Why doesn't ESP work on the people we really want to contact?

Today I was looking at an object that someone had given me last year. I was thinking that I'd like to contact this person so that I could finish the art piece--a linocut. This person has a press. We went out once, and I think we could hit it off as friends--but not in the romantic sense.

So, of course, I was just thinking about this person at noon today (I had the day off for "end of the semester"--believe me, I'm not complaining!!!). I got home from yoga class tonight, happily groggy, to see that this person had sent me a mail today. I hadn't heard from him since Thanksgiving.

Now, my question is this: if I can think about someone and they call, especially someone I haven't conversed with in a long time, why can't I think of someone I just saw last week and have them call me?

Tonight I spoke with one of the major thinkers at Psychic Horizons about karma. She said that karma is made up of images and thoughts and actions that have to be gotten to, have to be centered upon and resolved. Fair enough, I thought. Perhaps there is more to this than my rigid brain wants to let in. It's tough that my non-frigid libido always gets in the way!!!!

Parce que je suis folle.

Last night I went to the ashram in San Ramon. It was so beautiful, the indigo-black sky dotted with stars, with Mars about 2 feet away from a nearly-full Moon.

It was fitting that we talked about astrology...Vedic Astrology. Our friend Mark checked out a book from Amma's library called Vedic Astrology without Tears. I spoke with Sadasiva about the Moon and Mars at dinner after the meditation. He asked me, "Are you feeling angry tonight?" I had to say, no, I wasn't feeling angry. I was just feeling confused because I couldn't meditate. All these memories from the past kept coming up--even Moises. I thought I had forgotten about him.

I asked Sadasiva if he had dated many women from the ashram. He said, yes, he had, and one of those women was at the ashram that evening. He said that Amma throws alot of karmic relationships his way. I said that I have had similar experiences. In 2002 I made out with a guy who was probably 19 or so. When Moises and I got together in 2005, he was 23. The woman Sadasiva had had a relationship with was younger than him also. She came by as he and I began standing up, and he was quick to stop her to talk with him.

Have I learned a lesson from this? I think it's his karma to be lost in the land of wanting a relationship based upon experience rather than appropriateness. I hope that all the relationships I've had have had some love energy--despite the painful karma--swirling among them.

Special Education, or, how much attention do you need?

I never complain much about teaching Special Education for the past 10 years. Tonight I was just recalling a time when, during an IEP meeting with about ten people present, I got up and walked out, crying. The emotional pressure was too much; I couldn't handle what the "therapist" was saying about this child with cerebral palsy. The therapist wanted to demit the child from services, and I completely disagreed.

It still happens now that a therapist will demit a child because, supposedly, the child is making no progress. Can I do that, too? Can I tell a parent not to send the child to school because no progress is being made? Whose fault is it?

There is constant attention which must be given to my students with severe impairments. Thankfully, some of them are learning how to use the toilet. But some of them still hit other kids and hurt other kids or refuse to walk or just lie down and scream.

It is my belief in bhakti yoga and Amma that helps me stay afloat in this turbulent ocean. Last year I had four paras, but two of them were out to stab me in the back every day. This year, I have only two paras and more kids. These paras are sweet and have great intentions, but we are understaffed. It is about time that I did something proactive about this situation. I am working too hard, and I have to tell someone who can help me. I already typed up an 8-page table on what all the kids do and what all the adults do to help them. This report was written in November. I still have not heard anything from the Special Education department.

It's ok to feel sorry for me. I do!!!

The Unicorn, or how high are you.

Tonight the Planet Glee show was really fun. We fixed the cameras and lighting, and I have been so happy that is Friday and I don't have to get up and do public service tomorrow. It's much more entertaining to do the show. I wish this could be my form of public service rather than trying to provide developmental instances for children with severe cognitive disabilities.

Nonetheless I was in a rare mood this evening. I brought a 4" squarish, pointed rose quartz crystal to keep on the desk to channel good, loving vibrations. My guests, Tobias from Total Care Massage and Sam from Sleeping Buddha Massage Therapy were all set; we were all relaxed. We were told it was air time, and I put the crystal on my forehead because I had a slight headache. I told the camera (the viewers, I guess--I don't assume anything!) that I was a unicorn with a headache. I also had a hood on which made me look like a milkmaid (the rainy weather has brought out the braids again).

We got a call almost right away. The caller told me I looked like I was high on something and that he could tell me what would be the best stuff to get high on. I got a little shy, but I said that I was high on Friday and whatever. We stayed talking for about 2 minutes. He said he was watching the show. That's the point, isn't it? I was enthralled with the exchange. Someone else suggested that I should have hung up on him. NO way!

Meanwhile, the rest of the show was fun. We had three more callers. Next Friday there will be a reflexologist on the show...all about feet!!!

I do miss jamming. I'm looking for musicians who can jam with me on the show. I put out a craigslist ad, and I got some good responses. The musicians want to hear my stuff. Let's put it this way: I'm good at faking it!!!

Venus is in Scorpio, or Planet Glee

I remember really liking the writings of Theodor Adorno. He was part of the reading list for a one of my courses in Marxist criticism at Berkeley. Somehow now he is reminding me of Kierkegaard, the either/or. Oh, I'm writing about my title for this blog. I wrote a paper on Adorno called 'Theodor, or the Adornos.'

Venus is in Scorpio now and for a while. Jupiter is in Sagittarius, which is a good thing. Some things can seem dark, but the idealim of a strong Jupiter can keep the boat afloat and more.

Meanwhile, tomorrow is another night of Planet Glee. We will try to fix the cameras to give the illusion that we are not in a fishbowl like in the other shows. My guests will be massage therapists demonstrating some techniques and best practices. Planet Glee is a call-in show. It's on channel 76 in San Francisco at 7 p.m. on Fridays.

Happy New Year to me.

I spent most of last week going to sleep early. Back to work, and I didn't want to be sleep-deprived given the weird emotional nature of the beginning of a new year. On my first day back to work, at 6:25 am, I was trying to pick up the striped kitten Pablo and he got skittish, his back paw leaving an almost 2" slice of cat claw in my index finger on my dominant hand.

But I stayed steadfast in my desire to return to work and do what I had to do. I'm glad I had my Elmo bandaids.

Meanwhile, I did the chance to see two films WHEN THE CAT"S AWAY (CHACUN CHERCHEZ LE CHAT) and THE BUDDHA OF SUBURBIA. I hadn't seen either film for almost three years. What do they have in common?

THE FUTURE IS UNWRITTEN

Joe Strummer, how I adored you. Your latest bio-documentary (besides RUDE BOY) is really impressive in its use of the medium of film and what it conveys about an artist who went through several incarnations until his early death at age 50. I remember hearing the news and thinking, "Oh, he's turned fifty--too hard to handle, I wonder." But no, although he met death when identifying his suicidal brother's teenage body, he never stopped talking about how being alive was what we all had in common. He died of a heart defect that had gone undiagnosed.

The film's documents the early life of John Mellor (Joe's given name by his diplomat father and Scottish mother) and how, after his brother's death, he continued on to be what he called a non-stop-talking "git." This git got bad grade except in Art. He could draw. Joe's drawings are interwoven in the film's rich fabric.

Pictures, people who knew him, music, all embellish this tale by the fire, as it were. One of Joe's last drawings was of little islands in a river, each with a fire that one sits by and talks. Many of the people who knew him well sit by these fires in different parts of the world. There are no subtitles identifying the interviewed. The members of his bands, The One-on-One-ers, The Clash, and Joe Strummers and Los Mescaleros needed no titles.

The exploration into his film work both as musician and actor are new. I remember the ...Hell film. One of my housemates was watching it on a summer afternoon in the living room. Usually, I didn't go into the living room, but I was drawn in by Joe's presence in the film. I was drawn into the Red Victorian today to see Joe again onscreen. Although I cried at times and at times didn't understand why he said and did things in this life, I will go back and see this film again.

The Confusion of Non-productivity.

Today was spent on the phone, at the laundromat and in cafes. The state of my papers in my room beckons for clarity. It's muddy in here! I save lots of images for future collages that I have yet to make. That's not all the paper that's lingering around. There are all the bills and receipts and stuff that I have no idea where to put. There is no room in my room. So, I put them in paper bags so that I may go through them sometime.

I almost titled this the "pleasure of non-productivity." At my job I have tons of papers that I have not looked at in years. I went through a box of them from 2005. I think I take great joy in not being organized. There is something uncomfortable about being too neat with the paperwork. Or, maybe I've become too used to spontaneity.

In my social life I would like to see more plans made. I tend to let things be decided at the last moment. It's my sleep schedule that gets in the way; it really dictates my days and nights. I'm so glad to be on vacation and to think that I don't have to get up at 7:00 am tomorrow. Lucky!!1

Happy Birthday to me and thank the gods for Zante's

Happy Birthday, Jennifer. Yes...born on the day before Jesus. Many restaurants were closed today. I'm so lucky. One friend took me to dinner last night (we had Indian/Pakistani food), one friend took me to lunch today at a place in the Haight called Cafe for the People (I think that is its name; the sweet punk rock girl behind the counter gave me a free chai for my birthday), and tonight another friend took me out to dinner. Every restaurant on Valencia and Cortland was closed tonight. I knew Zante's would be open. They got to be pretty packed. It's an Indian restaurant, and I had my fill of naan and chai for another night!

So far my holiday vacation from work has been pretty fun. I still haven't returned the dvd player that doesn't work. I watched a vhs this week, a French film from the early nineties called UN COEUR EN HIVER. I have no idea what winter (hiver) has to do with this film. Daniel Auteuil is the star, and he gives his usual enigmatic performance.

I want to get a dvd player soon. At least I won't miss the Joe Strummer film at the Red Vic this week.

It's my birthday night, and I'm spending it with the two cats, Pablo and Budders. Pablito really likes the fact that I sleep in in the mornings, because he's tired then, too. Maybe I'll paint tomorrow during the day before I go over to my friends' house.

Oh, the Judeao-Christian holidays.

It's so much easier for me to be a Hindu. Praying is a good thing. But the Judaeo-Christian "holidays" are something to be thankful for. In the United States, people who work for the government in the United States get paid on the Judaeo-Christian holidays. It's so cool--I can be a Hindu (and an aspiring Tibetan Buddhist) AND still get time off.

I'm getting tired of being alone, though. Even my once-a-week meetings have ended because I don't want to put myself down any more. He can call me and kiss me good-bye. But he chooses not to. Therefore, I don't choose him.

What is my problem with relationships? Only my pediatrician knows for sure. As a child, I was never encouraged to think in terms of a happy family life because I didn't have one. I spent most of my time in my room (yes, I'm thankful I had my own room).

Now, living in San Francisco on a public school teacher's salary, I have my own room. It is smaller than the one I had when I was a child. I have no formal closet. All my video and music stuff is all over the place as are my papers. I can only paint in watercolors. Why have I put up with this life for so long? When is a man going to enter my life and me his? I really miss living with a man as a romantic partner. I've probably lived with six or more guys for over 2 years or more in my lifetime.

JEANETTE ET MARIUS

The film MARIUS is a famous early film from France (I think it's from the late 1930's). This film is set in Marseilles. JEANETTE ET MARIUS, a film from 1997, ia set in Marseilles. I recommend viewing this film. It has much to say about love and society.

But I digress. I really want to talk about the nature of having sex with someone one has just met and knows is not going to be any more than one night of sex. Last Christmas I almost did the one-night stand thing with someone I met at some longtime friends' party. We kissed but didn't go home together because my housemate was with us.

This year I had to see this person again. He took my phone number at the party a year ago and never called me. I never ran into him with my friends. Tonight he was such a complete asshole. When I was in my twenties and thirties, I was never treated this way...like some fucking saint who overlooks the stupidity, vapidity and shallowness of another person in the name of feeling like justice has been served. The saint is a martyr. The other person is just being a moronic human being. The saint is exalted.

I was a fucking saint tonight. I told this guy he was a straight (meaning conservative, drinker type) asshole. He is so stupid to me. But the one is who is really vacant is me. This guy is 22-years-old with maybe a high school education. I'm the one with all the education of a newt following the fragrance of my cunt toward what is merely meat. It's time to buy some veggie dogs.

Jeannette get together with Marius in the aforementioned film because they are contemporaries, they understand one another. Actually, I don't think it's an ageist thing with me. It's a question of intelligence. If you're cognitively impaired by ignorance or lack of empathy, then you're probably really happy. There's only oneself and one's shallowness to puddle around in.

I forgot to mention the call-in show.

Ever since this past summer I knew at one point I'd try having my own 1/2 hour cable (San Francisco's accessf) show on Friday nights. This past Friday was the second show so far. I have so much anxiety about getting there on time. I was 20 minutes late to the Flash studio training, and I was warned IN A SCAREY way that if I were late 2 times to a shoot, that it would be the end of my show.

I thought about it today, and I'm glad that I'll have some time off work for two weeks. Teaching grade school is just too involving. Special Education is a special kind of drain. The first show went really well, but I had to rush through dumb San Francisco Friday night traffic to get there a half hour before the show. The show is on at 7:00 p.m. It was so much fun for me to play around and have fun on this show.

The first show, Jack from the Bargain Basement Band (the band I always jam with on the The Bro Jud on Love Energy Show), was on, and we played music together. He played his guitar and sang, and I played my tabla (without the bhayan). It was so fun. This past Friday, Sam Geppi, the Vedic Astrologer, was on. I asked him if he wanted to play music, but he really did have alot to say. My fascination with Vedic practice of all kinds rocks on.

Meanwhile, Sam will be on the show again this Friday. He'll talk about the positive effects of Jupiter and Mars on the present. This past week he answered a caller about the moon and spoke about Venus and the Moon. Venus is in Libra now. On the 25th it goes into Scorpio. Since my birthday is on the 24th, I'll be feeling the effects of the Venusian movement more deeply, since it will be the time of my solar return: Sagittarius can handle Venus in Scorpio. I just now wondered: do people get bored hearing about other people's charts than they're own?

HEREMAKONO and JAMON JAMON

I had just bought a DVD player. The two other ones I had broken. It was Thanksgiving weekend, and the video store was completely ravaged of all the new dvds. I just happened to see this film at the side of the new releases. It is called HEREMAKONO, or il attende le bonheur. It is a film by Sissako. He studied filmmalking in Russia. The montage effect is so evident in this film. Instead of dialogue, there are scenes to the tell the story with no dialogue. The main character is a traveller. He has come to another place. There are many scenes of him just staring, and the "unprofessional" actor who plays him stares very well.

JAMON JAMON is a more recent one I've seen. I'm trying to improve my Spanish. It's easier for me to listen to Spanish in (I suppose) a Madrid accent. I initially learned Spanish from Catholic nuns from Spain. I still haven't completed a Spanish class since elementary school! Meanwhile, I got this film in Spanish because I had wanted to see it and had somehow heard about it. It is an older film and stars Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem in it as lovers in their early twenties.

I discussed this film with a friend of mine from Mexico. The notion of "puta" or whore in the film was an important one for him. I thought the film was funny and cynical at the same time. The constantly unleashed passions of the characters was hilarious; he association of penis excitement with bull fighting is an example. The obsession with breasts and size is, too. I wonder if Penelope Cruz had her breast enhancement surgery after the making of this film.

Somehow the association of ham and pigs with these characters best exemplifies its cynical naturalism. The pigs are just as attractive as the characters. Maybe the relationship between ham, pigs, and passionate humans overpowered my vegetarian leanings such that the leg of pig that Javier Bardem swings at his lover's fiancee didn't make me flinch but seemed appropriate.

The last night at the ashram.

It was a bizaare evening. I have to process this and then write something worth saying. For now I can say that Devi Bhava in November is an amazing and beautiful way to say thank you.

The thirteen seed portal.

There's a paper I'm supposed to be writing for a class at City College. The paper is about the Mayans and time and the esoteric nature of the glyphs and then about the nahuales. Maybe I should write a paper about the relationship between a nahual and the Skywalker time glyph. The website put out (I think) by the famous Mayan time professor Jose Arguelles is the source of my knowledge about the glyphs. The portal website names each day's figure glyph and its placement within the tone element.

When I saw Amma a very special estoteric glyph was on that calendar day. The blue eagle representing the eyes of the divine, the viewing of all as divine, in the now, in the present, the ultimate present. The tone was rhythmic, after the 3rd and 4th dimensions comes the rhythmic pulsating of the universe.

I got darshan with Amma this morning.

We left for the ashram in San Ramon at about 7:15. My friend who normally drives a taxi cab for income was driving. Both my other friend and I didn't have to drive! She was shuttling people back and forth three times a day. That's just too much and too generous. Thursday I took some people in my car, and I was feeling like a taxi driver. Maybe I've driven to the ashram with lots of people over the years and I felt like not having to worry about the driving. My car is a five-speed, so I especially have to be aware at all times about what gear the car is in and etc.

In any case, I was so grateful that I could sit and anticipate my experience with Amma. I had not idea when we first got there and the ashram was closed off that I would get darshan tonight with Amma. We missed her initial talk, which is something I always enjoy. But we sat for about an hour and a half in the ashram after getting tokens, and Amma was smiling at everyone and giving darshan with intention and sweetness.

I was so happy to get a kiss on the head! And one of the people in our group, a visitor from Germany wanted to get blessed with me. It was really nice. I'm always alone when I meet Amma, and tonight was special.

We got shuttled out to the car about five miles away from the ashram and headed for San Francisco. Someone at the ashram shop asked me if I were going to the retreat this weekend. I had to say no. Monday night is Devi Bhava. I have to go!!! Even if I don't get darshan with Amma, I want to be there to see her again.

Amma is coming on Thursday.

Mata Amritanandamayi is my mother. She is Amma. Read the biography by Judith Cornell. It gives some insight into a person who is more than a person. There are many gurus in India, and there are many spiritially-inspired and gifted people within the Hindu/Buddhist prayer construct.

When I listen to bhajans, I am content. Driving is not that difficult. (I have an 8-hour cd of bhajans written by Amma--it's called the Bhakti Pod, because Amma is Bhakti, self-less love.)

She will be here on the Amurikan holiday of Thanksgiving. I've been thinking about the "holidays" of Autumn: Indigenous People's Day, Dia de los Muertos, Samhain, Diwali, and now Thanksgiving. These months can be dreary upon people's emotions and psyche (see the events in France, the strikes). People are empowered. Somehow Thanksgiving is the perfect day to see Amma. All of us vegetarians will be gathered together to pray for everyone we know and don't know as well as ourselves. It will be a good thing to do.

The Visionary Activist and Planet Glee

Last Saturday, a week ago, I got to meet a person I'd heard on the radio--KPFA--many times and have always had something to say to. It was very weird. I had listened to her lecture at the Green Festival and then bought her book. I stood in line and bought her book. After talking with her, I see that she is a person thinks deeply on some of the same topics that I do. I'm not into American politics the way she is, for instance. Maybe I don't understand her point of view completely. We differ in that she uses western astrology for her interpretations and I believe that Vedic is more accurate.

I'm writing about Caroline Casey (I almost wrote Carolyn Myss--who is that?). Her book is entitled MAKING THE GODS WORK FOR YOU. Yeah. I read about my least favorite one of the gods, Shiva, Saturn. He is not one to be ruled! She writes, "Saturn is our...basic center. In fact, this god lives in our real center, the psychic uterus, right below our navel.

The word hysteria, derived from the Latin word for uterus, addresses this Saturnine issue of loss of center...A therapeutic colleague once described hysteria as occurring when one evters a world that is not of one's own definition. THe process beigns with detachment, which becomes loneliness, which becomes hungry yearning. Hurngy yearning tilts us off balance so that we easily fall into someone else's game, where we then thrash crasily like a hooked fish. Thrashing crazily could be called the predomeineant symptom of the last twentieth century. But flailing is actually a healthy raction to an unhealthy situation, as when a fish attempts to become unhooked. (p.86)"

Caroline is a genius. Saturn is impossible to comprehend. But she demystifies this force while making it even more mysterious--akin to our "center," not in the Derridean sense or Freudian, but in the psychic sense, the realm of Ouspensky and Gurdieff, of the esoteric school.

She and I agreed that Vedic has its similar interpretations of the planets. The first Vedic text I read was Robert Svoboda's Light on Life.

The American idea of DARJEELING LIMITED

It's been a while since I've blogged. I like the word blog. It sounds like blob. In the film BILLY ELLIOTT, our main character says something like "Don't be a blob..."
--or something like that. I didn't get the meaning and context.

Perhaps I don't get the meaning and context of the newly-released Wes Anderson film DARJEELING LIMITED. Starting Friday, November 9th, this weekend started the Diwali celebration. Everything Indian, all Friday night and all weekend. On Friday I saw one of Shahrukh Khan's latest film in which he plays the coach of a women's hockey team that goes to the World Cup. Kind of a sleeper, and Shahrukh barely smiles (his most entertaining facial expression), it was worth some Diwali fun.

There is no excuse for DARJEELING LIMITED. It is purely annoying. I forgot that I mentioned that I might not understand the context. Actually, I think I do. It's another Hollywoood slap in the face to the American worker, to the people who go see films in the theater and buy popcorn and veggie dogs and whatever. This is a wannabe French farce yet instead insults and bores us all the way along.

There are three supposed brothers whom we meet together on a train in India. Although I think Adrien Brody is a great actor, and he is the only one worth watching in the film, I can't believe he would--as an Engishman--make fun of India. Yes, he can't rescue the Indian boy from the downcurrent, etc., and he is invited to the child's cremation, there is no respect paid to India and its rich culture and people.

Owen Wilson puts me to sleep, and just how is Jason Schwartzman? Certainly not the hearthrob this film makes him out to be. These characters never wonder about money. They have an unlimited cash flow. THey have matching, expensive luggage. They dress like French guys often do in suit jacket and unbuttoned buttoned, tailored shirt. They soulless monied Amurikans in a country that experiences some of the deepest poverty on earth. I failed to see the humor and I hope that most Amurikans will not even wonder what India is like. THey will be overwhelmed if they were to visit this beloved, sacred land.

NO END IN SIGHT

This is the title of a documentary written and directed by Charles Ferguson, 2007. It reveals the steps toward the Iraq invasion through the eyes of the people who were actually in Iraq working for the US government. The film begins with the some very sad footage of an Iraqi young man in a casket and other men crying incessantly around him. I was brought to tears and couldn't imagine myself getting through this film.

So, I walked out to the bathroom. The guy who was working at one of the best theatres in San Francisco, the Red Victorian, was reading Notes from the Underground by Dostoevsky. This was a guy I could trust with my feelings about the film. He said that it was well-composed and that he came out from it feeling very frustrated.

For me, the film is another documentary of talking heads interspliced with actual footage of the explosions, fires and demonstrations that Iraq has seen since the US invaded in 2003. Some of the talking heads are actually people who cared about what was happening--and were here and survived.

Others, like UN Ambassador de Vello from Argentina, did not survive. The US government in the form of a Mr. Bremer (who only made it to Iraq once) placed the UN ambassador there for its own purposes: to gain the trust of the Iraqi political elite. Why he had to die in the process is unknown.

What is also left unknown is why the US quadruplets, Bush, Cheney, Rice and (the other one skips my mind--fill in the blank, if you know) kept putting people in Iraq who spoke no Arabic. One is left with the feeling that to bully a group of people and kill and torture them doesn't require that any communication be achieved.

The news is full of the fact that the Iraqi army had been re-hired by a new government, the US. Because Baghdad is held by many factions of Iraqi groups and the US had its hold on Saddam's palace in the center of the city, it is difficult to see, once again, any communication happening. Meanwhile, the cost of the war is something in the thousand trillionth of dollars. Although the draft is not mentioned, the fact that the US doesn't have enough enlistees to carry on conflicts in Iran and North Korea, there might be an end in sight.

The film concludes with a statement by one of the US enlistees. I was able to make it through this insanity without shedding too many more tears. Somehow I couldn't imagine how a woman profesor interviewed from Harvard's government school could actually believe that the son of the president who got the whole ball rolling in the Middle East could possible be a person of intelligence and compassion. I asked my friend about this during the movie. "She's from Harvard, isn't she supposed to be smart?" My friend said, "Maybe she was just idealistic." Yes, belief in the American voting process as a just one is idealistic. But those of us with a material viewpoint can see through the opaque electoral college, two-party (in name only) system. I would like to see a documentary on those scholars and researchers who are looking into the revamping of the whole US legal system.