Thanks for looking in on me. I've got to talk about the path.  Each of us have a path.

      I think we all come and go though this plane many times.  Each time we have a goal.  Sometimes it is to learn about the harm that comes from selfishness or disregard.  Othertimes we pass through to play a part in the journey of a friend. There are as many lessons as there are jouneys.

     I know the direction of my path.  I've avoided it for ever so long a time.  It's not fun or easy or pleasant.  It requires that I release the binds that secure me to my stuff.  We all love our stuff.  I know I do.  If our goal is a higher spiritual awareness then the stuff only serves to distract from the work. 

     All of creation has a source.  Some call it God, others Nirvana. All the miriad names point to the same giver of all. The more direct your connection to that source the closer you are to not needing these bodies anymore.  My path lies along that route. 

     As I've said I've avoided that for a very long time.  For the last couple of years everything I've used to justify keeping my stuff and peeps has been taken from me.  Something more than a year ago I had my life turned upside down and realized that in that turmoil I had found my path.  I followed that for awhile.  Things really started to fall into place. Then the bad habits crept back.  I'd do DVDs instead of meditation.  Instead of pondering the nature of man, I'd ponder the nature of men, or at least men au naturale.  But then all manner of things went wrong again. 

     I was very ill for the 1st time in years.  I rolled my brothers camry over twice in a soybean field and was inexplicably unharmed while the car was reduced to an unrecognizable hulk. My finances have gone from bad to "oh my god". That sort of thing.

      I'm obviously being told that it's time to get back on track.  I am at present working up the courage to commit to the one act that can get me back on track.  I've dangled from helicopters, hang-glided, and been chased by angry mobs. I've crashed in cars, trucks, jeeps, and helicopters.  But I'm finding out that the scariest thing I've faced so far is letting go of the things that connect us to this plane.  Stay tuned.  If I can be brave then this spring the adventure begins...again.  Namaste!

    I'm 45 and physically I'm a mess.  I have made many mistakes and I have many regrets.  Chief among my regrets is the fact that I didn't come out till I was 43.  Many gays my age will recoil at that.  I can't blame them.  I was closeted when you were beginning to confront society.  I was closeted while gay men in cities all across America were being murdered. Meanwhile the police and courts stood idle.  Worst of all I cowered in silence while our country and its conservative leaders ignored a tragedy. They and I silently watched a generation of beautiful loving men die of AIDS.  However hollow it may sound I offer my heartfelt apology. I'm Sorry, I'm so very sorry.

   I offer the following account not as an excuse, rather as a chronicle of my journey to freedom. I'm finally free from denial.  I'm free from the need to satisfy someone elses idea of who and what I should be. Free to be me.

   Many queers of my generation who grew up in Middle America or the Bible belt know you didn't come out in the 70's.  Not if you valued your life.  I grew up Mormon with a strong Baptist influence.  I couldn't begin to count the number of slurs and disgusting comments I heard about fags and homos.  All the while grown men were having their way with me.  How confusing that my true nature was being subjected to the most heinous negative reinforcement while, most of the time, the only affection I received was while expressing myself physically.  How confusing and damaging.  I dont believe that it was as damaging to me as it might have been to a little straight boy.

   I've read many times of sexual abuse as a contributing factor to Homosexuality.  I think my story provides anecdotal evidence to the contrary.  The same man who was my main abuser abused my brother John, sexually.  Not nearly as extensively nor was he "shared around".  John was straight.  He killed himself at age 37.  The burden of that and other wounds were just too much to bear.  In my case the sex was inappropriate but not unnatural.  The confusion of mixed messages damaged me much more than sex.

   I chose religion as my refuge.  That helped me deny my orientation and hide in the closet.  I married at 17.  I married again at 22 and yet again at 32.  Religion and marriage were my feeble excuses for denial.  Pitiful, weak and pitiful, I know.  Finally at 43 I came to that place where honesty must be embraced or life destroyed.   I found the strength at last to embrace honesty.  Before I got to that place I had made my wife and myself miserable.  Unable to cope with Her physical needs, I hid in the cab of a semi for several years. I rarely went home, fearful of confronting my failure as a husband and lover.  I let my hygiene and heath deteriorate, badly.  In retrospect I believe I was trying to eat myself to death.  You see, someone as unattractive as me shouldn't be loved or desired.  I was safe from sex and failure, or so I thought.

   I was in crisis when I came out.  Two more years alone, again living in my semi.  I became more and more out of shape physically.  Mentally and spiritually, though, I made huge breakthroughs.

   Well here goes, my first ever blog entry.  What a wonderful and awful tool the internet has turned out to be.  For every truth expressed online there seems to be a dozen deceptions.  But still, the truth can be found.  Uncensored and unfettered. The truth is a funny thing.  For the most part it seems to be quite subjective. It only seems that way.  If you make a closer examination you find mostly opinoin.

   In my search for the truth I have realized a few things.  A lot of the time when someone "seeks the truth" they are accually looking for validation of their position. You must seek with an open heart and mind.  Truth is universal.  If you are lucky enough to find it, the truth will ring like a bell. It will be as undeniable as it is unassalable.

   I titled this World View. so here's my world view.  When I think of the world the first thing that comes to mind is material plane. I believe that while we occupy the material plane we are living a duel existance .  Now and always we are Spiritual Beings.  We are connected to and part of God, The Source, Allah, attach whichever lable you wish. 

   In order to help focus our attention to the "here and now" of the material plane we wear these bodies.  They provide a block or filter from the greater reality.  There is much to learn from being confined to such a narrow focus.  Not the least of which is how we are suppossed to treat one another.

    My favorite analogy is scuba diving.  A diver dons his or her gear and enters a much different world.  Much as we don these bodies and come here.  While a diver is in the water they are subject to the conditions and limitations of their environment and equipment. We are subject to the evironment of the material plane and the limitations of our bodies.  Sooner or later our air will run out and we will have to return to the place we truly belong.  I have to say I'm not very comfortable underwater and I'll be glad to go home.

   Here is the core of my personal philosophy.  Since we are part of the divine whole, we share it's insight and abilities.  That truth makes each of us worthy of respect.  We are each and every one in full possesion or our dignity. It can only be lost or damaged if we grant another the power to do so.  We are bound to each other with ties of love.  I hope to defend your dignity as diligently as I would my own.

NAMASTE