In the middle of negotiations...

Walking Iris, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Organic Landscape Nursery: Out of Business Sale
Reply to: serv-165017943@craigslist.org
Date: 2006-05-26, 10:56AM HST


Looking for a land canvas to paint with plants. Must move my nursery, everything far sale, everthing must go. I have trees, groundcovers, shrubs, and more. I am looking for someone who wants to buy it all, for resale or instalation on site. Let me give your place a face lift. Everything is still available. I have not made a big push to unload everything yet. I can send a plant list with prices, and pictures,but the thing would be to come and see the nursery.

The nursery is the only one like it in Hawaii. It's a commercial landscape nursery based in organic principles and sustainable practices. I have plant combonations and instalation techniques that are climate specific, designed to use little water, no chemical fertilizer, no herbicides.

My operation has only been in Waimanalo for ten months so the model gardens have yet to fully come into ther own, though they still look great.

I have a green thumb and a natural talent for landscape design. I started the whole operation with no capital. If I only had to move the place once, I would've been able to last. But my new operation is on a piece of property that has recently become the site of political shenanagans, corruption, and bad blood between neighbors. The problem is with the lease holder, not me. I just happen to be in the middle of this debacle. Oh that magic feeling : no where to go.

So maybe you can own a piece of the dream before I bring in the other nurserys to pick the place clean.

If you would like to make an appointment to see it before it's uprooted, or if iterested in lots of plants and/or a land scaped, e-mail me for a list of plants and photos.. First come first served.


Mahalo

-D

* this is in or around Waimanalo

Banana

Banana, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

HOW TO KILL A BLOG...

When does it end, the blogging. What does one do when they are through with blogging on their blog? I wanted to be a writer, not a blogger. Such an unfortunate name, Blog. Web Log. On Line Journal. Glow in the Dark Psychologist. Un-Official Source of Information. Last Bastion of Free Speech. Cyber Den of Iniquity. Incriminating Evidence. Ego Fluffing Device.

I started writing on this Web Log because it was free. And because my notebooks were molding in the jungle and my hard drives had a habit of crashing. An effort to preserve my writing. And to juxtapose photos with words.

Among other things.

How personal can I get here, really. People sometimes tell me that they read my blog. Sometimes I forget that. Remembering now.

Hello.

There was some kind of motivation in the begining. I thought that I would exploit a public forum and insert my two cents worth of humanity into the information stream. I have to admit, in the beginning I had thoughts of becomming a popular figure in the blogoshere, but I didn't have photo capacity.

I only had words. I didn't think people would read just words with no pictures. So I stopped thinking about an audience and just wrote, like I had a habit of doing. Just write. No agenda necesesarily. Not trying to make a point, primarily. It was more about what was between the lines and behind the letters than what I was saying directly. For me. I was less interested in Obviously than I was Essentially. Until Recently. Obviously has taken Immediacy hostage and won't let it go until I pay Attention.

Gnomeville

Alchemy 2 008, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Politics of Farming

Morning on Olomana, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

“Confidence is the feeling that precedes understanding the situation.”
-foutune cookie fortune found in Weekly World News


Had a State Senator show up to the hearing on Friday. And two District Representatives. A head of a State Farming Federation. Among others. The Senator was wearing board shorts. He came to advise the Department of Land and Natural Resources board to vote their conscience and to not be swayed by the threat of a lawsuit. One District Rep. testified that one of his constituants had called him to see if he could assist in a case of a friend who was facing eviction from State Ag Lands. He motioned to me and mentioned that he hoped I wasn’t the person he was supposed to help. He said that he felt Agricultural Lands should be used for agriculture.

Neither the Senator nor the District Rep. have been to the nursery.

Defending attourney turned on the power point and instructed me to explain the nursery layout and plan. A board member interjected and asked “Haven’t we already seen this?”. I replied that I didn’t think it was understood the first time, really understood, or we wouldn’t need to be in a hearing for the third time in three months. I stated my understanding of a “base yard”(the original accusation) as a place where machines or equpment unrelated to intensive agriculture are stored on Agricultural lands. The board agreed to the definition. I then demonstrated that all the by-products of the Tree Trimming operation were an integral part of the nursery design and concept. Therefore the chippers, the trucks, the boom trucks and the crane were all directly related to the functioning of this particular agricultural operation.

(to be cont….)

Red Elephant

Red Elephant, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Coming Mid-June 2006

Red Elephant

Red Elephant, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Coming Mid-June 2006

Blinded by the Light,

LA Sand 014, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Not what happens, but how we deal with what happens.

How we deal. How we see.

Violet blue green yellow orange
and I see red.
Keeping my head low on the pole.
crouched into this perspective.

So I can capture an image...

LA Sandprint

LA Sand 029, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Remembering what I forgot
For naught
For now I want not to remember
as much as I want to do something
to be remembered and forgotten later.

Palolo

Kaau 059, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Moss and Fern

Kaau 061, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Life. Here>>>>>>>>>>>Now.
=
I Think I Thought I Knew It All and Gladly.


I am living this life
Writing these words to an audience
I don’t know.
You
May or may not know
Me.

I may come to know you
the audience of this writing
If I keep on writing
I may come to know you
the audience of these words
If my if’s are true

Dick Cheny Moon Bunker Lunar Republic

Moon2, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Moon for Sale

Moon for Sale, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

I just found out about the Lunar Republic. I didn't know the Moon had a republic, but it does, and it's on Earth.

The Republic of the Moon has claimed part of the Moon, and is selling it to raise money to get there. Yep. It's all legal according to their website. They are selling 1 acre for only $20.00, on the sunny side (that way they don't interfere with Dick Cheney's ranch on the Dark Side).


I'm considering staging a coup de tat in the Lunar Republic. We just have to get there before they do, put on space monster suits and point ray guns at them, brainwash them, then have them sign over their leases and use them as slave labor to build a hydroponic green house. Then...

Wait, this just in...

I've been following the rise of the Lunar Republic for over two weeks now. They apearantly have a moon monopoly. From what I gather, the Lunar Republic aren't the only ones to have laid claim on the Moon, though they claim to be the only legitimate ones. The town of Geneva Ohio claimed it in 1966. A Berkeley science fiction club claimed part of it. A Chilean lawyer claimed the whole thing (apearently Nixon asked his permission for the NASA to land there in '69).

Then there is Dennis Hope's Lunar Embassy that claims to have sold over 300,000 acres on the Moon since 1980. He also claims exclusive rights to our Moon, eight other planets, and their moons. Some of the Moon real estate entities have been to court on their claims. Some judges throw them out claiming no jurisdiction over the Moon.

The US and Russia planted their flags there, but the UN prevented them from claiming it for themselves. Reportedly, the Lunar Republic have been in talks with India and Russia's space programs. The Republic wants to help fund Lunar missions in order to have their real estate registry delivered, thus sealing their claim.

In 2004 President W. Bush pledged to go back to the Moon and build a Lunar base for a mission to Mars. Ferrell Jackson, Managing Director for the Lunar Republic Society, claims the US can no longer afford it.

It sounds like the Moon is still up for grabs, until someone actually homesteads the place.

I wonder if I could be sued for transcribing a musing on the notion that the Lunar Republic funded Al Queda to initiate a war that has drained the US's Space budget. While the US is buisy with Iraq, Iran, and North Korea, the Lunar Republic Is talking to Russia and India. Just a thought.

Here'a another conjecturial thought:

What if the billions of the mystery dollars that Halliburton shines away each year is being spent on Dick Cheney's Dark Side Lunar Bunker. The Moon Treaty says that's a no-no, but when does Dick and Co. regard anything other than their own plans and plots?

Went to bed after that last paragraph and woke today to read THIS on the Washington Post. "U.S. Planning to Build Base on Moon to prepare for Trip to Mars". Last night was the first time I'd thought about Bush's space plan since it was news two years ago. Maybe the writer read my blog last night. Maybe Bush read my blog and decided he'd better throw it in gear lest the Lunar Republic show up the USofA. I'd much rather hear Bush talking about Moon dust and Martian water than Terrists and Armageddon.

More later....

King of the World

I usually don't get too topical, as far as "news" and politics goes. I like to try and write things that are timeless, that might have some poetic quality that allows it to live longer than the time it takes me to write it.

Well, treason is timeless. Mass hysteria is timeless. Dictatorships are timeless. Throughout my blog I have crypticly peppered hyperlinks to un-news: the undercurrent of the mainstream. A swift and cold undercurrent. I am moved to now to present some not so cryptic hyperlinks:

EX-REPUBLICAN SUPREME COURT JUDGE WARNS OF THE NATIONS DESCENT INTO DICTATORSHIP.

BYU PHYSICS PROFESSOR CLAIMS THE COLAPSE OF THE WORLD TRADE TOWERS IMPOSSIBLE... WITHOUT PYROTECHNIC HELP.

BUSH BUSTED FOR IGNORING CONSTITUTION...AGAIN.

I'm now compelled to re-post some hyperlinks I put up in October '04:

DOES ANYONE REMEMBER THE WORLD BEFORE 9-11?

THE BLUEPRINT FOR A 21ST CENTURY DICTATORSHIP

OPPOSED TO DICTATORSHIP? TRY THIS.

Oh, one more very recent item:

HOW TO PICK OUT THE CONSERVATIVE IN THE PLAYPEN

Linear Man

Linear Man 7, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

My venture into web toons. Go HERE to see Liner Man blog.

Kolohe: ??-??-?? - 02-23-06 R.I.P.

Recycled Dog, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Weed Pulling Meditation: Introduction

TJ on Banyan under Albezia, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

WPMC Introduction

Humans aren’t the only force vying for domination of this planet. There are other forces that thrive on the destruction of everything around them.

The Albezia tree, native to arid parts of Africa, was introduced to Hawai’i by the US military to quickly grow and provide camouflage for their barracks and instillations. Now, half a century later, members of this introduced tree species are on a fast track to becoming the largest living organisms on the planet. Hooray for the tenacity of the Albezia and its efficient capitalization on the wet Hawaiian climate. Woe unto anything that attempts to live around it. Its dense, wide canopy robs the light from anything trying to grow beneath it. The massive lateral branches can run for a hundred yards at a height of eighty feet. They are brittle and subject to snapping in the tropical winds. A considerable threat to anyone or anything attempting to live below. Unchecked, it will cover whole mountains, extincting the plant diversity that has evolved for millennia. It will shut down roadways, crush dwellings, wreck underground infrastructure. It will survive as the fittest, at the expense of many other life forms. But they sure are impressive. Beautiful to look at, and awe inspiring in their grandeur.

This seems to be a natural event in the course of life. This phenomena can be found in the insect world, the body of humanity, geology, meteorology, chemistry, etc. It has been alarmingly accelerated by the human tendency to reshuffle the life deck and deal new hands to nearly every level and locale of life. We introduce ourselves, our ideas, our cultures, our loves, our hates. Our disease. Our advances. Our essence, which shares a commonality with all life. But, life tends to be alarming. Right from the start.

It happens in your garden as well. What evolved to grow in your chosen plot may no longer be around, or it may not be able to compete with what volunteers to grow there now. There seems to be no going back to what many consider a natural state. We can’t bring back the dead (yet). Fighting the mega-vitality of the introduced poses a formidable challenge. But there be hope for us, individually and collectively, to foster some kind of desirable, sustainable, equanimity in our gardens. There can be no specific manual for how to tame the unique chaos of each garden. The transformation of a garden from burden to benefit depends on the garden and the gardener, their mutual desires and needs, their will and volition. This manual proposes to offer tools for the gardener to use in developing a blueprint for their ideal garden.

A garden to feed the belly, a garden to soothe the soul, a garden to inspire the mind. A garden to aggravate the neighbors. A garden to kill you enemy. A garden to harvest for others. A garden to experiment with. Your garden can be chosen consciously and in harmony with your way. It helps work become play.

It’s hard to grow bananas in the desert, unless you choose to do so for the sake of the challenge. It’s easier to grow plants that are suited for your environment, but it may not be as interesting to you.

This manual covers my process of growing my ideal garden. I endeavor to generalize the lessons I have learned in order to broaden their appeal to a general audience. It’s more the travelogue of a process than a prescription of a method. Take it how you like. It’s not so much about what is written here, but more about what you hear in the writing. How you interpret this message. Go crazy with it.

Weed Pulling Meditation Center Manual : Chapt. 1

Weed Pulling Fingers, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Official Weed Pulling Meditation Center Document

Lets start by talking about the word metaphor. I think the word deserves attention.

(m t -fôr , -f r)n. 1. A figure of speech in which a word or phrase that ordinarily designates one thing is used to designate another, thus making an implicit comparison, as in “a sea of troubles” or “All the world's a stage” (Shakespeare). 2. One thing conceived as representing another; a symbol: “Hollywood has always been an irresistible, prefabricated metaphor for the crass, the materialistic, the shallow, and the craven” (Neal Gabler). [Middle English methaphor, from Old French metaphore, from Latin metaphora, from Greek, transference, metaphor, from metapherein, to transfer : meta-, meta- + pherein, to carry; see bher-1 in Indo-European Roots.] met a·phor ic (-fôr k, -f r -) or met a·phor i·cal adj. met a·phor i·cal·ly adv.


I start with this word because I think a deep understanding of metaphor enables a person to make connections that might not otherwise be made. In my opinion, finding a metaphorical illustration to help convey the essence of what one sees or has a desire to share adds an additional dimension beyond the words used. To illustrate:

Before a garden can be planted, the ground must be prepared.

One could limit the phrase to seeds, weeds and dirt. One could also assign metaphorical designations to the nouns and verbs:

Before a desire can be realized, the conditions must be cultivated.

Or something like that.

The illustration of the garden (if one actually knows how to plant a garden) serves as a mental model to reflect upon in the process of realizing ones desires. Knowing what you want = getting the seeds. Knowing the ideal season and climate that the plants will flourish in = knowing when, where and how to act on what you want. Cultivating the desire = weeding out volunteer seeds that would compete with the ones you chose.

Now, I would like to propose that the act of planting a garden can serve as a meditation on, and/or a prayer for, the realization of ones larger desire. Even more, I propose that the real, active process of finding what grows well where you are (or moving to the place that best facilitates what you want to grow) serves to germinate ones natural desires if one opens their mind to them, and showers them with attention once the seeds have sprout.

Whoah. I’m mixing my metaphors here. On purpose. That’s my point. Metaphors can be two way doors. Or three.

Do you see what I’m saying? I ask this not in condescension, but as a literal question.

Do you see what I am saying? Or do you just hear the words? Probably neither since this whole thing be written text.

Get my point? I ask this both metaphorically and literally. It be my intent as a writer to prod your curiosity to read further. Then we can have a relationship. Without ever having physically met.

It be my desire to relate with more people with less effort. So, I concentrate my effort on defining clearly what I want to relate, and choose an appropriate medium for that want to be conveyed. Hi there.

Plumera Negative

Future Primitive, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.

Future Primitive

I climb into my motor vehicle and begin to drive off. There are a couple of horses in the street. They look old, like they’d escaped from the glue factory. They were cantankerous as well. One kept sticking his snout in my window. His teeth were brown and curled like an old beavers. I drove on and found a strange dog that looked like a kiwi. A very pointy nose that flared dramatically into a puff ball of a dog. He was seriously injured. Half of his fantastically furry back was hanging to the side and his raw flesh was exposed. The Amazing TJ had said he wanted a dog. Well, here was something to test his resolve. We decided to try and fix it. What do we do? Tie the dog down and stitch him back together? Shave the fantastic fur first? Wash the whole dog in peroxide? We debated. This debate and vacillation took a very long time and many people were consulted. Eventually Mayor Mufi stitched the dog up on a football field with a full house.

This whole scene wore the colors of a 1970’s detective movie: dingy city colors. Mustard yellows and forest greens. After the dog surgery I found myself in a high rise married to a Pilipino woman. I don’t know how long I was married to her, but I didn’t know her name. She was very nice, and took good care of me, as much as I would let her. The building was noisy. There was a freight elevator outside the windows. I could push a big round plastic button and the elevator would stop at my windows. I had four windows. I opened one window to throw out cans, one for bottles, one for newspapers, and one for books. Then when I closed all my windows, the elevator would drop with a shriek of old metal and flip into a compartmentalized bin. I wore combat boots and all black and walked stiffly. Though I wore these things by choice, I looked forward to taking them off at night.

This scene had the hues of a 1960’s Technicolor film. I’m standing in a field of dead brown grass. There are a couple of pieces of hulking architecture with flaking paint that are partially overgrown with weed trees and vines. Large manors. “South Africa” I think to myself. There are people around. I sense small activities in the large places. I enter the massive arched doorway on the building in front of me and find a courtyard. A dark skinned old woman approaches me and hands me a piece of dried stiff hide with black fur on it matted with blood. She then points to a gorilla that has a terrible scabbed
wound on its back. She indicates that I should fix it. I protest that it is too late, this cannot be repaired. She ignores my opinion and returns to the building. The gorilla is outfitted with an iron frame with wheels like a cart. It’s head is in an iron hood with a slot to see out the front. This mechanism forces it to walk on all fours. I lead the gorilla cart through the courtyard to a marketplace. The place is not very busy and has the feel of an abandoned theme park. Managed decay. Julie Andrews is there. She informs me that we are not in South Africa, but Big Island Hawai’i. It seems that there had been a huge growth spurt, then thpphtht. Economic collapse. Fuel prices made it impossible for the tourist industry to continue, and the wealthy fled during the uprising. A stasis had been reached and a new culture took hold. It was brutally male, and yet the women were afforded a high degree of safety. Well, it wasn’t that simple actually. There was a self imposed caste system. Some people evolved into what resembled the Homo Noeticus, while others happily indulged in the id-ness of the Homo Sapian. There was a mutual respect between the two classes and mutual social interactions, but the divide was definite. The Homo Sapiens became the worker class, the Homo Noeticus employed them in building a sustainable infrastructure. Words were less a priority to both groups. The Sapiens were much more physical with each other, slapping each other around as a matter of course, the Noeticus communicated more subtly, and less redundantly, using words as tools, instead of spending them as social currency. Ironically, the Sapiens took over the cities, and the Noeticus spent most of their time and energy in the more rural parts.

Then a rooster crowed and I found myself in Waimanalo.

Does Anyone Remember Laughter?

Dino -1991, originally uploaded by Dark Sevier.