May 11, 2022

 We are  in Virgin Gorda for two weeks and life is good.  Snorkeling in a fishbowl, gorging on lobster, living large.  This island is rife with giant boulders spat out  by Mother Nature from a volcano long ago.  Supreme beauty born of ultimate violence, the world of opposites in action. 

Here it is again: I  begin each morning,  as I have for years, with a  selection from Vasistha's Yoga on the daily blog. Deep peace ensues.  Then I blow it all away by turning on the smartphone.  Lately I'm caught up in the holocaust visited upon Ukraine by the Russian Orcs. From here at a distance it is  David vs Goliath, with the slingshot lately hurling USA-labeled 177mm howitzer shells at those bastards. My heart is with them.

So while Sue and I revel in paradise, the world continues its worldly activities pinballing between the poles of good and evil.  Nisargadatta calls it "the functioning." This goes on spontaneously without effect on pure being, like a movie upon the pure white screen behind it.  But, oh, how sad this movie sometimes is. Ukraine is both horror film and tearjerker.

Speaking of jerks, we met a party of young folks on the beach yesterday who had just returned from catering a wedding on nearby Necker Island, privately owned by billionaire Richard Branson. Now these twenty-somethings were not jerks but were in fact very kind to us as we struggled through the sea caves known as the Baths on Virgin Gorda. Nor is Richard Branson a jerk in the classic Steve Martin sense from what little I know of him, although anybody narcissistic enough to possess multiple thousands of millions of dollars in a world torn apart by economic inequities has some moral shortcomings in my humble estimation. No, it was the young caterers' employer for the past week, who tried to conceal the fact that he had just spent $30,000,000.00 on his daughter's wedding from those who might misconstrue his shit-show of "love" as perhaps flagrant mega-wealth-in-your-face-little-people greed.  He did this by forcing all who attended or worked that wedding to sign non-disclosure agreements, which were about as effective as the few beers it took to loosen the tongues of his caterers. I don't know his name, aside from "asshole," but I do know he is the founder of a large consumer products company and he and all the other billionaire big spenders are part of the massive problem facing this earth on the verge of climate extinction. Meanwhile, a couple short miles away from Necker the Blacks of Virgin Gorda live on semi-wild goats and chickens. Everywhere, but especially in the Caribbean, the proximity of such wealth and such poverty is nauseating. 

But this is the world. Extremes of good and evil on the surface, perfect peace at its depths. Ride the roller-coaster or dive into the stillness beyond expression--we have that choice. Too few take it. I sit here in my rented villa overlooking a sparkling blue Caribbean harbor very fortunate and very grateful. Three weeks from now I go under the knife for my third cancer operation in three years and I am at peace. This is "the functioning." A billion dollars could not stop the knife, nor could it buy this peace. I am so damned lucky to have accessed it in my lifetime. 

Somebody else on this island has also touched it. Sue spotted a small, crude sign tacked onto a random telephone pole today. It read:

        Live simply.

        Love one another. 

        Don't expect anything. 

Enough said.