A welcome to readers

As a resident of this planet for more than four fifths of a century, I have enjoyed both successes and disappointments in a wide variety of vocations, avocations, and life experiences. This blog satisfies my desire to share some thoughts and observations--trenchant and prosaic--with those who are searching for diversions which are interesting, poignant and occasionally funny. I also plan to share recommendations about good/great movies I've watched and books and articles which I've found particularly mind-opening, entertaining, instructive. In addition, I can't pass up the opportunity to reflect publicly on how I am experiencing the so-called Golden Years. Write anytime:
markmarv2004@yahoo.com

Thursday, March 31, 2011

It'll never get well if you Tippett..

It's always exciting to come across a kindred soul. It's even more fun if that soul is a thinker and writer you didn't even know existed. When I began this blog,  I promised that I would pass along the titles of books and great movies as I came across them.  I also figure that since you are fellow searchers, you  might profit from an introduction to a new soul mate. So I'm going to nudge you in the direction of several web sites which have provided me with tons of FREE food for thought. And you know how I am about food of any kind!

Here's the first web site. Last year, my daughter Kate suggested that I check out an NPR weekly program that she liked featuring a woman I had never heard of,  Krista Tippett. As I probed into her life and interests prior to listening to her program, I discovered that we had a lot in common--including time spent studying with some of my former professors at Yale, an inquisitive searching mind, a sense of humor, directness of approach, intellectual honesty, wide-ranging interests, and a relentless unwillingness to settle for fuzzy thinking and half-truths.

I listened to a recording of one of Tippett's programs and was immediately hooked. Not only did I find Krista Tippett herself a font of food for the brain and soul, but she has, in her interviews and writings, also opened  (in some cases re-opened) my eyes to other writers and thinkers who share many of the interests and values that I do: Annie Dillard,  Barbara Brown Taylor, Joan Chittister, Scott Russell Sanders, Kathleen Dean Moore, Terry Tempest Williams, Wendell Berry (the old Kentuckian), Donald Hall and his Jane Kenyon, Mary Oliver, Bill Moyers, and dozens more. Tippett is, I suggest, a good place to start: either with her recorded NPR programs (Onbeing.org) or her book, Speaking of Faith.

However, be careful. Once you enter the intellectual universe of Krista Tippett (populated by bright, sensitive, articulate, profoundly thoughtful and sapient colleagues and mentors),  "it (your soul) will never get well." She and her ideas will become irritating existential itches which require constant scratching. Calamine lotion doesn't work, and I know of no other antipruritics (other than total immersion in the waters of spiritual literature) which will bring any comfort. Don't say I didn't warn you.

More sites and suggestions to come.

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