"We humanists take one look at a world in which the lives of thousands of innocent children are ripped away every year by hurricanes, earthquakes, and other 'acts of God,' not to mention the thousand other fundamental injustices of life, and we conclude that if the universe we live in does not have competent moral management, then so be it:  we must become the superintendents of our own lives."  --from the introduction of Good Without God, page xiii, by Greg M. Epstein (the Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University).

I'm looking forward to reading this book.   I have a feeling that it is going to do a very good job of capturing what more and more Americans really do believe--and not just those outside of our churches, but within them as well.

The other day I was talking with some friends about what our 3 favorite albums are.  Talk about a hard question!

As I thought more about it, it occurred to me that one of the albums that I’ve continued to think about over the years is a little know album called “Under a Raging Moon.”   It was a tribute by the lead singer of The Who, Roger Daltrey, to their deceased drummer Keith Moon.

To those of us who grew up in the age of classic rock, and particularly those of us who play drums,  Moon was a legend.   There are lives that we cannot live for any number of reasons, but that doesn’t keep us from sometimes secretly wishing we could.  Keith Moon’s life, wild and out of control and bound for death though it was, was (and maybe even still is) such a life for me.

Below are the lyrics to the album’s title song.  I find them even more haunting now than I did when I first heard them years ago.  Caught up in the passion of knowing what one was born for, seeing “Zion”, having a golden age in our lives with people so important to us that somehow now we’ve lost, remembering it all, just knowing what it is to “lay the thunder down”… and then, of course, those final lines:  Why are the young so blind?

Such great stuff…

Under a Raging Moon

by Roger Daltrey

In the searchlights
You could see us as we circled around
Down below us
You were screamin' I
could hear the sound
I could see your arms
Reaching up to me

Like a demon
Feel the madness running thru the crowd
We were freedom
From the moment that we hit the ground
And the wild man
He laid the thunder down

Do you remember me?
Like I remember you
In a sea of hands
You came shining thru
In the mist of time
I can see it now

All my life I will remember this
Under a raging moon
For this moment I was born for this
Under a raging moon
Under a raging moon, We
were flying there
Under a raging moon, We saw Zion there
It ended all too soon,
Under a raging moon

We were out there
When they handed us the rebel's crown

All the headlines
All they tried to do was tear us down
But the wild man
He didn't fool around

Do you remember me?
Cuz I remember you
Yeah you won my love
When the dream came true
When my blood ran high
I can hear it now

All my life I will remember this
Under a raging moon
For this moment I was born for this
Under a raging moon
Under a raging moon, We were flying boy
Under a raging moon,
It's worth dying for
It ended all too soon,
Under a raging moon

Taking me back to better times
We never read the danger signs
Why are the young... Why are
the young so blind?

My wife and sister-in-law at our parish retreat last weekend to Shrine Mont.  Are my brother and I lucky guys or what?!  :)

Though it runs counter to my inner hippie, which somehow still persists live and well after all these years, I decided that part of what it means to come back from my trip is to be a responsible middle aged adult once again.  And though it pains me to do so, that means leaving NSN (No Shave November) to the young bucks in college.  So I did set the electric razor on 1, and applied it not just to my head but to my face as well...

For the last month, I've been on vacation/retreat.  My blog has been autoposting, which is why I haven't responded to comments or emails during that time. 

But as of late last night, I'm back.  On the way home, I stopped at my younger daughter's college to take her out for supper.  It was sooo good to see her!

Her first comment was "Wow!  I've never seen your beard so long!"  She asked if I was doing "No Shave November" (NSN). 

I didn't know it was NSN, and my plan was to shave both my head and my beard (well, not shave completely, but set the electric razor to setting 1) as I return to civilized life (my first thought when driving into northern Virginia last night was how populous this area is.  It never struck me like that before, but it felt...strange.)

But now that I know it is NSN, I guess I might just have to wait...  For the beard, at least.  The hair is definitely going.

Pretty smart for an insect, huh?  If he was a little bigger, he'd probably be waiting by my refrigerator door...

In any discussion of Garden All Stars, I can't imagine not at least mentioning gourds.  That is because on a purely personal level, I can't imagine a garden without at least some gourd plant growing somewhere.

I think a big part of what I love about them is the surprise.  Gourds come in just about every shape, size, and color.  Unless you are planting a specific type (which I never do), you never know what you are going to get.   And if you plant three plants, you'll likely get three different kinds of gourds.

How do you find space?  Think "up".  Grow them up trees or fences or decks or sunflowers.  That way the don't take much extra space at all. 

It's always nice to see someone who enjoys gourds as much as I do!

Dictionary.com defines a weed as follows:

1. a valueless plant growing wild, esp. one that grows on cultivated ground to the exclusion or injury of the desired crop.

2.  any undesirable or troublesome plant, esp. one that grows profusely where it is not wanted

Yep, sounds like a weed all right.  Plants that want to take over the world, starting with your yard,  that don't produce beautiful flowers or attract interesting animals in the process, and which crowd out the plants that do.

Still, I might take umbrage with those definitions.  It seems to me a bit unfair to lump into one category every plant that grows so well that it will overrun anything and anyone if given half a chance.

If it were me writing the definition, I might further break it down into "good weed" and "bad weed".  Quite simply, a good weed is one that, while still trying to take over the world, at least carries some readily noticeable benefit in doing so.

This award, therefore, goes the to the best good weed--which, in my book, is clearly milkweed.  Milkweed spreads both by prolific underground runners and  seed pods which open to release even more prolific windborne seeds into the air.  So yes, they most definitely qualify as weeds in so far as they will rapidly take over a given space and then move on to all the other spaces around them as well.

But--and this is a big but--they also bloom heavily and beautifully.  What is more, these are some of the most deliciously fragrant blooms your nose will ever be privileged to smell.   Probably because they are so fragrant, they readily attract a wide range of insects including bees, beetles, and a wide variety of butterflies.

Finally, as you know doubt know if you read this blog, they are also the food plant of Monarch butterflies.  That in itself makes them worth having in my book.  In my admittedly limited experience, the more of them you have, the more butterflies you will have as well.  And doesn't it seem like having more butterflies in the world can only make it a better place?

(Note:  You can actually control milkweeds growth pretty easily with just a little work.)