The Mark Of A Man

The universe has lost a peacemaker.  Nelson Mandela passed.  Age 95. 

South Africa's Nelson Mandela dies

The announcement of Mandela's death was made by President Jacob Zuma

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South Africa's first black president and anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela has died, South Africa's president says.

Mr Mandela, 95, led South Africa's transition from white-minority rule in the 1990s, after 27 years in prison.
He had been receiving intense home-based medical care for a lung infection after three months in hospital.
In a statement on South African national TV, Mr Zuma said Mr Mandela had "departed" and was at peace.

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1918 Born in the Eastern Cape
1943 Joined African National Congress
1956 Charged with high treason, but charges dropped after a four-year trial
1962 Arrested, convicted of incitement and leaving country without a passport, sentenced to five years in prison
1964 Charged with sabotage, sentenced to life
1990 Freed from prison
1993 Wins Nobel Peace Prize
1994 Elected first black president
1999 Steps down as leader
2001 Diagnosed with prostate cancer
2004 Retires from public life
2005 Announces his son has died of an HIV/Aids-related illness

"Our nation has lost its greatest son," Mr Zuma said.

He said Mr Mandela would receive a full state funeral, and flags would be flown at half-mast.

The Nobel Peace Prize laureate was one of the world's most revered statesmen after preaching reconciliation despite being imprisoned for 27 years.

He had rarely been seen in public since officially retiring in 2004.

"What made Nelson Mandela great was precisely what made him human. We saw in him what we seek in ourselves," Mr Zuma said.

"Fellow South Africans, Nelson Mandela brought us together and it is together that we will bid him farewell."

UK Prime Minister David Cameron paid tribute to Mr Mandela, saying "a great light has gone out in the world".
Earlier, the BBC's Mike Wooldridge, outside Mr Mandela's home in the Johannesburg suburb of Houghton, said there appeared to have been an unusually large family gathering.

A number of government vehicles were there during the evening as well, our correspondent says.
Since he was released from hospital, the South African presidency repeatedly described Mr Mandela's condition as critical but stable.

Born in 1918, Nelson Mandela joined the African National Congress (ANC) in 1943, as a law student.
He and other ANC leaders campaigned against apartheid (white-only rule).

A look back at the life of Nelson Mandela

He was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964, but was released in 1990 as South Africa began to move away from strict racial segregation.

He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 and was elected South Africa's first black president in 1994. He stepped down after five years in office.

After leaving office, he became South Africa's highest-profile ambassador, campaigning against HIV/Aids and helping to secure his country's right to host the 2010 football World Cup.
He was also involved in peace negotiations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi and other countries in Africa and elsewhere.

  Nelson Mandela was in Nelson Mandela was in the hospital for nearly three months

 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-25249520

In his honour, the South Afrikan national anthem:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFW7845XO3g

She Shudda? Really?

She shudda?  Really? And who are you to say?  Violence is everywhere.  It is toward animals, one another, children, women.  It comes from the unconscious, the frightened.  Find your softness.

Please listen:   

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlb4Pu23kqw

An Honor And A Privilege

"It is an honor and a privilege to live in this unique time with all of you. I appreciate you who stand strong and are willing to think and live outside the box. Every day you do your best to choose Harmony instead of Drama; Truth instead of Illusion; Love instead of Hate; and walk in Authentic Power not over-powering others with faux force. Then when our best is not enough and we fall, we support each other, and we lift each other up. We own the fact that sometimes we are not perfect; yet we also know that we are nothing but divine perfection. It is by living our authentic truth that we raise ourselves up collectively, and thus change the world by being authentic in each moment and continuing the work of restoring peace, harmony, love and true wisdom to all living beings. It is wonderful to know that we walk the same path in so many diverse ways."

Aluna Joy Yaxkin

Octocopters and Amazon: A Little Too Jetson?

Do you love looking up toward the sky? For the most part, it isn't incumbered yet, save comtrails, military equipment, commercial airlines and UFOs.   But can you imagine looking to the dome and seeing commercial optocopters delivering products?  If Amazon has its way, it will. They say they are five years
 away from making this operational.
Remember the tv show, The Jetson's? 


Well, this is a bit too Jetsonian for me.  If you don't know who they are take a listen below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtPQEz6In6o

 Amazon.com Inc. is testing drones to deliver goods as the world’s largest e-commerce company works to improve efficiency and speed in getting products to consumers.

 

The Amazon.com Inc. Prime Air octocopter is seen in this undated handout photograph released to the media on Dec. 2, 2013. Source: Amazon.com Inc. via Bloomberg

Dec. 2 (Bloomberg) –- Amazon's business runs on speed, price and customer service. We go inside Amazon's Phoenix 6 fulfillment center to see the technology it takes to keep those little brown boxes moving, from the moment they arrive on a truck to the moment they get packed into a box and shipped out. (Source: Bloomberg)

Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos unveiled the plan on CBS’s “60 Minutes” news program in the U.S., showing interviewer Charlie Rose the flying machines that can serve as delivery vehicles. Bezos said the gadgets, called octocopters, can carry as much as 5 pounds within a 10-mile radius of an Amazon fulfillment center. Amazon may start using the drones, which can make a delivery within 30 minutes, within five years pending Federal Aviation Administration approval, Bezos said.

For more info:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-12-02/amazon-testing-octocopters-for-delivery-ceo-tells-60-minutes-.html

Personally, I think optocopters have some wonderful applications.  But one has to be ethical about their use.  I do worry about our government.  Spying.  And then the individual who is just plain noisy. Spying. 

Here is a super use of an optocopter. One of these photographed my home recently:

Should Amazon be allowed to fly the friendly skies? What do you think? 

Snow People

These are some of my buddies.  Not all.  They are neat because they are all about the season.  Some were made by friends long ago.  Some were acquisitions along the way.  They always put a smile on people's faces.  It doesn't say 'buy a gift' or anything like that.  It just says ENJOY.  

I hope you have an enjoyable season.

You Can't Have Both

Laura Flanders' interviews stream at GRITtv.org. This week, Peter Buffett, son of billionaire investor Warren on the conflict between capitalism and humanism. Says Buffett: "You can't have both."

Peter Buffett argues that philanthropy needs to do a better job of listening. He says that the structure of philanthropy is such that nothing seems to get better, but rather locks existing problems into place.


"Poverty, hunger, the environment, education, health - all those things are symptoms of a larger problem of nobody really wanting to get in there and blow some things up," Buffett says.

For more:

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/20343-peter-buffett-big-philanthropy-and-philanthro-feudalism

Perspective

So often we see things up close and personal.  We don't see the forest through the trees.  Taking oneself out of the equation works well. 

Yesterday, a dear friend took this aerial photo of my western North Carolina home.  As many of you know, it is up for sale.

What attracted me to this piece of land is the view of the mountains from the front porch and the side porch areas.  The Smokies are gentle, scalloping mountains.  They literally draw you in as do all the mountains in western North Carolina.

The evergreens you see in the front of the house were all planted by me.  Many literally. I planted nearly 1,000 seedlings and dozens of large trees.  Everything is native based. It is a sacred piece of land.  A private retreat.  That is what people seem to love about it.  I often hold meditation classes and workshops in the sunroom.  The entrance is through the side porch. Private.

In years past, so many animals have traversed this land.  Feral cat, coyote, fox, turkey, bear, wolf, opossum, squirrel, eagles, hawks to name a few.  The pass through because it is safe.

Life is all in the perspective.  I am grateful to have this one. 



Things grow fast in this wonderful climate.