2008.10.12 07:00 - From Tuscany to Space

Adams Dubrovna was the Guardian on this Sunday morning and the comments are his

I arrived at the pavilion and was soon joined by Doug who had been away painting in Italy for a few weeks. It was good to see Doug again

Adams Dubrovna: Hello Doug :)
doug Sosa: i forgot how to do all this, gotta turn chat on!
Adams Dubrovna: Yes, I just spent a good bit of time doing that morning myself

Second Life had recently forced us all to upgrade and the chat log setings had been changed for each of us. Since I use three or four different computers and more than one avatar, I have to check preferences every sesion to make sure I am logging

Adams Dubrovna: How was Tuscany?
doug Sosa: very good trip. we were really a bit north, umbria, painting every day.
Adams Dubrovna: Sounds great :)
doug Sosa: a great way to see the old hill towns.
doug Sosa: Assisi, Perugia, and much smaller.
Adams Dubrovna: Really stopping and looking
doug Sosa: long stoping, each morning a place, so about three hours to either do a full sketch o a quick water color. i chose the watercolor because i like to paint what i see.
Adams Dubrovna: Seems a good medium for traveling

Pia arrived and interestingly enough the autologger seemed to start with her presence

Adams Dubrovna: Hello Pia :)
doug Sosa: good way to put it.
Pia Iger: Hi, Adams,
doug Sosa: how are things here in PaB?
Pia Iger: and Doug, welcome back
Adams Dubrovna: Do you know the architect Louis Kahn's watercolors?
doug Sosa: hey, thanks, and morning!
doug Sosa: i don't see you. ah.
doug Sosa: can't turn easily in these seats.
Adams Dubrovna: I am not the best person to bring you up to date because I seem to be attending in spurts these days
doug Sosa: kahn, no. is there a book?
Adams Dubrovna: Hmmm. They are published in various places. He travelled fairly extensively and of course was recording architectural works but they have a quality which is wonderful
doug Sosa: I will check 'em out. thanks!
Adams Dubrovna: How are you Pia?
doug Sosa: I've been looking at sargets more closely.
Adams Dubrovna: Sargent?
doug Sosa: painter..
Adams Dubrovna: Sarget? Sargent?
Pia Iger: I am fine. just listening.
Adams Dubrovna: Doug was telling about his trip to Tuscany Pia
Adams Dubrovna: He went to Assisi among other places :)
Pia Iger: wow, sounds terrific
Pia Iger: Maxine just came back from Italy too. She talked about it on my 7am session yesterday
doug Sosa: Deep, good constant PbA.
Adams Dubrovna: Oh sorry I missed it; I will have to read the log
doug Sosa: oops PaB.

I get a bit silly and inadvertantly start a discussion leading to limitations of vocabulary

Adams Dubrovna: Playing Being Aimlessly
Adams Dubrovna: :)
doug Sosa: When your town is on top of renaissance architecture on top of miedieval buildings on top of roman roads and foundations on top of tuscan temples...
doug Sosa: when aimless, always on target!
Adams Dubrovna: :)
Pia Iger: yes, aimless can be understood in different ways.
doug Sosa: i think anything can. so thought and language are treacherous bridges to the next moment.
Pia Iger: Aha.
Adams Dubrovna: My more recent experiences seem harder and harder to convey in words but language is the only thing we have to communicate here in SL
Adams Dubrovna: Except for play :)
doug Sosa: hmm?
Adams Dubrovna: We convey something by the way we play
doug Sosa: yes, but the play routines here seem a bit limited. imagine if we were in this as a real palce, just as we are.
Pia Iger: somehow we managed to convery something by words in these few months. not very precise, but still illuminating.
doug Sosa: i can't even turn very well to look at you both.
doug Sosa: yes, the words do well, not well enough, but then in some ways
Adams Dubrovna: Ah lag would severely limit our lifestyle :)
doug Sosa: better than in real life. i do love the typing to each other this way. amazingly effective.
Adams Dubrovna: Yes, I agree Doug
Adams Dubrovna: It is the inability to put some things in to words that I was speaking about
Adams Dubrovna: Some of our exeriences
doug Sosa: one thing to do here is try, see what does come across in the awkward effort.
Adams Dubrovna: Play might just communicate comradship
doug Sosa: could we try one of those experiences?
Pia Iger: which one?
doug Sosa: of adams..

OK Doug. I did have an example of an experience hard to put into words. Turns out Doug and Pia had experienced something of this as well and they know of others too

Adams Dubrovna: About a week ago, I realized that I was dreaming furiously for the first half of the night
doug Sosa: and..?
Adams Dubrovna: The second half my mind would settle down by I couldn't sleep
Adams Dubrovna: one of the nights I had this experience that lasted only a few seconds
doug Sosa: thinking?
Adams Dubrovna: Suddenly space opened up and I felt free
Adams Dubrovna: It was exhiliarating
doug Sosa: wow!
Adams Dubrovna: I never experienced anything like it before
doug Sosa: still sort of asleep or wide awake?
Adams Dubrovna: During those few seconds I realized I have been living in compartments
Adams Dubrovna: The compartments felt dark and were limiting
Adams Dubrovna: The experience lasted just a few seconds but I have not been able to recreate my feeling of living in compartments anymore either
doug Sosa: when we dream we are free from external constraints, so the mind is unbounded. at the moment of waking we can experience that freedom before sensory reaattachment to the sensory world re constrains us, in the compartments of real life.

Hmm Doug seemed to have some words for it :)

Adams Dubrovna: I am freer but not free like I felt during those few seconds
Adams Dubrovna: But words do not do justice to the experience. It is just the best I can do
Pia Iger: pretty well.
doug Sosa: Sems to do quite well, i am a bit shivery just thinking about what you've told us.
Adams Dubrovna: I had a discussion with Cal about her feeling of nothingness and our descriptions were pretty similar
Adams Dubrovna: She also could not put it in words
doug Sosa: nothing and free seem different. Nothing in the context of compartments feels free and open, nothing in the presence of nothing feels like bottomless despair.
Adams Dubrovna: But Cal neverdescribes despair
doug Sosa: I must go If I am to show up at 8..
doug Sosa: bye, wonderful people.
Pia Iger: see you, Doug
Adams Dubrovna: Ah, it was good to see you :)

Doug left and Pia and I kicked around this ecperience of space

Pia Iger: the sense of space opening up is very common.
Pia Iger: I also feel the time/moment is spacious
Adams Dubrovna: It was very new to me
Pia Iger: It is great you feel it very directly and intensively.
Adams Dubrovna: It was a wondeful experience
Adams Dubrovna: Would you care to tell more about your experience?
Pia Iger: I mentioned it in a couple sessions.basically, I feel there is another dimension opened up beyond our normal 3 dimension space concept.
Adams Dubrovna: Wow
Pia Iger: and I felt I can enter the 4th dimension, it feels freedom
Adams Dubrovna: wow again
Pia Iger: hehe
Pia Iger: I think these direct experience is the step stone for us to proceed further.
Pia Iger: you and I, we already 'see' differently from normal persepctive.
Adams Dubrovna: Yes, so interesting that so many of us seem to experience things somewhat simultaneously
Pia Iger: Yes, yesterday, Stevenia, Maxine, we all said somethng about space similar
Adams Dubrovna: :)
Adams Dubrovna: Learning from each other, growing together...
Pia Iger: We all 'see' or notice something that we used to ignore before. Use Stim's word, we were "heedless". Now, 9 -sec let us notice what is there.
Adams Dubrovna: Are you familiar with Carl Sagan's demonstration of the dimensions
Pia Iger: not really. do you have links? or let me google.
Adams Dubrovna: It is from the 1980s series called Cosmos. The dimension segment is on YouTube

The URL for Carl Sagan's discussion with visual props is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9KT4M7kiSw

Adams Dubrovna: He demonstrates how a two-dimensional being might experience the third dimension
Adams Dubrovna: by instriuducing an apple in toe the 2d world
Adams Dubrovna: One of nthe two dimensional creatures gets thrown up into the air and comes back telling marvellous tales
Adams Dubrovna: The other two-dimensional creatures doubt his sanity
Adams Dubrovna: Your experience of the fourth dimension reminded me of it
Adams Dubrovna: (not that I doubt your sanity)
Adams Dubrovna: :)
Pia Iger: the point of his demonstration was?
Adams Dubrovna: To show how a different dimension might to appear to those who cannot directly experience it
Adams Dubrovna: He goes on to talk of a fourth dimension
Pia Iger: ok.
Adams Dubrovna: Did Steve and Maxine use the word "free" with their experiences?
Pia Iger: found an interesting site of quote: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/au...arl_sagan.html
Adams Dubrovna will have to look later after leaving SL
Pia Iger: no. I just searched yesterday's log, no word of free.
Adams Dubrovna: I will read the log. I have been falling behind a bit recently

In addition to a feeling of freedom,light

Pia Iger: Steve use the word 'light'
Adams Dubrovna: Hmmm
Pia Iger: which I think all connected. light, space, time
Adams Dubrovna: I use the word dark for the compartments
Pia Iger: and freedom
Pia Iger: and energy
Adams Dubrovna: ahhh. Interesting. That might be similar to a feeling of freedom
Pia Iger: yes, various words lean to similar direction.
Pia Iger: Did you read Pema's long email sent yesterday?
Adams Dubrovna: Yes, but it is not registering
Adams Dubrovna is a bit confused because of talks with Pema, which is which
Pia Iger: oh, It very much gave me clearer idea of "Play" part, in PaB
Adams Dubrovna: Hmm. I will have to reread
Pia Iger: You got special tutoring from him :)
Adams Dubrovna: yes
Adams Dubrovna: It is wonderful when we do
Adams Dubrovna: Right to our needs
Pia Iger: nods.
Adams Dubrovna: I have missed seeing everyone since I am not getting to a variety of session times these days
Pia Iger: most time, I only go to my own sessions.
Adams Dubrovna: That was a nice thing about summer (Adams thinks wistfully)
Adams Dubrovna: It seems time to move to the Hall
Pia Iger: yes. lets

And we went to the Hall of Appearances where Pema, Syl, Artimisia and Maxine were waiting for us (see next session)