"The medicine wheel is the basic structure, or the essential metaphor, for all that is. Picture a medicine wheel, a circle divided into four parts. Think of the segments as winter in the north quadrant, spring in the east, summer in the south and autumn in the west. There is a line between winter and spring, showing the equinox where winter ends and spring -begins. Exactly at that line is an opening that allows, and in fact demands, for new ideas to enter. Right at the line between winter and spring, new ideas enter via a slice of light into the medicine wheel. These lines between the seasons represent gates or doorways. Among my people, it is believed there are gatekeepers. These gatekeepers are referred to as grandmothers or grandfathers — or, in Tiwa, as mother- father beings. Their responsibility is to let in the new ideas or to refuse their entry. At this precise point immediately after entry chaa-ched happens. Chaa means the here-and-now. Chaa creates presentness in linear time. In the word chaa-ched, the ched means that which is perceptive. Before ched we do not have cognition because we cannot perceive. Ched is the vibration of perception."
Even if our efforts of attention seem for years to be producing no result, one day a light that is in exact proportion to them will flood the soul. |
SIMONE WEIL  Some interesting symbols **************
  I watched Michelle Obama's whole speech, but not Barak's. The day was sunny and hot, and Hillary was wearing a hat and sun glasses on the stage, and one of the Presidents even had a fan in his hand. At one point Biden seemed to have fallen asleep. Poor guy is sick, after all! -------------------- PS: Heather Cox Richardson summarized some of Michelle Obama's speech, and so I'll just paste it here (for my own historical purpose.) For the opening of the Obama Presidential Center, former first lady Michelle Obama and former president Barack Obama welcomed living presidents and first ladies, except the Trumps, who were not invited: President Bill Clinton and Secretary Hillary Clinton, President George W. Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush, and President Joe Biden and Dr. Jill Biden. The crowd at the center was packed to hear speeches by the Obamas and longtime friends and aides, and to hear performances by Christina Aguilera, Marc Anthony, Common, Jennifer Hudson, John Legend, Marsai Martin, The Roots, Bruce Springsteen, Tems, U2’s Bono and The Edge, Eddie Vedder, and Stevie Wonder. Tens of thousands of people also packed the nearby Midway Plaisance Park to watch the event on jumbotrons. In both places, the mood was jubilant and warm. Comedians Stephen Colbert and David Letterman and Obama Foundation board chair Martin Nesbitt all showed up in tan suits, a reference to the tan suit Obama wore in the Oval Office in August 2014. Although past presidents including Ronald Reagan had also worn tan suits in the White House, as Jacob Gallagher of the New York Times noted today, Obama’s suit led to a right-wing meltdown about how the suit was too informal for the West Wing: then-Representative Peter King (R-NY) called it “a metaphor for his lack of seriousness.” The story of the South Side of Chicago, from which the Obamas hail, is “a story of possibility,” a video introducing the center said. “[W]e can come together and create the change we seek. ‘We.’ It’s the single most powerful word in a democracy: ‘We the people.’ We shall overcome. All things are possible. Yes we can. ‘We’ includes everyone.” The emphasis of the event was on new leaders shaping the future. “The future is now, and it starts with us.” Mrs. Obama urged Americans to make a choice to change the future. “The Obama presidential center is a living testament to the power of choice,” she said, “the historic example that millions of you gave the world about what this imperfect democracy has strived for and achieved.” And, she said, it is “an urgent call to go out there and do it again.” She said she hoped the center would remind people “of the power of choice. And the steady work of change. The arduous, unglamorous march up that mountain, one foot after another, day after day, generation after generation. But I…also hope you fully absorb the elation of achieving something together. You know, that feeling when you clear the tree line and see a vista that takes your breath away. A feeling that can never be erased.” “I know that can be hard to grasp right now,” she said, “when everything feels so upside down. When fact and fiction run together, when folks seek to stifle speech, limit access to education, devalue diversity, erase the inconvenient parts of our history. When our phones constantly buzz with the latest outrage.” She hoped the center “can reignite the optimism and empathy and ambition that has always powered this country’s greatest change.” “[W]e want you to come here and put away your phones and talk and laugh and cry…and make new friends,” she said. “Get your hands dirty in my garden. Push your baby on a swing in the playground. Have a romantic picnic on the great lawn. Because that’s the work of democracy too. Being neighborly. Taking care of public spaces. Having some fun enjoying each other. Shaking out of the isolation and division that have crept too deeply into our lives.” She championed the power of the people as she urged the center’s South Side neighbors “to make this campus a part of your lives. Be inspired by the world-class art. Check out the books from our beautiful public library—and bring them back on time. Drop some beats in the recording studio, hit some corner threes at home court, hold birthday parties, jump-start clothing drives. Host citywide cleanup dates here. Use this campus to show off this place we call home. This joyful place where Marian and Fraser Robinson taught their two kids to dream big. This hopeful place where an unknown guy with an unknown name took flight. This stubbornly optimistic place where family after family scrapes and claws and laughs and dances their way to a better tomorrow. That’s what this has always been about.” She told Chicagoans they “have shown the world what we are capable of. You’ve proven that a lasting legacy isn’t an award or a name on a building or a number of zeros in a bank account, but the difference we make in one another’s lives. It’s about seeing each other, and showing up for each other, and carrying each other when we’re weary or faltering or losing faith. That’s how you build something that endures. “And that’s what you all have done at every twist and turn of this extraordinary journey,” she said. “You have protected and proclaimed the hope that beats within the heart of this campus. You’ve rekindled and renewed this untameable, unpredictable, and unbreakable democracy. And I know that you all are gonna astonish us even more in the months and years ahead. Because you all have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that when we truly see each other, when we strive to bring out the best in ourselves and one another, oh, there is no limit to how high we can go. Thank you all. I love you all. God bless you, and God bless this country we love.” ----------------------------------- Today is a national holiday - Juneteenth Link is to my Open Yesterday's Pages blog. |
