Better Than Dead

Whether you’re looking to find Bigfoot or find a cure for what ails ye, believe in flying saucers and the hollow earth theory, or just feel called to go spiritually journeying in a place where the “veil between this world/dimension and the next is thinner” there’s a destination in California that will fit the bill: a currently inactive volcano called Mt. Shasta. That it’s in California may not surprise some—Cali is the state of oddball seekers, after all—but the fact that the legends stretch back to the earliest settlers and further back into Indian lore may surprise some.

The New Agey stuff, of course, has been grafted onto the place wholesale, but Shasta has always been a place of legend. The mountain is sacred to many Indian tribes in the area: the Wintu, who believe they emerged from a sacred spring on the mountain; the Achumawi; the Atsugewi; the Modoc. The Shasta Indian tribe believe it to be the center of the universe and home to their creator god, Chareya, often called Old Man Above or Great Man in English. While he was creating the world, he made himself a gigantic tipi out of ice and snow. He lived there for thousands of years and the Indians knew he was in residence because they could see the smoke of his fire coming out of the tipi’s top. However, when white folks showed up in the area, Old Man Above decided it was time to go and the smoke wasn’t seen on the mountain after that.

Perhaps that’s why there are people who to this day believe Shasta is hollow inside, a interdimensional passageway, the place where the last of the Lemurians live in a crystal city called Telos, home of the ascended masters, a covert UFO base, a…well, you get the picture. UFO sightings are quite frequent in the area, even without the lenticular clouds that frequent the mountaintop. And it’s said to be a Bigfoot hotspot, as a recent Finding Bigfoot episode claimed. Many spiritual seekers there report “telepathic communication” with Bigfoot when they pop in and out of the fifth dimension…and saucer occupants, and Lemurians, and…again, you get the picture.

I do not laugh at the belief systems of others. I may not take them on as my own, but I figure that as long as they’re harmless and make these people happy, why not? And the beliefs clinging to the mountain are mostly that—peaceful and transcendental. Well, if you discount that one Guy who started a cult in the 1930s. His wife and son wound up swindling people out of a lot of money and getting busted by the Feds. The Guy himself did not go to prison—he was dead when the swindling occurred—so his name remains “pure” and the cult lives on in a Visitor’s Center in the town of Shasta.

But hey, Mt. Shasta is not to blame for the darkness at the heart of some humans, and most activity there is pretty positive. One might even come to believe that Mt. Shasta could purify even the darkest of hearts.

At his first sight of Mt. Shasta in 1874, John Muir is reported to have said, “I was fifty miles away, afoot, alone and weary, yet all of my blood turned to wine and I have not been weary since.”

And therein may lay the essence of the Mt. Shasta experience. More than anything, what fascinates people about the mountain is the gosh-awful grandeur of the place. It inspires awe, and so people pour that awe into a multiplicity of belief systems. The place may very well be a vortex to some otherworldly place, or it may just be a vortex of amazing beauty.

As Steven Jackson put it, writing for NPR, when he hiked there: “I don’t have a spiritual epiphany. But the air feels cold and sharp. The old-growth cedars are covered in brilliant green moss and shape-shifting clouds whip across the sky impossibly fast. In short, it is literally awesome. And regardless of what one believes about the mountain, it’s easy to see why it has so many legends to its name.”

Random quote of the day:

“The miracle is not to walk on water. The miracle is to walk on the green earth in the present moment, to appreciate the peace and beauty that are available now.”

—Thich Nhat Hanh, Touching Peace

 

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

Random quote of the day:

“What is really beautiful must always be true.”

—Stendhal, Armance

 

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

Random quote of the day:

“Once wealth and beauty are gone, there is always rural life.”

—Mason Cooley, City Aphorisms

 

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

Random quote of the day:

“The sight of a small child sleeping remains one of the unassailably beautiful things—a bulwark against despair & cynicism.”

—Alain de Botton, Twitter, 2011

 

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

I had to run home to take care of something at lunch. On my way back to work driving through Venice, I saw a young woman walking down the street headed in the direction of the Boardwalk. She wore mid-calf fringed boots of brick red, long black gypsy hair, and a black micro-mini dress that seriously clung to her seriously nice curves. Over her arm she twirled a sparkly blue hula hoop.

Headed down to the beachfront to show off some moves, I thought. A lot of people head down to the Boardwalk to show off moves. It’s kind of the expected thing. And I thought, “Yeah, I could seriously get into watching her twirl that hoop around her small waist and curvy hips.”

I’m a content non-practicing heterosexual, but I would have really appreciated that show. So much youth and beauty and lovely curves—and youth and beauty and lovely curves should definitely work it while they have it. They ain’t nuthin’ wrong with that, sugar. It’ll be gone in a heartbeat. That life and exquisite energy needs to be celebrated in full while it is present.

I ain’t so young no more and the curves I have now are not like that. Never were, truth be told. I am not un-beautiful, but I don’t have the vigor right now to do much with it. Other truth be told, I don’t have a lot of energy at all these days. I still feel exhausted most of the time, even after getting a good night’s sleep or a full weekend of lounging. I’m in a post-stress phase, a grieving phase, and that eats at my vitality.

I would never cheapen PTSD by even implying I have anything remotely like it, but there is all kinds of post-ness on the stress spectrum. I spent the last five years, particularly the last two, dealing with a high degree of tension most days as my mother progressively failed. It takes a while to get over the ashen burn out of that kind of situation. Anti-parenting, a caregiver I know calls it, where you’re burning up all your time easing those you love towards death. Where there is no happy ending, as another caregiver I know says. The ease-up from that daily grind has a pretty powerful rebound. So I’m trying to let gravity slow me down and steady me out from the bungee jump I’ve just been forced to make.

I do hope to get some of my energy back with time, but it’s way too early to tell if I’ll ever return to where I was before I became a full-time caregiver. I suspect I might not, but it’s way too early to say, one way or another. I can say that if fate is kind, if I do get that energy back—even if I only get part way there—watch out, baby. I will work it, work it hard, work it for all it’s worth, in my non-youthful, unconventionally curvy way. You will definitely enjoy that show. It will make your wild gypsy hair blow right on back from your face.

Random quote of the day: 

“The only beautiful things are those that madness prompts and reason writes.

—André Gide, The Journals of André Gide, Vol. I

 

Disclaimer:  The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

Random quote of the day:

“Beauty will save the world.”

—Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Idiot

 

 

Disclaimer:  The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

 

Rock Hudson seems to be enjoying this “bout” rather a lot. Now I know how he wound up with the name Rock.

Rudolph Valentino at the shore. Pass me my fan.