When I walked upstairs to the mezzanine of the North Market and saw a bunch of LDA folks sitting around a table, it all made sense. I had planned to meet Seattlepoet for lunch after church on Sunday, since she was in town for the weekend, and that was when she said she had time. So I was surprised to see our mutual friends Aikidogirl, Walkingstylebook, and Politicalmom there with her, and lunch turned into a mini-reunion. We all used to work together at Loopiest Developer Around, and I've been out of touch.
We all had some catching up to do: Aikidogirl is returning to technical writing at Huge Ohio Not Draconian Auto; Walkingstylebook and Politicalmom were laid off by ENC, an independent part of OSU that lost its funding; Seattlepoet got a new job working for Bill Gates in the far northwest while applying to an MFA writing program in the far northeast.
It's a small town in a small world. Jack Thunder's name came up a couple of times; my old taiji buddy Herb happened to walk by and say hello. Pretty people walked around the upscale downtown market, and I adjusted to the sight of all that well-heeled, well-dressed, young, old, and middle-aged urban wealth. Like the song says, I don't get around much anymore.
And that's what made this day different. Rather than ducking out after the sermon and the last hymn, I stuck around to talk about the music with Nathan the pianist, about drumming with Barb the newsletter lady, about publishing with Missy from the committee, about future music with Marlene, and then bought an NUUC tee-shirt. That's about a month's worth of after-church socializing for Sven the Reserved.
Then came the unexpected group vibe at lunch, which lasted until 3:00, so I decided to stick around for the 4:00 qigong gathering that happens right next door at Benevolence Cafe once a month, and fortuitously this was the day. Debra and the gang of eight did a familiar form in an unfamiliar way - four times without stopping - that built up a kind of momentum and had a nice centering effect. Then we tried a new exercise our teacher Luke recently introduced called Hanging. It turns out to be very similar to a Basic Movement I learned on day one from Huo Chi-kwang back in 1978, but much slower, more methodical, and more intense. After 20 minutes of hanging, I could feel a lot happening in my lower back (mingmen, gate of life) and might consider doing a hundred-day gong.
I went home and spent a normal evening reading and eating on the patio as the heat slowly faded. But all that unexpected human interaction was a breath of fresh air for this solitary camper. Note to self: Do this again.
Friday, July 29, 2005
Thursday, July 28, 2005
Journalistic blather
Slate on Wednesday quotes Washington Post columnist David Ignatius's assertion that Muslim jihadists aren't impoverished or disenfranchised, just disaffected:
"This is the revolt of the privileged, Islamic version. They have risen so far, so fast in the dizzying culture of the West that they have become enraged, disoriented and vulnerable to manipulation. Their spiritual leader is a Saudi billionaire's son who grew up with big ideas and too much money. He created a new identity for himself as a jihad leader, carrying the banner of a pristine Islam from the days of the Prophet Muhammad. ..."
I find this really interesting so far. But read on, and see how Ignatius gets a bit carried away in his optimistic reading of recent and future history:
"What will stop this revolt of privileged Muslims? One possibility is that it will be checked by the same process that derailed the revolt of the rich kids in America after the 1960s—namely, the counter-revolt of the poor kids. Poor Muslims simply can't afford the rebellion of their wealthy brethren, and the havoc it has brought to the House of Islam. For make no mistake: The people suffering from jihadism are mostly Muslims."
Two questions, Mr. working-class spokeman:
What is the evidence that "the counter-revolt of the poor kids" caused the right-turn in American politics? Was it inner-city blacks that took their MBAs and bought into the Reagan-era myth that a rising tide lifts all boats? It was more likely the suburban Haves who chose to get theirs and screw the poor. Was it impoverished rural whites who took a ride on the Internet bubble in the 90s? More likely it was privileged offspring of the peace-love-justice generation who saw all that as old news and wanted something completely different.
If anything, the underclass was led - by whatever sources of information they give authority - to believe that the material rewards of consumer culture - and by extension the wealth-generating capacity of concentrating resources at the top of the economic pyramid - is their best hope. But I don't call believing the news and advertising you see on TV a counter-revolt. That's the oppressed being in complicity with their oppressors.
Second, what is the evidence that the social conditions that produced a "counter-revolt" in the U.S. now exist or will soon exist in Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Libya, and Sudan? That scenario is a stretch. But it will play well in the living rooms of Amerika, because it trivializes the cultural conflict that U.S.-British colonial policy feeds: there's no fundamental problem between fundamentalist Christians and fundamentalist Muslims, just a few disaffected rich kids with not enough to do (like the tee-shirt that says "Experts agree: Everything is just fine!") And it encourages the rest of us to sit back and wait for this little tantrum to pass so we can get back to the important business of taking over that part of the world and consuming more of its resources. So China doesn't do it first.
"This is the revolt of the privileged, Islamic version. They have risen so far, so fast in the dizzying culture of the West that they have become enraged, disoriented and vulnerable to manipulation. Their spiritual leader is a Saudi billionaire's son who grew up with big ideas and too much money. He created a new identity for himself as a jihad leader, carrying the banner of a pristine Islam from the days of the Prophet Muhammad. ..."
I find this really interesting so far. But read on, and see how Ignatius gets a bit carried away in his optimistic reading of recent and future history:
"What will stop this revolt of privileged Muslims? One possibility is that it will be checked by the same process that derailed the revolt of the rich kids in America after the 1960s—namely, the counter-revolt of the poor kids. Poor Muslims simply can't afford the rebellion of their wealthy brethren, and the havoc it has brought to the House of Islam. For make no mistake: The people suffering from jihadism are mostly Muslims."
Two questions, Mr. working-class spokeman:
What is the evidence that "the counter-revolt of the poor kids" caused the right-turn in American politics? Was it inner-city blacks that took their MBAs and bought into the Reagan-era myth that a rising tide lifts all boats? It was more likely the suburban Haves who chose to get theirs and screw the poor. Was it impoverished rural whites who took a ride on the Internet bubble in the 90s? More likely it was privileged offspring of the peace-love-justice generation who saw all that as old news and wanted something completely different.
If anything, the underclass was led - by whatever sources of information they give authority - to believe that the material rewards of consumer culture - and by extension the wealth-generating capacity of concentrating resources at the top of the economic pyramid - is their best hope. But I don't call believing the news and advertising you see on TV a counter-revolt. That's the oppressed being in complicity with their oppressors.
Second, what is the evidence that the social conditions that produced a "counter-revolt" in the U.S. now exist or will soon exist in Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Libya, and Sudan? That scenario is a stretch. But it will play well in the living rooms of Amerika, because it trivializes the cultural conflict that U.S.-British colonial policy feeds: there's no fundamental problem between fundamentalist Christians and fundamentalist Muslims, just a few disaffected rich kids with not enough to do (like the tee-shirt that says "Experts agree: Everything is just fine!") And it encourages the rest of us to sit back and wait for this little tantrum to pass so we can get back to the important business of taking over that part of the world and consuming more of its resources. So China doesn't do it first.
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Ambulatory monitoring
For the past 24 hours, I've been wearing a heart monitor strapped around my waist, a little electronic device about the size of a pocket calculator, connected to various parts of my chest by five sticky electrodes. During the round-the-clock data collection, I carried my very own Patient Activity Diary, a remarkable piece of work in which the patient is instructed to record Actions - exercising, eating, drinking, urinating, intercourse, reading about the secret societies Supreme Court nominees belong to, that sort of thing - and Symptoms - feelings of fatigue, light-headedness, calm, excitement, nausea, revulsion, rage, whatever. The technicians will use this information to help interpret the reams of data in my readout. I can't wait to hear the results.
This was just a small part of the fun of my "new patient exam" at the family doctor I had never been to see before. One of the privileges of regular corporate employment, need I say it, is carrying the insurance card that is the ticket to what is widely known as "health care" but in fact is membership in the Consumer-Industrial Complex. Until yesterday I carried the card in my wallet but I wasn't yet a patient, but today I'm in the system, another consumer of health care, and therefore fair game for an array of lucrative health care products and services.
Since I am so new to this particular meat-processing industry, I can only begin to understand the experience in narrative form. You park in front of the impressive new building, show the all-important card, fork over the copay up-front, and fill out a couple of forms. The physician's assistant sees you first, weighs and measures the patient, takes its blood pressure, gives it the standard-issue humiliating multi-colored clown-gown, and hooks up 12 tape-on electrodes to record a quick electrocardiogram. More about that later. Minimal chit-chat, minimal explanation. Don't talk, just sit quietly and nobody gets hurt.
The doctor comes in, nice to meet you, how are the kids, gee they were in high school when she first saw them, that's just great. Some straightforward questions about family history, any special concerns, allergies, surgeries, joint problems, exercise habits, do you smoke, do you drink, and what does your wife want you to check out? I say my wife is more concerned about my mind. The doctor, who is a dead ringer for the actress Jeneane Garafalo, mutters audibly, "Is he being serious?"
The witty and personable doctor sees an atrial flutter she doesn't like in the EKG, so she has the assistant hook you up to the 24-hour heart monitor (remember the cardiac monitor? This is a story about the cardiac monitor) and send you on your way. But not before drawing a couple of vials of dark blood for liver, kidney, prostate, and cholesterol screenings; a Coloscreen kit for stool samples; directions to the radiologist for a chest X-ray; and the names of the gastroenterologists who will be calling soon to set up the colonoscopy. Any questions? Yes, am I free to go now? That at least got a smile out of the surly assistant.
Some part of my brain "knows" abstractly that none of these really simple medical procedures is news to anyone reading this, and to many of you, women in particular and women with children especially, THIS IS NOTHING compared to the poking and prodding and probing you've been through. It's been so easy for so long to keep my distance from doctors that it's a bit of a shock, and now that I'm in the system, I'm sure that trained professional army of health care providers will find plenty of things my over-50 carcass requires.
This was just a small part of the fun of my "new patient exam" at the family doctor I had never been to see before. One of the privileges of regular corporate employment, need I say it, is carrying the insurance card that is the ticket to what is widely known as "health care" but in fact is membership in the Consumer-Industrial Complex. Until yesterday I carried the card in my wallet but I wasn't yet a patient, but today I'm in the system, another consumer of health care, and therefore fair game for an array of lucrative health care products and services.
Since I am so new to this particular meat-processing industry, I can only begin to understand the experience in narrative form. You park in front of the impressive new building, show the all-important card, fork over the copay up-front, and fill out a couple of forms. The physician's assistant sees you first, weighs and measures the patient, takes its blood pressure, gives it the standard-issue humiliating multi-colored clown-gown, and hooks up 12 tape-on electrodes to record a quick electrocardiogram. More about that later. Minimal chit-chat, minimal explanation. Don't talk, just sit quietly and nobody gets hurt.
The doctor comes in, nice to meet you, how are the kids, gee they were in high school when she first saw them, that's just great. Some straightforward questions about family history, any special concerns, allergies, surgeries, joint problems, exercise habits, do you smoke, do you drink, and what does your wife want you to check out? I say my wife is more concerned about my mind. The doctor, who is a dead ringer for the actress Jeneane Garafalo, mutters audibly, "Is he being serious?"
The witty and personable doctor sees an atrial flutter she doesn't like in the EKG, so she has the assistant hook you up to the 24-hour heart monitor (remember the cardiac monitor? This is a story about the cardiac monitor) and send you on your way. But not before drawing a couple of vials of dark blood for liver, kidney, prostate, and cholesterol screenings; a Coloscreen kit for stool samples; directions to the radiologist for a chest X-ray; and the names of the gastroenterologists who will be calling soon to set up the colonoscopy. Any questions? Yes, am I free to go now? That at least got a smile out of the surly assistant.
Some part of my brain "knows" abstractly that none of these really simple medical procedures is news to anyone reading this, and to many of you, women in particular and women with children especially, THIS IS NOTHING compared to the poking and prodding and probing you've been through. It's been so easy for so long to keep my distance from doctors that it's a bit of a shock, and now that I'm in the system, I'm sure that trained professional army of health care providers will find plenty of things my over-50 carcass requires.
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
"We are now satisfied..."
From the people who claim to define 'civilized' society, we have an example that should be instructive to all of us.
From the Sunday, July 24, Cowtown Dispatch:
The rest of us can feel so much safer now, knowing that our upright British allies are indeed getting with the program. The special relationship that has long existed between the two English-speaking racist-imperialist-militarist world powers extends to the shooting of dark-skinned people on the subway whom police observe behaving suspiciously.
Respectable people in the better neighborhoods of London, New York, Los Angeles, Detroit, Chicago, Cincinnati, Calcutta, Johannesburg, Sydney, and Hong Kong - or anywhere superior people bring their superior culture to the benighted 'others' - can rest assured that plainclothes police are out there killing those 'other' people (you know who they are) just in case they might be connected. Then after they've shot them eight times in the head while lying on the ground in the tube station, they can be satisfied that he, in fact, was not connected. (A later report corrected the first official account. They shot him eight times in the head as he lay on the ground.)
Jean Charles de Menezes was a 27-year-old Brazilian electrician who had lived in London for three years. They shot him in the head because he looked suspicious. Note to self: Watch your back.
From the Sunday, July 24, Cowtown Dispatch:
LONDON - The man gunned down Friday by police as he ran onto a London subway train had no connection to last week's terrorist attack, police said yesterday. They called the death "a tragedy."
... "We are now satisfied that he was not connected with the incidents of Thursday," police said in a statement.
... According to the official version of de Menezes' death, police had been watching his apartment block as part of their search for Thursday's would-be bombers. When the man emerged, plainclothes police followed him from Tulse Hill to the Stockwell station in south London.
... The official report simply states: "He was then followed by surveillance officers to the underground station. His clothing and behavior added to their suspicions."
A plainclothes officer shot Menezes five times in the head as he lay on the floor of the subway.
The rest of us can feel so much safer now, knowing that our upright British allies are indeed getting with the program. The special relationship that has long existed between the two English-speaking racist-imperialist-militarist world powers extends to the shooting of dark-skinned people on the subway whom police observe behaving suspiciously.
Respectable people in the better neighborhoods of London, New York, Los Angeles, Detroit, Chicago, Cincinnati, Calcutta, Johannesburg, Sydney, and Hong Kong - or anywhere superior people bring their superior culture to the benighted 'others' - can rest assured that plainclothes police are out there killing those 'other' people (you know who they are) just in case they might be connected. Then after they've shot them eight times in the head while lying on the ground in the tube station, they can be satisfied that he, in fact, was not connected. (A later report corrected the first official account. They shot him eight times in the head as he lay on the ground.)
Jean Charles de Menezes was a 27-year-old Brazilian electrician who had lived in London for three years. They shot him in the head because he looked suspicious. Note to self: Watch your back.
Wednesday, July 20, 2005
A little too much is just enough for me
Epigram attributed to Isadora Duncan, the dancer. Like "moderation in all things, including moderation," this manifesto is a kind of corollary or counterweight to MacKenzie's Laws (see Archives, April) for making you "stronger as you go along" in running or your sport of choice. But I digress. I think Isadora was more interested in the momentary sensation than the long-run consequences.
But the important thing is to keep moving, paraphrasing Anthony Burgess, who said the important thing is to keep writing, which I also firmly believe. So when I obey my own Commandment about cross-training (see Archives, June), and I actually follow through on a grueling day of copyediting and style guide meetings in an air-conditioned office, taiji in the park, hardship after hardship, and go for a jog up the bike trail in a quiet Ohio suburb, I'm practicing what I preach. And living the regulated life, I feel good and righteous about it.
Somehow I think I've veered away from Isadora's version. The way it unfolded the other day...no wait, I really have to go back at least a week to provide the context. I did a "dues-paying run" on Tuesday and felt like hell. (Addendum to MacKenzie's Laws: Some days you feel energized from the get-go, and you can feel a natural rhythm carry you down the trail; other days you never find a rhythm, and you just have to pay your dues and endure.) I probably ran farther or faster than I should have, or took too many days off, or not enough. But because of having run badly on Tuesday, I ran better on Thursday and felt stronger.
For me, at this stage of my somatic/athletic life, this was kind of a breakthrough, so I celebrated with a tall gin and tonic. It's part of the cool-down process: drink water, change clothes, and stretch - preferably while listening to music, in this case Neil Young's "Decades" (greatest hits), the high points being "Old Man" and "Heart of Gold" and "Even Richard Nixon has got soul" and other classics of the earthy-peacenik-rock genre. Then, after the excessively sedentary day, the excessively pushing-the-envelope run, and the excessively euphoric endorphin rush, only then does the double shot of Gordon's gin meet a generous slice of lime and 3-4 ice cubes in a glass tumbler of Canada Dry tonic water. Can you feel the fizz of the carbonation? Can you taste the tang of juniper berry colliding with lime?
A bite to eat and a book complete the evening. In this case it happened to be the remains of a pizza Helga brought home from Grinders, a spinach salad, and the catchy, jaded prose of Carl Hiaason's novel "Basket Case" set appropriately in hot, muggy Miami. A representative morsel: "It's an occupational hazard for obit writers - memorizing the ages at which famous people have expired, and compulsively employing such trivia to track the arc of one's own life - I can't seem to stop myself."
Where am I going with this? Who knows, which is, I guess, the point of surrendering to the momentum of excesses and contradiction. With any luck, the contradictory excesses balance each other out.
But the important thing is to keep moving, paraphrasing Anthony Burgess, who said the important thing is to keep writing, which I also firmly believe. So when I obey my own Commandment about cross-training (see Archives, June), and I actually follow through on a grueling day of copyediting and style guide meetings in an air-conditioned office, taiji in the park, hardship after hardship, and go for a jog up the bike trail in a quiet Ohio suburb, I'm practicing what I preach. And living the regulated life, I feel good and righteous about it.
Somehow I think I've veered away from Isadora's version. The way it unfolded the other day...no wait, I really have to go back at least a week to provide the context. I did a "dues-paying run" on Tuesday and felt like hell. (Addendum to MacKenzie's Laws: Some days you feel energized from the get-go, and you can feel a natural rhythm carry you down the trail; other days you never find a rhythm, and you just have to pay your dues and endure.) I probably ran farther or faster than I should have, or took too many days off, or not enough. But because of having run badly on Tuesday, I ran better on Thursday and felt stronger.
For me, at this stage of my somatic/athletic life, this was kind of a breakthrough, so I celebrated with a tall gin and tonic. It's part of the cool-down process: drink water, change clothes, and stretch - preferably while listening to music, in this case Neil Young's "Decades" (greatest hits), the high points being "Old Man" and "Heart of Gold" and "Even Richard Nixon has got soul" and other classics of the earthy-peacenik-rock genre. Then, after the excessively sedentary day, the excessively pushing-the-envelope run, and the excessively euphoric endorphin rush, only then does the double shot of Gordon's gin meet a generous slice of lime and 3-4 ice cubes in a glass tumbler of Canada Dry tonic water. Can you feel the fizz of the carbonation? Can you taste the tang of juniper berry colliding with lime?
A bite to eat and a book complete the evening. In this case it happened to be the remains of a pizza Helga brought home from Grinders, a spinach salad, and the catchy, jaded prose of Carl Hiaason's novel "Basket Case" set appropriately in hot, muggy Miami. A representative morsel: "It's an occupational hazard for obit writers - memorizing the ages at which famous people have expired, and compulsively employing such trivia to track the arc of one's own life - I can't seem to stop myself."
Where am I going with this? Who knows, which is, I guess, the point of surrendering to the momentum of excesses and contradiction. With any luck, the contradictory excesses balance each other out.
Monday, July 18, 2005
Recycadelic
The plum-colored Buick Riviera was parked behind the garage when I got home from church, but I didn't know it was Hallie until I walked in the back door and found her in the kitchen with Gven tearing into the ceiling. Voluptuous is not too strong a word. Big blue eyes, big smile, big blond hair, low-cut tank top, knows how to hang drywall, you get the picture. They're in a book group together with eight other suburban women who like to read fiction, drink wine, and talk. Now they're talking spackle and wiring and vents in their own female carpentry language, so I say hello, sounds good, and go outside to work on my own project, the fence of many colors.
Where I left off the day before, the posts and cross-members were in place all the way down the south side, where the improvisational builder (homo faber ignoramus) had determined the front yard ends and the back yard begins, therefore the fence turns a corner toward the side of the house. Two more posts for a gate, one right next to the house, and we're there, enclosed and complete, for now. All the salvaged or scavenged materials are ready to be put in place and become a fence made from scratch. Not a professional job, by any standard, not very straight, somewhat irregular and probably impermanent, but a serviceable fence around our humble yard. And you can't beat the price.
Did I mention that a miracle occurred on Friday? I saw a pile of lumber behind a storage barn next to the bike trail, so I went up there Friday morning. An older man happened to drive up in his little convertible just as I was walking in. I asked him if the barn was his (yes), did he know about the pile of lumber beside it (yes), and did he have any use for it (no, take all you want). So I helped myself to a bunch of cosmetically flawed but plenty strong fence posts and took them to their new home. There were also a couple of good, long 2x4s in the scrap pile, which would also come in handy.
Meanwhile back at the shack, I'm removing nails from old boards (see previous post, BARGAIN OUTLET), inspecting them for color, grain, texture, wear and tear, sorting them into groups that might look better than random combinations. I don't want to take all day deciding which goes next to which, and I'm open to any happy accidents that turn up. Even as I handle every board and group them roughly by color, it's semi-random which stack I start with. The salvaged boards have few common traits but many inconsistencies and flaws. Which is really okay, because so do the scavenged posts and cross-pieces, and for that matter so do the flower beds, garage, and house this fence will tie together.
I had a dream the other night where I'm working on putting together a kind of puzzle made of nearly identical arrow-shaped pieces that have to line up in a particular way so that their differences are minimized to the point where the eye doesn't see any larger or smaller, heavier or lighter, individual and irregular pieces, only the continuity of the line. It was challenging in the dream to see their differences in such a way as to arrange them to appear undifferentiated.
What made sorting boards tricky was the fact that they changed color each time I moved them. (Disclaimer: no drugs were taken during this experiment; I'd had two cups of coffee, some bread and butter, some water, that's it.) In the filtered light of a central Swing State mid-July afternoon, moving a board from one stack to another could change it from a blotchy light brown to a vivid grainy green, or from a pale solid beige to a vibrant reddish hue. Of course, we all know that the color of any object is a function of the way light hits it in a particular place and time, and the eye picks up that bit of information. Then you go from sun to shadow, turn it sideways, half an hour passes, the light changes and so does the color of the board. There is much I can't control in the assembly of my preciousssss fencccccce.
Clearly I'm getting into the process of handling each 4x4, 2x4, and 1x5 piece of wood thrown together by chance so that I can make something out of (almost) nothing. Maybe the heat is getting to me, even in the shade of the stately white pine trees (pinus strobus), as I toil with hammer and level. Board by board, the fence is taking shape from east to west. I use up the current stack of boards and take a break, only to see that Hallie and Gwen are cutting up a long 2x4 to use 3-foot pieces to frame in, and drywall over, the hole in the kitchen ceiling. That was going to be part of the fence, or so I thought. Note the smoke coming out of my ears as Hallie flashes her big smile and asks if it's okay. "It's done," I reply. Note how attached I had become to the free lumber acquired through divine intervention.
Long story short, I went back to my project reminded of the relative unimportance of what I'm totally absorbed in at the moment. Getting back to work on the nitty-gritty details, digging another hole for the gate post, leveling this stick horizontally and that stick vertically, I'm content to mind my own business and trust that the results hold up.
Where I left off the day before, the posts and cross-members were in place all the way down the south side, where the improvisational builder (homo faber ignoramus) had determined the front yard ends and the back yard begins, therefore the fence turns a corner toward the side of the house. Two more posts for a gate, one right next to the house, and we're there, enclosed and complete, for now. All the salvaged or scavenged materials are ready to be put in place and become a fence made from scratch. Not a professional job, by any standard, not very straight, somewhat irregular and probably impermanent, but a serviceable fence around our humble yard. And you can't beat the price.
Did I mention that a miracle occurred on Friday? I saw a pile of lumber behind a storage barn next to the bike trail, so I went up there Friday morning. An older man happened to drive up in his little convertible just as I was walking in. I asked him if the barn was his (yes), did he know about the pile of lumber beside it (yes), and did he have any use for it (no, take all you want). So I helped myself to a bunch of cosmetically flawed but plenty strong fence posts and took them to their new home. There were also a couple of good, long 2x4s in the scrap pile, which would also come in handy.
Meanwhile back at the shack, I'm removing nails from old boards (see previous post, BARGAIN OUTLET), inspecting them for color, grain, texture, wear and tear, sorting them into groups that might look better than random combinations. I don't want to take all day deciding which goes next to which, and I'm open to any happy accidents that turn up. Even as I handle every board and group them roughly by color, it's semi-random which stack I start with. The salvaged boards have few common traits but many inconsistencies and flaws. Which is really okay, because so do the scavenged posts and cross-pieces, and for that matter so do the flower beds, garage, and house this fence will tie together.
I had a dream the other night where I'm working on putting together a kind of puzzle made of nearly identical arrow-shaped pieces that have to line up in a particular way so that their differences are minimized to the point where the eye doesn't see any larger or smaller, heavier or lighter, individual and irregular pieces, only the continuity of the line. It was challenging in the dream to see their differences in such a way as to arrange them to appear undifferentiated.
What made sorting boards tricky was the fact that they changed color each time I moved them. (Disclaimer: no drugs were taken during this experiment; I'd had two cups of coffee, some bread and butter, some water, that's it.) In the filtered light of a central Swing State mid-July afternoon, moving a board from one stack to another could change it from a blotchy light brown to a vivid grainy green, or from a pale solid beige to a vibrant reddish hue. Of course, we all know that the color of any object is a function of the way light hits it in a particular place and time, and the eye picks up that bit of information. Then you go from sun to shadow, turn it sideways, half an hour passes, the light changes and so does the color of the board. There is much I can't control in the assembly of my preciousssss fencccccce.
Clearly I'm getting into the process of handling each 4x4, 2x4, and 1x5 piece of wood thrown together by chance so that I can make something out of (almost) nothing. Maybe the heat is getting to me, even in the shade of the stately white pine trees (pinus strobus), as I toil with hammer and level. Board by board, the fence is taking shape from east to west. I use up the current stack of boards and take a break, only to see that Hallie and Gwen are cutting up a long 2x4 to use 3-foot pieces to frame in, and drywall over, the hole in the kitchen ceiling. That was going to be part of the fence, or so I thought. Note the smoke coming out of my ears as Hallie flashes her big smile and asks if it's okay. "It's done," I reply. Note how attached I had become to the free lumber acquired through divine intervention.
Long story short, I went back to my project reminded of the relative unimportance of what I'm totally absorbed in at the moment. Getting back to work on the nitty-gritty details, digging another hole for the gate post, leveling this stick horizontally and that stick vertically, I'm content to mind my own business and trust that the results hold up.
Thursday, July 14, 2005
BARGAIN OUTLET!
Despairing of ever finding enough free fence materials through divine intervention, I did the next best thing and went to Grossman's Bargain Outlet.
I expected to find a limited selection of dog-earned fencing in a standard size in a run-down lumber yard with no service, for slightly less money than the shiny suburban shopping experience with the helpful folks at Home Despot. What I found was "We don't have any, and we're not getting any more" from a pock-marked salesman out back. What, no 1x6 fencing until next year? "Oh, except some damaged stuff, already nailed together, you can have those for $15 a panel." Mark indicated the pile of discarded wood in the back corner of the lot. I did the math...even if 3 of the 18 boards on each panel are broken, I'll get the rest for $1 each instead of the $1.50 they cost at HD. I told Mark I'd sort through the stack and take the least-damaged ones. He said okay.
Mid-morning and it was already hot in the lot, but I've got all day and all it's costing me is labor, which some people spend good money for at their local gym. I'm actually making these rationalizations as I hoist the 6'x8' panels, inspect the wear and tear, separate the wheat from the chaff. Turns out they're all pretty much the same, a couple of slightly split or bent ends on each panel, so I set aside all but one of the panels and told salesman Mark I'd give him $10 a panel, 10 panels. Deal. He and his hulking assistant, high school John, shuffled out to the back lot and loaded my hand-picked fencing materials into the back of Hank the truck. I also bought a new hammer.
Drive slowly up a scenic section of West Methodistville Road and unload in back of Om Shanty by the woodpile, and by now I'm getting a first-rate upper-body workout on my second-rate upper body. For the next couple of hours, I pulled a pile of nails and pried 180 dog-eared boards from their 2x3 cross-pieces (3 per panel = 30, stacked neatly in the woodshed, though I have no idea what I'm going to do with them). After tossing aside a few seriously broken boards (kindling), I ended up with 176 1x6s that are usable. That comes to about 57 cents apiece, but who's counting? Of those, 24 were badly bent or split on one end, so I cut them a foot shorter. They became the 10 feet of 5-foot fence, a transitional section between the 4-foot fence back by the garden and the 6-foot privacy fence up by the patio.
By the end of the day, I've got a minor blister on my hammer hand from pulling how many nails? And a mild case of frustration from the unevenness of the overall crude construction, but the fence was a step closer to completion. By the end of the next day, two more sections of 6-foot fence was standing - not straight, not color-matched, sometimes gappy, but standing - and I have to admit a certain satisfaction with making something out of (almost) nothing.
I expected to find a limited selection of dog-earned fencing in a standard size in a run-down lumber yard with no service, for slightly less money than the shiny suburban shopping experience with the helpful folks at Home Despot. What I found was "We don't have any, and we're not getting any more" from a pock-marked salesman out back. What, no 1x6 fencing until next year? "Oh, except some damaged stuff, already nailed together, you can have those for $15 a panel." Mark indicated the pile of discarded wood in the back corner of the lot. I did the math...even if 3 of the 18 boards on each panel are broken, I'll get the rest for $1 each instead of the $1.50 they cost at HD. I told Mark I'd sort through the stack and take the least-damaged ones. He said okay.
Mid-morning and it was already hot in the lot, but I've got all day and all it's costing me is labor, which some people spend good money for at their local gym. I'm actually making these rationalizations as I hoist the 6'x8' panels, inspect the wear and tear, separate the wheat from the chaff. Turns out they're all pretty much the same, a couple of slightly split or bent ends on each panel, so I set aside all but one of the panels and told salesman Mark I'd give him $10 a panel, 10 panels. Deal. He and his hulking assistant, high school John, shuffled out to the back lot and loaded my hand-picked fencing materials into the back of Hank the truck. I also bought a new hammer.
Drive slowly up a scenic section of West Methodistville Road and unload in back of Om Shanty by the woodpile, and by now I'm getting a first-rate upper-body workout on my second-rate upper body. For the next couple of hours, I pulled a pile of nails and pried 180 dog-eared boards from their 2x3 cross-pieces (3 per panel = 30, stacked neatly in the woodshed, though I have no idea what I'm going to do with them). After tossing aside a few seriously broken boards (kindling), I ended up with 176 1x6s that are usable. That comes to about 57 cents apiece, but who's counting? Of those, 24 were badly bent or split on one end, so I cut them a foot shorter. They became the 10 feet of 5-foot fence, a transitional section between the 4-foot fence back by the garden and the 6-foot privacy fence up by the patio.
By the end of the day, I've got a minor blister on my hammer hand from pulling how many nails? And a mild case of frustration from the unevenness of the overall crude construction, but the fence was a step closer to completion. By the end of the next day, two more sections of 6-foot fence was standing - not straight, not color-matched, sometimes gappy, but standing - and I have to admit a certain satisfaction with making something out of (almost) nothing.
Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Roll over, Rover
"I think the way to be most helpful is to not get into commenting on it while it is an ongoing investigation." Thank you, Scott McClellan, mouthpiece of the mouthpiece of the Cheney administration.
And while we're refusing to comment on our refusal to comment on the leak from the elliptical office itself, let's make this a perpetually ongoing investigation, you know, kind of like the perpetual war President Cheney and his dog Rover started, so that the Enabling Act (oops, that was 1933) I mean Patriot Act, suspending the Constitution, can become a permanent fixture of nouveau fascism. But the white house can't comment on that either, because there's an ongoing investigation into it, which makes us all feel safe.
Safe knowing that the epicenter of policy making in Washington blew the cover of its own espionage agent in a fit of retaliation against another agent whose investigation into Iraqi weapons came up with the wrong conclusion, i.e. NOT the information Rover wanted. So let's take a break, Rover. Resign now for personal reasons, let's say, to spend more time with your family, or something cute and adorable that will play well with your base.
But I wouldn't expect Bush to "fire" his boss any more than I would fire Terry McGraw or Derek Jeter would fire George Steinbrenner. I'm picturing Cheney deep in the bowels of his life-support system, tick, tick, tick, confidently biding his time until all this blows over, telling whoever objects to to go f*#k himself. While upstairs in the briefing room, press secretary McClellan says it would be more helpful to not comment.
And while we're refusing to comment on our refusal to comment on the leak from the elliptical office itself, let's make this a perpetually ongoing investigation, you know, kind of like the perpetual war President Cheney and his dog Rover started, so that the Enabling Act (oops, that was 1933) I mean Patriot Act, suspending the Constitution, can become a permanent fixture of nouveau fascism. But the white house can't comment on that either, because there's an ongoing investigation into it, which makes us all feel safe.
Safe knowing that the epicenter of policy making in Washington blew the cover of its own espionage agent in a fit of retaliation against another agent whose investigation into Iraqi weapons came up with the wrong conclusion, i.e. NOT the information Rover wanted. So let's take a break, Rover. Resign now for personal reasons, let's say, to spend more time with your family, or something cute and adorable that will play well with your base.
But I wouldn't expect Bush to "fire" his boss any more than I would fire Terry McGraw or Derek Jeter would fire George Steinbrenner. I'm picturing Cheney deep in the bowels of his life-support system, tick, tick, tick, confidently biding his time until all this blows over, telling whoever objects to to go f*#k himself. While upstairs in the briefing room, press secretary McClellan says it would be more helpful to not comment.
Tuesday, July 12, 2005
Remember John Peter Zenger
The arrest of Judith Miller of the New York Times is yet another desperate attempt by yet another repressive colonialist regime to turn back the clock 270 years and deny the existence of a free press. Think Pravda. Think Greece under the Generals (the movie 'Z'). Think New York, c. 1734.
The American Vision has a nice little feature on John Peter Zenger's arrest in 1734 for printing articles critical of the British royal governor of the American colonies. Zenger's lawyer argued that only a press that is free to criticize the government could prevent that government from abusing its power, and after eight months in prison, Zenger was found not guilty of libel. Zenger is universally celebrated as a hero in the history of freedom of the press later guaranteed by the First Amendment. Until now.
While the circumstances of Miller's refusal to reveal her sources are different from Zenger's refusal to muzzle his criticism of the arbitrary rule of British tyrants, the journalistic principles and constitutional issues are the same. In reporting (or even NOT reporting?) the White House leak of Valarie Plame's identity as a CIA agent, following Plame's husband's outing of the Bush administration's lies justifying the war on Iraq, Miller apparently has pissed off the war makers who were caught in their own fabrications. She has committed the terrible crime of keeping her promise to an anonymous source.
If reporters were forced to reveal their sources of information, informants would clam up, sources would dry up, and reporters would be left with the official government account of official government business, which anyone can see on Fox, CNN, CBS, NBC, or ABC anytime. The information just wouldn't get out, exactly as federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald and his bosses want it. (Let's watch for his upcoming appointment as a federal judge. He'll get a sure confirmation vote from Senator Katherine Harris of Florida, another good team player.)
"Journalists are not entitled to promise complete confidentiality," Fitzgerald said, "no one in America is."
Fair warning from the top: there is no such thing as confidentiality, fool. Anyone can be forced to reveal anything at any time. Miller said, "If journalists cannot be trusted to keep confidences, then journalists cannot function, and there cannot be a free press."
Now every mainstream editorial page is paying lip service to their high-minded solidarity with Miller and the NYT, and most of them will continue to bootlick the official sources and print their official version in the official language of the official white house press release. With NPR safely under self-censorship and reporters being jailed for protecting sources, totalitarian control of public information is closing in by closing off the independent news outlets.
Call me an alarmist. Correct my factual inaccuracies and exaggerations. Then tell me with a straight face that the First Amendment isn't systematically being erased while we all watch other stuff on the nightly network infotainment.
The American Vision has a nice little feature on John Peter Zenger's arrest in 1734 for printing articles critical of the British royal governor of the American colonies. Zenger's lawyer argued that only a press that is free to criticize the government could prevent that government from abusing its power, and after eight months in prison, Zenger was found not guilty of libel. Zenger is universally celebrated as a hero in the history of freedom of the press later guaranteed by the First Amendment. Until now.
While the circumstances of Miller's refusal to reveal her sources are different from Zenger's refusal to muzzle his criticism of the arbitrary rule of British tyrants, the journalistic principles and constitutional issues are the same. In reporting (or even NOT reporting?) the White House leak of Valarie Plame's identity as a CIA agent, following Plame's husband's outing of the Bush administration's lies justifying the war on Iraq, Miller apparently has pissed off the war makers who were caught in their own fabrications. She has committed the terrible crime of keeping her promise to an anonymous source.
If reporters were forced to reveal their sources of information, informants would clam up, sources would dry up, and reporters would be left with the official government account of official government business, which anyone can see on Fox, CNN, CBS, NBC, or ABC anytime. The information just wouldn't get out, exactly as federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald and his bosses want it. (Let's watch for his upcoming appointment as a federal judge. He'll get a sure confirmation vote from Senator Katherine Harris of Florida, another good team player.)
"Journalists are not entitled to promise complete confidentiality," Fitzgerald said, "no one in America is."
Fair warning from the top: there is no such thing as confidentiality, fool. Anyone can be forced to reveal anything at any time. Miller said, "If journalists cannot be trusted to keep confidences, then journalists cannot function, and there cannot be a free press."
Now every mainstream editorial page is paying lip service to their high-minded solidarity with Miller and the NYT, and most of them will continue to bootlick the official sources and print their official version in the official language of the official white house press release. With NPR safely under self-censorship and reporters being jailed for protecting sources, totalitarian control of public information is closing in by closing off the independent news outlets.
Call me an alarmist. Correct my factual inaccuracies and exaggerations. Then tell me with a straight face that the First Amendment isn't systematically being erased while we all watch other stuff on the nightly network infotainment.
Friday, July 08, 2005
Neighborly
The fence is about half-done on the south side of the yard. I've been stacking the posts and rails of the old split-rail fence on our side as I take it down and replace it section-by-section with recycled posts, 2x4s, and barn siding. The old fence was ON the property line, so no one was sure who it belonged to. The new fence is a few inches inside the line. It's my fence.
When Gven and I were heading out the back door to start cleaning out the garage, we saw our neighbor Bill and his brother Alan in Bill's yard surveying the damage. I went over and asked Bill if he wanted the old pieces of fence, since I had no use for them. Alan jumped right in and said they would be just right for his next-foor neighbor Jim Bob to extend his rail fence from the front yard to the back. Deal. I tossed the old rails and posts over the new fence for them to do with what they wanted. Jim Bob came right over and helped Bill and Alan take apart the remaining rail fence and load the lot of them into Bill's truck to transfer around the corner to Jim Bob's yard.
Gven and I returned to our task of sorting and rearranging stuff we've been storing in our second garage (future workshop). She designated several boxes of stuff as give-aways (clothes, kitchen implements) and several other items as throw-aways (old desk and stereo), and several more as keepers (Jess and Helga's clothes, books, and childhood art). Gaven took the give-aways to the Brethren College Thrift Store, I hauled the throw-aways out to the curb, and we cleared some space among the stored boxes.
Later that evening, as I relaxed on the patio with a Michael Chabon book and a gin and tonic, Brian, another neighbor, dropped by the borrow back his weed whacker and invite us to his and Amy's house for a cookout on the Fourth. All of Amy's tribe of extended family would be there, they would grill and provide drinks, we could bring a side dish and libation if we wanted. We noncommittally said it sounded like fun.
Come Monday, the West Methodistville parade kind of took over. Gven's yoga buddies at the Factory launched a spur-of-the-moment plan to march in the parade, and I offered the use of Hank the truck, so I got up and gave Hank a bath. We went down State Street to the starting line past throngs of townspeople lining the parade route eight-deep in places and found our place in line between middle school cheerleaders and the Ted Strickland for Governor campaign. The crew of yoga teachers pounded the pavement in the midday heat for the two hours it took to parade about two miles, while I rode the clutch in first gear and spotted a few familiar faces in the crowd. They passed out a ton of fliers, answered a ton of questions (yes, yoga, right here in West Methodistville), and no doubt it was great advertising.
We retreated to Om Shanty for the duration. Helga got home from Grinders and went to a friend's backyard cookout. Gven and I ended up watching the fireworks from the patio through the pine trees - a brot, a gin and tonic, and thou.
When Gven and I were heading out the back door to start cleaning out the garage, we saw our neighbor Bill and his brother Alan in Bill's yard surveying the damage. I went over and asked Bill if he wanted the old pieces of fence, since I had no use for them. Alan jumped right in and said they would be just right for his next-foor neighbor Jim Bob to extend his rail fence from the front yard to the back. Deal. I tossed the old rails and posts over the new fence for them to do with what they wanted. Jim Bob came right over and helped Bill and Alan take apart the remaining rail fence and load the lot of them into Bill's truck to transfer around the corner to Jim Bob's yard.
Gven and I returned to our task of sorting and rearranging stuff we've been storing in our second garage (future workshop). She designated several boxes of stuff as give-aways (clothes, kitchen implements) and several other items as throw-aways (old desk and stereo), and several more as keepers (Jess and Helga's clothes, books, and childhood art). Gaven took the give-aways to the Brethren College Thrift Store, I hauled the throw-aways out to the curb, and we cleared some space among the stored boxes.
Later that evening, as I relaxed on the patio with a Michael Chabon book and a gin and tonic, Brian, another neighbor, dropped by the borrow back his weed whacker and invite us to his and Amy's house for a cookout on the Fourth. All of Amy's tribe of extended family would be there, they would grill and provide drinks, we could bring a side dish and libation if we wanted. We noncommittally said it sounded like fun.
Come Monday, the West Methodistville parade kind of took over. Gven's yoga buddies at the Factory launched a spur-of-the-moment plan to march in the parade, and I offered the use of Hank the truck, so I got up and gave Hank a bath. We went down State Street to the starting line past throngs of townspeople lining the parade route eight-deep in places and found our place in line between middle school cheerleaders and the Ted Strickland for Governor campaign. The crew of yoga teachers pounded the pavement in the midday heat for the two hours it took to parade about two miles, while I rode the clutch in first gear and spotted a few familiar faces in the crowd. They passed out a ton of fliers, answered a ton of questions (yes, yoga, right here in West Methodistville), and no doubt it was great advertising.
We retreated to Om Shanty for the duration. Helga got home from Grinders and went to a friend's backyard cookout. Gven and I ended up watching the fireworks from the patio through the pine trees - a brot, a gin and tonic, and thou.
Thursday, July 07, 2005
On Cheney
Robert Scheer has a short, forceful account of the making of recent and current U.S. foreign and domestic policy. Check it out:
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20041108&s=scheer1026
Calvin Trillin also contributed a little poem in The Nation (July 4 issue):
When rockets fly and battle smoke is thick,
It's good to hear from "Four Deferments Dick."
He's always sure. He knows what warfare is--
Enough to know it's not for him or his.
Insurgents somehow, though they're in the throes,
Kill more GIs--but no one Cheney knows.
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20041108&s=scheer1026
Calvin Trillin also contributed a little poem in The Nation (July 4 issue):
When rockets fly and battle smoke is thick,
It's good to hear from "Four Deferments Dick."
He's always sure. He knows what warfare is--
Enough to know it's not for him or his.
Insurgents somehow, though they're in the throes,
Kill more GIs--but no one Cheney knows.
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
Brem
When I was just a sprout, back when middle school was "junior high," I had a friend called Brem who, among other things, was Bill Medley to my Bobby Hatfield. That's right, aging Boomers and guilty oldies radio listeners, the Righteous Brothers. We would belt out their hits, to the annoyance of our teammates, in the shower room at Blue Collar Junior High in Westside, Michigan, after practice for whatever sport was in season - football (halfback/quarterback), basketball (forward/guard), track (high jumper/half-miler). We both wore blue and gold letter jackets with a B on the front, even though there was no varsity club in junior high school. In the summer we played softball (left field/second base) in the rec. league. We knew the same girls (cheerleaders, natch), rode our bikes with the same gang of budding delinquents, and we both had Mr. Gutman for social studies.
You may recall Mr. Gutman from a previous post - a memorable and influential teacher who loved his work. Well, it was my phone conversation with Mr. Gutman that prompted a long-shot subscription to classmates.com that, lo and behold and saints be praised, landed a hit. Brem was listed, and he answered my e-mail. Tentatively at first, probably wondering if I was selling insurance or looking for a date or a loan. The last time I saw him was the summer I transferred to Michigan, when I was still excited about college, and he was not. I remember him talking about taking the police academy entrance exam, and I thought, oh no.
So, 34 years later, I get a blast from the past from the desk of Sgt. Jack Bremenhoffer (name changed to protect me), Crime Scene Unit, Westside Police Department. We exchanged a few brief catch-up notes. Brief by my verbose standards, anyway. My first one ran nine paragraphs: school here, school there, moved here, moved there, met Gven, two kids, taught here, taught there, moved to the suburbs, edit textbooks. His self-disclosures, while less wordy, have been poignant. All-league in football, no scholarships; went to NMU, learned how to drink, not to study; took the civil service test and the job; had a great time single, met wife at work; played softball until this year, shoulder surgery, knee surgery, osteoarthritis, two kids, college to pay for. The next exchange told me about the mutual friend (and best man at his wedding) who moved to Chicago, the one who got heavily into drugs, and the one who came back from Vietnam and joined the Zulus motorcycle club. I remember him riding his brother's 650 Triumph around their back yard when he wasn't on his ten-speed.
Which brought it all back to where I started. My call to Mr. Gutman had been prompted by a question in my Wednesday night men's group about mentors, and Brem's back-story addressed another men's group question about street gangs, prompted by a Dispatch column wherein "Teenagers join gangs because it gives them a sense of belonging and group identity....They feel they belong because they share the excitement, symbols and rituals of the gange, are accepted as insiders and believe they really care for each other." Something resonated.
Forgive me, Brem, if you'd rather I didn't disclose all this, but we did have kind of a gang mentality - tame and suburban, but in the same spirit. And we all went our separate ways, so I won't be surprised if Sgt. Bremenhoffer doesn't become a constant e-mail correspondent. But I also wonder whether a beer and a ballgame would bridge at least some of those changes. Not sure.
You may recall Mr. Gutman from a previous post - a memorable and influential teacher who loved his work. Well, it was my phone conversation with Mr. Gutman that prompted a long-shot subscription to classmates.com that, lo and behold and saints be praised, landed a hit. Brem was listed, and he answered my e-mail. Tentatively at first, probably wondering if I was selling insurance or looking for a date or a loan. The last time I saw him was the summer I transferred to Michigan, when I was still excited about college, and he was not. I remember him talking about taking the police academy entrance exam, and I thought, oh no.
So, 34 years later, I get a blast from the past from the desk of Sgt. Jack Bremenhoffer (name changed to protect me), Crime Scene Unit, Westside Police Department. We exchanged a few brief catch-up notes. Brief by my verbose standards, anyway. My first one ran nine paragraphs: school here, school there, moved here, moved there, met Gven, two kids, taught here, taught there, moved to the suburbs, edit textbooks. His self-disclosures, while less wordy, have been poignant. All-league in football, no scholarships; went to NMU, learned how to drink, not to study; took the civil service test and the job; had a great time single, met wife at work; played softball until this year, shoulder surgery, knee surgery, osteoarthritis, two kids, college to pay for. The next exchange told me about the mutual friend (and best man at his wedding) who moved to Chicago, the one who got heavily into drugs, and the one who came back from Vietnam and joined the Zulus motorcycle club. I remember him riding his brother's 650 Triumph around their back yard when he wasn't on his ten-speed.
Which brought it all back to where I started. My call to Mr. Gutman had been prompted by a question in my Wednesday night men's group about mentors, and Brem's back-story addressed another men's group question about street gangs, prompted by a Dispatch column wherein "Teenagers join gangs because it gives them a sense of belonging and group identity....They feel they belong because they share the excitement, symbols and rituals of the gange, are accepted as insiders and believe they really care for each other." Something resonated.
Forgive me, Brem, if you'd rather I didn't disclose all this, but we did have kind of a gang mentality - tame and suburban, but in the same spirit. And we all went our separate ways, so I won't be surprised if Sgt. Bremenhoffer doesn't become a constant e-mail correspondent. But I also wonder whether a beer and a ballgame would bridge at least some of those changes. Not sure.
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