will be. You want something bright and shiny? Haven’t you noticed that the shine always wears off and it was never that bright in the first place?

Are you contemplating some perfect marriage to your perfect She? Have you forgotten that the only perfection to be found is in the stillness where the Word resides? What are you fighting for? What are you fighting against? Have you forgotten that you wrestle not against flesh and blood? Have you forgotten that that which is desired is the quiet where God resides? Stop waging war in your mind and simply sit still – that is the only battle worth fighting and it can only be fought by letting go. So let go. Let go of righteousness. Let go of unrighteousness. They are the same substance. Only God is good.

There is the tree again. There is the fog. There is the rain and the wet street. All things pass except for the stillness from which all things rise and all things return. Are you worried? Are you angry? Are you happy? Are you proud? Where will it drop you when you find its end? There is only one faithful love, only one perfect marriage and that is only found in settling down and sinking into the embrace of silence. What is higher than peace, O Spike? What is of more value? Ask yourself again what is worth the effort. Look at the world and ask which holds more value – the quiet or the good? You cannot right the wrongs. You cannot save the world. You cannot be happy. No one can. When there is a chance to do right, do right. When you are happy, be happy. When you can show compassion, show compassion. But remember that at the heart of all these things is the empty maw of the grave. Your self will die, and with it will die your no-self – they are not two, not one. In the end, only the Word remains and He will call again all things to One. Haha.

Of the Silent Word

05/16/2006 7:05 AM – 7:26 AM

The church bell and the call of the beggar, sounding there in the rain. The light glows out from the window. The sign saying that someone is in business. The first time I sat on a zafu. It was a good sit. Just to sit. Still the body. Point the mind towards the breath. Point it again.

There is no such thing as good advice, only pointing towards the breath and saying, “be content.” All roads lead to the grave, all graves lead to eternity. Where are we from? Where are we going? Just pull out the poison arrow, there is only movement in space and drifting time. What should I do? How should I live? What am I going to be when I grow up? Doesn’t really matter. Step down beneath the rippling surface and swim in the silence that is the Word. “God spoke one Word,” says John of the Cross, “and that Word was spoken in silence.” Still God speaks that Word. Still that Word echoes in all that is. Where you’ve reached the Cloud of Unknowing, kick the ladder away.

The green is coming on beneath the purple-gray sky, these, of course, are the days that Spikes were born for. The touch of the heavens is only falling water, and we dissolve in the forgetting. What self? What no-self? Both propositions are equally ridiculous. True is found in the silence of oppositions. This. What is this? Falling away is coming together. Being is non-being. Yes, it’s a lie. Doesn’t matter. There’s just rain and chlorophyll. Smaller down, the quanta bubble. Pulsating geometry. Are you trying to forget something or remember something? Same thing. Be here now. Yes. I definitely have to pee. I should stop smoking habitually. All those clouds. All that water. The ocean is suspended by air. The rain, accumulating, falls down. Doesn’t matter. It’s just the teeth in your head. The heart in your hands. Let it go. There’s only this. Be content. This is enough. What should I do? Whatever it is that you’ll do. Flip a coin. Take a career placement test. Doesn’t matter. There goes another car. It reminds me of riding with my grandmother. Underlying everything is the soundless Word.

Which is Mostly About the Importance of Attempting

05/15/2006 6:49 AM – 7:09 AM

I guess that in the end, the only way to do something is to station yourself in place and do it. Letting all other things that enter the mind, pass on through while you continue in the attempt. The only way that you’ll sit is to sit down and attempt to sit. The only way to write is to sit down and write. The only way to have faith is to attempt to have faith.

We can only attempt to do the thing when we are in the action of attempting. You have to act in order to act. And still, there is only attempt. There is still time and chance. Sometimes, time and chance bring desirable ends, sometimes undesirable. But there remains the primary action of attempt. The muse is fickle. The mind is a monkey. But there is the reinstatement of attempt. And attempt is all we’ve got. As the mind to the brain, so God to the world. Hovering over the face of the deep. We see out and learn the rules of thumb. We look inward and discover the calm that underlies all attempts.

There is a time for everything, even not-faith, but when faith’s time is there, we attempt to have it. There is a time for not-writing, but when the time for writing is there, we attempt it. Time and chance still hold court, they are still the lower gods, but we, with honest humility, still must continue in our attempting. Looking up, we see the clouds drift, and we wish that we too could be drifting. The clouds form and cover the sky and then the temperature changes and the clouds dissipate and the sky is blue. We are born onto this earth, we drift along and then the temperature changes and we dissipate. That thing that once was us is no more. We have hope in the resurrection and the coming Kingdom, but if we cannot touch the hem of the Kingdom, our faith dissipates. What is the substance of the hem we grasp? Why was the tomb empty? All answers require faith in an unprovable atomic proposition. So which answer works the best? And I cannot answer that for anyone but myself. And some days I cannot answer it for myself. That I prefer my faith to yours is time and chance, but prefer it I do. From viewpoint of grave, all actions are equally ridiculous. But I’m not dead yet. The treetops tickle the belly of the wind. All things follow delight.

On the Catechism For Existing

05/10/2006 6:35 AM – 6:56 AM

What’s some good advice? Save more money. Eat less food. Own less stuff. If you need to buy something non-perishable, make sure you have enough money to replace it. Lessen attachment to possessions, because attachment to possessions can only bring fear of their loss.

Recognize that everything is perishable and cherish those few things that you do have so that you can learn to morn and then move on. Forgetting what is behind, I press on. Where are you going? To the grave. What lies beyond? I do not know. Should you fear it? I do not know. Is there comfort? I am alive right now. Why is that a comfort? Because this is good enough for right now. Where is the catechism for existing? From what do we divine the value of the path we’re on? Only from our limited experience of living. Set reason on her throne. Until she runs out of answers. Then let go.

Being no one, going no where, I sit down and sit and I stand up and walk and I sit down and type and I go to work and work and I lie down and sleep and I sit down and eat. Where were you when he laid down the foundations of matter in time? Were you there when he set down the boundaries of light and speed? There is no answer to the great mysteries, but we ask them when we can. Why don’t I fall in love anymore? Will I ever again? Could I live without the possibility? When is right now? I’m sailing along the timestream and I cannot turn around, I cannot slow the current, and I cannot gauge the speed. Even in all of this unknowing, I’m still here. I’m still looking out the same widow at the same street and for this moment, I am content. Where is the fixed point? Where is the Unmoved Mover? Where is the pristine vision? The questions rise. Do I know the answer? Can I discover the answer at this moment? Then I let them go. This is not always the case. There is still time and chance. There is still an end to strength and wisdom. But there is still enough to exist. I stare down at the pewter sphere in the center of the pewter cross that I bought twelve years ago in a market in Ireland. There are no answers in it. Merely that, somehow, it is. Somehow, I am. Somehow, here. Somehow, now. What is good advice? Save more money. Eat less food. Own less stuff. Love whacha got.

In Which A Meditation on Time is Boarded by Pirates

05/09/2006 6:53 AM – 7:15 AM

Human beings have a very vague sense of the passage of time. When deprived of the movement of the sun, our bodies loose the rhythm of sleeping and eating and waking. The internal schedule cannot be maintained without external verification.

But still we must sleep and wake and eat and poop. Eat, drink, sleep, wake, make dirt, pass water, breathe: this is the sole requirement of existence. But letting go of all that, where are we again? Where are we other than sitting here at the desk? Yes, being a pirate. The pirates were villains – thieves and murderers, and yet, here I am, being a pirate. There is what a pirate is and what it is to be a pirate. They are the same thing, but they are different. But that’s the wrong way to say it. Not two, not one. That, in its vagueness, is more exact. What advice do I have for myself today? Sit still.

Forgetting everything except what is at hand, I continue. Continue to remember this right now. Forgetting to plan, which is the future, forgetting to remember, which is the past; I will just sit and type. Sit up straight with a higher cushion under your butt (to keep your back from hurting too much). Half close your eyes (to keep them from drying to quickly) and stare at a point on the floor. With every breath, count off until you reach ten. Then start with one again. If at any point your attention drifts from counting (even if you’re able to keep counting without giving full attention to it) start with one again. I made it to seven once today. It is being awake, not merely slowing down. Though there is some slowing down. Unfortunately, this counting thing ties you to the passage of time. In order to count, you must remember what came before and plan what is going to come next, but for a novice like myself, this will have to do. I think (though I’m not 100% on this) that it eventually becomes possible to leave the numbers behind. It is possible to come down to “in… out…” but this too makes reference to the past and future. I think, somewhere down the line, it just becomes “this… this…” and then, sometime after that, it’s just breathing, without names. Maybe it comes in flashes. Probably, in fact. In one instance, you’re counting, then, next thing you know, you’re just being in time. A pirate. Damn it.

On Sitting Still

05/08/2006 6:11 AM – 6:34 AM

When you cannot set the mind on a single point, set the body. It’s a crude hammer, but it will be enough. Be where you are, monkey-minded but still. There is a good enough thing. Don’t be swayed by chance. Sit up and do stillness.

If your mind races and you can’t stop it, sit or stand and be where you are. You are here typing. Your feet are flat on the floor. Your hands are resting on the speakers of your laptop. Your fingers are striking keys. Your eyes are following the curser as it moves across the screen, discharging letters. If the stillness is enforced on the body, and doesn’t flow freely from the mind, so be it. Stillness is the point. The quiet is the point. Perhaps the mind will follow, perhaps it won’t. Stillness is the point. Emotions rise and fall with the rising and falling of the fortunes of the day, let that still small point of quiet reserve be the anchor the keeps the ship from the rocks.

What do you expect from yourself? Physical transcendence? Ha. Don’t make me laugh. You live here in the real world, not the impossible fantasies of cruel fundamentalism. Be here now. Forgive them their trespasses, forgive yourself for believing them. Now let it go. Remember the beauty of your father. Remember the beauty of your mother. Remember the beauty of your brother. Remember the beauty of yourself. Forget the rest, it’s inconsequential to the path your walking on. You do not yet have to stand before the direct glory, so stop trying. Stand and feel the first rays of sunlight. Sit and type. Do what you must do in this plane of reality; it’s the only one you’re in today. There are the porch lights on the house down the street, still shining in the shadows of the low morning sun. There are the cars, parked by the side of the road, waiting without thought. That we are a very strange combination of quanta cannot be denied, but the super-quanta state is all that we have access to. Perhaps the rock doesn’t move because it has forced itself not to. Perhaps the dolphin doesn’t build cities because it’s evolved beyond the need to. I doubt it, but, really, what bearing does that have on your experience? Just let it go and be right here. I’m just typing words. You’re just reading them. Stand still and read. When you’ve finished, be still and do what needs to be done then. Come home. Come to anchor. Come to rest. That is all.

Yoda Was Wrong

In the moment there is only the attempt. At this moment, I am attempting to type these words while I stand at the desk at work. At this moment, you are attempting to read these words. After the moment, we can look back and ask, "was it done? Did I accomplish what I was trying to do?" It is only in retrospect that there is a "do or do not." In the moment, there is only try.

Which Is About Letting Go of the Illusion of Complete Control

05/05/2006 7:22 AM – 7:51 AM

It isn’t about fighting desire. It’s about leaving desire behind, for a little while at least. It’s about looking down into the bottom of the deep well and seeing yourself curled and sleeping in peace. Where is the sun? Where is the moon? They are not in the words. They are there in the sky.

There is nothing wrong with studying, but studying is not experiencing. Forget your good sitting posture; forget what part of the chest that you’re supposed to be breathing from. Just sit and breathe. Do you damnedest to just sit and breathe. When you sit and write, do your damnedest to just sit and write. When you stand at the counter and work with a patron, do your damnedest to just stand and work. Living is a whirlwind. Mindful living is noticing the whirls. You are not whatever you are not. You are whatever you are. It isn’t about doing it well, it’s just doing it. There is no such thing as living well. There is only living. So you might as well enjoy it.

Delight yourself in the mundane as well as the exceptional – time and chance happen to us all. When there is sorrow, morn, but let it go. It is not a sin to be alive. It is not a sin to desire, but desires arise and fall away. You will desire because you are neither a myth nor a God. Do something and enjoy it. Do something and delight in it. There is just this. This is just being alive and sentient. If you try to capture it, you’ll find that there’s nothing there to grab. Let go of trying to capture it. You’re just here for the ride. I’m not saying that you’re existence is entirely passive; I’m not saying that time and chance are the only forces at work, but I am saying that they are a part of the system. How large a part? I don’t know. I think God is probably in the mix too. I don’t know how, but, for some reason, I think he is. Time and chance, effort and God – is this the whole of the working matter? I don’t know. You don’t need a to understand the system to live in it. Just live in it and accept that some things will happen that you didn’t plan and some things will happen that did. You’ll be doing something as long as your alive, so enjoy it. You’ll never be in complete control of your existence, but you can do some things, and whatever you hand finds to do, do it with all your heart, for this is the task that God has given man all the days of his life.

Which Is About Sinking Into the Thicker Mud

05/03/2006 6:55 AM – 7:18 AM

There is no single fixed point. The fixity of any given point is determined by perception of the ghost in the machine, the god on a line. Trying so hard to make sense of reality, reality becomes senseless. Just fix the moment in your mind. There is a time for everything, everything holds in time. Am I making sense? Then I’m trying too hard.

But then, where’s the wrong? Are you worried about holding unearned pride? What holds it? Are you worried that everyone will find out that you’re faking it? You are. Be content with that, because it’s all that you can do. Ask the questions until nothing makes sense, then ask the questions until nothing is wrong, then ask the questions until it’s just all right. Let it go. What are you letting go of? I don’t know. I just know that I have to keep telling myself that. Let go of your life, perhaps. Let go of right and wrong. Let go of pride and humility. Let go of two. Let go of one. Let go. Just let go. Flow into the stream. The stream flows into the river. The river flows into the sea. Don’t name it, just be it. Or name it and realize that it’s fine. The hardest path does not make it the best. The easiest path does not make it the most pleasant. It’s just this path. It’s just this whole life, lived in one second. It’s just the in-breath and the out-breath and pause between.

You can’t know, not in that way that you think you want, think you need. You can collect data, but what does it add up to? Only believe what you can’t not believe. There is light in the morning and darkness at night. There is only a burst of energy and then the return to this. There is only letting go and growing up. There is only the growing down into deep earth, into the food and water. Let it go and go. Running, we cannot see. Seeing we cannot process. It’s all running. It’s all seeing. Let the world run. Let the ghost sink down into the creekbed and scuttle about with the crayfish and minnows. Where are you? What can’t you let go of? Let go of it and come back to this moment. Notice that you exist. Notice it again. What are you saving for yourself? Let it go. It will only tear you apart. If you can’t, don’t worry. After you’ve been torn apart, your pieces will settle on the surface and slowly, one by one, sink down into the water, and there you are, once again, playing with your crayfish and building dams of smooth, round stones. It’s just this, dude. Whatever this is, it’s only this. Follow soft delight wherever it goes, sinking down farther and farther into the thicker mud. Be content. This is enough. This’ll do, boy. This’ll do. And there is nothing better than that.

On Case 38

05/02/2006 5:45 AM – 6:11 AM

- The Gateless Gate, Case 38: A monk asked Joshu, “Why did the Bodhidharma come to the West?” Joshu replied, “an oak tree in the garden.” – If the Buddha and all the dharma heirs were truly desireless, how then could it be that they desired to teach the dharma way and ending the suffering of all sentient beings? Something strong, in no need of tending, in a well-tended place.

It comes again to that contradiction. If sitting teaches us to be content at all times in all things, why would we do anything at all? If one can be equally content while starving and feasting, what should we strive for? Why strive for anything? Why do I need to get up this early to sit and write? Why not do anything but sit? Why sit? - an oak tree in the garden –

I wish to be content, like an oak tree in a garden. There is no need for worrying. This is enough. And this is enough. And this. And this. On and on until the last this we experience slips from our minds and bodies. I do not understand those things which are paradoxes, but I will desire a desireless existence. Well, okay, I’m not that far along. I merely wish to end my own suffering. Suffering is ended by learning that each moment is enough, more, filled with peace and understanding. I understand enough to be alive at this moment. I have enough data processed to know how to breathe in this moment. And now that moment is gone and I have enough understanding to know how to breathe in this moment. I’m alive in this moment. I desire a strong cabin in the woods. I desire a motorcycle. But I am breathing at right this moment. I’m typing on a computer and will soon post what a write on the Internet. I actually have more than I absolutely need. I have enough food to last me through the day. I have enough air to breath. I even have enough tobacco to smoke. Which sort of works against the last thing. Parting words, then? This is enough, Spike. There is more than enough at hand to keep you from being bored. There always will be. There’s no need to worry. Just count your breaths and let go of your anxiety. Worrying won’t help you. You have more than enough for this moment. And this one. And this one. And this one. An oak tree in the garden.

On Looking For the Fixed Point

05/01/2006 6:40 AM – 7:04 AM

Give me one fixed point, a long lever and I can move the world. Where is that one fixed point? Where is the singularity of immutable stillness? We cannot see it, being fluid beings in fluid time. But it must be there. The world moves.

What a soft green on the budding leaves. What soft tufts on the floating clouds. Where am I, then? I’m here, sitting in my chair, looking out on the Elmwood Avenue that I’ve looked out on ten thousand times before. But that’s not the whole truth, is it? You can’t step out onto the same street twice. But I recognize it. The changes are more subtle than the recognizable landmarks. There is that tree. There is that house. There is that window. I cannot wake up twice in the same body. My body changes constantly. The old masters say that if you look hard enough for the self, you will discover that there is no self. But here I am, typing the instants once again.

Where is the underlying peace? It’s there, but how did it come to be? Did I force it to be perceived, which is to say – did I imagine it? Is the whole structure imaginary? Which is to say – will it be taken away? We perceive again. The senses tell us that this is what this is like. There is no absolute consensus among the roshies. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be illuminated by ten thousand things. It’s poetic, but is it useful. To say that there is an underlying stillness to existence is to take a stance of faith – is there, or did I merely make myself imagine it to be so? And does it really matter? No. Yes, I think the answer is no. It does not matter. I cannot divine the truth and I desire peace, therefore, I will chose to accept what peace I can find as real. There are external states and internal reactions, but it does not necessarily follow that this specific external state will produce this specific internal reaction. Only move, I suppose. It is movement that distinguishes the animal from the plant and growth that distinguishes the living from the dead. I am alive. If I am melancholy once again, even on a cool, quiet spring morning, I don’t have to be. Do I want to be melancholy? What am I punishing myself for? Or what silliness makes me think melancholy more profound that peaceful contentment? Just breathe in, Spike. Let the melancholy go. Hold onto peace. Clasp yourself around the one still point and float on down through passing time.