One of many recent editions of the national news dedicated to the hot topic of the day included yet another congressman being asked questions about his views on marriage equality and whether he lines up with the views the President stated on the matter. He was also asked how he felt this was received by citizens of his state and the churches of his state.
Interesting in the premise alone.
A specific query in this interview was, When do you think government should lead on social issues and when is it better left to the American people to lead?
In the matter of marriage equality - oh hell, let's simplify it - in the matter of equality, our government led on this long before we even had a real government. When our rebellious forefathers decided this new land should be free of the many prevailing restrictions under a stodgy old form of government from across the ocean, a declaration of independence was drafted in which lofty but fundamental ideals were set forth. The very concept that all men are created equal was enough to bring the anger and force of centuries-old traditional governmental controls down on our tiny upstart experiment. The idea that these equal individuals should all enjoy unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness - well, it was rebellion enough to start the revolutionary war. A small, under-developed association of colonies with a non-existent military set out to throw off the shackles tightly held by the most powerful force in the world of that day. And only a tiny group of dedicated men of action and courage led the way. These men were no doubt distrusted by many colonists and were expected to lead the fledgling American way of life into sure destruction. Yet free thinking and determination prevailed.
The war was won, in a way, but the devil in the details still has to be fought and overcome.
Our national constitution, while not stating some of the language in the identical way as the earlier declaration, still made our self-determined national freedoms clear and went even farther in defining many of them. Yes, these freedoms still must be argued today and some were argued with more violent war within the first century of our nation's existence. Yet little-by-little, our country evolves in its grasp and its exercise of freedom. Ugly back-steps are often taken when too many people succumb to greed, corruption, racism, nationalism, basically anything guided by fear, and our freedoms again are threatened.
Marriage equality, as all equality, is part of the fabric of our national character. In my humble opinion, it appears clear that any desire to deny any citizen the right to the pursuit of happiness is directly antithetical to our way of life as a nation. It would appear that millions of us in this supposedly advanced society would rather move back under the flag and heavy hand of King George in 1776. Jefferson, Madison, Franklin, Adams, Washington and all the other founding fathers would surely shake their heads in bewilderment upon seeing what little true advancement in ideals and fundamental human decency we express today. They would certainly admit that they did not get it all perfectly worked out, but as certainly, they would still stand by their huge sacrifices and monumental undertaking that started us on a road we should be able to walk.
Why do we humans continue to tie our own shoelaces together and then get pissed off at the floor that smacks us in the face?!
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Sunday, May 6, 2012
Perfect Congress
After another of the many Bernie Sanders interviews I have witnessed, I got to thinking of how wonderful it would be if more independent-minded legislators were in our national congress. [ Understand here, I am using the word Congress to include both houses, not the singular House of Representatives that has come to be the popular usage nowadays.] Sanders is now a Senator from Vermont, elected to that seat in 2006 after sixteen years in the House. He is an Independent, and he is a thinking person who looks at all possible sides of arguments before giving his opinions. Though he caucuses with (has more in common with at present) the Democrats, he has no trouble speaking up against those same colleagues if he views them to be leaning in some unreasonable direction. He has even suggested that it might be a good idea to have someone more progressive who could run in a primary against President Obama. Not afraid to speak his mind, this Congressional Independent. Too bad we can't clone Sanders!
Naturally, we all would like to surround ourselves with those who are more like us. It's human logic, human nature - call it what you will. Since I am not in Congress, it obviously isn't exactly "surrounding myself" I'm concerned about here, but it's all about seeing the nation better represented - of course, by those who think more as I do. Often that means, to me, simply stating it as "those who think." Yes, it is unfortunate for us all, but I absolutely reject for the most part the concept that either a Democratic or Republican politician can allow him/herself to think and act in any way that contradicts party politics. My personal guess is that once a person gets elected as a major party representative, more than 90% of the thinking(!) is done by the party and the individual veers from the party line rarely and at his/her own peril.
Is there such a thing even possible to consider as a perfect Congress? No, there cannot be, in the truest sense, because that body is constructed of just people and people are far from perfect. Still, the very reason to have a Congress, in our constitutionally based society, is to have capable people gathered to represent all of us in legislating the direction in which we all are to be governed. It seems to come as a given expectation that this body of representatives should meld into something more perfect than just the sum of its imperfect parts. Decent and dedicated folks who truly do want to represent us all and act on behalf of the whole of our nation should by virtue of that call to decency and gravity, become better humans in support of the body politic.
With this in mind, and knowing (as I am confident I do know and my knowledge is empirical), that our two-party power structure is marginally effective due to infighting and hugging party lines, I feel strongly that my concept would work. Perfect? No, it cannot be. Far better for our nation? Absolutely.
My concept is probably far too idealistic to ever hope we might see it happen, and of course, it would never be constructed purposely within the national legislature. But maybe it should be. Each body of the congress should be generally made up of three self-balancing groups: Republicans, Democrats and Independents. There could have been placed in the constitution, (could still be by amendment) some limiting language that would prevent massive over-loads of any one party. It would be simple to have a limit of 40% of any one party making up a legislative body. If that meant that today, the House of Representatives were made up of exactly 40% Dems, 40% GOP and 20% Independents, think how many more bills would get handled with fairness and proper discussion on the merits of the legislation. My personal preference would be that ALL of the representatives would be Independents, but it's not what I advocate because as an Independent, I am able to recognize that the resultant free-thinking mass would not be any more workable in a practical way than is the current mess created by the two-party structure.
Perfect, in my practical view then, would be to have 40% of any legislative body made up of Independents, 30% Republicans and 30% Democrats. This would clearly place the onus of persuasive reasoning and convincing argument upon either of the major parties to attract the required majority vote numbers by tapping into the pool of independent thinkers on any issue. What a beautiful world this would be!
Naturally, we all would like to surround ourselves with those who are more like us. It's human logic, human nature - call it what you will. Since I am not in Congress, it obviously isn't exactly "surrounding myself" I'm concerned about here, but it's all about seeing the nation better represented - of course, by those who think more as I do. Often that means, to me, simply stating it as "those who think." Yes, it is unfortunate for us all, but I absolutely reject for the most part the concept that either a Democratic or Republican politician can allow him/herself to think and act in any way that contradicts party politics. My personal guess is that once a person gets elected as a major party representative, more than 90% of the thinking(!) is done by the party and the individual veers from the party line rarely and at his/her own peril.
Is there such a thing even possible to consider as a perfect Congress? No, there cannot be, in the truest sense, because that body is constructed of just people and people are far from perfect. Still, the very reason to have a Congress, in our constitutionally based society, is to have capable people gathered to represent all of us in legislating the direction in which we all are to be governed. It seems to come as a given expectation that this body of representatives should meld into something more perfect than just the sum of its imperfect parts. Decent and dedicated folks who truly do want to represent us all and act on behalf of the whole of our nation should by virtue of that call to decency and gravity, become better humans in support of the body politic.
With this in mind, and knowing (as I am confident I do know and my knowledge is empirical), that our two-party power structure is marginally effective due to infighting and hugging party lines, I feel strongly that my concept would work. Perfect? No, it cannot be. Far better for our nation? Absolutely.
My concept is probably far too idealistic to ever hope we might see it happen, and of course, it would never be constructed purposely within the national legislature. But maybe it should be. Each body of the congress should be generally made up of three self-balancing groups: Republicans, Democrats and Independents. There could have been placed in the constitution, (could still be by amendment) some limiting language that would prevent massive over-loads of any one party. It would be simple to have a limit of 40% of any one party making up a legislative body. If that meant that today, the House of Representatives were made up of exactly 40% Dems, 40% GOP and 20% Independents, think how many more bills would get handled with fairness and proper discussion on the merits of the legislation. My personal preference would be that ALL of the representatives would be Independents, but it's not what I advocate because as an Independent, I am able to recognize that the resultant free-thinking mass would not be any more workable in a practical way than is the current mess created by the two-party structure.
Perfect, in my practical view then, would be to have 40% of any legislative body made up of Independents, 30% Republicans and 30% Democrats. This would clearly place the onus of persuasive reasoning and convincing argument upon either of the major parties to attract the required majority vote numbers by tapping into the pool of independent thinkers on any issue. What a beautiful world this would be!
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
WORSHIP
Through the inner workings of Blogger.com, provider of this site, I can see various bits of info under the "stats" summary. Apparently someone who was on my blog site entered an internal search to ask how worship is handled in The Neutral Zone. If the wording and spelling were complete enough to mean anything to me, it seemed to indicate that the searching was being done by a reader perhaps in Russia, where nearly half my readership is located, amazingly. At least, that's what the stats page also gives me.
Here I will freely admit that my neutrality cannot be depended upon when it comes to worship. Neutral in my attitudes toward people who are worshippers? Sure; I do that as devotedly as I can manage, determined to not be judgmental through the remainder of my life in the way I was during my religious years. I have written, in a book manuscript as well as in online comments, about my years of abject devotion to a Christian sect. The countless hours I spent on my knees during thirteen years of humble worship have made it difficult for me today to feel anything but revulsion at the thought of worship. What I came to see as wasted time then morphed into a grudge against the whole concept. That grudge came by way of realization that the time wasn't merely lost to me; the time spent in that devout mode had reduced me, weakened me as a person. In retrospect, I see worship as a constantly demoralizing and self-destructive activity.
Consider this: I hit puberty during the time Marilyn Monroe was soaring to heights of stardom. She was there in front of all of us hormone-laden teens of the nineteen-fifties, there to want and to worship. If I had taken to this goddess so profoundly that I could delude myself into a belief that she would someday be my lover, my soul-mate, etc., then I would have been giving myself over to a pointless and demoralizing struggle, my psyche forced to survive my own folly. Anyone who knew me and/or cared about me would have naturally been begging me to stop the madness of worshipping this unattainable goddess. They would have watched me in pity as I continually ate away inside with wanting something I could never attain. They would see me missing out on important activities while I sought more ways of potentially attracting Marilyn's attention. They would tell me this obsession was destructive and that I simply had to give it up. Other boys my age would have soared past me in development while playing baseball and joining in many typical youthful pursuits. I would have lessened my own stature by constant wishing and by pleading to some unseen force to give me the chance to see Marilyn and to have her see me.
Ludicrous analogy here? Not at all. The sad thing is, my fanciful worship of Marilyn (that didn't actually happen for me but undoubtedly did for many of my contemporaries), would have been less far-fetched than was my later worship of a traditional supreme being. At least Marilyn was real, was visible, was approachable. Was capable of returning attention. The odds against my meeting and finding love with her would have been astronomical, much as the odds against winning the big Mega Lotto jackpot - but it was not beyond any possibility. Worshippers of that traditional phantom in the skies (in any of the disparate concepts) surely believe that their chances for ultimate satisfaction are better than mine would have been with Marilyn. While I strongly doubt there is anything at all out there to make that desired satisfaction materialize, I nonetheless leave those worshippers to their own devices. And I wish them happiness in any way they can achieve it. I prefer working continually on being a better human and a more devoted fan and supporter of our visible cosmos. It is my firm and constant belief that when I bend to pick up one small piece of trash off the surface of this abused planet that I am doing infinitely more good for myself and humanity than I ever did by bending and scraping before a mystical supreme being.
IF that fictional worship of Marilyn Monroe had occurred in my youthful world, I would have expected, in fact it would have been a shame if it had not happened, that all who cared for me would have tried to convince me to give it up. But the commonly accepted traditions of society demand of us all that we never try to pull our friends and loved ones back from the brink of madness when they express a devotion to something completely implausible, invisible, unapproachable. And the madness is even madder than that - there is an intrinsic zaniness within the larger world of general belief! A Catholic can be deeply convinced that a Baptist is going down a wrong road and needs to be shown the light, but this simply isn't done. A Mormon can be absolute in his conviction that a Muslim is wrong in every way, but he cannot try to enlighten him; the right to believe any folly is sacred. Why, in our advanced age of Man and our 21st century world of scientific knowledge, can we not look at this phenomenon and ask, "What then can be the logic in my choosing any one of the innumerable beliefs and sticking to it in a devoted worship?" Ah, that is the question one might ask himself (unlikely though it is that anyone will), but it is a question one can never ask of others. It's just not in good taste.
That's it for now. No more talk of worship for this moment. I think I will go out and pick up some more trash from our Earth during Earth Week, then come in to settle into a scotch-on-the-rocks and maybe an old Marilyn Monroe film.
Here I will freely admit that my neutrality cannot be depended upon when it comes to worship. Neutral in my attitudes toward people who are worshippers? Sure; I do that as devotedly as I can manage, determined to not be judgmental through the remainder of my life in the way I was during my religious years. I have written, in a book manuscript as well as in online comments, about my years of abject devotion to a Christian sect. The countless hours I spent on my knees during thirteen years of humble worship have made it difficult for me today to feel anything but revulsion at the thought of worship. What I came to see as wasted time then morphed into a grudge against the whole concept. That grudge came by way of realization that the time wasn't merely lost to me; the time spent in that devout mode had reduced me, weakened me as a person. In retrospect, I see worship as a constantly demoralizing and self-destructive activity.
Consider this: I hit puberty during the time Marilyn Monroe was soaring to heights of stardom. She was there in front of all of us hormone-laden teens of the nineteen-fifties, there to want and to worship. If I had taken to this goddess so profoundly that I could delude myself into a belief that she would someday be my lover, my soul-mate, etc., then I would have been giving myself over to a pointless and demoralizing struggle, my psyche forced to survive my own folly. Anyone who knew me and/or cared about me would have naturally been begging me to stop the madness of worshipping this unattainable goddess. They would have watched me in pity as I continually ate away inside with wanting something I could never attain. They would see me missing out on important activities while I sought more ways of potentially attracting Marilyn's attention. They would tell me this obsession was destructive and that I simply had to give it up. Other boys my age would have soared past me in development while playing baseball and joining in many typical youthful pursuits. I would have lessened my own stature by constant wishing and by pleading to some unseen force to give me the chance to see Marilyn and to have her see me.
Ludicrous analogy here? Not at all. The sad thing is, my fanciful worship of Marilyn (that didn't actually happen for me but undoubtedly did for many of my contemporaries), would have been less far-fetched than was my later worship of a traditional supreme being. At least Marilyn was real, was visible, was approachable. Was capable of returning attention. The odds against my meeting and finding love with her would have been astronomical, much as the odds against winning the big Mega Lotto jackpot - but it was not beyond any possibility. Worshippers of that traditional phantom in the skies (in any of the disparate concepts) surely believe that their chances for ultimate satisfaction are better than mine would have been with Marilyn. While I strongly doubt there is anything at all out there to make that desired satisfaction materialize, I nonetheless leave those worshippers to their own devices. And I wish them happiness in any way they can achieve it. I prefer working continually on being a better human and a more devoted fan and supporter of our visible cosmos. It is my firm and constant belief that when I bend to pick up one small piece of trash off the surface of this abused planet that I am doing infinitely more good for myself and humanity than I ever did by bending and scraping before a mystical supreme being.
IF that fictional worship of Marilyn Monroe had occurred in my youthful world, I would have expected, in fact it would have been a shame if it had not happened, that all who cared for me would have tried to convince me to give it up. But the commonly accepted traditions of society demand of us all that we never try to pull our friends and loved ones back from the brink of madness when they express a devotion to something completely implausible, invisible, unapproachable. And the madness is even madder than that - there is an intrinsic zaniness within the larger world of general belief! A Catholic can be deeply convinced that a Baptist is going down a wrong road and needs to be shown the light, but this simply isn't done. A Mormon can be absolute in his conviction that a Muslim is wrong in every way, but he cannot try to enlighten him; the right to believe any folly is sacred. Why, in our advanced age of Man and our 21st century world of scientific knowledge, can we not look at this phenomenon and ask, "What then can be the logic in my choosing any one of the innumerable beliefs and sticking to it in a devoted worship?" Ah, that is the question one might ask himself (unlikely though it is that anyone will), but it is a question one can never ask of others. It's just not in good taste.
That's it for now. No more talk of worship for this moment. I think I will go out and pick up some more trash from our Earth during Earth Week, then come in to settle into a scotch-on-the-rocks and maybe an old Marilyn Monroe film.
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Miss Representation
So - - If I appear in drag and ask for your vote, might I win the title of Miss Representation? It would be very fitting, although I'm sure the clothes would not.
Yes, I meant to spell it out in the way it is above. Because that is the well-thought-out and interesting title of a new documentary film about women and sexism in our society. Jennifer Siebel Newsom, director (creator) of the film and website, Miss Represention, was interviewed on a cable news show on Sunday, April 15th and has since been well covered in a number of media outlets. So rather than try to write a new, longer blog today, I ask that you check out this important effort to achieve balance in our world of inequality. My own feelings on the mistreatment and under-appreciation of females have been clearly stated in earlier blog entries. The work being done by Miss Newsom will go far beyond what I might write in my small corner of blogland.
Good cheer to you on this beautiful morning.
Yes, I meant to spell it out in the way it is above. Because that is the well-thought-out and interesting title of a new documentary film about women and sexism in our society. Jennifer Siebel Newsom, director (creator) of the film and website, Miss Represention, was interviewed on a cable news show on Sunday, April 15th and has since been well covered in a number of media outlets. So rather than try to write a new, longer blog today, I ask that you check out this important effort to achieve balance in our world of inequality. My own feelings on the mistreatment and under-appreciation of females have been clearly stated in earlier blog entries. The work being done by Miss Newsom will go far beyond what I might write in my small corner of blogland.
Good cheer to you on this beautiful morning.
Friday, April 13, 2012
Nightmare Golf
The last few days have been a bit of a loss to my real world - assuming anyone would characterize my strange existence as happening in a real world. I came down with some very debilitating bug shortly after an Easter dinner. No connection, I presume. But by late afternoon, I was slipping into a state of chills and fever, sneaking away from the other guests and hosts at the auspicious venue, and stretching out across the guest bed. That happened to be near the guest bathroom, where I was concerned my meal was going to end up shortly, returning by the same path it had taken an hour or two earlier.
And to my friend Al, who commented on my previous post, allow me to say I did NOT enjoy that scotch as you encouraged me to do. The fact that I was sipping a fine after dinner drink and could not enjoy the taste was a clue that something was not quite right in my interior. My downhill slide began sometime around half-way through the final round of The Masters golf tournament which all of us at that gathering watched with delight. Witnessing Bubba Watson's tearful release of tournament tension was about the last thing I recall of the day.
To emphasize this connection to golf in general (and you know by now, I'm something of a nut for the game), I had just spent a week with our children who came to hang out at our home on the golf course. We played well over 100 holes of golf during that week! When my son is here with me enjoying the typical warmth of southern California, he feels enfranchised and obligated to spend all the time he can on the course because it's just the thing to do! He might manage to play on another course only once or twice before he's back here in three to four months, so he backlogs his rounds of golf whenever he's here. Now my six-year-old grandson is becoming almost as committed. So I did play a lot of golf, having to always be out there with them to allow them to play in my senior community. Naturally, I loved it all.
The foregoing info will come into play here shortly. Sleep on Sunday night was practically impossible. All my bones seemed to want to reject each other and depart my body in protest. But if my estimate of ten minutes as my longest single time spent in any one position is correct, then my nightmare was amazingly resilient and determined. It seemed I had slept almost not at all, yet it equally seemed that I dreamed for hours - that is, endured the nightmare for hours. It would seem the nightmare was so determined, it renewed itself after a number of semi-wakeful stretches in which I was forced to painfully turn my body to a new, still uncomfortable, position.
And the nightmare, unbelievably, had me trudging a golf course! I use the word trudging pointedly because walking was more like dragging myself along through thick mud - an account I've heard others recite in trying to express the feel of a nightmare. But the course I was playing didn't look muddy or awful in anyway; it looked like a beautiful golf course. It wasn't Augusta National, for some reason, but a fine course. I simply was hampered in my ability to play it properly. Apparently I was required (by some impish golf-gods conspiring with nightmare gremlins) to go ahead of my son's round on the course, and until I could conquer a hole in some way, he would not be able to do well at all. The problems were two-fold essentially. One; as I said, it was as though I had to trudge through mud even though the course didn't show up as muddy, and two; the holes I had to hit were not really holes and not even on actual greens. As best I can describe them, they were rubber-like objects tossed on the ground at odd locations - I had to find them - and they looked more like enlargements of those crazy shaped rubber-bands of many colors that youngsters collect on their wrists. After each time I was able to putt the ball into the crazy band, I was told I had to pick up the rubber item and put it on my ankle, stretching it over my shoe. These then gathered in number and hampered me still more as I continued slogging through the course.
My son following along with the regular play, typical greens and holes, and having a caddy, appeared to be playing well though I could barely catch a glimpse of him at some of the greens while I was on the succeeding tee boxes. At some of these moments, he gave me a thumbs-up gesture. Much appreciated!
I'm sure a dream analyzer could come up with all kinds of psychological meaning out of all this, but to me it meant one thing only: I was sick! My supposition is that the brain is stuffed with so much info along with flotsam and jetsam that given a chance, it will push out some of that crud while other systems are down.
Congrats to Bubba and my son for great rounds of golf!
And to my friend Al, who commented on my previous post, allow me to say I did NOT enjoy that scotch as you encouraged me to do. The fact that I was sipping a fine after dinner drink and could not enjoy the taste was a clue that something was not quite right in my interior. My downhill slide began sometime around half-way through the final round of The Masters golf tournament which all of us at that gathering watched with delight. Witnessing Bubba Watson's tearful release of tournament tension was about the last thing I recall of the day.
To emphasize this connection to golf in general (and you know by now, I'm something of a nut for the game), I had just spent a week with our children who came to hang out at our home on the golf course. We played well over 100 holes of golf during that week! When my son is here with me enjoying the typical warmth of southern California, he feels enfranchised and obligated to spend all the time he can on the course because it's just the thing to do! He might manage to play on another course only once or twice before he's back here in three to four months, so he backlogs his rounds of golf whenever he's here. Now my six-year-old grandson is becoming almost as committed. So I did play a lot of golf, having to always be out there with them to allow them to play in my senior community. Naturally, I loved it all.
The foregoing info will come into play here shortly. Sleep on Sunday night was practically impossible. All my bones seemed to want to reject each other and depart my body in protest. But if my estimate of ten minutes as my longest single time spent in any one position is correct, then my nightmare was amazingly resilient and determined. It seemed I had slept almost not at all, yet it equally seemed that I dreamed for hours - that is, endured the nightmare for hours. It would seem the nightmare was so determined, it renewed itself after a number of semi-wakeful stretches in which I was forced to painfully turn my body to a new, still uncomfortable, position.
And the nightmare, unbelievably, had me trudging a golf course! I use the word trudging pointedly because walking was more like dragging myself along through thick mud - an account I've heard others recite in trying to express the feel of a nightmare. But the course I was playing didn't look muddy or awful in anyway; it looked like a beautiful golf course. It wasn't Augusta National, for some reason, but a fine course. I simply was hampered in my ability to play it properly. Apparently I was required (by some impish golf-gods conspiring with nightmare gremlins) to go ahead of my son's round on the course, and until I could conquer a hole in some way, he would not be able to do well at all. The problems were two-fold essentially. One; as I said, it was as though I had to trudge through mud even though the course didn't show up as muddy, and two; the holes I had to hit were not really holes and not even on actual greens. As best I can describe them, they were rubber-like objects tossed on the ground at odd locations - I had to find them - and they looked more like enlargements of those crazy shaped rubber-bands of many colors that youngsters collect on their wrists. After each time I was able to putt the ball into the crazy band, I was told I had to pick up the rubber item and put it on my ankle, stretching it over my shoe. These then gathered in number and hampered me still more as I continued slogging through the course.
My son following along with the regular play, typical greens and holes, and having a caddy, appeared to be playing well though I could barely catch a glimpse of him at some of the greens while I was on the succeeding tee boxes. At some of these moments, he gave me a thumbs-up gesture. Much appreciated!
I'm sure a dream analyzer could come up with all kinds of psychological meaning out of all this, but to me it meant one thing only: I was sick! My supposition is that the brain is stuffed with so much info along with flotsam and jetsam that given a chance, it will push out some of that crud while other systems are down.
Congrats to Bubba and my son for great rounds of golf!
Sunday, April 8, 2012
He is Risen...
Ra, that is. The sun god has not ceased to be honored in many thousands of years, the last two thousand or so of these all mystically combined with a Son and tied to an extended mythology.
When some jolting image in a zany dream awoke me this morning, I was suddenly aware of the bright light coming in through the window and realized the sun was already up, which is unusual for my world. Normally I am checking the clock every few minutes, in total darkness, and deciding when I might just as well rise from the bed and not wreck a tenuous balance of sleeping/waking time. Then the daylight creeps into my living room as I sit with my computer on my lap and listen to the coffee brewing. Today was different only in that I slept a few minutes into daylight and had to shake off the eerie effects of some very busy and typically confusing activity that had gone on in the vague webs of dreamland.
I did not suddenly jump to the realization I was missing some kind of sunrise service. In fact, it was only after getting up and turning on the coffee maker that I had to deal with the reality of what day this is in the world around me - a world far more zany and confusing than dreamland. And now I need to gather myself and prepare for dealing with actual humans who impact my life but who also feel tradition bound to make some special worshipful gestures on this day. For the cause of personal and family peace, I must allow myself to be sucked in once again to that arcane world of eggs and bunnies. To be less than comfortable but more in tune with others who are part of my life, I will again drive to be with those who insist on doing the Easter thing. At least I managed to make it clear many years ago that I would have none of the go-to-meetin' part of the whole morass of Easter Madness. My morning time, instead of sitting piously among fearful deity followers, can be enjoyed while at the steering wheel, seeing the world around me go by and relaxing in the pleasure of moving along the road. This has long been one of my religious experiences - far more satisfying than any ceremonial religious b***s*** in which I have involved myself in the past.
So now to appreciate the fresh coffee, turn on the TV and check out what the folks in Augusta are saying about the final round of The Masters golf tournament that is getting underway even as I write. Part of what made me decide to make the drive to the home of today's hosts was the fact I knew there would be lots of food and good Scotch, and that the television would stay tuned all afternoon to The Masters. Terrific irony there.
When some jolting image in a zany dream awoke me this morning, I was suddenly aware of the bright light coming in through the window and realized the sun was already up, which is unusual for my world. Normally I am checking the clock every few minutes, in total darkness, and deciding when I might just as well rise from the bed and not wreck a tenuous balance of sleeping/waking time. Then the daylight creeps into my living room as I sit with my computer on my lap and listen to the coffee brewing. Today was different only in that I slept a few minutes into daylight and had to shake off the eerie effects of some very busy and typically confusing activity that had gone on in the vague webs of dreamland.
I did not suddenly jump to the realization I was missing some kind of sunrise service. In fact, it was only after getting up and turning on the coffee maker that I had to deal with the reality of what day this is in the world around me - a world far more zany and confusing than dreamland. And now I need to gather myself and prepare for dealing with actual humans who impact my life but who also feel tradition bound to make some special worshipful gestures on this day. For the cause of personal and family peace, I must allow myself to be sucked in once again to that arcane world of eggs and bunnies. To be less than comfortable but more in tune with others who are part of my life, I will again drive to be with those who insist on doing the Easter thing. At least I managed to make it clear many years ago that I would have none of the go-to-meetin' part of the whole morass of Easter Madness. My morning time, instead of sitting piously among fearful deity followers, can be enjoyed while at the steering wheel, seeing the world around me go by and relaxing in the pleasure of moving along the road. This has long been one of my religious experiences - far more satisfying than any ceremonial religious b***s*** in which I have involved myself in the past.
So now to appreciate the fresh coffee, turn on the TV and check out what the folks in Augusta are saying about the final round of The Masters golf tournament that is getting underway even as I write. Part of what made me decide to make the drive to the home of today's hosts was the fact I knew there would be lots of food and good Scotch, and that the television would stay tuned all afternoon to The Masters. Terrific irony there.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Duck Tape
Yes, that's duck tape. Because you just never know when one of those pesky ducks is going to come crashing to Earth, flopping on the ground at your feet on a perfectly clear day for no obvious reason. It could be guilty of eating too much smoked salmon and flying while inloxicated. If you had compassion for him and could endure his fish breath, you would naturally put him back together using duck tape.
Perhaps this drunken duck finds you while you are walking on the Isles of Marsh. Beware!
Having a little fun here this morning at the expense of mis-users of the language. A friend sent me a photo of a small plane that had been repaired with duct tape, enough to fly it back to his base for proper repairs. The article was in praise of duct tape saying, "Don't leave home with it." Good idea, but my mind suddenly jumped to the fact that some folks don't actually know that this product is is duct tape, spelled with a t - a very strong and durable tape developed for the HVAC industry to hold air ducts together. Perhaps some folks who know nothing about ducts think the tape is made with the linen canvas called duck. [* See insert below] Yesterday I saw in the hardware store a colorful roll of something new called Duck Tape - probably some enterprising marketer figured out the public's tendency to think of the name in this way. I personally have heard people clearly say duck tape on many occasions. But no, I have never heard anyone say inloxicated.
The Isles of Marsh line was also a reference just made up today because I am jotting notes on March 15, called by Shakespeare the ides of March, or the middle of that month. That's definitely an indefinite placement, the Roman calendar giving the 15th day of four months (March, May, July and October) the position of ides while the other eight months show the 13th bearing that wispy label. So please don't make the simple slip of writing about the ides of April when taxes are due. Forgivable, but it's better to be informed.
My mind has been on this matter of word misunderstanding, misspelling, mispronunciation etc., as well as the twisted use of expressions, due to an online literary contact having made a major fox paws in a promotion piece. Even people who work in the world of words and writing can make bold blunders in their strange misuses of words and phrases, and as someone I knew many years ago used to say, in all seriousness, "That just ceases to amaze me." (My own twisted sense of humor has allowed me often to utilize that little gem when in the company of someone who can enjoy the laugh with me.)
It was actually a literary agent sending out emails of self-promotion who made the stumble that has been eating at me for a few days. I can't decide whether to thoughtfully inform the young lady of her misused reference or to let it go without comment. First, it would be difficult to do a thoughtfully worded correction without sounding pompous or pretentious; and second, I've already questioned whether this literary connection is one worth keeping. She could turn off others while representing me!
The blunder itself involved a lovely photograph of a night sky in a storm. Two dramatic lightening bolts were caught simultaneously touching the ground, perhaps within three or four miles of each other. The literary agent looking for an assist in catching the attention of her audience to impress us with the exciting news that an opportunity might actually be repeating itself, simply fell upon a seemingly easy context. Problem was, the easy context was a totally misused one simply because the young lady apparently has always heard an old expression repeated in its common shortened version: lightening never strikes twice ... The fact she didn't even seem to know that the original expression ends with, in the same place, is indicative of our abbreviated speech and abbreviated reasoning nowadays. And she was not dedicated enough to check it out - even by a cursory Google search. I did so and even typing in the shortened version only, the quick selections available all point to the full idiom and go into probable meanings and usages. So she constructed an entire concept on half of a thought, which not only changed the meaning entirely, it showed she was lacking in thought.
Bothering me still further was the amazing fact that this person had obviously never witnessed a beautiful double - or multiple - lightening strike in her own world. I've personally enjoyed these displays on a large scale and on numerous occasions. One especially memorable night in Arizona a few years ago, my wife and I stayed outside our tent to marvel at the massive electrical storm that kept most of the sky to the west (a good, safe distance west!) of our location almost continuously lit up like some kind of laser light show. We even put music (vocalizing Beethoven's 5th, etc.) to it and made up the likely words of a banter being shared among the clouds and their charges firing out. There were easily six to ten strikes at times hitting the ground simultaneously during an hour or more of our devoted watching. We weren't doing the photography thing and even if we had been, we could not have captured nearly enough of the action to do justice to the intensity of our excitement of being there in person. Truly talented and dedicated photographers have displayed some incredibly awesome lightening shows.
The more I look into it now online, the more disgusted I am with the shallowness that a supposed literary person revealed in using a simple premise to sell her too-simple approach and taking no time at all to check out the subject. There must be hundreds of better ways to grab attention for a commercial purpose than to so flagrantly misuse and misunderstand an old expression. I think I will just delete her emails in the future.
This dismissive way of dealing with a language abuser is not a typical approach for me; it all depends on whether the speaker is someone who already has my respect but who merely slips up. Such was the case last week when I had to endure many repetitions of the old nucular offense, this time by Melissa Harris-Perry. She is a highly intelligent and very highly educated professor who is worthy of my respect in her typical output and I try to catch some of her new show on MSNBC on weekend mornings. She's so worthy of my audience that I've long since learned to virtually not hear a speech impediment that is obviously not within her control. But her mispronouncing of words in the manner of less capable speakers was just too much for my ears. So I sent her an email asking her - begging her - to rise above the level of the embarrassing former POTUS, GWB, who was notably poor at any kind of speaking and who never seemed to catch on to the way most of the world laughed at him for the oft-repeated mispronunciation of nuclear. SNL folks did a commendable job of poking fun at him for it as did other comics and writers. But as I said to Ms. Harris-Perry, Bush was perhaps incapable of learning; she is not.
No, I do NOT go through life trying to correct all the linguistic errors I encounter nor trying to punish all the usage criminals I confront. And yes, even as one reader of this blog called me out, I still make those occasional blunders myself. I hope I can avoid repeating egregious (or even minor) slips, but I'm pragmatic about this. Anyone using the language very much is bound to sometimes misuse it. I'm no paragon of proper speech, only someone who tries hard to be a good usage example. My wonderful wife, who communicates as effectively as anyone I know, is nonetheless a font of foibles and flaws in speech and spoonerism. She not only misuses words and expressions, she creates her own where nothing she knows is quite sufficient. She unintentionally utters many hilarious lines such as those delivered with practiced innocence by Gracie Allen many years ago, but she is a cute and bubbly blond, so I have dubbed her Gracie Hawn. When she asked me years ago to correct some of her missteps in speech, I declined until pressed on the issue. Acting as a constant verbal editor for my wife would not have promoted much harmony between us. We finally agreed that if she would try hard to avoid abusing just three offending words which are commonly mispronounced and are particularly grating on my nerves, then I would try hard never to wince or show any outward sign of dismay when she misses on any others. So the only time I call her on anything is when she slips up and says the aforementioned nucular or that word I already covered in an entire post - real(e)ty.
And the third one? The other abused word I am allowed to reject and repair for my wife? Amazingly, it's another one heard often coming from people in all walks of life, including even broadcasters! And it's one of those words that is easier said properly than it is in the commonly corrupted version. Go figure! Oh, well, I guess error is here to stay; we can never excape it!
[ * Correction INSERT - Mar. 23]
Once again, this red-faced writer is guilty of doing exactly as he accused others of doing; writing before thoroughly checking it out himself. If Wikipedia is correct, the article about duct tape shows that I am sadly lacking in knowledge of this product. Now I'm reading up on other articles found in an online search, and I see that The Duct Tape Guys have written seven books on the subject. No, I probably won't read all of those, but allow me to stand VERY corrected on my earlier snide remarks about the tape. And NO, this was not premeditated as a test of my readership to see who might slap me around for my gaffe. I simply blew it!
Perhaps this drunken duck finds you while you are walking on the Isles of Marsh. Beware!
Having a little fun here this morning at the expense of mis-users of the language. A friend sent me a photo of a small plane that had been repaired with duct tape, enough to fly it back to his base for proper repairs. The article was in praise of duct tape saying, "Don't leave home with it." Good idea, but my mind suddenly jumped to the fact that some folks don't actually know that this product is is duct tape, spelled with a t - a very strong and durable tape developed for the HVAC industry to hold air ducts together. Perhaps some folks who know nothing about ducts think the tape is made with the linen canvas called duck. [* See insert below] Yesterday I saw in the hardware store a colorful roll of something new called Duck Tape - probably some enterprising marketer figured out the public's tendency to think of the name in this way. I personally have heard people clearly say duck tape on many occasions. But no, I have never heard anyone say inloxicated.
The Isles of Marsh line was also a reference just made up today because I am jotting notes on March 15, called by Shakespeare the ides of March, or the middle of that month. That's definitely an indefinite placement, the Roman calendar giving the 15th day of four months (March, May, July and October) the position of ides while the other eight months show the 13th bearing that wispy label. So please don't make the simple slip of writing about the ides of April when taxes are due. Forgivable, but it's better to be informed.
My mind has been on this matter of word misunderstanding, misspelling, mispronunciation etc., as well as the twisted use of expressions, due to an online literary contact having made a major fox paws in a promotion piece. Even people who work in the world of words and writing can make bold blunders in their strange misuses of words and phrases, and as someone I knew many years ago used to say, in all seriousness, "That just ceases to amaze me." (My own twisted sense of humor has allowed me often to utilize that little gem when in the company of someone who can enjoy the laugh with me.)
It was actually a literary agent sending out emails of self-promotion who made the stumble that has been eating at me for a few days. I can't decide whether to thoughtfully inform the young lady of her misused reference or to let it go without comment. First, it would be difficult to do a thoughtfully worded correction without sounding pompous or pretentious; and second, I've already questioned whether this literary connection is one worth keeping. She could turn off others while representing me!
The blunder itself involved a lovely photograph of a night sky in a storm. Two dramatic lightening bolts were caught simultaneously touching the ground, perhaps within three or four miles of each other. The literary agent looking for an assist in catching the attention of her audience to impress us with the exciting news that an opportunity might actually be repeating itself, simply fell upon a seemingly easy context. Problem was, the easy context was a totally misused one simply because the young lady apparently has always heard an old expression repeated in its common shortened version: lightening never strikes twice ... The fact she didn't even seem to know that the original expression ends with, in the same place, is indicative of our abbreviated speech and abbreviated reasoning nowadays. And she was not dedicated enough to check it out - even by a cursory Google search. I did so and even typing in the shortened version only, the quick selections available all point to the full idiom and go into probable meanings and usages. So she constructed an entire concept on half of a thought, which not only changed the meaning entirely, it showed she was lacking in thought.
Bothering me still further was the amazing fact that this person had obviously never witnessed a beautiful double - or multiple - lightening strike in her own world. I've personally enjoyed these displays on a large scale and on numerous occasions. One especially memorable night in Arizona a few years ago, my wife and I stayed outside our tent to marvel at the massive electrical storm that kept most of the sky to the west (a good, safe distance west!) of our location almost continuously lit up like some kind of laser light show. We even put music (vocalizing Beethoven's 5th, etc.) to it and made up the likely words of a banter being shared among the clouds and their charges firing out. There were easily six to ten strikes at times hitting the ground simultaneously during an hour or more of our devoted watching. We weren't doing the photography thing and even if we had been, we could not have captured nearly enough of the action to do justice to the intensity of our excitement of being there in person. Truly talented and dedicated photographers have displayed some incredibly awesome lightening shows.
The more I look into it now online, the more disgusted I am with the shallowness that a supposed literary person revealed in using a simple premise to sell her too-simple approach and taking no time at all to check out the subject. There must be hundreds of better ways to grab attention for a commercial purpose than to so flagrantly misuse and misunderstand an old expression. I think I will just delete her emails in the future.
This dismissive way of dealing with a language abuser is not a typical approach for me; it all depends on whether the speaker is someone who already has my respect but who merely slips up. Such was the case last week when I had to endure many repetitions of the old nucular offense, this time by Melissa Harris-Perry. She is a highly intelligent and very highly educated professor who is worthy of my respect in her typical output and I try to catch some of her new show on MSNBC on weekend mornings. She's so worthy of my audience that I've long since learned to virtually not hear a speech impediment that is obviously not within her control. But her mispronouncing of words in the manner of less capable speakers was just too much for my ears. So I sent her an email asking her - begging her - to rise above the level of the embarrassing former POTUS, GWB, who was notably poor at any kind of speaking and who never seemed to catch on to the way most of the world laughed at him for the oft-repeated mispronunciation of nuclear. SNL folks did a commendable job of poking fun at him for it as did other comics and writers. But as I said to Ms. Harris-Perry, Bush was perhaps incapable of learning; she is not.
No, I do NOT go through life trying to correct all the linguistic errors I encounter nor trying to punish all the usage criminals I confront. And yes, even as one reader of this blog called me out, I still make those occasional blunders myself. I hope I can avoid repeating egregious (or even minor) slips, but I'm pragmatic about this. Anyone using the language very much is bound to sometimes misuse it. I'm no paragon of proper speech, only someone who tries hard to be a good usage example. My wonderful wife, who communicates as effectively as anyone I know, is nonetheless a font of foibles and flaws in speech and spoonerism. She not only misuses words and expressions, she creates her own where nothing she knows is quite sufficient. She unintentionally utters many hilarious lines such as those delivered with practiced innocence by Gracie Allen many years ago, but she is a cute and bubbly blond, so I have dubbed her Gracie Hawn. When she asked me years ago to correct some of her missteps in speech, I declined until pressed on the issue. Acting as a constant verbal editor for my wife would not have promoted much harmony between us. We finally agreed that if she would try hard to avoid abusing just three offending words which are commonly mispronounced and are particularly grating on my nerves, then I would try hard never to wince or show any outward sign of dismay when she misses on any others. So the only time I call her on anything is when she slips up and says the aforementioned nucular or that word I already covered in an entire post - real(e)ty.
And the third one? The other abused word I am allowed to reject and repair for my wife? Amazingly, it's another one heard often coming from people in all walks of life, including even broadcasters! And it's one of those words that is easier said properly than it is in the commonly corrupted version. Go figure! Oh, well, I guess error is here to stay; we can never excape it!
[ * Correction INSERT - Mar. 23]
Once again, this red-faced writer is guilty of doing exactly as he accused others of doing; writing before thoroughly checking it out himself. If Wikipedia is correct, the article about duct tape shows that I am sadly lacking in knowledge of this product. Now I'm reading up on other articles found in an online search, and I see that The Duct Tape Guys have written seven books on the subject. No, I probably won't read all of those, but allow me to stand VERY corrected on my earlier snide remarks about the tape. And NO, this was not premeditated as a test of my readership to see who might slap me around for my gaffe. I simply blew it!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)