Hail,Hail, The Gang’s All Here!

A  “new year” sounds pretty arbitrary to me---is it really a “new year” for each one of us?

 

What if we are in the middle of writing a book or translating an important document from a foreign language?  Of course it is only a “foreign” one for those who do not understand it!

What if we are just in the middle of a mind boggling project, and cannot foresee the conclusion?

I find birthdays easier to handle than “new years”. The latter sounds so major in the pronouncement of a portion of universal time ending. Will I be part of the “new” even though I am pronounced “older”?

I am in a time of life when each day is t be celebrated as a major event.

There is a quiet uncertainty that follows bedtime.

Sam Harris has been my life guide. His podcasts are brilliantly constructed with brilliant thinkers and educators who speak to our futures and remind us of why we are living!

Our daily Yoga  practice  throws out a  new lifeline for my husband and me. We are devoted to an early morning meditation practice on a daily basis which has been evolving into a happily anticipated event. Who would have thunk it??

There is little “culture” here in Eilat, of the Tel Aviv/New York variety, that is.

There is but human culture which allows us to survive as we embrace the simple aspects of daily life-----many smiles and “hellos” in various languages.

Life is not to be fooled with, nor wasted on absent mindedness! So say I, the Eilat

guru. I continue to teach private students whatever language they desire, and regale in their appreciation of new words or word order or sounds.

My approaching   new year may not be just another year. I can no longer take them for granted. Actually no one of us can.

I adore living. All of the small details, pleasures, turmoil, sudden delights, mishaps, encounters, are mine if I choose to make them mine.

What I will miss most as I think of what in my life has given me the greatest pleasure , is traveling to a new place. I have always looked forward to new encounters-----the not knowing---I do not try to find what I will be seeing in a guide book or on the internet before arriving. Once I am there, I may inquire such from a local, or allow myself to stumble upon it. I do not look forward to leaving.

What has become the most odious to me is the notion of taking a religion, any religion as a serious truth. A fable, yes, but a serious steadfast belief, NO!!

I know that life has an end. It has to be so. 

It is both sad and   frightening   to know the forecast. I urge all of you to hasten your daily enjoyment in whatever suits your fancy without deliberate self destruction .The latter will ultimately destroy your pleasure .I allow myself to proclaim because there is no shortcut ---no “program”; there is only “Do it now, and make it good!”

Bury your cell phones for a while and take back life in the raw! I do not have a smart phone, and do not want to enter that graveyard of spontaneity!

I take photos in my head. They never turn out to show all I want to show!

I am so grateful to be able to send you these thoughts and ideas, none of them innovative, I know! I only want to record my experience of life at his age---very similar to what it has been all along---minus the self destruction!

I hope you will welcome my future blogs with all of their simplicity!

Politics are a drag, yeah—here as well as there.
Much love from Miss Rheingold

FINAL DESTINATION

Finale has a most definite ring---sort of like a curtain falling with accompanying light-Show is over---back to routine.

So, there seems to be a new set of lights that can be seen by those who remain in the audience.

There is much to be gained in the morning reading I am partner to with my husband David.

Real stuff----deep stuff--now into:

THE GENE, by Siddhartha Mukherjee---a wondrous piece by a medical innovator and investigator of the gene and all of its implications for many generations as told through the author's family's health history.

Reason has come into its own---finally putting the "feeling reign" into  its place- (up there somewhere)---speculation now succumbs to plausible thinking: refreshing and truly informative.

There is much to be said about choice of parental partners!

Living in Israel has allowed me to understand why the world in general can be said to be in a foul mess! Political mess, that is.

It also allows me to wonder about the lack of socialized medicine in he United States, a heavy factor in our choice to return to Israel.

Born to the rich variety of New York City, I am a native snob! Born an American Jew, I was not made to feel out of place as I do here in Israel.

There is much material development here; money from abroad is and has been plentiful.

The mentality beyond the material profit has scarcely been developed.

Today in our Yoga class, there was mention of the day being a holiday: Christmas. The instructor jumped a day ahead --this group will not be meeting tomorrow. There was some surprise as he went on saying that he was Christian, Muslim, and Jewish. I smiled. I am removed from all of it!

It is time to allow for reason to overtake feelings of faith---or at least to take equal billing.

Along with ongoing, horrifying starvation in Venezuela, I witness imposed starvation of healthy ideas to be fed to our next generations.

It is time to renounce religion and  its thwarted pronouncements. Reason can stand alongside of emotion----the two are not mutually exclusive.

It is time to hallow Alain de Boton and Sam Harris and other true thinkers who are believers in the possibility of life being  a truly satisfying experience for all human beings. It is time to brush religion out of the air---out of our hair---and into a new dustbin--- and a new and separate trash receptacle.

There is no time to lose----

Even the word "politics" is disturbing to me--all inclusive of ----what? I ask.

Keep reading the real stuff----keep making your minds clean---what can each of us do before kicking off?

Looking for solutions, MISS RHEINGOLD

HAPPY….HAPPY…..HAPPY…..DEAD!

This has been a week of weakness and recovery! Back to Yoga practice today----and what a treat to be lying back in Shevasayna. 

When David and I were living in San Miguel, Mexico, we attended a mid morning Friday philosophy group .A really cool circle of men and women( evenly attended) heard a tape of a famous philosopher, after a weekly summary of notes presented by the leader. Lively discussions   followed each and every week.

I cannot recall the philosopher the week that  a very lively comment was made by a French friend of ours, a single (divorced) woman in her 50’s.We were discussing dying, and each in our large circle got to give a comment on the subject.

The lady’s name was Michelle. She was fairly attractive and a novel dresser. She sat up straight, and with her deep French accent,, spoke these words:

“I want to be happy, happy, happy, dead!”

Everyone laughed. This was over nine years ago, and I can still hear her making this pronouncement!

I took it as beloved words that resonated in my own psyche.

Now, I   myself may be close to that time. My wish of how to experience that event comes very close to Michelle’s desire. ..HAPPY, HAPPY, HAPPY…… 

My husband and I read from a serious book every morning for about 15-20 minutes after a very early breakfast (about 6a.m.)-each one of us gets a chance to select the book (non-fiction), but it has been David consistently who has been doing the reading. We started this daily   practice  over 10 years ago----skipping a few periods of time when no book presented itself as worth our deep attention.

Julian Barnes, Sam Harris, and  Earnest Becker have written at times comic, but mostly serious studies, of serious , real (earth real) life events and attitudes. No use of word “spiritual” haunts their pages!

These are Pulitzer Prize authors----learned men with great understanding of human behavior---- while deep into daily living outside of the test tubes they have forged and examined.

President Clinton, I recently learned, mentioned Earnest Becker in his 2004 autobiography. Not such bad company!

The writing has become a sort of daily prayer practice with no mention of a deity.

We have a few books on order at the moment, some of which have been chosen after listening to Sam Harris’ podcast discussions with outstanding guests 

So, I am back on the mend from the wrenching week following my vibrant birthday week. Feeling  the happy, happy, happy vibe once again: in tune with life and all of its wondrous simplicity.

I invite you to join me!

I enjoy reading your comments. Thank you.

MISS RHEINGOLD

LIFE IS A DAILY OCCURRENCE

Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears!

Surely this bidding has been altered to: Lend me your eyes!

A week into the new age---or new stage of life--to include Shakespeare in my ruminations:

"All the world's a stage."

I have been suffering from an intense cold with 24 hour phlegm producing constant hacking, keeping me awake just about all night long!

The counter play to the marvelous week spent celebrating just last week.

I have come to the perfect conclusion that in life we do not create the first half, but we sure as hell do construct the second half----ah, but the final piece is the pièce de resistance.

`

Once one’s own demise is not blotted out by fanciful excursions into non - (i.e., accepted)  reality or a new poetic tinged reality, I am finding that facing forward into my own oblivion is a truly worthwhile challenge! Who do I want to be there? How do I want my final wishes and sentiments to be expressed? Do I want to have certain people excluded, or to be sure to have certain people present?

I am sad that cremation is not allowed in Israel. That would be my choice. I learned that there was a secret place in Jerusalem that has a crematorium. There would be a prohibitive cost, financially and emotionally for my religious family members. So, into a linen bag I will be popped, thrown into the dirt, with a ton of prayers for my next life (in heaven) pronounced by men I have not known (and would not have wanted to!).

I would like to be buried with a new copy of Josephine Hart’s OBLIVION. She passed away recently, within   the past few years.

Meanwhile, I am in an ambiance of celebration and exuberant planning for a life full of social obligations teaching private students foreign languages---my first true love!

I enjoy maintaining my beauty treatments---keeping myself deeply in love with my husband, and he with me!!

Each moment is alive with promise of enjoyment and recognition of the value of life. Clichés are usually not my forte; they are facile and unsophisticated, yes, but they have been uttered when the realization comes blasting into your psyche---YEAH!

Keep on living --- writing --- reading----making love ---- eating foods that make the act a délice---interacting with those whom you get pleasure from, as well as those who get pleasure from you.

OK — final note: “The years they run like rabbits” W.H. Auden ---- make sure you get a full view ---

Of a field of rabbits!

Miss Rheingold