lines of communication

Goodness, it's raining inside! Fortunately only a sprinkle, yet outside the heavens are still unleashing a furious downpour. The holiday weekend meant lots of time to catch up on yoga & sleep most importantly.   I started thinking about how remote of a place I have put myself in. I laugh as it became apparent while having lunch with friends on Saturday after yoga class and their friends visiting from Los Angeles. Such a different way of life yet yoga brought us together. Such a different set of priorities yet the ocean brought us together.

The ocean really is a conveyor and not an isolator. Thank you Mr. Heyerdahl for that insight. In relaying his mates' voyage across the eastern Pacific in a raft constructed of balsa logs from the jungle of Ecuador halfway through the 4300 nautical mile voyage he stated, "when we were halfway across, we were about 2000 sea miles from land both ahead and astern. We felt we were living in a strange world- 'east of the sun and west of the moon'".

It is this spirit of adventure, not entirely for sport but for research in to man's past... this is da kine! I have been swept away with this book wanting to fly through the pages but instead wisely choosing to listen intently to every word & let it's meaning convey itself, it's truths, in an unfolding mystery that is both satisfying & nourishing for my soul. This is my reality show of choice.  His descriptions of accounts thrill me. They lull myself out of the comforts (not that I have many...) of my existence. They provoke me to delve deeper into myself and see what I am really made of. The instigate a new chapter's inception.

There are no limits to communication- only if one chooses not to communicate. I have continued to learn upon this notion. What about the time traveling through the Sahara during 9/11 & the compassion shown to me by Tuareg Berbers from Morocco & Algeria? What about the time in Italy researching my family lineage equipt w/only a copy of our family tree & finding myself knocking of the door of "a Formolo" in Sporminore & only being able to speak Spanish to him? And then THAT time, and THAT time, and there was THAT time...etc.

So why is it so difficult to communicate among English first language speakers sometimes? Do we take conveying meaning for granted? Do we just consider communicating our lexical choices to be defined by the most popular usage of a term? Do we not know enough about our own language family to consider variations of meaning? Do we read things and only see what we want to see? Am I just an odd linguist who expects others to understand nuances of morphology, lexicon & phonology in relation to pragmatic usage? Hah, this last is likely!

If one looks at the greater scale of things in society though, so much of our perceptions are messed up. All channels of communication are strained concerning politics, economics and culture- on a global level. Miscommunication is present at every level of society. I have no answers, only thoughts. I think people need to travel more- outside their comfort zones. I believe when outside one's comfort zone, this is when you open up to the unknown. We can look back to our ancestors to see this. We are wanders, Homo sapiens: we are bi-pedal, we have large brain capacities, we have physical shells (our skin) that protect our internal organs, we manipulated tools to procure food, clothing & shelter. We radiated out of Africa to all reaches of the planet because we are social creatures. We are curious by nature & desire to not only understand our environs but influence them as well.

I continue to work on myself to keep my lines of communication open. Why- because it is necessary. Because I enjoy surrounding myself with these intrepid adventurers and because it is a meaningful existence for me. We are higher beings. We have been given the ability to communicate & convey meaning in so many different ways. We should hone our skills every chance possible.

Time to seize the day-