TBD

TBD on Ning

Did you ever notice yourself surrounded by tee shirts bearing a similar theme? I don't mean shirts from some club or something - at least, not one you could identify - heh! I mean really, that might be a relief, because then you could say O yeah, I get it, they really are all on the same team . . .

hee-hee!

eeYeah, that kind ah thing . . . Didja? Ever?

I bought a book Friday, Wild Chickens and Petty Tyrants 108 Metaphors for Mindfulness, by Arnie Kozak, Ph.D. Arnie is a faculty member at UVM, with over 25 years of clinical psychology, yoga, and meditation experience. His blurb at the back of the book says he was in India in 1985, so hey. He must know about the zen aspects of mindfulness, right? Sure . . . I'll spare you the praises of his peers, suffice it to say I found them interesting . . .

Anywayz . . . So ya, I did, I bought this book Friday, and on Saturday evening I was down on Church Street - it's the local shopping mecca, never mind, you probably don't want to know - and I was, I was surrounded by tee shirts. Of course I was, because it was warm out.

But I noticed among all of these tee shirts there seemed to be a subtle theme that stood out just a little, because of all of the tee shirts and all of the slogans there seemed to be more of them with one particular theme.

Peace symbols. Or the statement Visualize Peace. Or some other variation on the theme of Peace. I'm tempted to get sidetracked by the bumper sticker Visualize Whirled Peas, but I didn't see any bumper stickers, so I'll leave that for another time.

Visualize Whirled Peas I mean Please! Common! Can't we just say what we mean anymore?

REally.

Anywayz, after about the one hundreth tee shirt with a peace symbol on it - and no, there was no peace rally going on so get off my case will ya? -

After just so many of them I had to ask Why? Is al Qaida going to suddenly lay down their guns? How about the Bloods and the Crips? Hmm?

And guess what happened? All the peacenik tee shirts vanished. All of them. I didn't see another all night.

Now don't get me wrong, don't misunderstand. I think peace is a fine thing and we could all use a lot more of it. I just don't care for behavioral advertising. HAAA haa! heEEee! No I don't.

In fact, it really ticks me off.

So now I'm wondering . . . do you think Arnie had anything to do with that?

WHEEEeee! Lets Go sHOPping everyBody! Shop till Ya Drop!

hee-hee! Crazy! That's what it is! Just plain Crazy!

© D. Winter
July 26, 2009

Tags: american, arnie, dissent, kozak, shirts, tee, zen

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Haha!

Poor Arnie! I think suddenly he is in a world of Hurt!

lol!
I never look for deeper meanings in anything. It is the 40th anniversary of the Peace Symbol. Peace out baby!!!!
I'm always the last to find things out (sigh). Who's Arnie?
Arnie is the author of the book cited above. The theme of his book tends to conform to the, um, submissive suggestion embodied by the phrase Visualize Whirled Peas

I mean, really. If the intent is to visualize peace, then let us say so without ambiguity. Let us speak plainly, without fear. Arnie is something of a zen guru and his PhD is in psychology. It is, I think, an interesting combination.

I honestly haven't entirely made up my mind - is Arnie's book a part of the problem? or the solution? It feels like half measures to me, but that's me.

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