Oh, MH, I'm sorry that I have been remiss about posting. The problem is mechanical or ergonomic or something that has to do with equipment and environment. I'm down to using my desktop and it's in a room that's cold and my chair gives me a stiff neck. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whose fault is that? Oh well.
Anyway, I do not have an actual Ipod, but I do have and love a Sony Walkman MP3. I chose it because I wanted something with an FM tuner. It holds only 3.5 gigs, even though it's sold as having a 4-gig capacity, but for me that's not a problem.
What's on it TODAY is a playlist I call "mood alterers", which includes some inspirational things and some miscellaneous tracks that always get to me in some way. A few make me weepy, and a few make me move. A weepy one would be "I Believe" sung by Barbra Streisand, and a mover would be "Walkin' in Memphis" by Marc Cohn. Thanks to Mycokerewards, I have recently downloaded a whole album called "Don't Quit" by Jake the body guy, but I haven't really listened to it yet. I'm thinking it's mostly high energy tracks that will motivate me to really, really move. If someone finds me collapsed on a leisure trail, blame it on Jake.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Elections have consequences.
Elections have consequences. How many times have we in the USA heard that about our own ballot box choices? And now in Gaza we see the bloody reality of the Palestinian elevation of Hamas several years ago. Of course the suffering and loss are terrible. To say that is to understate the destruction and the waste. Of course western countries, who are not getting the full effect of what the Arab street is seeing on all-carnage-all-the-time-blame-the-godless-dirty-Jew-infidels-and-their-Western-friends Al Jazeera, don't know the extent of the suffering. However, even the brief comments I've heard from English Al Jazeera on NPR are enough to convince me that what is happening is horrific.
This morning I heard a plea for context, and it included an abbreviated chronology of the provocations and responses from both Israel and Palestine since Israel was formed in the 1940's. It really didn't help. Yes, the carnage is beyond disturbing and tragic, especially among the youngest victims, babies and children. And my heart goes out to any mother who has to hold a dead infant in her arms. I have done that, and it was in a safe amd quiet funeral home, not a rubbled and noisy street. It was still enough to threaten my will to go on.
But who is giving Hamas the power to use their children and elderly as shields against the Israelis who have seen carnage too? Who thinks that the elimination of an entire ethnic group will somehow benefit them? The Bush administration was dismayed when Hamas was chosen by the Palestinian people over Fatah in January 2006. The ensuing Bush plan seems to have been to choke off Hamas in Gaza by making life ever more difficult with checkpoints and border closings to show the Palestinians the error of their "free and democratic" choice. And now we see Middle East "democracy" evolving with behind-the-scenes nudging from Egypt and Saudi Arabia and the USA. And Iran. With Chinese-made weapons.
However, This is what my hero Alexander Hamilton and other founders of the USA feared: That uneducated and poorly informed rabble would too easily be led to choose demagogic leadership even over their own self-interest. We cannot have security and order in the absence of an educated public and free access to information. There is no point to playing at democracy without those game chips. Let that be a lesson to all who think that politics isn't their thing.
This morning I heard a plea for context, and it included an abbreviated chronology of the provocations and responses from both Israel and Palestine since Israel was formed in the 1940's. It really didn't help. Yes, the carnage is beyond disturbing and tragic, especially among the youngest victims, babies and children. And my heart goes out to any mother who has to hold a dead infant in her arms. I have done that, and it was in a safe amd quiet funeral home, not a rubbled and noisy street. It was still enough to threaten my will to go on.
But who is giving Hamas the power to use their children and elderly as shields against the Israelis who have seen carnage too? Who thinks that the elimination of an entire ethnic group will somehow benefit them? The Bush administration was dismayed when Hamas was chosen by the Palestinian people over Fatah in January 2006. The ensuing Bush plan seems to have been to choke off Hamas in Gaza by making life ever more difficult with checkpoints and border closings to show the Palestinians the error of their "free and democratic" choice. And now we see Middle East "democracy" evolving with behind-the-scenes nudging from Egypt and Saudi Arabia and the USA. And Iran. With Chinese-made weapons.
However, This is what my hero Alexander Hamilton and other founders of the USA feared: That uneducated and poorly informed rabble would too easily be led to choose demagogic leadership even over their own self-interest. We cannot have security and order in the absence of an educated public and free access to information. There is no point to playing at democracy without those game chips. Let that be a lesson to all who think that politics isn't their thing.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Groovin'
The other day a person named Scott, whom I don't know but who is on a list-serv I follow, asked "How do you people stay so positive?" This particular list-serv involves some pretty heavy and uphill issues that are part of many of the participants' personal lives. Anyway, I hardly ever respond to this group but did this time and was happy that some others did too. Given the probable numbers of human beings involved though, it's a little like seeing a flower growing in an interstate asphalt crack. But maybe more people are thinking about responding than actually did. That's an optimistic possibility that I can live with.
How did I become an optimist? It's not in my nature. I am a dark brooding Celt, and I have many real things to brood about, like almost everybody I know. This hasn't been a very successful week, and I could write about that, but my camellias are in bloom and there have been a lot of blue skies and beautiful views from the bridges to the mainland, and I'd rather think about those things than about how to express the missteps and disappointments.
I feel as though I may have found a groove that works for me, where I'm comfortable just being me and where setbacks are tolerable and met with a sort of Desiderata-like understanding of the path I'm walking. Possibly the sense of inner comfort is coming from the knowledge that I have more time behind me than ahead. It's sort of along the lines that even if I'm on a wrong path, I won't have long to walk it.
My father was a late-groover too, I think. Somehow I always knew that he was concerned about the security of our family, but I don't think I realized that he might be making choices based on what he saw as his responsibilities. After my brother and I were grown is when he intensified activities that were probably always part of who he was. He was elected President of UAW Local 153 in Teterboro, NJ, not known for automotive plants, but for aviation plants. There were death threats. Unions can be tough. My father used to carry on such loud dialogues with his shaving mirror that my mother worried what the neighbors were thinking. My father stood his ground. It was as though no one could do anything to him that would be worse than losing faith in what he understood as his path.
I understand that faith. Maybe that's why I'm a late-groovin' optimist.
How did I become an optimist? It's not in my nature. I am a dark brooding Celt, and I have many real things to brood about, like almost everybody I know. This hasn't been a very successful week, and I could write about that, but my camellias are in bloom and there have been a lot of blue skies and beautiful views from the bridges to the mainland, and I'd rather think about those things than about how to express the missteps and disappointments.
I feel as though I may have found a groove that works for me, where I'm comfortable just being me and where setbacks are tolerable and met with a sort of Desiderata-like understanding of the path I'm walking. Possibly the sense of inner comfort is coming from the knowledge that I have more time behind me than ahead. It's sort of along the lines that even if I'm on a wrong path, I won't have long to walk it.
My father was a late-groover too, I think. Somehow I always knew that he was concerned about the security of our family, but I don't think I realized that he might be making choices based on what he saw as his responsibilities. After my brother and I were grown is when he intensified activities that were probably always part of who he was. He was elected President of UAW Local 153 in Teterboro, NJ, not known for automotive plants, but for aviation plants. There were death threats. Unions can be tough. My father used to carry on such loud dialogues with his shaving mirror that my mother worried what the neighbors were thinking. My father stood his ground. It was as though no one could do anything to him that would be worse than losing faith in what he understood as his path.
I understand that faith. Maybe that's why I'm a late-groovin' optimist.
Thursday, January 1, 2009
How is this all going to work out?
How is this all going to work out? After we're dead, I mean. Really. Like everybody else I've heard the claims that we (Christians) will have new bodies and will see Jesus face-to-face and will have eternity with our loved ones. And many of us even believe we'll be escorted across the Rainbow Bridge by the beloved pets who wait for us.
But honestly, I'm having doubts. I haven't really wanted to dwell on the logistics of heaven, and I kind of liked the way the young murder victim in The Lovely Bones experienced it. She had some interaction with other embodied souls but the way I remember it is that it was her choice as to whether she wanted to be with someone or not.
What has brought me to this place NOW, and I truly mean no disrespect to the deceased is that someone who peripherally touched my life years ago died on Christmas Day. I read her obituary and was angry. Not listed among those having preceded her in death was a grandchild who died in 1992, a grandchild who carries her last name. I know this because I am the child's other grandmother and the mother of his mother, also deceased. I read about the deceased's eleven loving grandchildren and her daughters and her son, who fathered my second grandson and who has gone on with his new life and his new wife Phonita despite having left a trail of wreckage and sorrow in his drunken past. So I'm wondering how this family reunion will play out. Notice I'm assuming that all will be welcomed into heaven and that this woman is up there with my daughter and my grandson.
And since I believe I come from one of the world's most dysfunctional families, going way back, I'm thinking that I might prefer a cloistered spot in heaven to making nice with people who have been destructive to put it mildly. I wish them no ill, but I'd prefer to avoid them in heaven just as I have reserved the right to absent myself from them in this life. On the other hand, if this is one of those grand cosmic dilemmas where one has to choose between getting along with everyone and going to hell, well, kicking and screaming, I'll be nice to the other grandmother, God rest her soul.
But honestly, I'm having doubts. I haven't really wanted to dwell on the logistics of heaven, and I kind of liked the way the young murder victim in The Lovely Bones experienced it. She had some interaction with other embodied souls but the way I remember it is that it was her choice as to whether she wanted to be with someone or not.
What has brought me to this place NOW, and I truly mean no disrespect to the deceased is that someone who peripherally touched my life years ago died on Christmas Day. I read her obituary and was angry. Not listed among those having preceded her in death was a grandchild who died in 1992, a grandchild who carries her last name. I know this because I am the child's other grandmother and the mother of his mother, also deceased. I read about the deceased's eleven loving grandchildren and her daughters and her son, who fathered my second grandson and who has gone on with his new life and his new wife Phonita despite having left a trail of wreckage and sorrow in his drunken past. So I'm wondering how this family reunion will play out. Notice I'm assuming that all will be welcomed into heaven and that this woman is up there with my daughter and my grandson.
And since I believe I come from one of the world's most dysfunctional families, going way back, I'm thinking that I might prefer a cloistered spot in heaven to making nice with people who have been destructive to put it mildly. I wish them no ill, but I'd prefer to avoid them in heaven just as I have reserved the right to absent myself from them in this life. On the other hand, if this is one of those grand cosmic dilemmas where one has to choose between getting along with everyone and going to hell, well, kicking and screaming, I'll be nice to the other grandmother, God rest her soul.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Anthem for 2008
I used to rule the world
Seas would rise when I gave the word.
Now in the morning I sleep alone
Sweep the streets I used to own.
I used to roll the dice
Feel the fear in my enemies' eyes
Listen as the crowd would sing
"Now the old king is dead! Long live the King!"
One minute I held the key
Next the walls were closed on me
And I discovered that my castles stand
Upon pillars of salt and pillars of sand.
I hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror, my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field.
For some reason I can't explain
Once you'd gone, there was never, never an honest word
That was when I ruled the world.
(Ohhh)
It was the wicked and wild wind
Blew down the doors to let me in
Shattered windows and the sound of drums
People couldn't believe what I'd become.
Revolutionaries wait
For my head on a silver plate
Just a puppet on a lonely string
Oh who would ever want to be King?
I hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing.
Be my mirror, my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can't explain
I know Saint Peter won't call my name
Never an honest word
And that was when I ruled the world.
(Ohhhh Ohhh Ohhh)
Hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can't explain
I know Saint Peter won't call my name.
Never an honest word
But that was when I ruled the world.
(Ooooh)
--"Viva La Vida", Coldplay (2008)
Forever, I believe, I will think of 2008 when I hear Coldplay's "Viva La Vida." It's not only that I heard it in so many places at so many memorable times after it was released this year, it's also that to me the lyrics say so much about the will-o'-the-wisp, fleeting nature of success, which seemed to me to be a theme for the past twelve months, although really for longer. Honestly, I saw it coming when the equities entertainment sector was a leading success in early 2007. I suspicioned then that there were too many people playing and too few working, that a lot of the wealth we enjoyed was in our heads, that the U.S. might not be invincible. But I didn't envision the global wreckage. My worst case scenario was that the U.S. dollar would end up like early 2000's Argentinian scrip, and I soothed myself by saying "Well, smarter and richer people than I will never let that happen." Well, we came way too close! And we're not anywhere near home-free yet. In the end, what's true is that nothing is guaranteed, that the mighty fall, that anything can happen, that no one is so smart or so rich that they can outrun "death and all his friends."
So yesterday while I was in the frozen food aisle at Publix I found myself tearing up when "Viva La Vida" came on. I weep for my country and for how far we've fallen and for fear that we may not make the climb back up, that my grandchildren and their children might not know what we were for a while. While most of us never even dreamed of ruling the world, we enjoyed shouting "U.S.A.! U.S.A.!" and being seen around the world as winners. But things change. And they have always changed. Some around the world are desperately praying for change that rescues them. May what is needed to benefit them, benefit us too.
For some people, the reference to a leader's downfall is all about George W. Bush and his cronies, but for me it's bigger and smaller too. Big fish in the biggest pond and little fish in a bowl have all felt the shift underfoot, some proportionate to the risks they took and some not. I think that's the point. Life comes with no guarantees. May we recover and be a more hopeful, grateful people, less identified with our stuff and our power, and more concerned with our effects on the world.
"Just because [we're] losing, doesn't mean [we're] lost". More lyrics from Coldplay. Maybe an anthem for 2009.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Good morning, Joe!
"You know, you have such a stunningly superficial knowledge of what went on that it's almost embarrassing to listen to you." Another Morning Joe moment where I sit straight up. This time it's Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski giving Joe Scarborough an assessment of his analysis about what is happening today in Gaza and what preceded it. While I am interested in the discussion because I myself have only superficial knowledge of this subject, I am distracted by the interpersonal stuff that I imagine is fueling the smoking moment and by what seems to me to be an unusual skirmish between unequals. Sitting beside Scarborough and across from her father was Mika Brzezinski, who frequently is talked over and interrupted by Scarborough. Was this really about Israel and Hamas, or was it about a father who knew he had the power to deliver a small but very public comeuppance to someone who regularly disses his daughter and anyone else he feels like dissing? Who knows.
It would be nice to think that all in powerful positions, regardless of the situation, would be big enough to avoid putting others down on purpose. When pigs apply their own lipstick! Personally, I was happy to see someone, anyone, call Scarborough on the dearth of actual information that is hidden behind what I see as his big-mouth dominance. On the other hand, I think that Mika Brzezkinski was a bit diminished by her father's interventon in her conflict with Morning Joe, if that is what in fact was going on. Whatever was really happening, I wasn't at all surprised to see Scarborough change Dr Zbig's statement to a more personal assessment, along the lines of "you are superficial" rather than "your knowledge is superficial" as he reacted (and did so more than once). When Dr. Zbig said later that Scarborough should not be so thin-skinned, perhaps he was telling us something about why Scarborough left his politician position and became a sideline commentator.
Anyway, it was a moment and to me it was more significant than whatever the interpersonal dynamics might have been. It was a bigger statement about the level of information that is available on cable news, whether it favors the left or the right. "Superficial" describes the snapshot sound-bite reporting and ensuing analysis which many of us consume far too regularly and which I have already spent far to much time bemoaning on this and other blogs.
I do like "Morning Joe" though, and it woke me up today.
It would be nice to think that all in powerful positions, regardless of the situation, would be big enough to avoid putting others down on purpose. When pigs apply their own lipstick! Personally, I was happy to see someone, anyone, call Scarborough on the dearth of actual information that is hidden behind what I see as his big-mouth dominance. On the other hand, I think that Mika Brzezkinski was a bit diminished by her father's interventon in her conflict with Morning Joe, if that is what in fact was going on. Whatever was really happening, I wasn't at all surprised to see Scarborough change Dr Zbig's statement to a more personal assessment, along the lines of "you are superficial" rather than "your knowledge is superficial" as he reacted (and did so more than once). When Dr. Zbig said later that Scarborough should not be so thin-skinned, perhaps he was telling us something about why Scarborough left his politician position and became a sideline commentator.
Anyway, it was a moment and to me it was more significant than whatever the interpersonal dynamics might have been. It was a bigger statement about the level of information that is available on cable news, whether it favors the left or the right. "Superficial" describes the snapshot sound-bite reporting and ensuing analysis which many of us consume far too regularly and which I have already spent far to much time bemoaning on this and other blogs.
I do like "Morning Joe" though, and it woke me up today.
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Made it!
So now it's Saturday morning, two days after Christmas 2008, and I am thanking God that He answered my prayer to help me remain sane throughout the festivities. I did really well, if I do say so myself. And I enjoyed a lovely Christmas Day at home as well as some time beforehand in Atlanta, with my little Czar Nicholas aka Saint Nicholas aka my treasured grandson, who turned four on December 21. The older I grow, the more I have in common with him. There are times when in each of our cases a nap is clearly needed. I find too that my feelings are more transparent than they used to be, and of course his have always been right out there. We are both easily distracted, although I may be regressing at a pace incompatible with his development, because this year one of my favorite gifts was some handpainted wrapping paper by Artist Nicholas, where he now appreciates more what's inside the wrapping. I, however, do not run around the house, crashing and banging, and I am never threatened with a time-out. And I am allowed to drink alcohol.
To all who didn't quite make it through without making a scene or witnessing one, may I say "turn the page, fuhgeddaboudit, and you're only human." Also "to forgive is divine."
To all who tried really hard to make a contribution to a wonderful Christmas, whether they were successful or not, may I offer appreciation and gratitude. The world needs you, at least you showed up, and I cherish every person who makes an effort.
To all who didn't quite make it through without making a scene or witnessing one, may I say "turn the page, fuhgeddaboudit, and you're only human." Also "to forgive is divine."
To all who tried really hard to make a contribution to a wonderful Christmas, whether they were successful or not, may I offer appreciation and gratitude. The world needs you, at least you showed up, and I cherish every person who makes an effort.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)