Currently Unit One has two divisions (or unities, as we prefer to call them): The English language Unit One Cascadia, and the Norwegian language Enhet En Trønderland. Thus the need has arisen for an overarching organization that can handle units in Prince Rupert, and other places were we have friends.
But why should one stop at the boundaries of the atmosphere? If Elon Musk and Space X has his way, soon there will be humans once again on the moon, not to mention Mars. But stopping at the edge of the solar system, seems a bit short sighted. Should we not be open to humans to be associated with other stars? Proxima Centauri, for example. Why should we exclude other sentient beings, just because they lack human DNA?
Does anyone have any comments on the proposed name, “Ignited Aggregates Intergalactic Cultural Cooperative”? Ignited is meant figuratively.
Are Bob Dylan’s songs literature? An answer to that question is provided in the banquet speech written by Bob Dylan but given by the United States Ambassador to Sweden, Azita Raji, at the Nobel Banquet, 2016-12-10.
Good evening, everyone. I extend my warmest greetings to the members of the Swedish Academy and to all of the other distinguished guests in attendance tonight.
I’m sorry I can’t be with you in person, but please know that I am most definitely with you in spirit and honored to be receiving such a prestigious prize. Being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature is something I never could have imagined or seen coming. From an early age, I’ve been familiar with and reading and absorbing the works of those who were deemed worthy of such a distinction: Kipling, Shaw, Thomas Mann, Pearl Buck, Albert Camus, Hemingway. These giants of literature whose works are taught in the schoolroom, housed in libraries around the world and spoken of in reverent tones have always made a deep impression. That I now join the names on such a list is truly beyond words.
I don’t know if these men and women ever thought of the Nobel honor for themselves, but I suppose that anyone writing a book, or a poem, or a play anywhere in the world might harbor that secret dream deep down inside. It’s probably buried so deep that they don’t even know it’s there.
If someone had ever told me that I had the slightest chance of winning the Nobel Prize, I would have to think that I’d have about the same odds as standing on the moon. In fact, during the year I was born and for a few years after, there wasn’t anyone in the world who was considered good enough to win this Nobel Prize. So, I recognize that I am in very rare company, to say the least.
I was out on the road when I received this surprising news, and it took me more than a few minutes to properly process it. I began to think about William Shakespeare, the great literary figure. I would reckon he thought of himself as a dramatist. The thought that he was writing literature couldn’t have entered his head. His words were written for the stage. Meant to be spoken not read. When he was writing Hamlet, I’m sure he was thinking about a lot of different things: “Who’re the right actors for these roles?” “How should this be staged?” “Do I really want to set this in Denmark?” His creative vision and ambitions were no doubt at the forefront of his mind, but there were also more mundane matters to consider and deal with. “Is the financing in place?” “Are there enough good seats for my patrons?” “Where am I going to get a human skull?” I would bet that the farthest thing from Shakespeare’s mind was the question “Is this literature?”
When I started writing songs as a teenager, and even as I started to achieve some renown for my abilities, my aspirations for these songs only went so far. I thought they could be heard in coffee houses or bars, maybe later in places like Carnegie Hall, the London Palladium. If I was really dreaming big, maybe I could imagine getting to make a record and then hearing my songs on the radio. That was really the big prize in my mind. Making records and hearing your songs on the radio meant that you were reaching a big audience and that you might get to keep doing what you had set out to do.
Well, I’ve been doing what I set out to do for a long time, now. I’ve made dozens of records and played thousands of concerts all around the world. But it’s my songs that are at the vital center of almost everything I do. They seemed to have found a place in the lives of many people throughout many different cultures and I’m grateful for that.
But there’s one thing I must say. As a performer I’ve played for 50,000 people and I’ve played for 50 people and I can tell you that it is harder to play for 50 people. 50,000 people have a singular persona, not so with 50. Each person has an individual, separate identity, a world unto themselves. They can perceive things more clearly. Your honesty and how it relates to the depth of your talent is tried. The fact that the Nobel committee is so small is not lost on me.
But, like Shakespeare, I too am often occupied with the pursuit of my creative endeavors and dealing with all aspects of life’s mundane matters. “Who are the best musicians for these songs?” “Am I recording in the right studio?” “Is this song in the right key?” Some things never change, even in 400 years.
Not once have I ever had the time to ask myself, “Are my songs literature?”
So, I do thank the Swedish Academy, both for taking the time to consider that very question, and, ultimately, for providing such a wonderful answer.
522 K is the name of Unit One’s Knowledge Preservation initiative. Much of the knowledge preserved is in the form of books, but also instructional videos. Sometimes, the material will be worked into a course, including a MOOC – a Massive Open Online Course. The first proposed MOOC course, Life skills, to be produced by Unit One has been described elsewhere.
What has not been described elsewhere is how to handle MOOCs and other forms of information, after the end of the Internet (as we know it).
The End of the Internet?
Yes, we have to be realistic. This age of freedom that we have enjoyed since about 1880 seems to be coming to an end. Those who want an understanding of this should very quickly watch Adam Curtis’ HyperNormalisation (2016). General information about it can be found in Wikipedia.
The reason for the haste is not that HyperNormalisation will disappear. It will simply be morphed into countless fake versions by adding and subtracting content. In the end, no one will know how the original looked. This is accord with the political philosophy of Vladislav Surkov (1964 – ).
Vladislav Surkov in 2013 (Photo: Kremlin)
I leave it as an exercise for the reader to find additional information about Vladislav Surkov and his implementation of Sovereign Democracy. Critics of the approach often use the term Managed Democracy, or even a phrase that eliminates the word democracy altogether. HyperNormalisation describes it vividly, and interested people are referred to that section of the film.
Surkov’s approach to politics is to have the state give financial support to a vast number of organizations that populate the political landscape, not merely from left to right, but also in many other ways. These groups will frequently be in opposition to each other. Using this approach, politics becomes theatre. It is impossible to know what is a real group, and what is a fake group. This is precisely what the politicians (and the economic elite) want.
There is no need to physically shut down the Internet, to end its usefulness. Instead, fake news is being produced and added to the feeds of social media. Soon, there will be so much fake news, and so little real news, that people will have a hard time knowing what is real and what is fake. Presumably, in the next few years numerous iterations of this blog post will appear, and no one will know which one is original, and which are fake.
This is especially easy to accomplish with the use of the Cloud. Why anyone in their right mind would trust some unknown organization to store data is beyond my comprehension. My advise – trust no one you don’t know personally, and have met in the flesh. If there is one thing that I am certain, it is that the Cloud is sentral to the “faketization” of content.
It may come as a surprise to many, but those that run clouds store their data in lakes.
The alternative to cloud and lake computing is pond computing. Everyone should store data in their own pond, and back up that data in someone else’s pond. As of 2022-04-10, we have a NAS (Network Attached Server) that can back up over 50 TB of data, with a potential of 90 TB. When this post was written in 2015, the capacity was 12 TB of data. More importantly, we also have external drives capable of storing over 30 TB of data in 2022, compared to 20 TB in 2016. While the NAS is online, the external drives are offline, making them considerably more difficult to manipulate. They are also located physically away from our house. Destroying our house will not destroy our data. We are in the process of acquiring a second NAS, located at another location well away from our house, that will mirror its content, as well as a third one in another country. These will eliminate the need for external drives.
522 K is designed to ensure that information remains uncorrupted. We encourage people to have their own NAS, and to have external drives that duplicate the content found on their NAS.
An Asustor AS5002 NAS. The Asustor NAS is typically populated with 2 x 6 TB Western Digital Red hard disks. (Photo: Asus)Four Western Digital My Passport Ultra 4 TB external disks. Photo: Western Digital)
The project title refers to Ray Bradbury’s iconic Science Fiction novel, Fahrenheit 451. It seems that Bradbury was about 30 degrees F. too low in his estimate of the auto-ignition temperature of paper. Thus, 480 is probably a more correct estimate. Despite the fact that the number of significant figures is somewhere between 2 and 3, conversion sites will provide 248.889, as its Celsius equivalent. Converting this to Kelvin, one gets 522.039 as an official answer. Here, we will pretend that we have 3 significant figures and use 522 K as a title for this project.
To make certain that one can see the arbitrary nature of this number, we will connect it (in some mystic new age fashion) to the Dewey Decimal number 522 – Astronomy: techniques, equipment, materials. Readers should also be pleased to know that 522 K could also refer to Pioneer VSX-522–K home theater receiver, or some exotic feature of an American tax law that I have not been able to understand with sufficient clarity to post anything about here.
Update: On 2020-06-29 at 10:00 this weblog post was updated, with the following information.
Asustor equipment is no longer being used for our NAS. Instead, we are using a used Dell rack-based server running Nextcloud. There are twelve bays available, of which four are populated with 8TB drives.
While we still have large numbers of Western Digital My Passport external hard drives, we have stopped purchasing new Western Digital equipment, because of Western Digital’s inappropriate substitution of SMR = Shingled Magnetic Recording technology on their Red NAS drives.
We are now specifying Toshiba drives for future purchases. Standard components will be N300 8TB drives for the NAS, and Canvio Advance 4TB external drives.
While this article refers to another weblog post on the WordPress website, the article can also be found here.
This post was further updated on 2022-04-14 at 20:00.
As the world continues its spiral of decline, there will be a greater and greater need for insight into basic knowledge, as more and more families become dysfunctional.
J. D. Vance explained the challenge in a TED talk.
Not everyone is blessed with an understanding of hygiene. Because lives may depend on it, The province of British Columbia requires all food service employees to take a Foodsafe course, level 1. This ensures that everyone has a minimal level of knowledge about the correct handling of food.
For some time, male inmates at Verdal prison have been offered a House Husband course. Here, they learn the basics of hygiene, food preparation for a family (nutrition, meal planning, setting tables, cooking, serving, using dish washers and washing/ drying dishes), laundry basics (washing, drying and ironing clothes, some minor repairs) and house cleaning (dusting, vacuuming, washing floors, walls, windows and bathrooms).
Snow removal is not covered in the House Husband course. Perhaps it should be, but with a focus on more manual methods. (Photo: Patricia McLellan, 2010)
Dysfunctional families and their members need fundamental knowledge on how to survive. Life skills is the proposed name for a MOOC course that provides this fundamental knowledge. MOOC stands for Massive Open Online Course. Those interested in learning how to make MOOCs should investigate a course offered in Sligo, Ireland.
Comments are invited as to what such a course should contain, and how it should be divided up into modules.
Proton Bletchley is responsible for General Systems Theory at Unit One. Here are his Nine Requirements for working effectively with Systems.
1. Persona
Life can be distracting. A person who has a mind divided between, say, surfing in Australia and general systems theory will accomplish little, because they will be bouncing between dreams of waves and boxes of GST content. At Unit One, work is divided between several different personas. While Brock heads off to virtually surf at Bondi Beach, Proton Bletchley is responsible for GST. His last name comes from the secret WW2 centre where Alan Turing worked, and developed much of the foundation for computer science. His first name comes from Earnest Rutherford, who named protons in 1920.
Proton Bletchley is Unit One’s resident expert in General Systems Theory. He is also an environmentalist, which helps him focus his thoughts.
2. Wardrobe
If one goes to the trouble to develop a persona, the very least one can do is to clothe that persona in something relevant. Proton uses corn blue workwear. This in part is because his environmental focus is on water.
Workwear is useful because people who work with General Systems Theory also have to function in many different places in the real world. A typical example, might involve the collection of environmental data using Arduinos with SD cards. Devices may have to be made in a workshop, then transported to a site where they would be used as data loggers.
Of course there are GST theorists, sitting around producing virtual thoughts while puffing away on their virtual pipes, can reduce their clothing budgets considerably, by purchasing only virtual clothing.
Workwear feels appropriate when working with General Systems Theory. While Proton has only a blue outfit, other workers may wear green, black or red – depending on their moods.
3. Computer
Computing is an integral part of General Systems Theory. At one level this means supercomputing. Meteorologists and other -ists who want data in real time, need fast computers.
The fastest computer in the world is arguably D-wave’s quantum computer in Burnaby, just a few blocks from where our good friends Roy Sinn and Sue Innes live. See: http://www.dwavesys.com/
So, there is no point in Proton having anything big. It will never be big or fast enough. He is opting for the exact opposite – minimal computing. Proton remembers seeing his first ad for an EEEbook, and thought “I want that!” He was referring to the computer, not the girl!
Asus EEE PC 701 was launched in Japan in January 2008. (Photo: Asus)
By June 2008, Asus had probably realized that many of its customers were women and offended by its previous ad. With the launch of the Asus EEE PC 900, it replaced its beach girl user with one referred to as “The Housewife”.
“The Housewife” was used to promote the new and improved Asus EEE PC 900 in June 2008. (Photo: Asus)
Today’s (2016) ads for Asus have not changed much, although the computers are larger and more powerful.
Asus EeeBook X205TA (Photo: possibly odishafast.in)
Sam Rutherford, in Laptop Mag concludes, “The Asus EeeBook X205TA offers excellent battery life, a solid display and strong everyday computing that puts it a notch above other budget laptops.”
4. Operating System
Proton prefers Linux. Because of Proton’s connections with New Westminster, the original answer was Mandrake. Mandrake the Magician takes his name from Leon Mandrake, the stage name of New Westminster resident Leon Giglio. Leon Mandrake had been performing for more than ten years before Lee Falk “invented” the comic strip character. However, in 2004, MandrakeSoft lost a court case to Hearst Corporation, and was forced to change the name of its Linux distribution.
New Westminster’s very own Leon Mandrake with Princess Narda (Photo: Yes, well looks like Romaine down at the bottom …citing sources can be difficult at the best of times)
Fast forward to 2016. Mandrake has morphed into Mageia. Version 5.1 was announced 2016-12-02.
Proton has considered using other Linux distributions, including Linux Mint and elementary OS (which has a unique and simple design). If Proton wasn’t so prejudiced, I’m sure that he would be wanting to experiment with elementary OS.
5. Browser
In keeping with the open source philosophy of Linux, Firefox is an open-source web browser. There are many other open source browsers, including Chromium and Opera. However, Proton is concerned about the close bindings between Chromium and Google. Opera has started to require users to log on every twelve hours, so they can profit from advertisements. As an alternative to Firefox, Midori is a lightweight, fast and open-source (free) browser.
6. Email address
One of the main challenges of employing so many personas, is the habit of having only a single personal email address. Proton disagrees with this philosophy, and is considering having an additional email address just for the Proton Bletchley persona. The advantage is that one can keep all of the material related to that persona in a single place.
7. Office software
Open source office software provides many of the features and functions provided by Microsoft Office. LibreOffice is a fork of OpenOffice consisting of a suite of programs packaged in a single install. Components of the LibreOffice suite are:
Writer: word processor.
Calc: spreadsheet editor.
Impress: presentation editor.
Draw: graphical editor.
Math: mathematical formulae editor.
Base: database program.
Project planning software has always been something of a problem. LibrePlan, for example, states that it is open source, but that only applies to a limited suite of software. Anything really useful is excluded from the open source version, and has to be purchased. At the moment, Proton’s favored open source project software is Open Project.
8. Simulation software
There is a close connection between general systems theory and computer simulation. While Insight Maker is not open source, it is free and available, although Proton notes disturbingly, that it has not been updated for over a year. The last bimonthly newsletter was posted in August 2015. His fear is that someday it will simply disappear.
While some simulation programs are general, others are made for specific purposes. This topic will be covered again in another post.
9. Library
Books and articles are needed for inspiration. Ideally, they also have to be available for scrutiny at any time. It is becoming more and more important to use ebooks, which compress the space of even the largest library into less than a litre.
Update: 2022-01-26 13:00
This is historical content written and published in 2016. There is little point in updating this post, except to add how some things have changed, while others have remained the same.
Persona: From the number of weblog posts being written, a person might suspect that Proton had retired, rather than Brock.
Wardrobe: It is difficult to acquire cornflower blue workwear. Brock did manage to get some red workwear about 2017, but even these are difficult to get hold of. He is now using grey work trousers. Arduinos are no longer being used. These have been replaced by Raspberry Pi Picos, starting in late 2021.
Computers: Asus computers are still in use, but Brock’s latest laptop is now a VivoBook, with a 14″ screen, Ryzen 3 processor, 8 GB of RAM, and 512 GB SSD. Trish is still content with her ZenBook UX305C. At some point, but only at her request, it will be upgraded. Other computers include an Asus VivoMini VC65, an Asus PN-50, an Asus AiO Pro.
Operating system: Linux Mint is in use. Brock still dreams of using Mageia, with version 8 the latest incarnation. The latest experimentation in the household has been with Linux Endeveaur. However, it was not performing adequately to replace Linux Mint. Mageia
Browser: Firefox is still the main browser in use. Brave has been installed.
Email Address: Currently, the McLellans have a domain at mclellan.no that serves their needs in terms of email addresses and websites.
Office software: no changes.
Simulation software: no changes
Library: A Calibre library stores household ebooks. People in the household then use their personal Kobo ebook readers to read books. We have ordered two new Kobo Libra H20 models, as replacements for our current Glo HD models, purchased in 2016-.
Update: 2022-12-24 23:00
Our general policy is for Trish and Brock to use the same equipment. Thus on 2022-08-30, we purchased 2 x Asus Zenfone 9 (A12202) hand-held devices, then in 2022-10-20 we purchased 2 x Acer Swift 3 14″ (SF314-43) laptops. Both sets of machines use USB-C ports for charging.
Soon after the previous update, the 2 x Kobo Libra H2O e-readers arrived. They supplement, rather than replace the Glo HD models. All of the Kobos use USB-micro ports for charging. Any future e-readers will have to use USB-C ports.
J.D. Vance gave a passionate appeal in a TED talk about America’s forgotten working class.
Vance is a working class person who was given a break, and was able to pull himself upwards into the middle class, as a Yale educated lawyer. He has not forgotten his roots.
Vance says working class youth need help in two areas.
The first, is to provided with “social capital” (or what I would classify as informational capital). Perhaps they don’t need to know how to make a bed. They do need to know how to wash bedding, and to do it regularly. There are probably a thousand other life skills that need to be learned as well.
The second is more difficult. They need a trauma free environment. They need someone to ensure that they are not beaten or abused in any way. Sometimes it is as simple as finding a quiet space for homework. Sometimes it is considerably more complex. The most important line in the talk described childhood trauma as “the gift that keeps on giving.” There has to be some way to stop the generational transfer of childhood abuse.
Fiction, in the form of a novel, play or film is one way to provide help to youth with the above needs. One suggestion is “To Hell with Anna”, set in the village of Hell, Norway. At the start a dysfunctional Anna, living in squalor, finds a temporary solace in alcohol. The story documents her transformation from addict to plumber.
The main purpose of writing this work is to help young people make their own personal transformations. Of course, it should be written, performed as theatre, or performed on video by youth themselves.
“Lost Tribes of Inderøy” is the title of a comic videography about five tribes living in Inderøy, rural Norway.It is being produced by Jade Marmot.
Joyful Marmot Creations is an unusual family business. Its genius is that anyone can become a member of the Marmot family, and thus a stakeholder in the video project. The only requirement is that participants choose a unique “marmot name” and work on the project. Even scriptwriter Qwerty Asdf has been forced into using a Marmot name, Qwerty Marmot.
A little more about … Joyful Marmot Creations and “Lost Tribes of Inderøy”
Slogan: Inclusive multimedia storytelling
Mission: The purpose of the JMC is for people to have fun. While hoping to avoid financial losses, projects are not designed for commercial success. Everyone, especially locals, immigrants, people with mental and somatic health challenges are welcome. To avoid wearing people out, a long working day is limited to four hours (with breaks).
The production is based on the five tribes of Inderøy. Below is an overview of some of the the codes that describe the members of each tribe.
Attribute
A
B
C
D
E
Area
Utøy
Sandvollan
Straumen
Røra
Mosvik
Values
Traditional
Ecological
Upper Crust
Metal
Geek
Hobby
Crafts
Gardening
Bridge
Motorcycles
Data
Fashion
National costume
Jeans
Haute couture
Leather
Relaxed
Food
«Sodd»
Vegetarian
French cuisine
Meat
Pizza
Drink
Coffee
Water
Wine
Beer
Cola
Car
Veteran Volvo
EV
Mercedes
American
Bicycle
Dance
Rhinelander
Swing
Ballet
Raw
No
Music
Fiddle
Pink Floyd
Classic
Heavy metal
Electronic
Art
Tidemand & Gude
Teodor Kittelsen
Edvard Munch
Anders Kjær
Marianne Aulie
Housing
Farmhouse
Plain
Luxury
Workshop
Apartment
Pet
Dog
Cat
Aquarium fish
Snake
No
Not all participants are ethnic Norwegian. For example, upper crusters could have a Sudanese origin, while their servants could be ethnic Norwegian. Living in Sandvollan, for example, does not mean you have to play a role featuring ecological values. Even people from Leksvik, Steinkjer, Verdal or Ontario can be given temporarily Inderøy citizenship, allowing them to participate.
Note: Sodd is a traditional meat soup eaten in Inderøy. The artists are (in)famous Scandinavian artists. Billi Sodd has offered to create fake works that show some of the qualities that make the works (in)famous.
Plot: The plot mirrors headlines in the local newspaper and other media, with all the tribes wanting to preserve their own local school, and waring against all the other tribes. About the only thing the five tribes have in common is that all enjoy the natural environment, and want to protect the municipal eagle population. When foreigners climb up into an eagle’s nest and steal eagle eggs, then tribes unite. The historic wooden sailing vessel Pauline (referred to as the Royal Yacht) and the hamlet of Kjerknesvågen represent a centre where all the tribes can meet. The remainder of the film becomes a hunt for the culprits along the roads criss-crossing the municipality, where all sorts of vehicles (historic and otherwise) are used to track the thieves. When thieves finally stop for a meal, locals replace the stolen eggs with imitations. They then return the eggs to the eagle’s nest. The film ends with the foreign thieves despairing that their “eggs” will not hatch, while alternate images of the hatched eagle chicks in the wild.
Rora Station. Røra is home to Inderøy’s Metal tribe. Photo: Alasdair McLellan
There is also a sixth tribe, the Vikings. Initially, they are only found in Kjerknesvågen and aboard the “Royal Yacht”. However, by the end of the film, all of the participants dress in their Viking uniforms – the lost tribes are united.
The Jekt Pauline, being considered for a role as the Royal Yacht in Lost Tribes of Inderøy. Photo: Ivar Svare Holand
If you are interested in working with Jade Marmot and everyone in the Marmot family, contact Jade’s agent: brock.mclellan@gmail.com
Hans Holbein the Younger ca. 1523 Study of the Right Hand of Erasmus of Rotterdam,
Stephen Ellcock has breached Facebook’s community standards, by posting the above image on his Facebook site. For this offense he was to be ostracized for 30 days. He protested, and received an apology.
I am tired of multinational corporations becoming the arbitrator of morals in our post-modern society. Personally, I suggest that Facebook should use a more laissez-faire approach. If a person wants to paste photos showing nudity, my approach would be to allow it, but then allow those closest to the poster to voice their opinions. They will undoubtedly be forthcoming.
If a person’s postings violate laws then this is not a matter for Facebook, but the local police authorities.
My concern is not with Facebook in particular, but the loss of our freedom of speech and expression in general. Those who need trigger warnings should stop reading now! Because life does not come with trigger warnings. It happens in real time. The Girl Guide/ Boy Scout motto still prevails, “Be Prepared!”
College students, and everyone else, need exposure to a variety of ideas, including those they don’t like. Coddling youth is disastrous for both their education and their mental health. Yes, Virginia, trigger warnings have a negative impact, and micro-aggression must be allowed. The following article explains the reasons:
At the moment, the mail system on my laptop has a problem allowing me to approve comments. So, I am adding this comment from Caroline, manually. This is actually linked to the above Holbein drawing. The request was dated 2016-12-17 00.46:
It seems he has been banned again – all trace of his name has disappeared from Facebook, and google produces v little info. Do you know what has happened? I so miss ( with countless others I am sure) his extraordinary and magical images that he curated with such care and generosity.
Stephen Ellcock, where are you?
End of Caroline’s comment.
Reply
Very interesting, Caroline. When I do try searching for Stephen Ellcock I find no reference to him on Facebook. Perhaps he too has found other social media. After writing the original post I googled alternatives to Facebook, and came up with ello.co, which I now visit more often than Facebook.
Also of interest is the fact that when I attempted to visit Caroline’s blog, I was met with “<blog name> is no longer available. The authors have deleted this site.”
No, I’m not writing about that impossible art of accepting the loss of one’s powers of movement, hearing, seeing, sexing, remembering, calculating or reasoning. Rather, I am writing about how our perception of time changes. In childhood, a year feels like infinity while in later life it feels increasingly shorter.
To accept this fact of life, a new time unit is needed which I have termed the Grace. A grace is a measure of time reflecting the opportunity for (spiritual) development, which occurs simultaneously with the growth and decline of the biological organism. Originally, I just used values between 0 and 9 to reflect this development. However, because people are used to dealing with chronological years, many people will want to use decaGraces to measure their spiritual age. It requires a simple calculation: multiply the Grace number by 10. DecaGraces are used in the table below.
As in school, aging is not the equivalent of being more spiritual or smarter. People reach a plateau that limits their intellectual, physical and spiritual development. Just as there are absolute physical limits to how fast a person can run, how many kilos a person can lift, there are also limits to how much spirituality a person can acquire in a world dominated by physical needs.
My hope is that in the future every family will be able to have a home that has a spiritual heart – an area devoted to the needs of the soul. It will be a quiet place allowing prayer and reflection.
As I approach retirement, I see a need to reappraise and re-purpose the space in our house. Our children have moved on with their lives. Rather than keeping their rooms as monuments to their childhood, both they and their parents have to accept that rooms can serve many purposes.
Cliff Cottage, or Fjellheim (as it is also called) has been our home since 1989-03-01, over 27 years. Even though an urban apartment would be a more practical way of life, I have no desire to sell. I have seen two generations long to return to their childhood homes. While we are spiritual creatures, we are also grounded in physical space and time. Childhood is a special time. I lived in my childhood home, on Ash Street in New Westminster, between 1951 and 1972, a little over 20 years. In many ways, I have never gotten over its loss.My mother also talks fondly of her childhood home in Kelowna, keeping a drawing of it even now on a wall of her apartment in New Westminster.
While I accept that my mother’s childhood home is important for her, to me it is just a building. I am not sure that I have ever been in it, although I have stood outside it, and have clear visions of its interior in the 1920’s and 1930’s. For me, it is nothing more than a house, a building.
God willing, I will keep this house in Vangshylla, in trust for Alasdair and Shelagh. There will be changes made to it, but nothing irreparable. If either child wants to take over the house, they will be welcome to it, and I will gracefully move to something more appropriate for someone of my age.
I hope you will forgive me, Alasdair, for my plans to transform your former bedroom into a prayer room. Similarly, Shelagh, I hope you will forgive me for using your former bedroom as a workroom and guest room.
This does not mean that everything is perfect at Fjellheim. We are not always living in paradise.
Brock using a snow blower for the first time, 2010-12-11.
