Letters
• From a Beachhead Founder - Bill
Olive
• Open Letter to Nancy Pelosi -
Terence Pearce
• The Lighted Way - Ron
Lowe
From a Beachhead
Founder
Dear
Beachhead,
I have just had lunch today
(in a pub in Suffolk, England) with my old mate Mick Flaum who I emigrated to
Canada and then on to California with in 1966. Mick still lives in Santa Monica.
When we were talking he showed me an article about the death of John
Haag.
This brought back amazing
memories for me, of my time in Venice. What a time to be there in late
1967-70.
I was lucky to be involved
with John, his ex-wife Anna and the start of the Beachhead (circa 1968). I lived
with Anna (Haag) and her kids, Thomas and Duanna, until I came back to the UK in
May 1970. I designed the original ‘logo’ for the paper, which when I
look at it now seems a little crude, but was in keeping with the time. I was
also lucky enough to do the version in 1969 that was based on the Iwo Jima
image.
I was working in a place in
Venice called the ‘Earth Rose,’ run by Steve Rose (poet), on the
boardwalk. There were a bunch of us there, but only two of us used to actually
live there. I was silk screen printing my own art, together with a Canadian
silversmith named Davic Knox. We used to get massive aggravation from....in
those days.....’the pigs’, because the ‘City’ ....LA
were trying to ‘clean’ the area up from Hippies, Blacks, Mexican
Americans, Bongo Players, Surfers, Old Jewish people who had survived the
concentration camps....in fact anyone who was not a
WASP.
Good luck with the work you are
doing.
All the best, Bill
Olive
**************
Open
Letter to Nancy Pelosi
Ms.
Pelosi,
I and all my friends and family
are horrified that you should condemn Pete Stark’s honesty on the floor of
the house when he contrasted the failure of legislation to give healthcare to
poorer children against the massive waste of Iraq. It was unbelievably
refreshing to hear the uncensored truth from a Democrat, but having been
uplifted by his courage, our hopes were then dashed to the floor by your
criticism of his candor.
You know very
well that his words were not at all "inappropriate" as you so tepidly stated. It
is not at all inappropriate that, in the face of millions of American children
being denied healthcare, and some dying as a result, he should contrast that
with the incredible feeding frenzy of the corporations and their pals in
government around the trough of Iraq & the suffering of troops, their
families and countless Iraqis. Was any statement ever more appropriate!!? This
isn’t some university group debating political abstracts here, children
are dying in the ‘Good ol’ USA’ from neglect! Five thousand
American families are in mourning and at least one million Iraqis are
dead!
Now, with an election coming up
whose importance cannot be overstated, you have chosen to reinforce the public
perception that ‘Democrats are spineless’. Let me tell you that that
is undoubtedly my perception too when looking at the party in general and it is
not an illusion. People like Pete Stark & John Conyers should be leading the
charge for you, not being pilloried by their own side; shame on you. These are
the True Patriots, those willing to tell the truth regardless of the cost to
themselves.
As a father trying to
teach my children fundamental values I am so disgusted that it is hard to
articulate. Please, please, start telling the truth too, if not out of true
moral courage then simply out of cold political expediency to safeguard your own
position and to win an election. The American people are not jaded Washington
sophisticates; they do not think in terms of ‘appropriate’ or
‘inappropriate’, we are way beyond that. They will think about your
words in terms of courage and candor or cowardice and subterfuge and, if spoken
from truth, will celebrate them wherever or whenever you speak them. Help put
America in a position of moral leadership in this world for, like it or not,
without America’s participation, we are heading for much worse than has
already come to pass,
Sincerely,
Terence
Pearce
************
The
Lighted Way
A dear friend died
recently and this letter is dedicated to her. She knew all this and had a
peaceful passing.
People fail to relate
death and sleep. Death is a longer interval from the physical plane than is
sleep; one "goes abroad" for a longer period of time in the death
experience.
Death is essentially a
matter of consciousness. We are conscious one moment on the physical plane, and
a moment later we have withdrawn onto another plane and are actively conscious
there.
There is no death, there is only
a release of the physical body and entrance into a fuller life and higher state
of consciousness.
You have reached a
plateau of comfort. Things are OK, but you intuit there is more. No doubt you
have worked on yourself; you have meditated, affirmed, visualized, wired two
crystals to your nose, stuffed alfalfa sprouts in your ears, jogged around the
block and kissed Swami on the toe. But still, the glorious energy of higher
consciousness and bliss eludes you. What goes? Still the mind and get rid of
negative thoughts running around in your head. Remain in the present moment,
which contains all past and future
moments.
Possessions are becoming
progressively burdensome and wasteful and therefore
obsolete.
Good communication is as
stimulating as black coffee.
Think of
all the beauty around you and be
happy.
Soulmates are compatible on all
levels; physical, emotional, mental and
spiritual.
Charity is the voluntary
giving of one’s wealth or labor to another in
need.
Slow down the movie that is
playing inside your head.
In the movie
Star Wars, Luke Skywalker’s adventure begins when a beam of light shoots
out of the robot R2D2 and projects a miniature three-dimensional image of
Princess Leia. This image is a hologram. A hologram is a specially constructed
image which, when illuminated by a laser beam seems eerily suspended in three
dimensional space. The most incredible feature of a hologram is that any piece
of it, if illuminated with coherent light, provides an image of the entire
hologram. The information of the whole is contained in the
part.
We must understand that a totally
new society is coming into being, one that rejects our old values, conditions,
responses, attitudes and
institutions.
Our inner goals and
strivings create a sort of magnet which attracts the outer
possibilities.
Pure thought has the
power to resist the most harmful
vibrations.
There are still people that
insist there is no life except on earth – billions of galaxies with
billions of planets and no inhabitants. How
preposterous!
Religion you get in a
church. Spirituality you get within
yourself.
Invisible realities exist
beyond physical sight. Thoughts are objects in the invisible world. Anyone want
to say there aren’t thoughts?
"I
quit school when I were sixteen."
We
all know what light is, but it is not that easy to tell what it
is.
You can no more win a war than you
can win an earthquake.
Wishes are
recollections coming from the
future.
Flying saucer phenomena is not
all imaginary. Something really is flying around up there. There is a multitude
of other life in the universe and extraterrestrial civilizations are far in
advance of ours.
The universe is full
of magical things waiting for our vision to grow sensitive enough to see
them.
Creative work is play; it is free
speculation using the materials of one’s
choosing.
Beyond that which you think
is that what you are. All that is needed to find the soul is a change of
viewpoint, which you bring about
yourself.
I love deadlines. I like the
whooshing sound they make as they fly
by.
Reality is nothing but a collective
hunch.
Life is a great big canvas and
you should throw all the paint on it you
can.
Success is the child of
audacity.
Let your work remain a
mystery; just show people the
results.
Ron Lowe
Posted: Sat
- December
1, 2007 at 07:27 PM