Day Two: LDS Holy Spirit
The day that supposed to be so comforting starts out in the outer reaches of uncomfortable. My best friend's wife is evoking all kinds of drama and causing psychic harm all around. It's just full tilt tense as we head off to church.
My mind and body register the bad start for the day.
We get to the meeting house and services started. Usual sacrament service started things, and then a few people spoke including my friend.
We went on to a "gospel essentials" class that I had like somewhat before. Keep in mind this is LDS gospel essentials, so entirely off from your run of the mill Protestant gospel basics.
Let's all slow down here and let me announce for all you science and secular people, I am more like you. I am hardcore about evolution, for a dose of my hearty embrace of it see this post. This blog entry is extremely different for me.
Brother Magneson leads the class, I've liked his style and thoughtfulness in the previous times I've attended.
Someone read aloud the first verse reading. It was on the LDS version of the Holy Spirit, mind you. Something clicked. Not just understanding what was read, but an instance of what it was talking about.
The gist is the LDS Holy Spirit is not singular entity with mystical influence in the world. It means the spirit in all of us, including deity and prophets. It doesn't mean just one spirit, such as the deity's or a prophet, or just yours....it means the whole of all spirits in each of us past and present....it means a network of inter-relating and communicating nodes. It is not a system in opposition to our physical world, or science....or a counter to realism with a mush of dysfunctional mysticism.
It doesn't deny science. Although it is very unscientific I must emphasize, because it cannot be affirmed by science. It basically claims there is a network with nodes that are individual people, and its communication/information grid dedicated not to the physical but to the spiritual. It is not so much at war against reality and materialism, it more like fights for the things of the spirit.
After church services my friends took me to King's Wok Buffet. I was contemplating chancing it with a move out of the sure security of the Benedict House to an unknown and unseen shelter in Seattle. My friend said it was a good idea to get full of a lot of good food before going through what could a physically and mentally stressful situation in the move.
All this on the last day of 2017.
The next morning I said good bye to the good people of the Benedict House, explaining I needed to be closer to my son and no matter how nice their place was the cost and time of ferry rides was unsustainable in my situation. My friend's gave me a ride to the ferry terminal, and once there I felt wonderful. I was surrounded by the homeless and struggling seeking warmth at the ferry termnal that early morning of New Year's Day. All I felt or saw was beautiful. I took a photo of the first sunrise of 2017 and it expresses my feelings of peace.
Over the next several days I stayed in this mode of inner peace and appreciation all through the next days of flux and homelessness.
I stopped by my ex's and hung out with North for a few hours. We played our current favorite computer game, and chess. It may sound simple but it's the best time I could have.
I then plunged into the world of Seattle homeless shelter life. I got to the area of the shelter way too early, trying to make sure I was there at opening time to get on the list and get a place to sleep out of the cold.
A woman was nearby, next to a man, both sitting on the sidewalk up against a vacant storefront. Covered in blankets, they were professional homeless. She was maybe 30, Alaskan Native American, and we talked for over an hour while I waited for the shelter doors to open. Her face was covered in red splotches. She soon started using a needle. I looked the other way. Then she started having some problem with a bleeding hand. Then she talked about Jesus, and being a hooker.
I moved on to the shelter to get in line. An odd assortment of people, old timers for the place, were there. We all waited in the sub-freezing air for the doors to open.
Once they did I walked in and gave my name, then sat down to the side and hoped, hoped my luck was up enough to sleep in a shelter with drug addicts and psychotic mental cases.
8:00PM. I'm accepted! This means I have a kind of seniority built in, I'm slated to have a spot the next night for sure. And so on after that. It's not a bunk though, just mats with a basic minimal blanket, sleeping in clothes, no pillow. They do have meals in the evening, so I get a couple of slices of pizza.
I meet the program manager for an intake interview. We are few words into the conversation and she says "We need to get you out of here". It said in a nice but yet serious and urgent tone. Days later I would begin to figure out why -what dark risk was looming over me if this became even remotely a norm.
The program manager asks me my trade and I say web programmer. She opens up about being at Microsoft in the 1990's and seeing this new language the company created. It was originally called OOB. Yeah, OOB. Object Oriented Basic. They eventually decided OOB sounded stupid, so they renamed it Visual Basic. She told "hey guys, this an ugly unwieldly language", then she got out with her savings and stock options and became this major player in Seattle homeless advocacy.
Her last name is now "Blessing". Best hippy lady I've ever had the pleasure to meet. Mainly I like her for a direct grappling with reality, which of course requires the beautiful thing called pragmatism. She adds a dose of other beautiful things - hope, community, and concern. A right mix, and I will always remember and appreciate her.
I get through the night sleeping on my mat using my backpack full of hard things such as electronics as my pillow.
Through the night and the morning I remain upbeat, I mean no big worries, dread or unhappiness.
My mind and body register the bad start for the day.
We get to the meeting house and services started. Usual sacrament service started things, and then a few people spoke including my friend.
We went on to a "gospel essentials" class that I had like somewhat before. Keep in mind this is LDS gospel essentials, so entirely off from your run of the mill Protestant gospel basics.
Let's all slow down here and let me announce for all you science and secular people, I am more like you. I am hardcore about evolution, for a dose of my hearty embrace of it see this post. This blog entry is extremely different for me.
Brother Magneson leads the class, I've liked his style and thoughtfulness in the previous times I've attended.
Someone read aloud the first verse reading. It was on the LDS version of the Holy Spirit, mind you. Something clicked. Not just understanding what was read, but an instance of what it was talking about.
The gist is the LDS Holy Spirit is not singular entity with mystical influence in the world. It means the spirit in all of us, including deity and prophets. It doesn't mean just one spirit, such as the deity's or a prophet, or just yours....it means the whole of all spirits in each of us past and present....it means a network of inter-relating and communicating nodes. It is not a system in opposition to our physical world, or science....or a counter to realism with a mush of dysfunctional mysticism.
It doesn't deny science. Although it is very unscientific I must emphasize, because it cannot be affirmed by science. It basically claims there is a network with nodes that are individual people, and its communication/information grid dedicated not to the physical but to the spiritual. It is not so much at war against reality and materialism, it more like fights for the things of the spirit.
After church services my friends took me to King's Wok Buffet. I was contemplating chancing it with a move out of the sure security of the Benedict House to an unknown and unseen shelter in Seattle. My friend said it was a good idea to get full of a lot of good food before going through what could a physically and mentally stressful situation in the move.
All this on the last day of 2017.
The next morning I said good bye to the good people of the Benedict House, explaining I needed to be closer to my son and no matter how nice their place was the cost and time of ferry rides was unsustainable in my situation. My friend's gave me a ride to the ferry terminal, and once there I felt wonderful. I was surrounded by the homeless and struggling seeking warmth at the ferry termnal that early morning of New Year's Day. All I felt or saw was beautiful. I took a photo of the first sunrise of 2017 and it expresses my feelings of peace.
Over the next several days I stayed in this mode of inner peace and appreciation all through the next days of flux and homelessness.
I stopped by my ex's and hung out with North for a few hours. We played our current favorite computer game, and chess. It may sound simple but it's the best time I could have.
I then plunged into the world of Seattle homeless shelter life. I got to the area of the shelter way too early, trying to make sure I was there at opening time to get on the list and get a place to sleep out of the cold.
A woman was nearby, next to a man, both sitting on the sidewalk up against a vacant storefront. Covered in blankets, they were professional homeless. She was maybe 30, Alaskan Native American, and we talked for over an hour while I waited for the shelter doors to open. Her face was covered in red splotches. She soon started using a needle. I looked the other way. Then she started having some problem with a bleeding hand. Then she talked about Jesus, and being a hooker.
I moved on to the shelter to get in line. An odd assortment of people, old timers for the place, were there. We all waited in the sub-freezing air for the doors to open.
Once they did I walked in and gave my name, then sat down to the side and hoped, hoped my luck was up enough to sleep in a shelter with drug addicts and psychotic mental cases.
8:00PM. I'm accepted! This means I have a kind of seniority built in, I'm slated to have a spot the next night for sure. And so on after that. It's not a bunk though, just mats with a basic minimal blanket, sleeping in clothes, no pillow. They do have meals in the evening, so I get a couple of slices of pizza.
I meet the program manager for an intake interview. We are few words into the conversation and she says "We need to get you out of here". It said in a nice but yet serious and urgent tone. Days later I would begin to figure out why -what dark risk was looming over me if this became even remotely a norm.
The program manager asks me my trade and I say web programmer. She opens up about being at Microsoft in the 1990's and seeing this new language the company created. It was originally called OOB. Yeah, OOB. Object Oriented Basic. They eventually decided OOB sounded stupid, so they renamed it Visual Basic. She told "hey guys, this an ugly unwieldly language", then she got out with her savings and stock options and became this major player in Seattle homeless advocacy.
Her last name is now "Blessing". Best hippy lady I've ever had the pleasure to meet. Mainly I like her for a direct grappling with reality, which of course requires the beautiful thing called pragmatism. She adds a dose of other beautiful things - hope, community, and concern. A right mix, and I will always remember and appreciate her.
I get through the night sleeping on my mat using my backpack full of hard things such as electronics as my pillow.
Through the night and the morning I remain upbeat, I mean no big worries, dread or unhappiness.
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