Not sure why...

I seem to have fallen off the radar with this blog. For a few years I wrote almost daily entries or at the very least weekly. Perhaps it is that I have been so engaged in my personal relationship or maybe it is because I actually have someone to share my thoughts with. Whatever the reason, recent discussions about journalling reminded me that I still love put my thoughts down on digital paper, as it were.

I started this who thing when I went off to graduate school in 2005. Now some nine years later I have completed my journey down that path, having recently submitted my revisions for my PhD in Communications and Culture.

I was motivate to come back here after reading a column in the New York Times by William Kristoff, in which he decried the disappearance of the public intellectual and the failure of quantitative research to address the many social and political challenges in our modern society. He situates the blame squarely inside the academy and its obsession with narrow lines of intellectual inquiry along with the typical elitism label that right wingers love to throw at those who do not agree with them. In Canada, at least, public intellectuals have been under direct attack by the Harper government. Evidence based decisions are entirely absent form their planning, unless the evidence points towards voter-suppression ( they want this) or to rallying the hard core of their support.

I like to frame myself as a public intellectual and given that this blog has been my platform, I felt the need to return and to reactivate my discourse. Does anyone read this? I am really uncertain but that cannot be my singular motivation. My primary reason has always been to keep track of my own reflections. Should others wish to share in them they are free to do so. My concerns have always been wide-ranging and eclectic so some may find them rather random. But then my life has always been so.

And now that I have completed my graduate studies I can get back to my disorderly life.

Waking up from hibernation

I have been away from my blog for almost a year and it really feels like I went into hibernation. I had shut down on many levels, not because I was away from the world but simply because I had disconnected from my muse. I felt like I really had nothing left to say but now I know that I had too much going on and I simply was not able to externally deal with it.

I am not sure what has helped me to break free of that sense of needing to withdraw deep inside of myself but now I am fighting my way back to the light. I have started back into my writing for my dissertation. I have landed a role in a play and I am hoping to hear back this week on a project proposal that could earn me some badly needed money.

So I am wake and back in the world and I am again looking for stories to tell and things to ponder. Perhaps it was the baby robins perched at our doorstep. What better sign of hope and life could there possibly be than such fragile beauty greeting you every time you step out your door and there when you return to the comfort of your home?

Season's end...

Season's End

Summer has fled

Leaving my world in disarray

An ungracious autumn has

Hastily crept into her empty bed

Turning warmth  and delight

Into the dank and dreary

Cloud filled day 

That closes into starless night.

I might yet yearn

For winter's crystal breath

To sweep away fog and mist

But I will not spurn

The days yet due

When  trees grace the land

With leafy fire

And grey skies arch in blue.

After an absence...

I have been away from this blog for months now. Until I just checked I not realized that it had been quite so long. The past months have been very different - transformative in many ways.

The biggest change is my new relationship that seems to have exploded into my life out of thin air. It truly was unexpected and we both have o step back from time to time and shake our heads. Logically we admit that we may have moved more quickly than reason would advise but as Pascal says "the heart has reasons that reason cannot know." So now here I am living in London, Ontario still toiling away at my dissertation, searching for work and most importantly living with an amazing woman. Gertie Mai can best be described as a force of nature though she is much more modest in her self-image. Somehow she swept me off my feet with just a smile - a rich heartfelt laugh - and of course a sweet kiss.

I am both content and joyfully happy.

When times change,,,

Through my six decades I have seen considerable change and yet there are times when I think I really will not see any more progress. This tends to be especially true in politics. But then I am reminded by the Canadian public that though quiet they are thoughtful and resilient.

The past several years in Canadian politics have been bleak, brutal and nasty. Under Stephen Harper the Conservatives have waged a war on democracy by distorting the truth and suppressing any attempts at open discussions and critiques of their policies. Lacking any idea beyond reducing the role of government in Canada they smear and denigrate anyone who might attempt to articulate a vision for this country beyond balancing the books and reducing taxes. The level of vitriol and acrimony within Parliament has become poisonous.

When the current election began it seemed that the best Canadians could hope for was another Conservative minority. Then something happened. Malcolm Gladwell talks about the Tipping Point and it seems somewhere in this campaign Canadians reached theirs. That it first became evident in Quebec is most intriguing. That it soon spread outwards across the country is fascinating. Beginning the campaign at 19% in the polls, the NDP have steadily risen from a distant third to a close second. The gap between them and the first-place Conservatives is tantalizingly small.

Will this result in a transformation in Canadian politics? Only election day will confirm that but something has already happened and any political party that ignores this does so at its own peril. Canadians are not sheeple. We may be slow to react. We may be patient beyond our own best interests at times but when change comes it is transformative.

Eagle's Flight

Eagle soars on golden wings
Sweeping clouds from azure sky
Passing from view
Drawing me higher
Lifting me free
From contemplation
Opening my heart
To all creation
Filling my spirit
With the simple joy
Of a new day
The gift of being.

My day

Chickadee sits on treetop
And cheers the world
With its simple song.
No harbinger of spring
It gives way
To other birds
Returning with the sun
Winging north on a softer breeze.

The winter's rage that was so fierce
Collapses before the gentle touch of spring.
The rain comes to sweep away its frozen cousins
The snowdrift, the icy patch.
They blend together
And sink into the thirsty ground.

I sit behind the shielding glass of sun porch
And let the sun warm me as it slides down the sky
Sinking below the waving line of a wet horizon
Marked by ocean swells.
The sliver of a pale moon hangs there
Marking the night.