May 1, 2023


May 1, 2023

As what many believe is suspense-filled race between extinction and exhilarating transcendence continues, this month I have been taking a break from worrying about this to concentrate on being happy without needing anything to change.

Of course, there's a limit to how much happiness is possible if human made disasters get unavoidably terrible enough. That said, even in the Zen story of the man driven over the edge of a cliff by a ferocious man-eating tiger, holding on to a vine for dear life, this man was able to at least enjoy a strawberry while temporarily avoiding both forms of doom. This month's entry is a description of What Does it Actually Take to Be Happy.

The song this month is of the first two verses of Biology Song, a song for kids I work with who are learning about the Clock of Eons from the Big Bang to the emergence of life from the ocean to its proliferation into Five Kingdoms. To take all this in this kind of history and complexity a childish song can be useful.

Biology Song
Words and music by Michael Silverstone
©2023 Mr. Silverstone Music/ASCAP
4/9/23 

Cells that split
Divide and quit
Regenerate and grow
Fungi break down what they find 
While humans run the show
At least they think they do
Do you think that’s true?

To walk on land
Or crawl on sand
Are very different things
To swim with fins
In sea or lake
Or fly away on wings
Still all life is the same
In spite of different names

That there’s life in this world is amazing
Raising from itself
To proliferate all around the Earth
Where humans know and wonder

I have a feeling
Rising higher than the ceiling
Oh, there is happiness
That resides inside a net of jewels

The sprout the root
The leaf, the shoot
The branch with bud and flower
The vegetables and summer fruits
The ancient redwood towers
Habitats of green
And all things in between

The rocks and stones
The earth of fields
   The trees, the clouds, the sky
Your mind may tell you where you are
  But can not tell you why
The you that has no name
Knows it just the same
 
I have a feeling
Rising higher than the ceiling
Oh, there is happiness
That resides inside a net of jewels





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