Gaia, by Anselm Feuerbach (1875)

FRACKING

I am beginning to turn into a green guy.

I have been clean and sober for just over a month now and have made the commitment to travel down the recovery path once again.  Nearly a decade ago I had tried this before and after a couple of years of a week here and a month there I was able to achieve about a year of continuous sobriety before going "back out."  Consequently I saw new year arrive last night sober for just the second time in some thirty five years (except for those times I had fallen asleep before the midnight hour).

I don't bring this up seeking some kind of congratulations (or pity), nor to wag my finger at all those out there who enjoy their libations in whatever preferred form.  The reason I bring this up can be seen in the word "libation" itself. While we now use the word to merely describe any of the intoxicating beverages (and other substances) we consume or the consuming of such, it originally referred to the pouring of a liquid offering as a religious ritual or the liquid so poured.  Like the word libation, our celebrations have tended to lose their role to help orientate us in the world once the event is over.  They have become just merely another event in which we participate. 

Herbert Blau wrote in Taking Up the Bodies:

We lack the ritual forms with the clear events; when we have the clear events we distrust the forms.

OK, to start with, this is meant partly tongue-in-cheek. But… only partly.

As you may recall, in 2008 there was some name calling within the Democratic party as to whether you were a racist (if you were a Clinton supporter) or you were a sexist (if you were an Obama supporter). Obviously, I'm hand-waving quite egregiously, but I trust that everyone remembers what I'm referring to, even if I am being a bit glib about it.

Recent blogs by myself and others has me pondering the notion of nations and the forces that hold them together and tear them apart.  And this pondering inevitably leads to remembering Professor Peter Sugar.  I only took one class from him during my time at the University of Washington in pursuit of a degree in history.  Yet he had a profound impact on how I see the world and the relationship between that world and myself (and others). 

In spite of the diversity of the country and our best intentions, we do find ourselves in a community of folks that lean one particular way or another.  I have spent most of my adult life in the Northwest urban areas. As a consequence, it was easy to believe the folks who will say, when the topic turns to God, "I'm spiritual, not religious" were quite common.  As my recent years in the Mid-West and Gallup's newly released finding from their religious identity poll attest to, this is not really the case when we scan the contours of the American nation.  Gallup summarizes the findings this way: