Xanga Post 9: The Nature of Religion and the Religion of Nature

I'm sorry for the lack of posts. It seems that once I get started on updating regularly, something comes up that keeps me busy, or tired, or uninspired. All three of those have happened over the last few days. Just so you know, when I say I'm going to update in a day or two, I really mean that I intend to update in a day or two, as do all people when they say things like that. But in my case, I seem to jinx myself every time. Maybe I should just stop.

I said I was going to continue analyzing the waterfall dreams. I WILL.

..... tomorrow. Because I need a book (a dream dictionary and encyclopedia) to help me argue my points. This book is in another room where there are sleeping people. :/

So I'll come back to that, once again.

Continuing on.....

7.14.2005 __thursday____
When on the highway, I look at the trees that have been cut off from each other by roads, and see the walls that were built around them. But the walls and roads seem like they won't last long at all. Vines and branches of trees are growing over and around.
I feel like climbing over the wall to the other side, under a canopy of trees. But maybe farther down would be more roads, more civilization. Or a cliff....leading to a river below. And keeping an eye out for that one river, I end up thinking that it's on the other side of these man-made walls that line the highways that we take. It could be right there, and I don't know it.
And all the trees seem so animated and alive, somehow. I almost expect them to move without the wind helping. In my head I've come up with my own explanation that these were once mythical beings, like wood nymphs, that have permanently turned to trees while they were dancing, when they saw humans were cutting and building and tearing. Might sound dumb to you, but it makes more sense to me when I don't say it out loud for everyone to hear. It makes sense when it's not written down. Which I have done, so now I'm thinking twice about it.
I don't really know if what I wrote so far has meant anything at all.



For some reason, I fell asleep last night and woke up this morning with this on my mind: What's a Satan worshiper's heaven and hell? If he worships Satan, does heaven even matter to him anymore? But if he's to be punished, what would be his hell? Would it be all the things he hates, combined in one? Because it's not always a place. But what if everything he hates is heaven? Would he be placed in a fake heaven? But...if he was to be punished, would Satan be proud of him? So.. would he automatically go to hell?




don't worry, it's not like i worship satan

I don't.
So I thought about this again, and the answer is obvious to me now: his heaven is his hell, and his hell is his heaven. They are one and the same -- because how can he deserve a "hell," since that would mean he is answering to God instead of to Satan? That's like saying, "Oh no, I did a good deed today...." My point being that it's easier to sin than to do good, most of the time.
Then again, what is sinning to them, and what is good?
So Satan's followers must believe that there's a heaven, since we Catholics/Christians believe that there is a hell. It's just a matter of which "side" you're on, I guess.

All right, that's enough discussion of that. I don't know much about it, and I don't feel like researching on it. It was merely something to think about that always ends with me greatly appreciating my religion, as I like to do.

I did a lot of imagining when I was younger, sitting in the back of the van and staring out the window. I pretended that rolling hills were the backs of hibernating dinosaurs and if you dug into them with backhoes and such, they were killed. I also listened to the different sound that the car would make when the wheels go over concrete sections; it sounded like a shrieking dragon in the distance.
So when I had these waterfall dreams, I always tried to look for it. When driving on the highway, I would look at the tops of trees as if I could recognize them in a split second. I never did, but I always told myself to look for them. Sometimes, I was so sure I saw something I knew that I wished we would pull over on the shoulder so that I could climb over the wall and see for myself. I would go to sleep reminding myself to pay attention to the foliage above my head if I happened to dream of standing on the ledge by the waterfall, but I could never remember.
And one day, I stopped actively searching. If I do it now, it's more of an afterthought.

As for the "mythical beings, like wood nymphs"....man, that does sound dumb. But hear (read...?) me out.
Think of them as Pan's Labyrinth-type creatures, or those of Greek mythology, frozen like Dr. Who's weeping angels, with movements as slow as the Ents of Tolkien. Someone's always watching them, or around them, so they can't move. They only way they can move when we look at them is if the wind is passing through. And wild trees are different from those that we grow and plant, lined up as soldiers or guards ready to serve.

The image in my head of what nature looks like and how it really works eventually leads to the thought of the inevitability of ruins. It's going to happen.
Think about how much effort is put into the maintenance of local roads, highways, buildings, and landscapes. I love to see plants growing over the walls and rails of highways; sometimes, it's simply a wall of green. Seeing abandoned buildings overrun by overgrown grass and vines, or little trees growing in gutters of dilapidated structures is more intimidating. If plants can break rocks so delicately, they'll have no trouble in squeezing through crevices between bricks where old mortar crumbled away. Nature poses a constant battle against us and will one day claim the planet again. We'll be gone, and we'll be covered up and forgotten.

< / The Happening >

jk I watched like 3 minutes of that movie and then decided to watch the newest episode of Community instead.