High school student builds hydrogen powered model car that never needs refueling.

Good grief. My high school science projects all involved construction paper diagrams and relied substantially on coathangers for their structural integrity. Where do they get these kids?

Under the "your body is a temple" heading, this article is hitting the airwaves just in time for the summer cook-out season:

The University of Hawaii has released a new study that shows people who consume processed meats have a 6700% increased risk of pancreatic cancer over those who consume little or no meat products.

Now, that's the sort of info that makes for truly awkward grill-side conversation.

Edit: note the altered figure. Apparently a lot of publications made this error, and it got passed on to me in that erroneous form. Still a hair-raising figure, but not nearly so heart-stopping. :-)

Tonight's Law & Order proposed an interesting quandry - what do you do if the person who committed the crime years ago has since done a complete 180 and is now the poster child for the sort of spiritually-centered, service-oriented community-enhancing do-gooder that every justice system dreams of resulting in?

The two arguments pretty much boil down to this:

"A" says that if the whole point of incarceration is rehabilitation and keeping the general public safe from offenders who are likely to present a future menace, then there's no justice in sending this person to prison - especially given that prisons today are notorious for taking in peope who might be criminal minded or dangerous in limited circumstances (and sometimes unique cirucumstances) and turning them into violently sociopathic monsters by the end of their sentence.

"B" says that true spiritual redemtion requires that you own up to your responsibility and do the time, even if that's the only purpose for sending someone up. It also references closure for the victim's family, etc. This argument additionally makes clear note of the danger of combining the carrying out of governance with the influence of religion (Taliban membership applications, anyone?)

Where do I stand? Undecided, but leaning slightly toward "A," as reality currently stands. In the set up we have now, prisons do little if anything to deter criminals. Iin fact, in many circles they are looked upon as badges of honor and even mandatory requirements of gang membership - rather like finishing school. They do little to nothing to prevent criminals from re-offending - if the dehumanization doesn't actually make the situation far worse, which is often the case. And they do not protect the community from the criminal - they only defer such interaction until a later date, often with tragic consequences since our present prison system is notorious for taking in those who present little to no danger, or danger only limited or unique circumstances, and spitting out fully-formed sociopathic monsters with a big beef against the outside world they perceive (sometimes rightly) as having treated them like animals.

Also, I fear that victim closure too often morphs into socially-supported retribution and revenge, which helps neither the victim, nor the offender, nor the society in which they both will end up living.

I am a big fan of the restorative justice movement, which brings offenders, victims and the community they live in together with trained facilitators to work together to come to an equitable solution that works for everyone. So far, their success in rehabilitating criminals, restricting recitivism and restoring a sense of peace to the victims are impressive and have apparent longevity. Check it out for yourself by typing the phrase "restorative justice" into your search engine of choice.

So what's your take? Where do you fall on the continuum of the ends versus the means?

Well, you might have noticed that the last week was a bit quiet around the DGB. I was out of town sucking on the firehose of enlightenment at the Coachville Annual LoveFest, er, Conference in New Orleans. My brain is full. It hurts. Badly. I need someone to code me some sort of neurological zip application so that what I got will fit into what I had. Ouchie.

A few observations from the week:

Car rental sales managers around here have watched wayyyy to many Boiler Room-esqe movies. Young, caffeinated and frighteningly bright-and-shiny, in a glued-on-grin sorta way that only comes from repeating the mantra "This is only a stepping stone to my downtown Manhattan corner office reality" over and over for a very long time. The last time I saw a suit pressed that sharply the guy in it reeked of embalming fluid.

And since when does "something gas efficient with a little headroom for hubby" translate into a freakin' Jeep Liberty? Two people, two duffle bags, one suit hanger and a bag of sunflower seeds doth not a trail-rated 4-wheel-drive Lugz-on-Wheels require. Even if you are heading into the challenging terrain of deeper N'Awlins (c'mon - the place is so un-mountainous that it's technically under water). Talk about embarassing. One of the speakers was tree-sitter Julia Butterfly Hill, for crying out loud. I hope she doesn't read this.

Of course, I knew The Big Easy was my kind of place when I saw the "Eating Out Creates Jobs" billboard on the way in. Those who know me know that I am a foodie extraordinnaire and I will literally go to the ends of the earth (or as close as the Master Card will get me) for great food. The hotel restaurant was a disappointment (hint: even for room service, a continental breakfast should never cost more than the uniform of the guy bringing it up), but the local eateries more than made up for it. As is our habit, we decended upon the obligatory amazing Indian restaurant - where the food was so good it actually made me shake (yeah, it really was that good). Hookah Cafe, for anyone going that way (and you can get real hookahs there, and a bowl full of shisha tobacco to go with it). Go. Eat. Eat more. The chef is a close relative of God. Trust me on this - I know these things.

Even the town itself tasted good - or at least it smelled like it would. Oddly enough, my compadres' olfactory discernment seemed to stop at urine and vomit. But I found myself literally ingesting a banquet of smells, from food to animals to flowers to dust to river smells to, yes, human odors of all kinds. Maybe it's just me, but it was the sort of smell I could live on for a long time. My only disappointment was that I missed being able to smell it after a rainstorm. The streets, buildings and sidewalks are all pourous stone and when it rains, I imagine that hundreds of years of history must just steam up into the streets above. Maybe next time.

Scuttlebutt says we're going back there for next year's confab. I am soooo in.

If you're the sort who is always looking for the shortcut, the quick fix or the immediate gratification (or, like me, is always fighting these tendencies), check out the parable of the third floor from Tao Living.

I'm beginning to get snippy about those signs out front of churches. You know, the one's with the witty play on words that try to get you to wryly acknowledge your sinful nature and so be inclined to hurl yourself into the nearest pew for a spate of spontaneous redemption. Here lately the content of those messages has made me stop and think - but alas not, I fear, in the way the authors had intended.

My gripe is that there is a sneakily unwholesome theme underlying many of these overtly righteous messages that seems to be skimming under the radar the majority of those who read them and, one assumes, those who put them up in the first place. Although they apparently exhort the reader to form a deeper relationship with God, beneath the superficial message of spiritual devotion there's an underlying arrogance regarding just who should be in control of that relationship.

Take, for instance, that all-time favorite "God is my co-pilot." Co-pilot? Puleeze. You're the one who get's hung up on the 1040-EZ and who can't talk on the cell phone without walking into lamp posts - and you think God should be your co-pilot? We're talking about God here - the creative force behind the structure of the Universe as we know it, the One who set down everything in it's place and time and who built all of humanity up out of the dust of the ground with less effort than we put into making toast for breakfast this morning. We can't even figure out how to set the VCR so that the clock doesn't blink, and yet when it comes to guiding the ships of our lives through those long, dark nights of the soul, we pat ourselves on the back if we've had the foresight to put Him in the second chair, ready to take over whenever nature calls, we feel the need for a nap or we decide we want to go chat up the flight attendant in the galley.

Whatever.

Or how about the sappy, faux-generous plea to "Let God into your life." Oh, yeah, let's just clear Him out a corner somewhere between the family obligations that are driving us insane, the cruddy job we are too afraid to walk away from no matter how dehumanizing it gets and the weekly church service we mentally quit attending 4 years ago, even though our bodies still show up like clockwork so the neighbors don't start talking about us.

Trying to fit God in our pitiful human lives is the like trying to barricade a stampede of wild horses in the hall closet. No matter how expansive and open, a human life is such a small space to hold what already lays claim to it, without trying to shove the Infinite Being of Divine Light in amongst the other boxes of stuff to await the pleasure of our convenience, like an outdated keepsake chest that gets dragged out on holidays and in moments of deep fugue, or to satisfy some vague sense of spiritual nostalgia from our childhood, before being carefully re-wrapped and re-sealed away where it can't leak out onto anything else while we're not looking and mess up our carefully maintained arrangement.

Too often, like frightened children trying to minimize and parcel out what they can't take in all at once, we try to handle God. We attempt to find a comfortable and controlled way to experience the Divine on our own terms while still remaining in control of that experience, unwilling to risk letting it (or Him) run away with our lives - and perhaps drag us away from all the cool "here and now" stuff we've invested ourselves in.

But real spiritual devotion and strength isn't about dusting off a corner of ourselves for the Divine to sit on and watch us do our thing. It's about summoning the courage to throw the whole kit-and-caboodle into All That Is and watching it disappear into the well of Infinite Grace like a grain of sand slipping into the sea, barely riffling the surface with a ripple as it's swallowed up. It's knowing that no matter how big of a shot we are on earth, we're just another drop in the heavenly bucket of souls, albeit a vital and unique one. It's getting, on a deep level, that it's not us, but rather what comes through us, that really matters.

Quit trying to squeeze God into some unused corner of your life - or, for that matter, into a snazzy 3-line marketing message out front of the church. God doesn't reside within us - we reside within God. The sooner we recognize this and rearrange our lives to fit God instead of trying to rearrange God to fit our hectic lives, the better off we'll be and the better progress we'll make on our spiritual journey of growth and enlightenment.

And for God's sake, as well as you're own, get your incompetent behind out of the pilot's seat now - before you fly yourself right into the side of a mountain.

As if you needed more reasons to make the switch from an oily lifestyle footprint to a clean one, check out how far our nation's current priorities have swung:

Amount of oil in the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve, in days of net imports: 53 days

Amount of food reserve in most U.S. cities: 2 days

More gross disparities resulting from worldwide oil production priorities

From my inbox today:

Native Code of Ethics

1. Each morning upon rising, and each evening before sleeping, give thanks for the life within you and for all life, for the good things the Creator has given you and for the opportunity to grow a little more each day.

Consider your thoughts and actions of the past day and seek for the courage and strength to be a better person. Seek for the things that will benefit others (everyone).

2. Respect: Respect means "To feel or show honor or esteem for someone or something; to consider the well being of, or to treat someone or something with deference or courtesy". Showing respect is a basic law of life.

Treat every person from the tiniest child to the oldest elder with respect
at all times. Special respect should be given to Elders, Parents, teachers, and Community Leaders.

No person should be made to feel "put down" by you; avoid hurting other hearts as you would avoid a deadly poison.

Touch nothing that belongs to someone else (especially Sacred Objects)
without permission, or an understanding between you.

Respect the privacy of every person, never intrude on a person's quiet
moment or personal space.

Never walk between people that are conversing.

Never interrupt people who are conversing.

Speak in a soft voice, especially when you are in the presence of Elders,
strangers or others to whom special respect is due.

Do not speak unless invited to do so at gatherings where Elders are present (except to ask what is expected of you, should you be in doubt).

Never speak about others in a negative way, whether they are present or not.

Treat the earth and all of her aspects as your mother. Show deep respect for the mineral world, the plant world, and the animal world. Do nothing to pollute our Mother, rise up with wisdom to defend her.

Show deep respect for the beliefs and religion of others.

Listen with courtesy to what others say, even if you feel that what they are saying is worthless. Listen with your heart.

Respect the wisdom of the people in council. Once you give an idea to a
council meeting it no longer belongs to you. It belongs to the people.

Respect demands that you listen intently to the ideas of others in council
and that you do not insist that your idea prevail. Indeed you should freely support the ideas of others if they are true and good, even if those ideas are quite different from the ones you have contributed. The clash of ideas brings forth the Spark of Truth.

3. Once a council has decided something in unity, respect demands that no one speak secretly against what has been decided. If the council has made an error, that error will become apparent to everyone in its own time.

4. Be truthful at all times, and under all conditions.

5. Always treat your guests with honor and consideration. Give of your best food, your best blankets, the best part of your house, and your best service to your guests.

6. The hurt of one is the hurt of all, the honor of one is the honor of all.

7. Receive strangers and outsiders with a loving heart and as members of the human family.

8. All the races and tribes in the world are like the different colored
flowers of one meadow. All are beautiful. As children of the Creator they
must all be respected.

9. To serve others, to be of some use to family, community, nation, and the world is one of the main purposes for which human beings have been created.

Do not fill yourself with your own affairs and forget your most important
talks. True happiness comes only to those who dedicate their lives to the
service of others.

10. Observe moderation and balance in all things.

11. Know those things that lead to your well-being, and those things that
lead to your destruction.

12. Listen to and follow the guidance given to your heart. Expect guidance to come in many forms; in prayer, in dreams, in times of quiet solitude, and in the words and deeds of wise Elders and friends.


This article is a reprint from the "Inter-Tribal Times" - October 1994

A stiff apology is a second insult. The injured party does not want to be compensated because he has been wronged; he wants to be healed because he has been hurt. -- G.K. Chesterton, author (1874-1936)

Grudgingly given and unfelt apologies are only acceptable as legally binding statements in civil law settlements and other legal finales. For the rest of the world, if you don't mean it and you can't make a convincing case for that fact, you're better off not to bother. A lame apology just rubs salt into an already raw wound, since it informs the hearer that on top of the fact that the apologizer done wrong, he or she shows no regret and is only trying to get out of the consequences for being caught at it - and in such a way that is so obvious as to be flaunting their lack of concern for the preson harmed.

And remember, any apology that goes, "I'm sorry, but..." isn't an apology. It's a weasel's way of trying to get their side back into an argument that has already been closed.

Yesterday was the day that I took my dogs on a 2-hour trip to a nearby no-kill shelter and today I am feeling the pangs of seperation anxiety. It's a bit of a long story, but here's the short version:

About 4 years ago, I came home from work (at about 3am) to find hubby out hunting down the source of a weird noise outside. Turns out, some neighbor had dumped off two perfectly adorable, but barely weaned, puppies out in the field behind our house. If he hadn't heard them, they probably would have wandered off and starved.

We weren't set up dogs, nor did we particularly want them, but a trip to the local overstuffed pound would have been as good as a death sentence and I am a genetic sucker for a sorry case. So the two girls got a new home with us.

It's been okay, but never great. Neither the hubster nor myself are really dog people. Cat people, yes. Dog people, no. Don't get me wrong - we love them and care for them deeply. But it's more of an abstract "I love all creatures" sort of love. We never really bonded. At the time, it didn't really matter - they had good food, a lot of space to roam and play and they had each other. They were happy. We were tolerant. It all worked out.

But, as always, life changed. A sudden reversal in fortune dictated leaving our rental home on 35 acres in the backwoods of central North Carolina for the small, city home-on-a-lot of my grandmother. The dogs came with us, of course (along with several cats, but that's another story). At first they stayed in the country with my mother, but that ended abruptly when they broke out of their enclosure and wiped out the neighbor's flock of chickens. So into town with us they came, and spent the next few years confined to a small back lot with no room to play and not nearly enough attention from us (we have been very busy trying to re-reverse that fortune thing, although that's no excuse).

The truth is, we just never made them a high priority. Our schedules had a distinct underlap - we were never home together frequently or regularly enough to walk them as often as they needed (and they were too big for either of us to responsibly walk by ourselves). There wasn't enough room in their yard to really play, and it was out of the way enough that we had to make a special effort to go back and say hi, outside of feeding and watering. And there was too much "city stuff" going on for the hyeractive one of them to ever feel calm and secure. Essentially, we weren't so much keeping them as storing them. Sad, really, when you think about it.

So this past month we've given in (up?), hoping to nip rapidly appearing frustration- and boredom-based behavioral problems in the bud before they become irreversible. We researched our options, found a local Humane Society no-kill shelter with room (and that had our vet's approval). Yesterday was D-Day (Dog-gone Day).

And here I sit today, feeling guilty and sad and vaguely overwhelmed by the feeling that this was some sort of test that I failed miserably. Did I do the right thing? In the small picture, yeah absolutely. They are both great dogs and deserve to be with someone who really appreciates them and who can provide them with the care and love they need. But in the bigger picture, shouldn't I have been able to snap out of my selfishness, my apathy and my short-attention-span distractiblity and made this work? I don't know. Maybe it never would have worked, no matter what. The timing was all wrong, the place was wrong, it was all wrong. And so was I, and I knew it and I couldn't bring myself to change enough to do anything about it. And that's what hurts the most.

They'll be okay - the shelter folks (who are all very dedicated and loving) all agree that they are too adorable and just too huggably fat to sit on the shelf long. They have a few obedience commands under their belt to make things easier for the next owner. And I'll be going back up to visit them in a week or so when I take their doghouses up there.

It's not them I'm worried about. They'll be fine. But I've got a long way to go, and some not-so-comfortable thoughts to keep me company on the journey.

[Edit: called the shelter this afternoon to check in on them and just as I suspected, they're doing fine. Even had a good appetite for their food, which the shelter lady said was not often the case for new arrivals. Of course I could have told her that - I haven't found anything that will put those two off their feed :-D ]