From wackipedia "The most famous account of these is now in Virgil's Aeneid where Laocoön was a priest of Poseidon (or Neptune for the Romans), who was killed with both his sons after attempting to expose the ruse of the Trojan Horse by striking it with a spear.[4]
Virgil gives Laocoön the famous line "Equō nē crēdite, Teucrī / Quidquid id est, timeō Danaōs et dōna ferentēs", or "Do not trust the Horse, Trojans / Whatever it is, I fear the Greeks even bearing gifts." This line is the source of the saying: "Beware of Greeks bearing gifts."
This work, Laocoön and His Sons, was attributed by Pliny the Elder to the Rhodian sculptors Agesander, Athenodoros, and Polydorus. Them there boys knew how to chip them some marble, just sayin'.
I always liked how the sons were carved as miniature adults rather than using the actual proportions that youngsters have. Kind of like Greek folk art made to last a long time. And for the record, I always recommend puttin' on one's pants prior to fighting serpents of unusual size.
I am a big fan of the work of Hector Berlioz, but I won't link to "Châtiment effroyable" from his opera Les Troyens as it is just too early to listen to that ottetto et double chœur.
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Sixty is our Renaissance man.
Needs a link to the proper pronunciation. Based on the original, if possible. Wacki is normally good here but it seems to lack in this case.
Nice to see I'm inspirational.
This statue freaks me out.
It's paedo and it's phallic as all h-e-double snake grabber sticks.
Their little statue dicks are purposefully insignificant while a giant dick shape entangles all three of them.
BAN THAT SHIT!
But right now my mind is elsewhere.
Care to hear about where?
I'm sensing a realignment of the cosmos with my spirit.
There. I said it.
I keep my interactions with people very brief and even more scarce. My father would dismay at my purposeful absence of human interaction. I live an incredibly private life.
I spend a great deal of my time completely alone. I'm in my own world. And I like it that way. I do not seek the company of people.
So I step out into the darkness to buy milk. And no three steps into the street, a voice addresses me directly but I cannot see anyone. I continue forward while looking around and spot a black man in the darkness draped across a parking meter, the meter is helping the guy stand up.
He asks me kindly how I am progressing. I don't comprehend his question. He is not looking for a handout. He inquires about my recovery. He's asking if I'm getting better.
I tell him, no, it's been decades. It's getting worse while my dealing with it improves. So I feel improvement while actually nothing changes. My improved dealing + nerve degradation = 0
He goes, "Oh, Brother, I know! I've been wearing this neck brace for six months."
What a bummer!
We determine my store is closed. So, change of plans.
Instead of getting milk to carry in my backpack I turn back and drive to the store and spend, oh, 200X more.
In the store I ask a man, "What is that?"
His appearance is straight up hipster asshole.
He assesses me and he figures one hipster asshole to another. He senses a kindred spirit.
He explains the container he's holding is coconut oil. "What do you use it for?"
I have some, and don't use it.
Whereas he started out tentatively conversationally, while standing there, he blossomed like some crazy ass wild rambling rose taking over the whole porch and blooming all summer. He wouldn't shut up.
He really dug talking to me. So I listened.
A taciturn hipster asshole blooming like that. Unusual.
The lads checking and bagging went out of their way to accommodate me. Both of them independently reached out to me. The checker inquired if I am ready as I passed by. I wasn't ready. But he was ready for me. When I returned I began to bag my own things because there's a lot of it. Another young dude comes flying in from nowhere to take over. Then the two insisted on conversing throughout. They both went way beyond the usual checking and bagging. They were both overly obsequious and overly conversational. They both treated me as instant friend.
This is the third time in a row that this happened. As I'm loading the truck someone else is entering the store from behind me in the parking lot. As they approach they ask me if I would like some help loading the truck.
It's the easiest thing in the world. I don't need any help. Nothing is heavy. Nothing is too hard to do. Its easy as eating pie. What are these people seeing? Why are they asking? Do I look pathetic? Is my posture poor? What? Tonight it was a short Mexican woman walking inside with her daughter. The mother would have her daughter know that you stop and help people, that you inquire. It's very touching, I must say. Deeply personal. It means that in public I appear approachable. But honestly, I haven't the first clue what they are seeing.
They must notice my two canes on the handle of the trolly. That's it.
And that's another thing. Every person who touches those canes remarks on their quality. That's happened at least 20 times. Again tonight the bagger loaded a different cart than the one the checker emptied. That one had my jacket and two canes on it. The lad handed me my canes and said, "nice equipment."
Who even thinks of that?
Now, I've kept inside quite a lot and I've kept to myself minding my own bizwax. I do reach out to people via email, and out of the blue inquire. "How you doing, long time no see."
In three minutes, "I'm in Mexico, I'll be back in May."
To a Navy pilot, "these guys drew a dick in the sky."
In three minutes, "I KNOW! Those guys are in trouble too. That's not in the training syllabus."
Do you see what I mean?
In the past I could travel on foot for hours and nobody would address me. Some kind of barrier prevented people from violating my white privileged space. But cosmically and spiritually something has changed and I detect it only by the change in observable behavior of others around me. Every minute that I'm available to human interaction. It's strange. It's different. And it's lovey.
Out of a single block of marble. Think of that. And then think of the fact that the sculptor, or team of sculptors, couldn't make a single mistake! I mean one wrong chisel blow and kaput. Which means what? It doesn't really mean anything other than that humans can do awesome things. Here's the thing: without the Greek idea first, the idea that Man is Great, would a Laocoon have followed? Even without the umlaut. Another unanswerable question.
Chip -- the explanation is probably not all that mystical. It probably boils down to the fact you smiled at the guy. Or at least you didn't scowl. That's my guess. He got the green light. The rest is history.
My problem with most of these ancient depictions of men in marble is that they were all muscular Adonis' and that just wasn't the case. Men of ancient times were small and fairly malnourished. Very few if rarely a few of them could attain or maintain this type of physique. It requires a lot of protein on a daily basis, about 1 gram per 1 pound of body weight to be this muscular. Only the very wealthy even had access to that much protein at any given time and even then, they didn't eat that much meat either. I'm not saying meat wasn't available to everyone, but not everyone could afford it.
According to the Riddle of the Sphinx, Chip, you're only allowed one cane.
Chip -- the explanation is probably not all that mystical. It probably boils down to the fact you smiled at the guy. Or at least you didn't scowl. That's my guess. He got the green light. The rest is history.
I'll take what ricpic said and raise it, believing in the mystery of a light, green or otherwise, that's being seen or received by others, one that relates to openness.
Openness in the inner world is one of the results of solitude, silence and stillness.
Through experiences of deep love and deep suffering, we are invited into change and growth.
Those who respond to that invitation following encounters with one, the other or both at the same time, end up developing and giving off an inner light (a green light one might say) that quietly emanates without an agenda or the presence of persuasion. It's a light that those who've felt and lived through something similar can recognize, even before an exchange of words takes place.
I've not yet taken the time to figure out how to post something, but if I had, this would be something I'd post, a story that recently arrived through a book by Mark Nepo, entitled "Things That Join the Sea and the Sky". Through this story I discovered the poetry of Ted Kooser a 78 year old writer, artist and winner of the Pulitzer prize for poetry in 2005.
BETWEEN TROUBLES
The old painter tells me that he loves to drive through small towns, so he can sketch the light and strike up conversations with the young woman who pumps his gas and the lobster fisherman who lets him bait his traps. He loves to meet life as it bubbles up between troubles. Last summer, he wanted to meet that poet from Nebraska, the one who speaks so simply of all that matters. He didn't want to bother him, just to say how grateful he is for what his poems open. Eight hundred miles later, he was asking for the poet in the old bookstore. Then he drifted into the antique store in Garland where he bought four lanterns. It's there the owner said, "Oh Ted, he lives in Dwight." So the painter took his lanterns and drove the back road to Dwight where he left a note on Ted's window that read, "Your poems matter." Once home, he set up the lanterns and confessed that he needs more light as he talks to death. The next day, he painted a barn he saw in Dwight and sent it to Ted. In telling me this, he's all aglow, a lantern himself. He takes my hand and wells up, "I love this life."
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