Autumn

 

This image evokes something in me of an earlier time in life, hiking in the mountains of New Hampshire – walking in the woods in Westchester county

The crisp air of an autumn day

The pungent smell of leaves decaying

The rocky path that leads to unexpected vistas

The gentleness of landscape

I want to be walking there at this moment - lost in thought but soaking in the feel of the forest which gives so much year-round

Memories of Susan and her cottage and Trisha the eager black-and-white pooch

I felt at home in those woods

The Spirit of Self-Reflection

 "If you can learn to look at yourself and your life in a gentle, creative and adventurous way, you will be eternally surprised at what you find" 

from Anam Cara  John O'Donahue 

            

Reflections on 14 June, 2023

 "Let us dare to speak of our abiding dreams and occasional visions, and of the endless longing for some sanctuary beside the still waters where the soul can rest within the everlasting arms of the Soulmaker" Sam Keen

I wonder if the anxiety and disturbance I am feeling and that seems to be waking me up in the middle of the night is my conservative, change-resistant ("I don't wanna have to move") and fearful self blocking my sense of adventure ("I can move anywhere I want!") What if I spent my money on adventures instead of security? 

I have been secure here but I have also stagnated and had the feeling I was "running out the clock". Falcon Street is familiar to me now, I know my way around and I can take care of my needs with a minimum of effort. And yet I am bored a lot and just killing time. So many days I end up spending my time on idle internet surfing, trying to find movies to watch, waiting for 10 PM, my appointed bedtime. 

In some mystifying way, I think I am continuing to hang on to Floss.

Years ago when I ventured off to Georgia, I had no idea if it was gonna work out. I packed what little I possessed in my borrowed 1966 Chrysler that originally belong to my uncle, the Monsignor, and headed south, not without some trepidation. This was, after all, the South of Easy Rider.

It turned into one of the most productive and happy years of my life, a seminal experience that I treasure to this day. Can I channel that same sense of adventure now, faced with an ending and a potential new beginning? To do so I must say goodbye to the comfortable and familiar, and hello to the new and unknown. 

Gould's Inlet, St. Simon's Island Georgia

 

Gould's Inlet, St. Simon's Island Georgia

A beautiful spot where Floss and I used to happy hour when we visited St. Simon's Island, her hometown. 

On the surreal experiences of real estate

Well I probably should have know better. Faced with the prospect of attending cattle calls at open houses looking for an abode promoted me to seek some helpful referrals from my peeps here in SanDee. I sent out what was intended to be a qualified request to get some leads, to wit:

Hi have any of you worked with or know of a real estate agent that you like? I’m exploring housing options and I’d like to work with someone who's not too slick and calculating but has some degree of patience and empathy. I realize those traits are in small order in an industry that thrives on manipulation and competitiveness, but I am hopeful that that such a person may have accidentally found a niche in the jungle. At any rate, it never hurts to ask…

Hopefully,

Eric

Expecting at best a sparse response, I got instead a torrent of emails, texts, and VM's from the cybersphere, some copying both me and their recommended (and even beloved) real estate guru, who of course now have me in their "How can I help you" sights. I've become a "prospect". Precisely the outcome I was hoping to avoid. Now I feel saddled with an obligation to acknowledge all these efforts and perhaps return a call or two, just to avoid coming across as a lout. 

There is perhaps no industry this side of arms-dealing that typifies better in my mind the epicenter of rapacious, ethics-free materialism, gross ecological indifference and byzantine legalistic obfuscation than real estate. It is so irredeemably infused with an ethos of gratuitous hype, unctuous pandering and  mind-numbing data dumps that I can scarcely stand hearing the term. Every time I hear people talking real estate there is a blizzard of statistical and financial terms being tossed on the table like chips in a game of poker. And I can't be the only one thinking that when we reduce the sacred landscape to parcels of real estate we deepen out alienation. 

And yet, here it is. This is what one must do in 21st century America if one wishes to have something other than a park bench to rest your soul at the end of the day. Oy vey. 

Maybe, just maybe, there's a better way?