Passed along to me yesterday by a friend.
"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen”
Hebrews 11:1
Providence, luck and love from the ineffable was on my mind last week. I was taking a couple of days off to go the woods and camp, be surrounded by depth, scale, and spaciousness. Regroup before returning to school. Finish titrating off the "Tom's" (sleeping pills I felt necessary to take to de-escalate a bout of intense insomnia that came on in late August). Grieve the leaving of my mother.
Time has shown me that on these trips it takes about 2 days to sift through anxiety, depression, and other uncomfortable states as my spirit body reorients its way back to coherence. This morning I am on the downhill slope of a crisis I dealt with the past evening. Now I am sitting half in my cups, seemingly frozen in a fog blended by detoxing off an addictive drug and a necessary grief.
“So what are your thoughts about luck and providence?”
It was a question asked to Lloyd Kahn after the fact. The fact being I recognized him sitting near the coffee stand at Harbin. I recognized his face and asked,
“What is your name?”
“Lloyd” is his reply.
“I admire your work!”
Lloyd doesn't know that at this moment he is an angel. A voice inside says, "Yes. This happens to you a lot."
Lloyd Kahn is a writer, editor, publisher, photographer, self-taught architect, historian, dwelling expert, surfer and skateboarder. He was contributing dwelling editor to the original and Iconic Whole Earth Catalog and published several best selling books including “Shelter” one of the best book about global dwelling and building practices in the Seventies. This makes him a confederate of Jay Baldwin and Stewart Brand and protege of Buckminster Fuller. (Lloyd would then renege on his passion for domes after Road testing them and admitting that they didn’t work)
I thought our conversation was over. I wonder if I should return to get his autograph and let the thought pass. Sometimes more happens to what is not done.
Turns out, an hour later I am sitting at a table next to Lloyd as he is working on his laptop. Lloyd initiate's the conversation. I nod to the Gods. We're back on-line.
There's a break in the conversation. I go for the question from my doubt.
“I got to ask. What are your thoughts about luck and providence?”
“You mean this?” Lloyd waggles his index finger back and forth between our tables.
I soon sidle over to his and sit.
We talk for two hours 👍