Steve P Brady

New-to-me bookstore knows where it’s at.


First real snow of the year. Better late than never.



4/5 stars. Sean Harris is amazing.


2nd to last long run of 2023. Spent this morning in the woods. Still wishing for some snow though.


Week 51, 2023

The week started with a freak storm and power outages predicted to last 4 days- luckily ours was back in about 24hours- and ended with the start of the much needed Christmas break.

Reading

I came across this quote from Brian Eno:

"[S]o much of modern art is the sound of things going out of control, of a medium pushing to its limits and breaking apart. The distorted guitar is the sound of something too loud for the medium supposed to carry it. The blues singer with the cracked voice is the sound of an emotional cry too powerful for the throat that releases it. The excitement of grainy film, of bleached-out black and white, is the excitement of witnessing events too momentous for the medium assigned to record them. "

Makes you wonder how much of art’s beauty will be lost under the guise of a digital perfection.

I also read a pretty fun short story by Andrew Van Wey called “December 20th 1986.” It was a fun horror romp about a giant eye that shows up in a man’s basement as he tried to host the most important Christmas party of his life. This was short, creepy, seasonal and I actually finished it of December 20th.

Listening

Spotify continues to impress me with it’s ability to deliver new artist to me that are right in my wheelhouse. The lasted examples is Mindwarden’s album TIMELESS. It’s dark jazz, perfect for fans for fans of lingering piano notes, misty interiors and introspective science fiction in the mode of BLADE RUNNER.

Watching

Not much unfortunately. That’s something I want to get better at in the new year- finding interested out of the way movies to watch.


“When education is not liberating, the dream of the oppressed is to become the oppressor.” — Paulo Freire (1921 - 1997)


Two roads diverged…

#SaturdayLongRun 12/16/23


Doing a bit of a deep dive into Meister Eckhart this past week. I have to say, after spending the past 6 months studying Plotinus and Neo-Platonism in general I can't believe Eckhart was not exposed to those ideas at some point. I am just seeing so much overlap. 


Plotinus' Ennead III: On the Descent of the Soul into Bodies

Introduction to the Soul: Plotinus begins by discussing the nature of the soul, emphasizing its divine origin and its connection to higher realities.

The Descent of the Soul: Plotinus explores the soul's descent from the divine realm into the material world. This descent involves the soul taking on a succession of bodies as it becomes entangled with the physical realm.

Purification and Return: The soul's journey involves a process of purification, where it detaches itself from the material world and strives for a return to its original divine state.

Intellectual Beauty and Unity: Plotinus introduces the concept of Intellectual Beauty as a divine principle that draws the soul toward unity. The soul's ascent involves a progression through various levels of reality.

The One as the Ultimate Source: The culmination of the soul's journey is union with the One, the ultimate source and principle of all reality. Plotinus discusses the ineffable nature of the One and the transformative experience of the soul's reunion with it.

Ethical Considerations: Throughout Ennead III, Plotinus touches upon ethical considerations, emphasizing the importance of virtue and the pursuit of the Good in aligning the soul with its divine nature.


12/9/23 Weekend Long run


Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

From Robin Sloan's most recent newsletter comes this reminder that he does a public reading of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight every New year's Day. Putting this here as a reminder to myself as I want to listen int his year.

Longtime subscribers know that on New Year’s Day, I broadcast a live reading of the Middle English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. I took last year off; this year, the poem gallops forth again.
My reading will begin at 10 a.m. PT / 1 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. GMT, and run for a bit under three hours. Play it in the background while you relax or putter; it would be my honor to be invited into your home on the first day of 2024.
The broadcast is already scheduled on YouTube, and you can press a button over there to receive a reminder, if that’s helpful. I’ll send a quick newsletter on the morning of January 1 with another link.

New Dark Ambient find


As a teacher in a public school the Pledge of Allegiance is a daily ritual, but it's one I don't particularly care for. This speaks to one of the reasons why.

 "How does one hate a country, or love one? I lack the trick of it. I know people, I know towns, farms, hills and rivers and rocks, I know how the sun at sunset in autumn falls on the side of a certain plowland in the hills; but what is the sense of giving a boundary to all that, of giving it a name and ceasing to love where the name ceases to apply? What is love of one’s country; is it hate of one’s uncountry?" 

~ Ursula K. Le Guin


  “Sometimes people hold a core belief that is very strong. When they are presented with evidence that works against that belief, the new evidence cannot be accepted. It would create a feeling that is extremely uncomfortable, called cognitive dissonance. And because it is so important to protect the core belief, they will rationalize, ignore and even deny anything that doesn’t fit in with the core belief.”— Frantz Fanon (1925 - 1961)  


Urbain Grandier and Witch Hunts

The concept of witch hunts in the political sphere are all the rage right now, but they are nothing new. I watched a recent episode of Esoterica on YouTube and learned about the infamous Urbain Grandier. He was a French Catholic priest who lived in the 17th century, specifically in the town of Loudun. He is primarily known for his involvement in a famous case of alleged sorcery and possession, which became known as the "Loudun Possessions."

In 1632, several nuns from the Ursuline convent in Loudun claimed to be possessed by demons and accused Urbain Grandier of being a sorcerer responsible for their afflictions. The accusations against Grandier were partly due to personal and political conflicts in the town. He had enemies among the local clergy and was known for his criticism of the church's authorities.

The trials and accusations against Grandier were highly controversial and drew significant attention. Grandier vehemently denied the charges of sorcery but was nonetheless found guilty and sentenced to be tortured and then burned at the stake in 1634.

The Loudun Possessions and the trial of Urbain Grandier remain a notable episode in the history of witch hunts and witch trials and cab be seen as an example of how political and personal motivations can lead to accusations of witchcraft and sorcery during a time of heightened religious and social tensions. And as someone who lived through the "satanic panic" of the late 70s and early 80s and who now sees conspiracy theories run amok online, this really doesn't feel like ancient history to me.


On the one hand Hegel was a proponent of  historical development. His view of history was one of an unfolding of human consciousness and freedom. History progressed as societies and individuals resolved conflicts and contradictions to move toward more freedom and self-realization.

On the other hand:  “What experience and history teach is this — that nations and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.”

So 🤷‍♂️.


"God is a circle whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere" ~ Hermes Trismegistus  


Book Review: The Crane Husband

 "The Crane Husband" is an unsettling folk horror story by Kelly Barnhill. In this brief and well-crafted novella, she dives into the topic of domestic violence, all wrapped up in a modern twist on the classic Japanese folktale, the Crane Wife.  An excellent read that I finished in one sitting. 4 Stars.

Quotes:

                                                                        *****

" The more you love someone, the more dangerous to you they become. The more you love someone, the more willing you are to show them your throat.”

                                                                        *****

  “Maybe we never actually run away. Maybe everywhere’s the same.”

                                                                        *****

  “She tilts her head. Her black eye is a pool of ink. It is a bottomless pit. It is a collapsed star, all density and hunger and relentless gravity, pulling everything it can into its center- to be unraveled, unmade, undone, and unrecognizable. How can anyone survive that kind of love?”  

                                                                        *****

" It’s a lot more work to cause harm to someone who mistrusts you, or fears you. Or hates you. Love opens the city gates wide, and allows all manner of horrors right inside."


Flash Fiction: "The Unearthly Tome"

 Matthias sat alone. He was often alone. In the dark.

The library’s stacks were his second home as worked the overnight to help pay for his studies. Aside from the occasional query of “Please show me how the printer works, my essay is due at midnight,” he was largely left alone.

His favorite corner of the library was the rare book room as it was housed in the older, non-renovated part of the building. He appreciated its fading but still visible Victorian charm. He’d spent many a night browsing through books that most students never touched, never mind reading.

Sometimes he thought they may contain secrets, or ghosts of secrets. More often than not they contained nothing more interesting than old sermons or the desperate diary entries of lonely spinsters.

The last of the late night procrastinators had left and the early risers had yet to make their way through the wooded path leading from the dorms to the library. He heard the college chapel’s bell chime twice. 2 AM. Opening his tattered canvas backpack fishing his way through notebooks, paperbacks and pens, he withdrew from its depths a small brown paper bag containing his lunch.

Peanut butter again. His limited finances didn’t allow for much more. Sighing he gazed out the window to his left.

In the silence, he became acutely aware of the night outside. The moonlight filtered through the old, distorted, lead-glass windows, casting shadows across the ancient stacks of books. The walls themselves were alive with the interplay of dust and shadowy light. One shadow formed a finger stretching deeper and deeper into the stacks; it’s bony fingertip resting on a single leather-bound tome.

The compulsion, or more accurately the desire, to reach for that book grew until he had to hold it in his hands. Leaving his lunch untouched, he walked into the stacks.

As he cracked open the ancient book and leafed through its cracked and yellowed pages, the stacks, the shadows, the night outside all dissolved as his head dizzied and his heart raced over what he read. Things that were at once revelatory and yet lost to him. He was drawn into a narrative that defied all reason. It spoke of forgotten civilizations, cosmic horrors, and unspeakable mysteries hidden beneath the earth's surface.

Though he had been a diligent student over the past four years, never had he come across such truths that both attracted and repulsed at the mere reading of them. His rational mind resisted, but the words seeped into and infected his being, filling him with a combined sense of dread and awe.

The abyss was staring back at him. It may have been smiling. A dead-eyed smile.

He felt that he had ventured too far. This brief encounter with forbidden knowledge had shaken him. He knew with certainty that if he spent any more time lost in these pages his exterior self would cease to contain his interior turmoil. So, with a sense of dread that refused to dissipate, he closed the book, realizing with chilling certainty that some mysteries were best left unexplored.

* * * * * *

When the day time staff arrived at 6 AM there was no sign of Matthias other than his untouched lunch on the floor of the rare book room.


I feel like every weekend since about the middle of August I have been on overdrive with house projects, so I am designating this upcoming long weekend as house project free. Additionally, I'm working to complete my grading, finish up a client project and write my newsletter today so they are off my plate as well. 🤞 that I can get through it all before my weekend of freedom starts.


New find:


Just binged my first show in a long time. The 4th season of USA's The Sinner wasn't quite as good as the previous seasons, but it's hard not to root for Bill Pullman's  Detective Harry Ambrose as he unravels a mystery. While not the best season (that'll always be season one for me) this is a good send off for the character.


 There's something sadly poetic about the fact that we just lost Jimmy Buffet on Labor Day weekend, the unofficial end of summer.  

Radio Margaritaville has been the soundtrack of quite a few summers for me.


After 3 days of professional development school is officially starting today. Will be good to have kids back in the building. Here's to a good year 27!