Jim Taylor's Columns - 'Soft Edges' and 'Sharp Edges'

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14

Apr

2022

Facing up to life’s losses

Author: Jim Taylor

Thursday March 31, 2022

 

A summer evening, in beautiful Butchart’s Gardens, near  Victoria. B.C. On a grassy meadow, people -- young, old, and in-between -- sprawled on blankets, listening to entertainment from the Gardens’ open-air stage. 

            The singer was belting out a Barry Manilow piece. 

I write the songs that make the whole world sing.

I write the songs, I write the songs.

            Several people got up and left. I felt sorry for the performer.

            It must be discouraging for any performer to watch people leaving. It would have been discouraging for Barry Manilow himself, if he’d been there. No matter how many million songs you’ve sold worldwide, it hurts when people don’t want to hear your song. 

            Who are you, when what you’re good at doesn’t appeal anymore? 


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3

Apr

2022

Top-down rules don’t even change the top

Author: Jim Taylor

Sunday April 3, 2022

 

I won’t offer excuses for General Jonathan Vance, Canada’s former chief of defence staff.  Earlier this week, Vance pled guilty to a single charge of obstruction of justice. He was under investigation for sexual misconduct with a subordinate officer. 

            There’s no question about the sexual liaison with Major Kellie Brennan. 

            After their affair became public, Vance tried to get Brennan to deny their relationship. 

            There’s no question about that, either. Because Brennan recorded his phone calls. 

            Vance’s attempts to protect his reputation indicate that he knew he had done wrong. So why did he do it?


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Categories: Sharp Edges

Tags: sex, macho, Gen. Vance, army

1

Apr

2022

Resonating with the right energies

Author: Jim Taylor

Thursday March 31, 2022

 

In her semi-memoir Eat Pray Love, Elizabeth Gilbert describes being taught Balinese meditation. She had just spent four months in India learning -- sometimes painfully -- Yoga meditation. It involved physical postures that had to be practiced. And memorized texts that must be repeated precisely. Over and over.

            But her guru in Bali simply said, “Smile.”

            It was the Balinese attitude -- Smile. Always smile. Always face the world cheerfully. 

            It seems to me there’s an underlying truth there. We receive what we’re tuned to. 


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29

Mar

2022

Birdbrains can teach humans about cooperation

Author: Jim Taylor

Sunday March 27, 2022

 

Some magpies in Australia proved themselves smarter than a group of scientists. Magpies are known for their intelligence; they belong the corvid family which also includes crows and ravens. 

            A month ago, Australian ornithologists hoped to learn more about how wild magpies socialize. So they devised miniature backpack transmitters, weighing less than a gram, that they could strap onto individual magpies. 

            They designed the backpack so that the magpie carrying it couldn’t possibly remove it. 

            They reckoned without the intervention of other magpies. 


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29

Mar

2022

When it feels good to yell at God

Author: Jim Taylor

Thursday February 24, 2022

 

I took my bicycle for a ride along the Mission Creek Greenway in Kelowna, not long ago. I didn’t bother checking a map –why bother? The creek runs down to the lake; the Greenway follows the creek; what could go wrong?

            Except that the trail I was riding along abruptly ended at a wire fence.

            Clearly, the main trail had diverged somewhere, but I was so preoccupied with my own  ride that I didn’t  notice. It must be somewhere to my left. And fortunately, there was a trail of sorts leading that direction. 

            The trail was rough, but passable. Until I got to a little stream, seeping down through millennia of rotting vegetation, just too wide to leap across. 


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Categories: Soft Edges

Tags: God, Job, bicycle, Satan

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