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Chris Duel

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You Are Star Stuff

September 25, 2016 by Chris Duel Leave a Comment

You Are Star Stuff

 

A little reminder from the late astronomer Carl Sagan…

“The surface of the Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean. On this shore, we’ve learned most of what we know. Recently, we’ve waded a little way out, maybe ankle-deep, and the water seems inviting. Some part of our being knows this is where we came from. We long to return, and we can, because the cosmos is also within us. We’re made of star stuff. We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.”

  • Carl Sagan, Cosmos

 

 

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Filed Under: Cosmos, Life, Soul, Spirit, Uncategorized, Wisdom Tagged With: Carl Sagan, Sagan, Star, Star Stuff, Stars

The Summer of Our Discontent

July 8, 2016 by Chris Duel 4 Comments

 

American Summer 2016

American Summer 2016

How do we make sense of the senseless?

Beheadings and car bombs on the other side of the world.

Civilian “soft targets,” from Paris to Brussels to Istanbul, suicide bombed by “martyrs” in the name of their God.

A slaughter in an Orlando nightclub.

Over 2,000 gun deaths in Chicago this year.

Cell phone video of highly questionable shootings of African Americans.

And now, the ambush and assassination of Dallas Police officers during an otherwise peaceful protest.

Ironically, this most recent national tragedy occurred very close to Dealey Plaza, the site of America’s most notorious assassination.

How do we make sense of the senseless? 

We cannot.

But there are things we can do.

We can affect our own individual spheres of influence. 

Our family, friends, neighbors and communities.

It starts small.  It starts organically.  It starts with you.  And it grows.

We can choose reason over insanity.

We can choose light over darkness.

We can choose love over fear.

We can increase the peace. 

In our communities, in our state, in our nation, in our world.

The good people in this world vastly outnumber the misguided, vicious ones.

I am convinced that in the end, love wins.

We just need to consciously, actively intend the light and the love a little more.

 

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Filed Under: America, Blood, Crisis, Fear, grief, Love, Opportunity, Prayers, Shadow, Uncategorized Tagged With: America, Dallas, Dallas Police, Dallas Shooting, Fear, Love, Tragedy

“The Love You Take Is Equal To The Love You Make”

June 19, 2016 by Chris Duel 1 Comment

With Alan Weinkrantz at the 2014 KLRN Auction

With Alan Weinkrantz at the 2014 KLRN Auction – June 21, 2014

Last night, in the blink of an eye, my friend Alan Weinkrantz left this world.

He was sitting down to dinner in an outdoor sidewalk cafe on a beautiful, starry June night.

I saw the news of his death appear on my iPhone around 9:30pm while I was participating in the final night of the KLRN Auction, raising funds for San Antonio’s PBS television station.  Seconds later, KLRN VP Katrina Kehoe walked down the stairs from her position coordinating auction activities.  I could see by the look of shock on her face that she had just read the news as well.  We couldn’t wrap our heads around the notion that Alan was gone.

Alan volunteered for the KLRN Auction every year.  He would probably have been with us last night if he were not in Israel, where he traveled frequently to participate in the country’s growing tech community.

When I read that Alan died at a Tel Aviv sidewalk cafe, my first thought was that an act of terror must have taken place. This was not terrorism, however, but a very tragic accident.

Reports indicate that as Alan was having dinner, a man had a heart attack while driving his car at a high rate of speed.  The out of control vehicle instantaneously jumped the curb and slammed into the tables of the outdoor cafe.

Alan, another restaurant patron and the driver were killed at the scene.  Six others were injured.

Alan was a wonderful man who exuded joy and enthusiasm.  He was an evangelist and mentor for the tech and start up communities in San Antonio, in Israel and around the world.

He had a passion for technology, innovation, entrepreneurship and music.  We shared a love for The Beatles and had wonderful conversations about the brilliance of their songs.

One of the most mind expanding ideas that Alan shared with me was that rock and roll music is code, akin to the code that is used to program computer software and apps.

Alan Weinkrantz's 1005 Faces photo

Alan Weinkrantz’s 1005 Faces photo

As Alan said in this interview,

The idea began during I period when I was spending a lot of time at a good friend’s high-end guitar shop in San Antonio. Being surrounded by music all the time I started studying the history of rock n’ roll. And then it hit me.

It’s all code.

I went back in time, listening to old albums from the Kinks, the Who, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones. I realized that all the albums, the songs, the lyrics — they’re code. The code isn’t manifested as “lines of code” but rather in the stories built, layered and played.

If you look at the way musical history progressed, it seems each band was creating a new experience for their audience — not just musically but, story wise. We’re talking about their narrative, where they came from, how they got famous, their clothes, their sound and the overall experience which is just as important as the music itself — if not more.

Just like startups.

And just like startups, Rock & roll bands, work together iteratively. Collaboratively. And hopefully, harmonically.

I will always remember Alan for his contagious sense of wonder and his passion for big ideas. He mentored people of all ages seeking to find their path in a complex digital world, including me.

I trust he’s now in Rock and Roll Heaven, making music, creating code and embarking on his next cosmic adventures.

In the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.  – The Beatles

Beatles fan Alan Weinkrantz on Abbey Road

Beatles fan Alan Weinkrantz on Abbey Road

 

Learn more about Alan in this story by Bob Rivard in his Rivard Report.

Alan's Facebook Cover Photo - His laptop at a sidewalk cafe

Alan’s Facebook cover photo – His laptop at a sidewalk cafe

Above:  Alan’s Facebook cover photo.  His Mac at night at an outdoor cafe with the words, “Do Something That Matters.”

Perfect.

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Filed Under: Cosmos, grief, Heaven, Life, Love, Music, Solstice, Soul, Spirit, Uncategorized, Wisdom Tagged With: Alan Weinkrantz, Beatles, Israel, KLRN, San Antonio, Tel Aviv, The Beatles, Weinkrantz

My Little Time Machine

January 1, 2016 by Chris Duel 1 Comment

My Little Time Machine

My Little Time Machine

 

A package I ordered from Amazon arrived at my doorstep yesterday afternoon, on the final day of the year.

It is a machine that scans and digitizes old photographic slides and negatives.

This little device, no larger than the size of a softball, may as well be a time machine because it drew me back into a world that only exists as distant memories in my mind.

A lifetime of old, dusty slides and negatives from the pre-digital era have followed me through life in shoe boxes and tattered envelopes. Luckily, I’ve had the good sense to hold onto them all of these years.

Many of these images had not been seen by human eyes in over five decades.

Until now.

As I placed them into the scanner, long lost family images suddenly flickered onto my computer screen with crisp, vibrant color and focus. I was transported back to my childhood, to a time before life became complicated and dear loved ones passed on much too soon.

In a flash, it’s the first Christmas I am aware of and I am sitting in front of a silvery Christmas tree as white morning light streams through the window.

I see the faces of my three sisters as children in the early Sixties, just as I remember them when I first arrived on this Earth.

I’m being held by my father on an Arizona highway as a toddler. He would pass on when I was four years old, but on this sunny day all is perfect in my little world.

My mother holds me close to her cheek. She is 37 and I’m not yet a year old.

I’m pushed in a stroller by my mother as my sister Beth holds my hand.  It must be 1961 in this moment.

After an evening of time travel, I awakened into a new day and a new year.

It’s 2016.

How time flies.

When I was much younger, I remember adults telling me that the older you get, the faster time seems to fly by.  The days, the weeks, the months, the years seem to whisk past faster than when you were younger.

When I first heard this, I figured it was just another odd thing that older people muse about.  It didn’t make much sense to me.

Now I’m one of those older people.  And it turns out they were right. The longer we live, the faster time seems to accelerate.

It’s nice to have a time machine.

To see those young faces. Some of them we haven’t seen in years.

To see that tiny being you used to be.

To recall the love, the innocence, the joy of life as you first felt it as a child.

That love, that innocence, that joy never goes away. It is the magic of this wondrous journey through life that is truly eternal. It is still there in the recesses of our memory.

It’s still a thought away.

It’s still a breath away.

Inexorably following us through time.

The First Christmas I Was Aware Of

The First Christmas I Was Aware Of

 

My sisters Kathy, Beth and Rosemary - Early Sixties

My sisters Kathy, Beth and Rosemary – Early Sixties

 

With my father Frank - Arizona, 1961

With my father Frank – Arizona, 1961

 

Held by my mother - 1960

Held by my mother – 1960

 

Going for a stroll with my mother Katherine and my sister Beth, 1961

Going for a stroll with my mother Katherine and my sister Beth, 1961

 

 

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Filed Under: Christmas, Dreams, Life, Love, Miracles, Soul, Spirit, Thought, Uncategorized Tagged With: Chris Duel, Sixties, Time, Time Machine, Time Travel

Music of The Spheres

December 30, 2015 by Chris Duel Leave a Comment

Listen...

Listen…

 

At night if you’re silent enough

…if you’re centered enough

…if you’re open enough

you can hear

the music of the spheres

 

Spheres, Muses, Angels

singing, whispering their secrets

 

The secrets you’ve known

for ten thousand years

but had forgotten

until just now

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Filed Under: Cosmos, Heaven, Miracles, Moon, Music, Silence, Soul, Spirit, Uncategorized, Winter, Wisdom Tagged With: Listen, Music, Music of The Spheres, Silence

Another Dying Friend

September 9, 2015 by Chris Duel 5 Comments

Tracy Frost

Tracy Frost

 

(In memory of Tracy Frost)

 

Every time it happens

We remind ourselves

That life

Is so fragile

So fleeting

We took this friend

For granted

So we resolve

To appreciate

To revere

To affirm

To celebrate

The amazing friends

In our life

Until…

We slip back

Into the trance

And forget

That all of this

Is a miracle

Until…

The next friend dies

And we remind ourselves

All over again

And again

And again

Until that dying friend

Is finally you

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Filed Under: Uncategorized

In Contemplation of Tonight’s Full Moon

July 1, 2015 by Chris Duel 1 Comment

Full Moon

 

Sometimes the New Year or the Mid Year or the Full Moon whispers to you that your time is now. And like the year and the Moon, your days are full, but waning.

Perhaps now is the time to become more of the person you came here to be.

I wrote these words last night, as we moved into the midpoint of the year, in contemplation of the Full Moon and how it can symbolize not only the progression of our year, but of our lives.

Birth.

Growth.

Fullness.

Waning.

Death.

(Followed by Rebirth)

The fullness of the year, the fullness of the Moon and the fullness of your life is right now.

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Filed Under: Moon, Opportunity, Silence, Soul, Spirit, Uncategorized, Wisdom Tagged With: Full Moon, Moon, Whispers

Love More, Fear Less

June 27, 2015 by Chris Duel Leave a Comment

Love More, Fear Less

 

Love More.

Fear Less.

Laugh Often.

Breathe Consciously.

Forgive Everyone. 

 

(that is all)

 

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Filed Under: Love, Soul, Spirit, Thought, Uncategorized, Wisdom Tagged With: Breathe, Fear, Forgive, Laugh, Love

Fifty Father’s Days Without My Father

June 21, 2015 by Chris Duel 3 Comments

My Father, Frank

 

My father died in February of 1965. He was 42 years old and I was four. I was his youngest of five children.

I never knew him when I was an adult and I barely knew him past the age of three, as he served in Vietnam during the last year of his life.

Vietnam was my father’s second war, having flown B-17 bombers over Europe in World War II.  He would later tell my mother and older siblings how the war haunted him and how he grieved for the prodigious loss of life that he witnessed and participated in.

Because I was so young when he died, I only have a handful of actual memories of my father.

I have the one item he wrote directly to me. It is 22 words inscribed in pencil on the back of a photograph he had kept in his wallet.  It is one of five photos of his children that my father carried with him on his journey to and through Vietnam.

The photo is of his youngest son as he knew me in the last year of his life.

 

My Father's Message to Me

 

On the back he wrote,

“Kip,” You and your sisters and brother have been on the other side of the world – I love you son. Dad.”

More than 50 years later, I am touched that our father would carry photos of his children with him in a far away war.

How could he have known his son would treasure the message half a century later?

His words, “on the other side of the world,” have both the literal meaning he intended and a cosmic meaning now that he is indeed somewhere on the other side of this existence.

My brother and a sister have since joined him there.

As will I one day.

Until then, I carry the photo and those words with me, as he once did.

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Filed Under: Feeling, grief, Heaven, Love, Solstice, Soul, Spirit, Uncategorized Tagged With: Chris Duel, Father, Father's Day, Heaven, Love, Soul, Spirit

Let’s Wake Up, See The Divinity In Everyone & Break Bread

December 12, 2014 by Chris Duel Leave a Comment

WakeUpBannerPic2014

* ( This is a two-part blog: first, a post I made on Facebook, and then the idea of a wise friend who has chosen to bring people together )

First, my post…

 

Are we, as a people, asleep at the wheel?

Are we sleepwalking through our lives?

Our nation is so divisive these days.

We believe the dogma we identify with and demonize the other side.

For the most part, I’ve followed the lead of evolved human beings like my dear friend Gabe Quintanilla, who have decided not to talk about politics on Facebook, because it becomes so ugly so fast.

Yet I’m torn.

If people of conscience keep their mouths shut, then no evolution takes place.

Yet, when we speak, we are often drawn into the toxic, negative vibration.

I have dear friends on the left and on the right.

But the extreme (and well funded) political forces on the left and the right benefit from our demonizing each other.

We are better than this.

Let’s be human beings.

Let’s be conscious.

Let’s be open.

Ultimately, we want the same things… the best situation, the best culture, the best country, the best world we can co-create.

We can have different philosophies.

But that doesn’t make me an enemy of you, nor you an enemy of me.

We’re brothers and sisters.

We’re children of God and Goddess.

See the divinity in everyone.

Let’s start there.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

Now, Part Two…

Postscript:

My friend Gabe Quintanilla read the above post on Facebook and responded with this:

“This is one of the best posts that I have ever read on Facebook–written by my buddy, Chris Duel–it inspired me to throw out an idea…would anyone here or on Chris’ wall be interested in forming a lunch group that would meet once a month? Everyone invited–both the political left and right–just as a way of breaking bread–getting to know each other better–on a human level as opposed to just a viral FB friendship? If anyone is interested–let me know…”

Gabe got reaction…

 

  • Louise Locker Absolutely. Count me in.
  • Anita Naugle Yes!
  • Steve Walker I can take photos too.!
  • Susie Garcia I’m in!
  • Anna L. Stephens amen !
  • Gordon Weidman Yes.
  • Martha R Umanzor love the way you explain. your comments.
  • Jessica Bernstein Sure. Sounds like fun.
  • Chris Duel Gabe, I learned a long time ago that it is wise to follow your lead. I’m in. Wonderful idea.
  • Patricia Doria-Moreno I would love to! What a GREAT idea! Let us break bread and come together as one all in the Spirit of showing love and respect towards one another. Your an inspiration Gabe!
  • Carol Reager Hale This sounds so cool.
  • Judyjane Witte Would love to…count me and hubby in!!
  • Susan Banta Farris @Chris Duel…..what a wonderful idea. We all need to learn how to disagree agreeably again. The world would not be so interesting if we all thought the same things.
  • Charlie Parker Good Idea…
  • Fran Bickley Gabe Quintanilla, thank you for sharing Chris Duel‘s excellent piece. Your lunch idea is great. Please count me in.
  • Laura Marie So well said Chris! thanks for re-posting this Gabe. It’s true, we shouldn’t be silent about things that matter and we should be reminded to raise the level of our discussion rather than the volume of our voices. i keep hoping that our leaders will lead the way but, it’s us! We have to do it.
  • Kort Jackson I might be interested.
  • Cordelia L. Ramon Si.
  • Gary Hull Excellent idea. As a group you are an intelligent, well spoken and honest group. San Antonio needs social groups dedicated to the promotion of cultural and intellectual awareness.
  • Patricia Gonzales Santos Sounds like a great idea!
  • JaLa Ellen Hefner-Hill Fantastic idea! I would love to join!
  • Kimberly Bush Ummmm…yes. Very much.
  • Denise Castano Wirth Sure thing! Many of my closest friends swing to the left and yet we get along just fine, but I agree, we need to all come together and just agree to disagree. One thing I can say is that I surround myself with people who would do anything to help other…See More
  • Denise Castano Wirth Chris Duel, excellent post!
  • Dee Villarrubia I’m in, Gabe.
    – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
    So, Gabe Quintanilla has invited you, me and anyone who wants to break bread and have authentic, meaningful, friendly conversations to get together. 
    I hope one day you’ll join us.
    If you’re interested, contact me at chrisduel@gmail.com or via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Carrier Pigeon or however you choose.
    Let’s elevate our dialogue.

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