Harvest of Gems - Four

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..but you know. I really did it. I sent off a letter to Bhutan. Pretty crazy, huh? I didn't even really know anybody there. Well, I kind of knew the guy who sent me the letter. Do you know that there were about one thousand six hundred monasteries in Europe during the Middle Ages? Yeah, and another eight hundred of them were in Russia. . That's two thousand four hundred if I'm doing my math right. Well, do you want to know how many monasteries there were in Tibet before the Chinese screwed everything up? Six thousand! That's right, six thousand! All the former resources of a war state were converted to education. I just love it. Life-long education. Can you imagine that? What if you went to a university and could take any course for free, as many times as you wanted? I mean we aren't these machine outputs, Brains. No! Don't you think it's pretty stupid? I mean earning wages to produce a ton of widgets in an insecure technological dark age. I mean it's just rubbish! It's like this new ubiquity is the real thing in this kind of digital age. Don't you get it brains? We're being confronted. No, pounded from outside with all the sensory experience of the human race. Believe it! Within this background of ubiquity all perception can be seen for what it really is. Just temporary mind-states shifting through faster and faster recombinations like those you see in a neural network. This new media or whatever you want to call it is creating this new floating audience. And it's quickly shifting moods are about as impersonal as the weather. Economic empires are going crash within hours; and they are going to rise up just as quickly. We sort of had this kind of organic unity before during the Middle Ages. Then the machines came and smashed everything into these isolated pieces. Now this new digital web is coming up and it's going have its sacred and ritual kinds of niches. We're all swimming in this lactic sea of funny information and finding the information you want is going to be a real challenge. It's also going have a price-tag to it. Cultures aren't going to be even powers anymore. Naw, everything is going to be just a brand. What's America selling? FREEDOM, SEX, AND MONEY. Now that's a hard combo to beat. What's your brand, Brains? Do you think anybody wants to buy it? We need anchors in this non-linear maelstrom. You can forget about efficiency too. It's obsolete now. INEFFICIENCY is in. Does that sound too bizarre? You just become part of the digital landscape. Big Bother, we love you! We all crave a vague and ubiquitous message. The more ironic and iconic it is, the better. Just look, the difference between being productive and wasting time is rapidly disappearing now. Our culture is returning to a pre-industrial configuration. The web's not about finding anything, Brains. It's about wasting time. And only the young, the primitive, and the eccentric can afford to do this right now. Isn't it great? Where do you think the most useful inventions come from? From weirdos who waste time and who pursue the seemingly unpromising. The efficiency of the old machine age can't really discover anything worthwhile, nowadays. I love it. We're going back to the eras of organic history. This mechanical one was just a silly blip on the screen.

It's a dream. She is offering food. Are you listening? Holding one another, forfeit not. Jotting down the landmarks, Hum! The jewels. Prague, this raw energy. Amen. Tertons and consorts confined to the guardrooms. Vortex! Harness it, direct it. Pay the rates. Make a noise, this terma equation. Mind travel and energy manipulation. Sissy rich and rare. Now this....


--And so the mission is based on application?

--Yes, of the equation.


--You seem to be against the world?

--And so are both of you.

--Is this our temple here?

--Only, if you wish it so.

--Does it take energy to bind the body?

--to the mind?

--Yes, and when the bond is broken?

--Then the mind energy is dissipated.

--You mean it just floats around?

--Yes, and you can tap it.

--You mean in a cremation ground?

--Tantrics are good at it.

--You mean they do it all the time?

--It's good for purification.

--For power.

--For healing.

--It's seductive.

--It's a big source of energy?

--Yes and she's sensitive to it.

--Does death remind one of impermanence?

--Yes, but most Buddhists fall.

--And the loose mind energy..

--What does it do?

--It just sticks to the body.

--And what if there's no body?

--Then it sticks to where the body's disposed.

--What about the masters?

--They take it all with them, when they die.

--And what about a supernova?

--There's really no difference.

--You mean a mind is a mind?

--It's there for the tapping.

--So why does she dream-talk to me?

--She really doesn't want to be a burden.

--You mean a burden to me?

--It's the best because it's just more direct.


I mean we're a great love story and it still drives people crazy. They can't really see what's beyond it. Our man in Bhutan is now calling. Are you ready? Am I ready? Oh, I don't really know. You never do until it's time. You know I saw this really cool movie on cable. It was about Charlemagne, you know the
Holy Roam emperor. Sometimes, I wonder if we were born in the wrong era. I mean life today often feels so artificial. You know, it's like the magic and the sacredness have all gone somewhere else now. But it's still around, Brains. You know Charlemagne to Mozart. It's a wasteland on the outer-rim. Maybe we just have to make it all sacred again. Ah, yes. Brains. The Fin again wakes. It's pretty spectacular. I'm becoming an expert at spinning out puns. Joyce and I are in communion! Oh, the little dakini called from Egypt. She's having a lot of trouble with the Arab men. They're constantly pinching her poor ass. She doesn't really like it. She also saw a horse die somewhere near the pyramids.


Stockton-Calaveras-Lake counties
1995-1996

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