CATCHING UP, A TOWING ANGEL, THANKSGIVING AND TRAVELING THE TRIBE TO TONOPAH.

Can you see that thin book on the shelf of the Cottonwood library with my name and a library number on it?  It's a heady and gratifying experience to have your words out there for the public to consider.  I watched as a lovely lady checked it out.  Couldn't resist saying to her:  Hope you enjoy that book. Then I punched up Amazon books and spent a happy hour reading my reviews from around the world---  about 100 of them--mostly 5 stars.  Thanks to everyone who took the time to comment, and thank you my readers for returning to this blog after so long an absence and for indulging me in this little surge of ego.  It really amounts to nothing.  There are a thousand books of poetry out there.

Our little band of Nomads stuck together during this year of virus, hunkering down in the southwest in various places, sending one of us to town for groceries etc.  We had each other for company and for many adventures. Here's an unhappy one:

 MY TRANSMISSION QUIT WORKING IN A MOST INCONVENIENT PLACE---In the middle of the Navaho Indian reservation---then a corona virus hotspot that did not allow tow trucks from outside. You may find this hard to believe but a beautiful and powerful lady came by, saw my dilemma, made a phone call.  A half hour later a giant wrecker whisked me, with my truck and trailer, away to Flagstaff---150 miles away and would take no money.  I found out later that she had absorbed the thousand dollar cost. Believe it or not! When I get my camera working again, I will show you her picture.

                                            A new transmission cost $4,000, which I paid.

 Our people parked in the California desert west of Yuma. I think we celebrated Thanksgiving here.

And here's an essay on our group.

MUSIC AND MIND CAMP

Randy’s view

There’s a million of us mobile folks out here escaping rent, drudgery, loneliness and unpleasant weather. Most of us will eventually join a cluster of others to enhance our experience. Perhaps a hundred such groups of varying interest have formed.  Which ones will you be drawn to?  My favorite is MUSIC AND MIND CAMP, --about three years old.  My notion of a great tribe.

We define ourselves as an enduring nomadic neighborhood of friends.  Our members are mostly in the fourth stage of mobile living: (1. getting mobile 2. comfortably mobile 3. connected and 4. finding meaning.)

What is meaning?  It's a feeling—of aliveness, purposefulness and connection—- intimately associated with movement—physical and or mental movement toward chosen ends. Scratch an itch and you will have generated a flicker of meaning----chase a dream and you may generate years of meaning.  It vanishes from time to time when we stop moving— on a project for example. We seemingly run out of meaning or it mysteriously evaporates when we forget that movement is an essential component. Intensely felt meaningfulness is called FLOW and one can recognize it as interest so intense that time seems to distort.

A major goal of our group, as I see it is to train ourselves or inspire ourselves to improve our MEANING-MAKER skills. Expert meaning makers are called AUTOTELIC personalities which some scientist say are the most meaning-filled humans.

Bit by bit we have shaped a fun and effective tribe,  Here’s a glimpse into our thinking and doing:

We:

• Move toward good weather and free campsite
• Charge no fees
• Move freely in and out of community
• Respect the need for solitude and privacy,
• Seek to master the art of friendship,
• Invite visitors and accept new members,
• Seek to know and be known with games, ideas, traditions.
• Enjoy the thrill of personal growth.
• Share our knowledge and skills,
• Take responsibility for our lives, actions, feelings,
• Look for ways to improve the world,
• Play games, enjoy music, appreciate good minds.
• Welcome splintering.

Now some of us are cooling ourselves in the forest near Leadville, Colorado--elevation 10,000 ft.

Pictures as soon as I can master this new computer and a new camera.

Here's the loaded truck

And here's the powerful lady who spoke a few words into her phone then said to me: "it's handled"

AND TO MY AMAZEMENT-----IT WAS.  I wish a few words from me could call in the forces of earth like that.  I speculated that she had a support team behind her that jumped when she spoke.

RANDY PHILOSOPHIZES:When a subject (like meaning) is buzzing in your head and you think you have something to say about it, you might try my technique to express it.  I put the major words associated with the subject like FEELING, MOVEMENT.GOAL,FLOW,AUTOTELIC etc on paper and ask myself how they fit together, like puzzle pieces.  Then I construct sentences and let the paragraphs sit.  Almost inevitably I can improve them the next day-----and the next.  When I can't improve them anymore, I'm satisfied.  I spent three days on the above paragraphs about meaning.