are all my stars out?
on Jan 5, 2009 in life Dana love Salinger work writing For Christmas this year, my mother gave me a first edition copy of J.D. Salinger's Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction. When I was a younger, angrier, more confused man (or, ever since I discovered The Catcher in the Rye

let’s get our groove on
on Dec 24, 2008 in buddhism life music anti-intellectualism Google metablog pop-culture Over the last year or so I've made several minimalist changes to this blog, cutting out clutter. Lost in the shuffle have been long-winded explanations about me or the site that I thought would be self-evident or the type of thing that, if you were r

we’re so small
on Dec 19, 2008 in life pictures In case I don’t have the chance to write anything profound and meaningful before the holiday (I’ve got quite a bit to do before Dana and I leave town for a week), I wanted to leave the year on a high note. There are, as always, a multitude of inf...

your punk rock buddhist lesson for the day
on Dec 15, 2008 in buddhism music politics American Buddhisms Cat Power Erykah Badu Fugazi power Public Enemy punk rock Yo La Tengo It might just be the Fugazi talking, and I don't really know if these ideas are worth the digital ink I've spilled on them, but I think American Buddhist sanghas (of any variety) need to seriously think about how they're planning on carryin

what the hell is the dharma?
on Dec 11, 2008 in buddhism American Buddhisms dharma fundamentalism media practice When we say that we should spread the dharma in the West (or anywhere), exactly which dharma are we talking about? The dharma that says full awakening isn't even possible in this lifetime but takes aeons of rebirths? The dharma that says awakening is

food? oh, we got food
on Dec 11, 2008 in buddhism American Buddhisms family media practice There’s a couple of things I want to talk about. I want to point them out free of last week’s debate. I want to avoid conversations about race or ethnicity or immigration or access to power…. Oh, who am I kidding? I don’t want to avoid those...

i’m not bitter. (maybe a little.)
on Dec 8, 2008 in buddhism American Buddhisms media rant It's a quarter to nine in the morning. And I'm a little sleepy. And I'm liable to say some things in what follows that I might regret. Or at least will want to temper at some point when I've had a bit more coffee or settled down. So co