Quotes from Malcolm Margolin

The next time it begins to rain ... lie down on your belly, nestle your chin into the grass, and get a frog's-eye view of how raindrops fall . . . The sight of hundreds of blades of grass bowing down and popping back up like piano keys strikes me as one of the merriest sights in the world.

And I wonder---if everything's connected, does that mean that everything can be manipulated and controlled centrally by those who know how to pull strings. . . .

For as we stretch & strain to look through the various windows into the past, we do not merely see a bygone people hunting, fishing, painting their bodies, & dancing their dances. If we look long enough, if we dwell on their joy, fear, & reverence, we may in the end catch glimpses of almost forgotten aspects of our own selves.

Her father is dead. . . . Now she must never mention his name again. No one will ever mention his name. She must try not to think about him. He is dead.

The Ohlones seem to have lived at a time and in a spiritual place before the imagination was cast away and isolated from 'mainstream' consciousness. Since dreams were real, when an animal-god appeared in the hollows of the dream mind, it was not mere illusion: it was divine revelation.

The spiritual power sought by the Ohlones was not the pure, abstract kind of power such as modern religions offer. . . . In addition to its good qualities, it had erratic and often malevolent aspects as well.