Everyone around me seems to be having stronger than normal reactions to the things that are happening around them - not that that's a bad thing - and the weather is changing abruptly from mild indian summer to harsh early winter, which is the nature of fall in central swingstate, after all. It seems like people are feeling especially vulnerable, money being tight, families feeling the pressure, and holidays coming on.
I had an unusually vivid dream last night. Maybe it's the full moon tugging on astral auras, pulling the hopes and fears and anxieties out of everydayness. Or it could be the extra salsa I put in the black bean soup. Freudians, have a field day.
I'm in a big gym, with pickup basketball games going on right and left. I find a special ball on the floor among all the regular balls, and it practically calls out to me with its intense (blue) color, so I pick it up. A tall female player, whom I recognize from somewhere as a really talented athlete, walks up and tells me that's the ball she likes to use, so we start to play. Dribbling up the court, I say, "half-court?" but she says, "full-court," and I say "okay" but stop dribbling, so I have nowhere to go, so I shoot from half-court, and the ball, amazingly, goes in. Before we can continue playing, however, the special ball rolls out the door, and when I go after it, the door closes behind me, locking me out. I wait, and momentarily some guys come out the door, and as I start to go in they question whether I should be allowed in the gym, and whatever it was I said or did, they decided to let me back in.
The scene shifts to a car repair shop where a mechanic is finishing some work on my truck. I drive to a second shop to have the oil changed, but the second mechanic sees something lying on top of the hood, left there by the first mechanic, so he says, "This is from (first repair shop), so it will take two hours." I say "okay" and take two books from the truck to read while I'm waiting. Outside the second shop is a sunny hillside where a group of kids from a prep school are involved in a scavenger hunt, intently checking their lists of items and scouring the hillside to find them. A few of their parents are talking, clustered off to the side by their parked minivans.
My personal coach says its my second chakra expressing its need for the illusion of control. I say it's the full moon.
Thursday, November 17, 2005
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
Zizek!
Christian Moerk's 12 column-inches in Sunday's New York Times got my attention: "The World's Most Unlikely Movie Star" turns out to be a Slovenian critical theorist whose "musings on postmodernism and popular culture - rich in deeply spun allusions to the likes of Alfred Hitchcock and David Lynch - are inspired by the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan." Oh my, how very rich, how deeply spun.
Turns out an intern at Verso Books, which distributes his books, made a film of Slavoj Zizek's 2003-2004 speaking tour, and it's being shown in festivals in Toronto, New York, and "several national dates" (Wexner Center, pay attention). "This is propaganda for nerds," according to Andra Taylor, the filmmaker. "I think it's fantastic to reveal the structures of ideology and challenge people. It's a public service." Call me a dilettante, call me a dabbler, call me a poser, but I had to know more!
So I googled a bibliography of his books at the site of something called The European Graduate School, located in Saas-Fee, Wallis; New York; and Dresden. (Where the heck is Saas-Fee, you ask? It's a little town in the Swiss Alps near the Italian border; Wallis [or Valais] is the canton. Social studies really is fun.) But dig the titles: Organs Without Bodies; Contingency, Hegemony, Universality; and my personal favorite, Enjoy Your Symptom!
A clip from the film "Zizek," as he responds to a question about belief, contains a line attributed to the physicist Niels Bohr: "No, I don't believe in it, but I'm told that it works even if you don't believe in it." You can also view the trailer there and treat yourself to another nugget to chew on: "Philosophy doesn't ask 'Is this true?' Philosophy asks, 'What do you mean when you say this is true?'" If you'll excuse me, I have to go to a style guide meeting, where a group of editors will sit around a table and argue which words should or should not be used, based on how other sources did or didn't use them. It's all quite pragmatic. Kolkata means something, not because it's right or true but because it means something to someone.
If all this seems dry as dust to you, okay, just pass it by. On the other hand, if this kind of discourse on discourse is your meat and potatoes, your rice and beans, your bread and butter, well dig in. This interview, for example, entitled "The one measure of true love is: you can insult the other," might be old news, coming shortly after 9/11, but there are some radical ideas there about tolerance and multiculturalism, for example:
I guess what appeals to me about this kind of thinking is that it breaks out of the 'right-wing vs. left-wing' cliche of telling opposing versions of the same tired story, putting most of us to sleep. Now I think I'll go home and read a spy novel.
Turns out an intern at Verso Books, which distributes his books, made a film of Slavoj Zizek's 2003-2004 speaking tour, and it's being shown in festivals in Toronto, New York, and "several national dates" (Wexner Center, pay attention). "This is propaganda for nerds," according to Andra Taylor, the filmmaker. "I think it's fantastic to reveal the structures of ideology and challenge people. It's a public service." Call me a dilettante, call me a dabbler, call me a poser, but I had to know more!
So I googled a bibliography of his books at the site of something called The European Graduate School, located in Saas-Fee, Wallis; New York; and Dresden. (Where the heck is Saas-Fee, you ask? It's a little town in the Swiss Alps near the Italian border; Wallis [or Valais] is the canton. Social studies really is fun.) But dig the titles: Organs Without Bodies; Contingency, Hegemony, Universality; and my personal favorite, Enjoy Your Symptom!
A clip from the film "Zizek," as he responds to a question about belief, contains a line attributed to the physicist Niels Bohr: "No, I don't believe in it, but I'm told that it works even if you don't believe in it." You can also view the trailer there and treat yourself to another nugget to chew on: "Philosophy doesn't ask 'Is this true?' Philosophy asks, 'What do you mean when you say this is true?'" If you'll excuse me, I have to go to a style guide meeting, where a group of editors will sit around a table and argue which words should or should not be used, based on how other sources did or didn't use them. It's all quite pragmatic. Kolkata means something, not because it's right or true but because it means something to someone.
If all this seems dry as dust to you, okay, just pass it by. On the other hand, if this kind of discourse on discourse is your meat and potatoes, your rice and beans, your bread and butter, well dig in. This interview, for example, entitled "The one measure of true love is: you can insult the other," might be old news, coming shortly after 9/11, but there are some radical ideas there about tolerance and multiculturalism, for example:
Today's racism is precisely this racism of cultural difference. It no longer says: 'I am more than you.' It says: 'I want my culture, you can have yours.' Today, every right-winger says just that. These people can be very postmodern. They acknowledge that there is no natural tradition, that every culture is artificially constructed. In France, for example, you have a neo-fascist right that refers to the deconstructionists, saying: 'Yes, the lesson of deconstructionism against universalism is that there are only particular identities. So, if blacks can have their culture, why should we not have ours?'
I guess what appeals to me about this kind of thinking is that it breaks out of the 'right-wing vs. left-wing' cliche of telling opposing versions of the same tired story, putting most of us to sleep. Now I think I'll go home and read a spy novel.
Saturday, November 12, 2005
Gustav MacKenzie Surratt-Duncanson
b. April 1 (?), 1991, d. November 10, 2005.
Our cat Gus died Thursday night. I came home from work while there was still a little bit of light to rake leaves, and while changing clothes I heard an alarming little cough-like wheeze from somewhere in the bedroom. I looked everywhere I could think of - under the bed, behind books and shoes, on shelves, in other rooms, even outside in the yard - but couldn't find him. Isabel and Dali, the other cat and the dog, were present and accounted for but no help. I asked Izzy several times, "Where's your brother?" but got no reply.
Gven came home after her classes, and we both searched the house again, no luck. We ate supper, read, watched TV, walked Dali, and kept wondering where Gus was hiding. The poor guy has been sick for some time - heart murmur, thyroid condition - and has lost a lot of weight in the past year. Lately he's been losing his balance, walking unsteadily, and falling off tables without his usual aplomb. So we all saw it coming.
Finally around midnight Gven found him, curled up inside a wardrobe-type suitcase that was hanging in the back of her closet, quite dead. We laid him on a tee-shirt and talked about what to do next. He was limp and lifeless but not yet cold or rigid. I put my hand on him for a long time, and began to feel my own pulse, a strange sensation, but no, no miracles today. Dali hovered behind Gven, looking very concerned. Isabel stayed away for quite a while, seemingly oblivious, and finally sauntered over, sniffed around the corner of the room by the closet, and quickly walked right by with no outward response. Gven thought maybe she wasn't even acknowledging the body on the floor because his essence wasn't there anymore. Hard to tell.
We decided to bury him in the garden, and I found a wicker basket about his size. Since it was a cool evening, we put him in the closed garage overnight. Tonight or tomorrow I will dig a hole with the brand-new Sears Craftsman long-handled spade that has never been used. I just got it in exchange for the old shovel that had recently broken from hard use. There's a nice spot under a couple of smallish evergreens, and we'll place a little plaque there. First we have to tell Helga, which won't be easy. Gus was always her cat.
Gus and Isabel came to us as littermates from my running partner (see MacKenzie's Laws, Archives April 2005) and his family's family of cats. Funny, I hadn't seen the MacKenzies for years, then ran into his daughter at the coop Wednesday night, long time no see. We got Gus and Izzy as kittens on Helga's seventh birthday when we lived in Grandview. They were both longhaired little furballs and completely adorable. They moved with us to Alabama later that year, then back to Clintonville a year later, then to another house in Clintonville where we actually stayed put for ten years, and finally to Northeasterville, where Gus will remain.
Our cat Gus died Thursday night. I came home from work while there was still a little bit of light to rake leaves, and while changing clothes I heard an alarming little cough-like wheeze from somewhere in the bedroom. I looked everywhere I could think of - under the bed, behind books and shoes, on shelves, in other rooms, even outside in the yard - but couldn't find him. Isabel and Dali, the other cat and the dog, were present and accounted for but no help. I asked Izzy several times, "Where's your brother?" but got no reply.
Gven came home after her classes, and we both searched the house again, no luck. We ate supper, read, watched TV, walked Dali, and kept wondering where Gus was hiding. The poor guy has been sick for some time - heart murmur, thyroid condition - and has lost a lot of weight in the past year. Lately he's been losing his balance, walking unsteadily, and falling off tables without his usual aplomb. So we all saw it coming.
Finally around midnight Gven found him, curled up inside a wardrobe-type suitcase that was hanging in the back of her closet, quite dead. We laid him on a tee-shirt and talked about what to do next. He was limp and lifeless but not yet cold or rigid. I put my hand on him for a long time, and began to feel my own pulse, a strange sensation, but no, no miracles today. Dali hovered behind Gven, looking very concerned. Isabel stayed away for quite a while, seemingly oblivious, and finally sauntered over, sniffed around the corner of the room by the closet, and quickly walked right by with no outward response. Gven thought maybe she wasn't even acknowledging the body on the floor because his essence wasn't there anymore. Hard to tell.
We decided to bury him in the garden, and I found a wicker basket about his size. Since it was a cool evening, we put him in the closed garage overnight. Tonight or tomorrow I will dig a hole with the brand-new Sears Craftsman long-handled spade that has never been used. I just got it in exchange for the old shovel that had recently broken from hard use. There's a nice spot under a couple of smallish evergreens, and we'll place a little plaque there. First we have to tell Helga, which won't be easy. Gus was always her cat.
Gus and Isabel came to us as littermates from my running partner (see MacKenzie's Laws, Archives April 2005) and his family's family of cats. Funny, I hadn't seen the MacKenzies for years, then ran into his daughter at the coop Wednesday night, long time no see. We got Gus and Izzy as kittens on Helga's seventh birthday when we lived in Grandview. They were both longhaired little furballs and completely adorable. They moved with us to Alabama later that year, then back to Clintonville a year later, then to another house in Clintonville where we actually stayed put for ten years, and finally to Northeasterville, where Gus will remain.
Thursday, November 10, 2005
On bullshit
Harry G. Frankfurt's new book from Princton U. Press, On Bullshit, "explores why there is so much bullshit, what bullshit is exactly, and what functions bullshit serves," according to the introduction. In my field (educational publishing) these are salient questions with important consequences. That and a perverse curiosity about the subject piqued my interest when my sister sent me the book on CD.
"The phenomenon is so vast and amorphous," according to the author, and his treatment of it so refreshingly straightforward. It's a serious, but not TOO serious, analysis, and I had to laugh at times. You might find yourself thinking of people you know as he describes some of the types and traits of bullshitters. The quick little book doesn't disappoint. Thanks, Jo Jo.
Like the older and more genteel term humbug, which is explained by Max Black in his book The Prevalence of Humbug, bullshit misrepresents something but falls short of outright lying. Frankfurt cites public relations, advertising, and politics as realms of tireless and careful attention to bullshit. He uses Ludwig Wittgenstein's discussion of nonsense to shed light on the nature of bullshit as involving a kind of laxity toward what is true or can be know to be true. This leads to the conclusion that the essence of bullshit has to do not with a speaker's intent to deceive but with the speaker's lack of concern with the truth at all.
The OED, which apparently has plenty of material on the subject, cites a poem by Ezra Pound about using biblical passages to make a point, wherein Pound demands more from a speaker than empty talk, in effect calling their bluff. Frankfurt concludes that the bullshitter, like the fake and the phoney, engages in a relatively benign inauthenticity rather than the more offensive lie. The craft of lying is more specific and bound to truth-value than the wide-ranging art of bullshit. Liars and truth-tellers are playing on opposite sides in the same rule-bound game, while the bullshitter plays a different game altogether, free of those constraints.
Other synonyms (readers, please add more):
nonsense, bunkum, humbug, misrepresentation, insincerity, trivia, hot air, caca, quackery, balderdash, hocum, drivel, imposture, claptrap...
Why is there so much bullshit now? Maybe because there is more communication now, and the proportion of bullshit is unchanged. Frankfort goes into a short discussion of the corollary issues of skepticism and whether objective truths are knowable, ending with proposition that all a person can do is know and express how they feel. In that case, sincerity replaces truth as the standard of utterances, to which the author replies, "Sincerity is bullshit."
"The phenomenon is so vast and amorphous," according to the author, and his treatment of it so refreshingly straightforward. It's a serious, but not TOO serious, analysis, and I had to laugh at times. You might find yourself thinking of people you know as he describes some of the types and traits of bullshitters. The quick little book doesn't disappoint. Thanks, Jo Jo.
Like the older and more genteel term humbug, which is explained by Max Black in his book The Prevalence of Humbug, bullshit misrepresents something but falls short of outright lying. Frankfurt cites public relations, advertising, and politics as realms of tireless and careful attention to bullshit. He uses Ludwig Wittgenstein's discussion of nonsense to shed light on the nature of bullshit as involving a kind of laxity toward what is true or can be know to be true. This leads to the conclusion that the essence of bullshit has to do not with a speaker's intent to deceive but with the speaker's lack of concern with the truth at all.
The OED, which apparently has plenty of material on the subject, cites a poem by Ezra Pound about using biblical passages to make a point, wherein Pound demands more from a speaker than empty talk, in effect calling their bluff. Frankfurt concludes that the bullshitter, like the fake and the phoney, engages in a relatively benign inauthenticity rather than the more offensive lie. The craft of lying is more specific and bound to truth-value than the wide-ranging art of bullshit. Liars and truth-tellers are playing on opposite sides in the same rule-bound game, while the bullshitter plays a different game altogether, free of those constraints.
Other synonyms (readers, please add more):
nonsense, bunkum, humbug, misrepresentation, insincerity, trivia, hot air, caca, quackery, balderdash, hocum, drivel, imposture, claptrap...
Why is there so much bullshit now? Maybe because there is more communication now, and the proportion of bullshit is unchanged. Frankfort goes into a short discussion of the corollary issues of skepticism and whether objective truths are knowable, ending with proposition that all a person can do is know and express how they feel. In that case, sincerity replaces truth as the standard of utterances, to which the author replies, "Sincerity is bullshit."
Wednesday, November 09, 2005
London calling
My little girl is going to London and Paris during winter break from school. She's confirmed on her flights from Cleveland/Hopkins to New York/Kennedy and Kennedy to London/Heathrow the day after Christmas. Ten days later, it's Heathrow to Washington/Dulles, and Dulles back to Hopkins. Oh my.
It's the contents of that sandwich of plane trips, of course, that will be the real adventure. It's just that right now, the eTicket is what makes it real compared to the tentative plans and speculative what-ifs leading up to it. Confirmed flights mean she's in the art history group from Northeast Swingstate University (NESU) and enrolled in the tour. A rough itinerary:
December 27 - arrive London, orientation, general tour & National Gallery
28 - British Museum, ancient, agrican/Mexican and bookstores ('agrican'?)
29 - National Gallery, Victoria and Albert Museum
30 - British Museum, medieval, National Gallery and theatre
31 - Salisbury, Stonehenge, cathedral/churches
January 1 - Tate modern, Wallace collection
2 - to Paris via Eurostar and optional evening tour
3 - Louvre, free time
4 - Musee d'Orsay, Notre Dame, architectural, evening to london
A few details remain to be worked out, like a passport, and Helga's rapid-fire mind is probably busy listing things to do in the next few weeks. But if we could just maintain our focus for a little while longer on research and writing art history, Picasso, the art of Central Africa, elementary French, intro to glassworking, and metals I, then all will be well when it's time for the trip.
It's the contents of that sandwich of plane trips, of course, that will be the real adventure. It's just that right now, the eTicket is what makes it real compared to the tentative plans and speculative what-ifs leading up to it. Confirmed flights mean she's in the art history group from Northeast Swingstate University (NESU) and enrolled in the tour. A rough itinerary:
December 27 - arrive London, orientation, general tour & National Gallery
28 - British Museum, ancient, agrican/Mexican and bookstores ('agrican'?)
29 - National Gallery, Victoria and Albert Museum
30 - British Museum, medieval, National Gallery and theatre
31 - Salisbury, Stonehenge, cathedral/churches
January 1 - Tate modern, Wallace collection
2 - to Paris via Eurostar and optional evening tour
3 - Louvre, free time
4 - Musee d'Orsay, Notre Dame, architectural, evening to london
A few details remain to be worked out, like a passport, and Helga's rapid-fire mind is probably busy listing things to do in the next few weeks. But if we could just maintain our focus for a little while longer on research and writing art history, Picasso, the art of Central Africa, elementary French, intro to glassworking, and metals I, then all will be well when it's time for the trip.
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
Talking about music is like dancing about architecture
It's a cute line from a cute movie about a dysfunctional family with a catalog of relationship issues, all of which are tidily resolved in just under two hours. Something about "Heart" in the title. But I still like that line because it addresses the incommensurability of different art forms, which I find interesting because it lets me use one of my favorite words [IN kum EN sur uh BIL uh tee]. But it can also be frustrating, because sometimes those experiences that I would most like to communicate are the most difficult to put into language. Know what I mean?
I don't read many music reviews. Besides the generation gaps, culture gaps, and education gaps separating me from most rock, classical, jazz, you name the genre, critics, it is rare indeed to read a music review that succeeds in conveying something about the music that engages but doesn't gag me. I prefer to listen to the music, thank you, with or without an understanding of its theoretical, historical, or social context. My loss I guess. Dance reviews are similar. I see an article in the Sunday Times and think I'll read it, but it's written in dancecriticese, so I get as far as the second paragraph and turn the page. Visual art, forget it, I don't speak ze lingeau, capiche?
Theater and movies, on the other hand, like poetry and fiction, history and philosophy, I can read ABOUT because, duh, the work in question, like the review, is in, duh, language. It's not that I have any "training" in theater, movies, poetry, fiction, or history, and I'm therefore schooled in the special discourse of the discipline. I don't and I'm not. I don't speak theaterese or filmese or poetrese or literaturese or historish, and when I'm around those people at the party, I'm either observing them as an anthropologist observes the social habits of an exotic band of islanders or I'm crossing the room to talk to the jocks.
Am I belaboring the obvious? Yes. Am I betraying the fact that I personally am more of a "word person" than a musically or spatially intelligent person, in the jargon of Howard Gardner, whom I happen to like and respect because he writes well about those boundaries? Yes. Am I realizing, for the umpteenth time, that my vain attempts at a liberal arts education have not made me into a renaissance man? Sad but true.
Part of the difficulty, I'm sure, is my lack of education in the arts. I haven't studied art, so I don't have much of a vocabulary in which to discuss visual arts. I haven't studied music, so I am similarly handicapped in discussing any period or style of music. My name is Sven and I'm illiterate. (Hi Sven) In both cases, I can have an emotional response, but I can't articulate what caused it or where it fits in the larger scheme of things visual or musical. Maybe there's a 12-step program for people with my problem, but I don't speak their language either.
On the other hand, I have studied writing a little, so I am better equipped to write or talk about it, alright in a kind of a limited way for an off night, and I have studied movement and sport, so I have a vocabulary that's commensurable with it. In short, I guess it's all about me. Or you. Us.
There's a drum circle that meets the first Monday of the month at Central Swingstate Percussion on High Street across from Graceland. Last night there was a nice little group, maybe eight people, that got some hot rhythms going, let me tell you. And I would tell you if I could. You'd have to be there to hear the rhythm move around the circle, pull someone in, build in volume and intensity, change a little here and there, accents coming and going, and eventually come down again, get real quiet, and disappear. One of the proprietors of the shop was giving a tiny bit of instruction to help us novice hand drummers, but 99 percent of it is experiential, whatever that means. You grab a drum, sit down, listen, try your hand, pick up on something, see where it goes and go with it. What can I say?
I don't read many music reviews. Besides the generation gaps, culture gaps, and education gaps separating me from most rock, classical, jazz, you name the genre, critics, it is rare indeed to read a music review that succeeds in conveying something about the music that engages but doesn't gag me. I prefer to listen to the music, thank you, with or without an understanding of its theoretical, historical, or social context. My loss I guess. Dance reviews are similar. I see an article in the Sunday Times and think I'll read it, but it's written in dancecriticese, so I get as far as the second paragraph and turn the page. Visual art, forget it, I don't speak ze lingeau, capiche?
Theater and movies, on the other hand, like poetry and fiction, history and philosophy, I can read ABOUT because, duh, the work in question, like the review, is in, duh, language. It's not that I have any "training" in theater, movies, poetry, fiction, or history, and I'm therefore schooled in the special discourse of the discipline. I don't and I'm not. I don't speak theaterese or filmese or poetrese or literaturese or historish, and when I'm around those people at the party, I'm either observing them as an anthropologist observes the social habits of an exotic band of islanders or I'm crossing the room to talk to the jocks.
Am I belaboring the obvious? Yes. Am I betraying the fact that I personally am more of a "word person" than a musically or spatially intelligent person, in the jargon of Howard Gardner, whom I happen to like and respect because he writes well about those boundaries? Yes. Am I realizing, for the umpteenth time, that my vain attempts at a liberal arts education have not made me into a renaissance man? Sad but true.
Part of the difficulty, I'm sure, is my lack of education in the arts. I haven't studied art, so I don't have much of a vocabulary in which to discuss visual arts. I haven't studied music, so I am similarly handicapped in discussing any period or style of music. My name is Sven and I'm illiterate. (Hi Sven) In both cases, I can have an emotional response, but I can't articulate what caused it or where it fits in the larger scheme of things visual or musical. Maybe there's a 12-step program for people with my problem, but I don't speak their language either.
On the other hand, I have studied writing a little, so I am better equipped to write or talk about it, alright in a kind of a limited way for an off night, and I have studied movement and sport, so I have a vocabulary that's commensurable with it. In short, I guess it's all about me. Or you. Us.
There's a drum circle that meets the first Monday of the month at Central Swingstate Percussion on High Street across from Graceland. Last night there was a nice little group, maybe eight people, that got some hot rhythms going, let me tell you. And I would tell you if I could. You'd have to be there to hear the rhythm move around the circle, pull someone in, build in volume and intensity, change a little here and there, accents coming and going, and eventually come down again, get real quiet, and disappear. One of the proprietors of the shop was giving a tiny bit of instruction to help us novice hand drummers, but 99 percent of it is experiential, whatever that means. You grab a drum, sit down, listen, try your hand, pick up on something, see where it goes and go with it. What can I say?
Monday, November 07, 2005
Bittersweet
Jessi Golly is on his way to Tucson for the next leg of his epic journey across America. His friend Kiley is expecting him Wednesday. Get on the bus, Gus, don't need to discuss much, just drop off the key, Lee, and get yourself free.
There were only minor complications. To use the October 20 ticket, he had to check in at the Greyhound station and pay $10 to have it changed for departure November 7. No problem. Sometimes you get inconsistent information from different people at 1-800-houndog. This bus stops in Indianapolis, St. Louis, Oklahoma City, El Paso, and Phoenix instead of Dayton, Nashville, Dallas, and El Paso, six of one half dozen of the other. Arrival in Tucson is about the same time early Wednesday morning.
A good place for people-watching, the bus station. All sizes, shapes, colors, ages; arrivals, departures, transients. There are a million stories in the naked city. They announced the arrival at gate 14, and Jessi got in line with his backpack. Big hug. "It was good to have you home for a while. Have a good trip. Be careful; you know what you're doing." Handshake. Turn and walk out to Fourth Street, go east on Town, return a DVD at the library, go north on Grant, hit the interstate to the office, go to work as usual.
The soundtrack? WCBE played a rock version of a Hindu chant, then a very up-tempo thing called "Night Train" about lunch in Shanghai, sticky rice, business travelers, Westerners on holiday, and if it stays on schedule there will be breakfast in Bangkok. Jessi's journey will be slightly less exotic than that, but some of us can romanticize anything.
Sunday he went to see a family friend in Clintonville (see Your Worst Nightmare, August 15) and came back with a couple of good photos of a young man who went to war. Later another friend came over to our house and stayed for supper. We had a batch of bread in the oven and a cauldron of spicy bean soup in the crock pot. Gven and I were tired and ready for a black and tan after grouting the floor of the den, the dark green ceramic tile floor that Gven and Jessi laid last week. It looks great, by the way. It was pleasant to sit in the dining room and eat a meal with the bright and animated Aura and Jessi, who have know each other since fourth grade and are still fast friends.
Saturday Gven did a yoga workshop at Picturesque College with her friend Jody. It was a near-perfect day outside, so Jess and I took the canoe out on Hoover Reservoir. It's a simple matter to hoist the canoe from its sawhorses and tie it on top of the truck, drive a couple of miles to the southwestern edge of Northeasterville, push off from the muddy bank, and paddle around for an hour and a half. Well worth taking a break from yard work and other chores to get out on the water, listen to the geese, watch the blue heron, talk a little, but mainly just float and paddle on a partly cloudy Indian Summer day that defies description. Then we hauled the canoe out of the water and back to its sawhorses, and we climbed up on the roof to sweep leaves and clean gutters.
Pretty mundane stuff, but as I said, some people can romanticize anything. Let's see, he's probably crossing the Mississippi right about now.
There were only minor complications. To use the October 20 ticket, he had to check in at the Greyhound station and pay $10 to have it changed for departure November 7. No problem. Sometimes you get inconsistent information from different people at 1-800-houndog. This bus stops in Indianapolis, St. Louis, Oklahoma City, El Paso, and Phoenix instead of Dayton, Nashville, Dallas, and El Paso, six of one half dozen of the other. Arrival in Tucson is about the same time early Wednesday morning.
A good place for people-watching, the bus station. All sizes, shapes, colors, ages; arrivals, departures, transients. There are a million stories in the naked city. They announced the arrival at gate 14, and Jessi got in line with his backpack. Big hug. "It was good to have you home for a while. Have a good trip. Be careful; you know what you're doing." Handshake. Turn and walk out to Fourth Street, go east on Town, return a DVD at the library, go north on Grant, hit the interstate to the office, go to work as usual.
The soundtrack? WCBE played a rock version of a Hindu chant, then a very up-tempo thing called "Night Train" about lunch in Shanghai, sticky rice, business travelers, Westerners on holiday, and if it stays on schedule there will be breakfast in Bangkok. Jessi's journey will be slightly less exotic than that, but some of us can romanticize anything.
Sunday he went to see a family friend in Clintonville (see Your Worst Nightmare, August 15) and came back with a couple of good photos of a young man who went to war. Later another friend came over to our house and stayed for supper. We had a batch of bread in the oven and a cauldron of spicy bean soup in the crock pot. Gven and I were tired and ready for a black and tan after grouting the floor of the den, the dark green ceramic tile floor that Gven and Jessi laid last week. It looks great, by the way. It was pleasant to sit in the dining room and eat a meal with the bright and animated Aura and Jessi, who have know each other since fourth grade and are still fast friends.
Saturday Gven did a yoga workshop at Picturesque College with her friend Jody. It was a near-perfect day outside, so Jess and I took the canoe out on Hoover Reservoir. It's a simple matter to hoist the canoe from its sawhorses and tie it on top of the truck, drive a couple of miles to the southwestern edge of Northeasterville, push off from the muddy bank, and paddle around for an hour and a half. Well worth taking a break from yard work and other chores to get out on the water, listen to the geese, watch the blue heron, talk a little, but mainly just float and paddle on a partly cloudy Indian Summer day that defies description. Then we hauled the canoe out of the water and back to its sawhorses, and we climbed up on the roof to sweep leaves and clean gutters.
Pretty mundane stuff, but as I said, some people can romanticize anything. Let's see, he's probably crossing the Mississippi right about now.
Sunday, November 06, 2005
Good night and good luck
The movie was a little disappointing, or was it the rest of the evening, it's hard to tell. No review is objective, and who would want an object's analysis of another object anyway? I'm not sure what I was expecting, having watched another Clooney vehicle, "Ocean's 11," a few nights earlier, but this one didn't quite deliver.
I appreciate the distress call Clooney et al are sending and the period re-creation of circa 1953. Black and white film works well for this picture of cramped smoke-filled rooms in the masculine domain of the TV news business in its heyday. I appreciate the symbolic omnipresence of cigarettes in that world - smoke-screens, smoke and mirrors, smoke signals, where there's smoke there's fire - and the body language of men in suits lighting up next to their Underwood typewriters and big microphones.
I get the storyline of compromises built on compromises in the big-time game of journalism qua entertainment qua advertising, and I understand the self-preservation through self-censorship that occurs within the battle against censorship. Pick your battles, etc. And anyone with a pulse will get the unstated parallel with the media 50 years later, still tip-toeing around a ruthless crusade of lies and insinuations against civil liberties and those who have the cojones to exercise them. Murrow does not come across as an optimist. Good night and good luck indeed.
Somehow I failed to suspend disbelief and feel like it was Murrow I was watching and not David Strathairn, an actor I respect from his many John Sayles movies (Eight Men Out, Passion Fish, Matewan, Brother from Another Planet, etc.). Frank Langella was excellent as CBS boss William Paley, the tallest guy in the best suit. George Clooney and Robert Downey, Jr., gave confincing portrayals of square-jawed pretty faces in gray flannel suits. Joseph McCarthy gave a superb performance as himself. I'd like to see the same movie made by John Sayles with a tenth of the money, but that would be a John Sayles film, rather than an imitation of one.
The green tea and berry pie at the Radio Cafe were tasty, but the waitperson behind the glass case was so loud I couldn't hear myself think. Maybe that's her way of telling us to go away, it's closing time. And it wasn't her fault the ensuing conversation was amorphous and my two companions and I had trouble understanding one another's critique of public education. It was probably my fault for trying to steer the conversation in that direction. So I drove home wallowing in the inability of three otherwise articulate people to communicate beyond the anecdotal retelling of their personal histories. When I was in fourth grade, blah blah blah. Oh yeah, well when I was in sixth grade, blah blah blah. Yes, but when I was in eleventh grade, blah blah blah. Maybe the movie had more of an effect than I give it credit for, since the title sums up my attitude at the end of the evening.
I appreciate the distress call Clooney et al are sending and the period re-creation of circa 1953. Black and white film works well for this picture of cramped smoke-filled rooms in the masculine domain of the TV news business in its heyday. I appreciate the symbolic omnipresence of cigarettes in that world - smoke-screens, smoke and mirrors, smoke signals, where there's smoke there's fire - and the body language of men in suits lighting up next to their Underwood typewriters and big microphones.
I get the storyline of compromises built on compromises in the big-time game of journalism qua entertainment qua advertising, and I understand the self-preservation through self-censorship that occurs within the battle against censorship. Pick your battles, etc. And anyone with a pulse will get the unstated parallel with the media 50 years later, still tip-toeing around a ruthless crusade of lies and insinuations against civil liberties and those who have the cojones to exercise them. Murrow does not come across as an optimist. Good night and good luck indeed.
Somehow I failed to suspend disbelief and feel like it was Murrow I was watching and not David Strathairn, an actor I respect from his many John Sayles movies (Eight Men Out, Passion Fish, Matewan, Brother from Another Planet, etc.). Frank Langella was excellent as CBS boss William Paley, the tallest guy in the best suit. George Clooney and Robert Downey, Jr., gave confincing portrayals of square-jawed pretty faces in gray flannel suits. Joseph McCarthy gave a superb performance as himself. I'd like to see the same movie made by John Sayles with a tenth of the money, but that would be a John Sayles film, rather than an imitation of one.
The green tea and berry pie at the Radio Cafe were tasty, but the waitperson behind the glass case was so loud I couldn't hear myself think. Maybe that's her way of telling us to go away, it's closing time. And it wasn't her fault the ensuing conversation was amorphous and my two companions and I had trouble understanding one another's critique of public education. It was probably my fault for trying to steer the conversation in that direction. So I drove home wallowing in the inability of three otherwise articulate people to communicate beyond the anecdotal retelling of their personal histories. When I was in fourth grade, blah blah blah. Oh yeah, well when I was in sixth grade, blah blah blah. Yes, but when I was in eleventh grade, blah blah blah. Maybe the movie had more of an effect than I give it credit for, since the title sums up my attitude at the end of the evening.
Friday, November 04, 2005
Don't you hit me with that cosmic debris!
(With thanks to Frank Z.)
Being a collection of random junk found floating through the somatosphere during the last 48 hours or so.
1. The meteors I've been seeing on my nightly walk with the family dog, Dali Golly, apparently are visible to folks on the Continent too. Some of them have had a little different reaction, however, taking them for UFOs instead of making a wish, as I did. But the Germans are always ahead of the curve (or I'm always behind it). So, what do you make of it, Scully? "These people are obviously delusional, Mulder."
2. While drifting in or out of twilight sleep the other night, I had the following very brief dream: I'm standing on a beach, walking slowly toward the water, and there are several other people standing to my right and left. I don't see their faces and can't recognize them, only their half-lit, shadowy figures moving even slower than I am.
Both Gven's relatives and mine have talked about a beach reunion in 2006; am I anticipating that?
3. Another, longer dream last night: I'm at a party at my old friend Hank's parents' large, rambling suburban house in Michigan. His dad is actively circulating from room to room, talking with everyone and making us all feel welcome. I don't recall seeing Hank himself at the party, although his presence was somehow evident. I don't recall other individuals either, but there were lots of people there. The space was long and open, uncrowded enough for people to flow freely from room to room, and the adjoining rooms were a step or two up or down on both ends of the one I was in. There was plenty of food and drink set out on low tables, which Hank's dad kept inviting us to have and enjoy. I woke up with the old pop song "Friday on my Mind" by the Easy Beats (thank you, Lulu and Kevin) on my mind.
Hank and I spent a lot of time together in the mid-seventies, then we went our separate ways, him to Purdue and then the Navy, me to Oberlin and other adventures. I haven't seen him since the early nineties, when we both had little kids. Now we send each other Christmas cards about our families growing up; maybe something is telling me to get in touch.
4. The mother and daughter duo in my Thursday night beginning taiji class seemed to enjoy the last meeting of the quarter. As usual, a full roster of students in September dwindled as the weeks went by, and by week seven they were the only ones left. We practiced Basic Movement and clarified a couple of their questions about the mechanics of shifting the weight and turning the torso in order to fully focus on doing one thing at a time. Then we tried out the first few moves of a form they hadn't done before to give them a sense of what it's like at the next level. The mom said she's going to do the Basic class again, and the daughter is going to think about it.
That's the way it goes. Last summer there were three very enthusiastic, purposeful, inquisitive women, around my age or older, in the Saturday morning class that met outside in the park. At the time they were all anxious to start up again in the fall, and I haven't seen them since. A youngish man who practiced diligently all spring quarter disappeared during the summer, then resurfaced this fall. You never know.
Being a collection of random junk found floating through the somatosphere during the last 48 hours or so.
1. The meteors I've been seeing on my nightly walk with the family dog, Dali Golly, apparently are visible to folks on the Continent too. Some of them have had a little different reaction, however, taking them for UFOs instead of making a wish, as I did. But the Germans are always ahead of the curve (or I'm always behind it). So, what do you make of it, Scully? "These people are obviously delusional, Mulder."
2. While drifting in or out of twilight sleep the other night, I had the following very brief dream: I'm standing on a beach, walking slowly toward the water, and there are several other people standing to my right and left. I don't see their faces and can't recognize them, only their half-lit, shadowy figures moving even slower than I am.
Both Gven's relatives and mine have talked about a beach reunion in 2006; am I anticipating that?
3. Another, longer dream last night: I'm at a party at my old friend Hank's parents' large, rambling suburban house in Michigan. His dad is actively circulating from room to room, talking with everyone and making us all feel welcome. I don't recall seeing Hank himself at the party, although his presence was somehow evident. I don't recall other individuals either, but there were lots of people there. The space was long and open, uncrowded enough for people to flow freely from room to room, and the adjoining rooms were a step or two up or down on both ends of the one I was in. There was plenty of food and drink set out on low tables, which Hank's dad kept inviting us to have and enjoy. I woke up with the old pop song "Friday on my Mind" by the Easy Beats (thank you, Lulu and Kevin) on my mind.
Hank and I spent a lot of time together in the mid-seventies, then we went our separate ways, him to Purdue and then the Navy, me to Oberlin and other adventures. I haven't seen him since the early nineties, when we both had little kids. Now we send each other Christmas cards about our families growing up; maybe something is telling me to get in touch.
4. The mother and daughter duo in my Thursday night beginning taiji class seemed to enjoy the last meeting of the quarter. As usual, a full roster of students in September dwindled as the weeks went by, and by week seven they were the only ones left. We practiced Basic Movement and clarified a couple of their questions about the mechanics of shifting the weight and turning the torso in order to fully focus on doing one thing at a time. Then we tried out the first few moves of a form they hadn't done before to give them a sense of what it's like at the next level. The mom said she's going to do the Basic class again, and the daughter is going to think about it.
That's the way it goes. Last summer there were three very enthusiastic, purposeful, inquisitive women, around my age or older, in the Saturday morning class that met outside in the park. At the time they were all anxious to start up again in the fall, and I haven't seen them since. A youngish man who practiced diligently all spring quarter disappeared during the summer, then resurfaced this fall. You never know.
Wednesday, November 02, 2005
meteors
I saw another shooting star last night, the second one in three nights. It streaked in an arc across the southern sky just like the one Monday nighat. This time I was standing in the back yard after suppere, checking in with the garden. It's kind of neat to witness something like that, out of the dark blue, as it were.
Is there a well-known meteor shower happening now? I'm not in the habit of checking on current events in the sky, although I read somewhere that Mars and Venus are both visible right after sunset. I should listen to Block and Bird on "Earth and Sky" on the radio.
So I looked at Earth and Sky online, and they list the major annual meteor showers, of which there are two around this time of year:
Those don't sound like what I saw, Agent Mulder, but I know I saw something. "This man is obviously delusional," Scully added tersely. I'll be out there again tonight to see what I can see. Any naturalistic (or other) explanations?
Is there a well-known meteor shower happening now? I'm not in the habit of checking on current events in the sky, although I read somewhere that Mars and Venus are both visible right after sunset. I should listen to Block and Bird on "Earth and Sky" on the radio.
So I looked at Earth and Sky online, and they list the major annual meteor showers, of which there are two around this time of year:
October 21, Orionids. This is a modest shower but one that performs consistently. Its ZHR at maximum is 25, and with the radiant rising conveniently around 10 o'clock, meteors can be seen all night. Orionid meteors are zippy and faint, so if there is a Moon in the sky, you may as well pass on this one. You need a dark sky and dedicated vigilance.
November 5, Taurids. The Taurids is one of the humblest of the annual showers with a ZHR at maximum of only 10. And yet, I recall one early morning observing session with my telescope when I unintentionally stumbled upon an active display of meteors issuing from a region near the Pleiades, the shower's radiant. In one hour I counted a dozen or so meteors. These meteors are generally slow and fairly bright, and produce the occasional fireball.
Those don't sound like what I saw, Agent Mulder, but I know I saw something. "This man is obviously delusional," Scully added tersely. I'll be out there again tonight to see what I can see. Any naturalistic (or other) explanations?
Monday, October 31, 2005
Frost!
It snuck up on me this year. It's not like I didn't know it was coming. Maybe I was just preoccupied with my own petty personal transitions, a trip out of town, back into the routine of work, classes, meetings, sleeping in my own bed. It must have been Friday night that the plants got zapped - the potted lilies that I should have brought inside, the tomatoes of course, a volunteer squash vine, and a couple of basil plants long gone to seed. I don't know why all 16 pepper plants went unscathed, or why nothing ever gets "scathed" if it takes a direct hit from some scathing death rays. Anyway.
It's getting colder, and not all of a sudden, although it seems that way. The trees are turning - all of a sudden. The maple tree across Plum Street from our house went from green to bright yellow in two days, or so my brain registered it. The white pines along the north side of our yard have shed a ton of pinestraw, which looks good beside the raised beds and stepping stones, just one more reason to love pine trees. And these surface changes made me glad to be back in my own garden after my visit to the MoreGardens! house in the Bronx last week. It felt cozily good to walk in the back gate and up the walk into the enclosed yard, which is still my favorite room in the house, before going in the back door. Home is where the freely falling mulch is.
I guess the time change has something to do with my sudden recognition of the obvious gradual changes, and the fact that it coincides with Halloween. It's colder, it's darker, the plants are either dying or going to sleep for six months. All Hallows Eve, All Saints Day, All Souls Day, Day of the Dead, this is the dying time of year. Ghosts and skeletons walking every street (also pirates and princesses, but I'm ignoring whatever doesn't fit my thesis). It's all around us, people, and we should ponder the gravity of it all, as befits the prevailing darkness, cold, and deepening gloom!
Not necessarily. I saw a praying mantis yesterday lounging on the underside of a wheelbarrow in the late-afternoon sun. That's a good omen, right, mantises are friendly garden creatures? I saw a shooting star last night while walking the dog down by Alumni Creek. That should mean something too.
Jessi went up to Northeast Swingstate U. for the weekend to visit his sister, and they celebrated Halloween with Helga's friends and 20,000 other young people decked out in their ghoulish best. The streets of Cuyahogaburg were packed with costumed revelers, so apparently that campus has followed the lead of its sister school, Southeast Swingstate U. down in Hockingville, and turned Halloween into the major annual party. Just speculating here, but maybe the fall harvest coldsnap and festival of darkness is this culture's unofficial night of wild bacchanalian release, as Mardi Gras and Carnival are for our Gulf Coast, Caribbean, and Brazilian partying brethren, but inverted for us northerners.
It's getting colder, and not all of a sudden, although it seems that way. The trees are turning - all of a sudden. The maple tree across Plum Street from our house went from green to bright yellow in two days, or so my brain registered it. The white pines along the north side of our yard have shed a ton of pinestraw, which looks good beside the raised beds and stepping stones, just one more reason to love pine trees. And these surface changes made me glad to be back in my own garden after my visit to the MoreGardens! house in the Bronx last week. It felt cozily good to walk in the back gate and up the walk into the enclosed yard, which is still my favorite room in the house, before going in the back door. Home is where the freely falling mulch is.
I guess the time change has something to do with my sudden recognition of the obvious gradual changes, and the fact that it coincides with Halloween. It's colder, it's darker, the plants are either dying or going to sleep for six months. All Hallows Eve, All Saints Day, All Souls Day, Day of the Dead, this is the dying time of year. Ghosts and skeletons walking every street (also pirates and princesses, but I'm ignoring whatever doesn't fit my thesis). It's all around us, people, and we should ponder the gravity of it all, as befits the prevailing darkness, cold, and deepening gloom!
Not necessarily. I saw a praying mantis yesterday lounging on the underside of a wheelbarrow in the late-afternoon sun. That's a good omen, right, mantises are friendly garden creatures? I saw a shooting star last night while walking the dog down by Alumni Creek. That should mean something too.
Jessi went up to Northeast Swingstate U. for the weekend to visit his sister, and they celebrated Halloween with Helga's friends and 20,000 other young people decked out in their ghoulish best. The streets of Cuyahogaburg were packed with costumed revelers, so apparently that campus has followed the lead of its sister school, Southeast Swingstate U. down in Hockingville, and turned Halloween into the major annual party. Just speculating here, but maybe the fall harvest coldsnap and festival of darkness is this culture's unofficial night of wild bacchanalian release, as Mardi Gras and Carnival are for our Gulf Coast, Caribbean, and Brazilian partying brethren, but inverted for us northerners.
Friday, October 28, 2005
I see London, I see France
I'm getting strong, but still unofficial, signals from my dear, mysterious daughter, Helga Golly, that she is going to Europe for a two-week art history workshop over the holidays. Northeast Swingstate U. is offering a whirlwind museum and gallery study-tour of London and Paris starting the day after Christmas, with research and writing to follow. Kind of like The Twelve Days of Christmas abroad.
On the first day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me a whole day in the Louvre.
On the second day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me Notre Dame cathedral and a whole day in the Louvre.
On the third day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me Salisbury/Stonehenge, Notre Dame cathedral, and a whole day in the Louvre.
On the fourth day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me the National Gallery, Salisbury/Stonehenge, Notre Dame cathedral, and a whole day in the Louvre.
On the fifth day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me the Brit - ish Mus - eum! National Gallery, Salisbury/Stonehenge, Notre Dame cathedral, and a whole day in the Louvre.
That's not the whole itinerary, just a representative sample. It sounds like a great opportunity to travel, experience some amazing places, get a somewhat structured exposure to art objects and historical sites that are deemed "important" to academics, and get credit for it. I sound like a dad. Helga is excited about it, Gven is excited about it for her in a motherly way, and I am excited about it. Don't I sound excited? How excited am I? Let me count the dollars, I means the ways.
Some details are still tentative, but in general it looks good. I'll update this space when I know more and continue to vicariously live the dream.
On the first day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me a whole day in the Louvre.
On the second day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me Notre Dame cathedral and a whole day in the Louvre.
On the third day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me Salisbury/Stonehenge, Notre Dame cathedral, and a whole day in the Louvre.
On the fourth day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me the National Gallery, Salisbury/Stonehenge, Notre Dame cathedral, and a whole day in the Louvre.
On the fifth day of Christmas my tour guide gave to me the Brit - ish Mus - eum! National Gallery, Salisbury/Stonehenge, Notre Dame cathedral, and a whole day in the Louvre.
That's not the whole itinerary, just a representative sample. It sounds like a great opportunity to travel, experience some amazing places, get a somewhat structured exposure to art objects and historical sites that are deemed "important" to academics, and get credit for it. I sound like a dad. Helga is excited about it, Gven is excited about it for her in a motherly way, and I am excited about it. Don't I sound excited? How excited am I? Let me count the dollars, I means the ways.
Some details are still tentative, but in general it looks good. I'll update this space when I know more and continue to vicariously live the dream.
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