PANDEMIC DIARY

WHAT ARE MEN THINKING?
May 30, 2021

Friends are coming over to the house tonight. It was time to pop into the shower. I went to my closet, plucked a pair of undershorts from the drawer and proceeded past the bed where Adele laid comfortably, ignoring me as is often the case even as I antically tossed my underpants around my back and over my head. Unable to avoid my silly performance, Adele shook her head in absolute incredulity at my one-man; one-ring circus routine while I responded with my look of incomprehensibility at her dismayed amazement. It made me wonder what men do that women would never think of doing. And why? I will deal with that answer following the list. Here are eight suggestions that come to mind quickly.

1. The aforementioned tossing of underpants over your head or around your back.

2. Sticking protuberant objects in your nostrils for affect.

3. Wearing only a hat around the house butt naked.

4. Throwing food in the air attempting to catch the morsel in your mouth.

5. Sneaking food from someone else’s plate.

6. Daddy jokes about any and all things. (This Is clearly genetic)

7. Flicking the remote endlessly looking for nothing in particular.

8. Sticking your hand in your pants to scratch your ass.

9. Wanting to be left alone when you have a problem.

10. Wanting to be left alone when your wife has a problem.

Then I thought of this minister drawn from memory - I don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Life and marriage in all their glory are fully explained and comically delivered by the Preacher, yes, Preacher Mark Gungor of Gracepoint Church. [If the video is not embedded you can see this truly funny and hysterically identifiable routine via: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTPUhMdfvzw] Also, if you don’t want to sit through the whole performance, just go to Youtube and you will see versions pulled from this and other of his seminars that are shorter.

Here is the answer to the question, “Why do men perform, maybe act like clowns, or put themselves in silly, childish, and apparently frivolous and empty-headed positions that baffle their wives? The answer is: MEN WISH TO PLEASE!
They are out there all day hunting and gathering and when they come home they want to be greeted by an admiring audience of one. Men will attempt to get a smile out of you at any and all cost. They want you to SMILE. Laughter may be expecting too much. But, in our hearts…our heart of hearts…is the desire to please. And, we will go to any extent to do that. We will put down our spear, remove our loin cloth, and dance around the camp fire while burning our feet on the hot embers, just to get you gals to be pleased and happy.

Having said all this, of course, we cannot admit to any of it. We will deny, deny, deny to our death that we are anything but muscle-bound, aggressive, “I can’t wait for the next fight”, “Have one on me” ‘good-ole boys’. That’s why we get tattoos, carry guns and are casually abusive idiots. Our true nature is abhorrent to us. What kind of pansy lets his dingle dangle, dancing around like a ridiculous grade-school wallflower to please his wife? NOT ME!

YES, ME! We are so good and caring we literally can’t stand ourselves. That’s why we have such a difficult time, as an example, carrying a bunch of roses. Have you seen a man carrying flowers for his wife? He looks like he’s toting fifty pounds of just made soft dough - fidgeting and balancing - all so that his manly appearance is not forsaken.

You know the famous saying: K.I.S.S.? I once saw a man with a tee shirt that said: KEEP IT STUPID SIMPLE. Yes, men get it backwards sometimes. But, it’s the effort that counts. Men keep trying. Admittedly, their antics go to extremes, like the guy who wanted to do yard work for his wife and attempted to start his power saw by putting it between his legs and pulling the cord. God knows we try.

So, I ask you, next time your man appears with whipped cream on his chest nipples, or wearing his pants backwards, or if he puts Chinese hot sauce on your peanut butter sandwich, please forgive him and remember, above all else, that this is man at his best.

Some fabulous quotes from commiserating women I have known:

“You are like a fine wine. I want to stomp on you and keep you in the dark until you mature”.
”If it weren’t for sarcasm, how could I possibly express myself in a non-threatening manner”?
”My ‘alone time’ is for everyone’s safety”.
NOTE TO SELF: “You cannot stab a man for being stupid”.
”Sometimes all it takes being with you is a positive attitude…and a knife”.
”No issues today: I’m in my awesome bubble, and you’re not allowed inside”.
”Be careful who you trust. Salt and arsenic look the same”.
”People say I act like I don’t care about you. It’s not an act”.
”I wish my life had background music so I could know what the hell is going on with you”.

PANDEMIC DIARY

WHY DO I WRITE?
May 27, 2021

Three years ago, I took a writing course with Julia Green at the Carrboro Arts Center. Julia is terrific - a teacher, novelist, short story writer, and even a bit of a raconteur. Plus, she knows how to teach and provide instruction.

Over the years, I have developed a style of writing that, I believe, can be likened to a bad golf swing. Developed over years of non-instruction, I was always innately talented enough to surpass some one person in a foursome, but never a handicapped golfer despite my natural abilities. It is clear to me that as it was in golf, it is in writing. I have not been totally dedicated to the cause of either, therefore, never able to claim the moniker or byline: ‘golfer’ or ‘writer’.

Last week, Julia popped an email into my inbox (along with her sizable mailing list) to invite me to a summer writing course. I mulled this over, testifying in my head to all the reasons this would not work over the course of six weeks of summer. After all, Adele and I are leaving on June 26 for all points north. We will be with our friends much of the time. We will be hiking. I will be cooking. Blah. Blah. Blah. I cannot, for the life of me, shut my fucking brain prattle.

I signed up for the course. I could not stand listening to myself for another moment. The utter bullshit my brain produces is absolutely heroic…and no less annoying, like that Pileated Woodpecker that is fond of a tree right outside our screened-in porch. Peck, peck, peck, peck, peck! Then follows an hysterical cackling sound as if The Joker was a mad, laughing female opera singer escapee from The Cuckoo’s Nest. Cackle, cackle, cackle.

It’s not polite to lay this on my friends, but I thought you may find this therapeutic. I discovered I am on the spectrum, the Asperger’s spectrum, a couple of years ago. Mildly so. It has to do with what is identified as low Executive Function. Too late to really do anything about it. There was no such syndrome when I was growing up, so I was left thinking I was ‘not working hard enough’. My parents told me I was lazy. “You have so much potential”. Can you imagine all the kids out there suffering and believing that all it takes is to ‘try harder’.

Writing permits me to work at my own pace. Some days on and some off. If I need to get up and do something else, I simply get off my ass and move around. I remember when Alex was 4 1/2 years old, we brought him for a neuro-psych evaluation. During the exam, which was about 4 1/2 hours long, Alex asked the tester to stop. Alex got out of his chair and started doing jumping jacks. Afterwards, the psychologist told us the story saying that Alex was the first patient that he ever worked with who interrupted the exam to release his energy. He thought it was quite remarkable and commended Alex. Until my diagnosis, I had never really given much consideration to that incident. The son does not fall far from the parent.

The blog I write is a perfect match for my ‘special’ mind. Mel Levine, a Doctor of Pediatrics and x-Professor at The University of North Carolina wrote a breakthrough book called “All Kinds Of Minds”, which became a non-profit institute, in which he describes the numerous and different modalities of the brain. He exhorts us to realize the multitude of ways in which the mind works and unless we adapt to each individual we shackle that child with the unintended and unachievable task of having to navigate a world in which education is taught in a singlular modality that suits a particular type of young person but is denying a majority of children the opportunity to learn, flourish and succeed.

In the 4th grade, my school went on a class trip to, if I remember correctly, The Museum of Natural History in New York City. We lived in the Bronx, so we were to take a subway downtown. On the way we passed an Italian bakery which was famed for its Italian Gelato. So, I snuck off line, avoiding all eyes, and went inside the shop and ordered a gelato which was scooped into these soft, squeezable paper cups. Meanwhile, the teachers took a count of their students and realized one child was missing. They searched for me up and down the block without any luck until I exited the store with my gelato. I was a ‘pissah’.

By the way, I ordered a flavor called “Lily with Nuts”. This flavor never existed anywhere else. Then, years later, out of sheer curiosity, I looked up this flavor and lo’ and behold I found a posting in 2015 in which a woman asked a question on ‘reddit’, “In the Bronx borough of NY there is a section that makes an Italian ice flavor (Its a creme ice) called Lily with nuts. My family is addicted to the stuff and I want to replicate it. It has slivers of almonds and tastes of spices like cinnamon or nutmeg. I can't figure it out. Has anyone ever heard of anything like this and if so does anyone have a recipe? You would be a hero to my entire extended family!!!!! This is my white whale!”
An answer came back, "One of the more unusual flavors, lily with nuts, is a Bronx invention of vanilla, rum and slivered almonds”.
That’s it. That’s the taste. I could really go for a lick of that right now. By the way, the Italian Bakery was on Castle Hill Avenue in the Bronx.

PANDEMIC DIARY

THIS IS WHERE I DRAW THE LINE
May 24, 2021

I was riding in my car to and from chores when I turned on NPR. Whatever the segment, I had arrived mid-broadcast, mid-sentence. In a mere moment, I realized that the subject matter was a retelling of a difficult time from a difficult place. The person retelling the story conveyed a pall of dark memories in literal moments of time. And, without my having any context regarding who the is, where she is from, what happened and why, I was struck in my heart by the words to follow.

She retells that “he” asked her, “Does it hurt to die”.

Later, she noticed he would not keep away from his sister and was kissing and touching her to her mild annoyance. She recounts asking, “What are you doing?”.
”If I die I want to make sure I remember her”.

I teared up hearing the trauma through the eyes of a child’s experience. How fear to the uninitiated is all-encompassing. How experience to a young person is not particular, rather universal. They know one thing: what is happening to them in this moment. That becomes their world. Later their assumption. Then their burden.

I am thinking of all the moments in my life that I am still dealing with, and even sometimes still addressing. But, my world was still safe within its conclave of family. True, my mother was a sneaky, self-centered manipulative narcissist. But, she bathed us, cooked for us and ‘kvetched’ incessantly enough that we felt a non-threatening uniqueness of oddity. I still could ‘go out and play’. Nothing was ever falling from the sky and going ‘boom’. Noises did not infer impending doom or an urgency to run and hide in shelter.

There appears to be a world-wide fascination with authoritarians. We are witnessing a time when the odyssey of subverted corruption is surfacing and what lays beneath the surface of public political debates and partisanships has bubbled to the surface for all to see. There is no longer a model government. They are all…and have always been…corrupt. Those in government have always sought to serve themselves. When it came to their own political survival, policy was up for grabs. Integrity never seemed to matter except for the few. The concept of ‘servants of the people’ never took hold. The difference now is that what existed before, I believe rarely without exception, has become more entrenched, more institutionalized, more politically acceptable; more blatant and shameless; and, more popularly and commonly accepted than ever before. In other words, imminently threatening what remains as our democracy

I remember a pleasant happenstance that occurred to Adele and I. We were in Berlin on the day of their Marathon. We decided to become part of the crowd and position ourselves near a turn in the run where we could get a good long glance of the racers. Standing by us at the barriers was a gentleman with whom we started up a conversation. What’s relevant here is that we were staying in a portion of the city that was designated as East Berlin prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall. It has since become gentrified with young singles and couples with children and is really quite lovely. The gentleman went on to explain that his father, who is still alive, opines for the days before Berlin’s unification. He liked it under the old totalitarian regime.

We asked him what about authoritarianism his father liked? His answer was that like so many of his peers, they liked the certainty. They did not have to stand on line for jobs. They were given jobs. They did not have to worry about having a place to stay. They were given an apartment. They didn't possess much, nor could they go far, or did they have things to do and enjoy. Yet, he was satisfied. They didn't worry about capitalism. Decisions were made for them. Steady as she goes. Limit choices. Believe in the voices that tell you what is going on. No cares.

In now famous experiments from the 1960’s, Stanley Milgram, a Yale professor, questioned why people follow authoritarian figures. His first conclusion he called “The Power of Authority”. “Too often, orders from people with positional power can overrule individual judgment. Psychologist Stanley Milgram’s landmark study showed how people mindlessly obeyed an authority figure. They followed his commands to administer potentially fatal shocks to a person in the next room whenever he gave a wrong answer to a test question. Despite the victim’s cries of pain, pleas to stop, and complaints about his heart condition, the vast majority (82.5%) of research participants obeyed the experimenter. While hearing the screams from the person next door, these participants kept pushing the button to deliver severe shocks increasing to the level of 450 volts. Milgram (1974) concluded that most people will follow an authority figure’s commands because our culture reinforces us for obedience.” Later experiments conducted by psychologist Jerry Berger (2009) discovered that ‘testers’ could be easily persuaded to continue shocking to near fatal levels even after hearing subject (victims) cry out in agony. [All participants were actors and the pain performed).

Then there was “The Power of Limited Information”. “Without other reliable sources of information, they were forced to rely only on the claims of the authority figure. Is it any wonder that authoritarian leaders seek to cut people off from valid information? They censor and discredit the press as well as the academic and scientific communities so that people are left with only their authoritarian propaganda.”

Another critical stage in the development of authoritarian rule is “The Power of Avoiding Personal Responsibility”. In the obedience segment of the test, “the experimenter told participants that he alone was responsible for any adverse effects on the person subjected to shocks. The participants were just “following orders,” able to avoid personal responsibility because they were obeying the authority figure.” We see this occurring now in government, where legislators are falling in line with a dominant figure to mask their complicity and hide behind the idea that someone else is in charge.

A final reason is explained by the study of tyrannical regimes during WWII. Historian Timothy Snyder (2017) recognized how often authoritarian leaders prey upon our fears. They will discredit facts, deny credible news and abuse sources of information, finally drawing the public into false webs of conspiracy theories that produce a toxic mix of angst, polarization, scapegoating, and chronic cultural positions and anxieties that potentially undermine a civil, free society.

We are at a critical vector in our history. Republicans seem to have been planning for this for decades. Their hateful, racist policies have been with us since Reconstruction and the ‘Southern Strategy’. I am thinking of ways to re-engage and start marches. But, what I absolutely am committed to is “to not tolerate fools”. They are not my friends. They are not who I wish to socialize with despite our past, despite what other good qualities they may possess. I am using my voice, not to apologize or compromise, but to repudiate.

THIS IS WHERE I DRAW THE LINE!

PANDEMIC DIARY

“YOU’RE RIGHT”…or, The Last Words of a Confident Woman
May 3, 2021

Sunday evening, sitting outside on our screened-in porch having a casual meal with friends, the conversation turned ‘local’. Both couples know young people who are moving. We have friends whose daughter and husband are moving to the Boston suburbs, another young couple to Ann Arbor, another to an outlying part of the borough of Brooklyn in New York, and finally our mealtime friend’s son and fiancé are trying to find a starter home in or around Decatur, Georgia. We all acknowledged that none of these people can afford

The exchange then turned to the Triangle - the Chapel Hill, Durham, Raleigh corridor - and what has occurred in real estate over the past year of Covid. Nationally, there has been a middle-class, white flight from inner cities to suburbs and beyond. Real estate prices have skyrocketed. Here, in Chapel Hill, real estate prices have increased 7.7% year over year. Good news for home owners. Not so good news for the town’s infrastructure and Rte.40 traffic., or for the minority communities wanting to get a start and share in the now more distant hope (fantasy?) of the American Dream.

However, this post is not about financial, economic, or political issues. Let me explain. Adele and I are frequent walkers. On our jaunts, it is fairly common that we come across home renovations. About one month ago we strolled passed new construction. The house was about 2,800 square feet, but narrow and plopped on, I’m guessing, a less than quarter acre plot. The asking price of the home was…? Well, let’s pause for a moment. Ladies and gentlemen, have you ever had a difference of opinion or disagreement with your spouse when one or the other becomes vehement regarding a shared experience. And, what ensues is a, shall we say, spat that can and does escalate into a brouhaha and finally a falling out that denies both of all pleasure and unity.

I did not pose this as a question because I already know the answer. A most definitive YES. And so, to reduce the chance that Adele and I feverishly interact and say things we will later regret, I devised this game that has worked so incredibly well that these divergent views never escalate into anything more laughable contrariness. Here’s the game: when either of us makes a statement that the other feels is blatantly false or untrue, we will make a bet. The size of the bet depends upon the degree of surety that each marks. Of course, we don’t exchange real money, but we also cannot bet less than a million dollars. If either of us is on the margins of the debate, the bet will be small, albeit a million dollars. But, when we are willing to bet the bank, the sum can go up to 5 or 10 million dollars. At this very moment, Adele owes me 2 million dollars.

A photo from 2014. Adele and I kissing across the International Date Line in Ecuador - O’ Longitude : O’ Latitude
A symbolic gesture to the mediation of differences.

Back to the dinner: Adele and I are one day walking and passed this new construction. When we returned home Adele checked the price of the house on Multiple Listings. The price of the house was $875,000. 875,000 divided by 2800 sq.ft. equals $312/sq.ft. I mentioned this to our friends and Adele immediately corrected me suggesting I was thinking of another house in construction on Hillsborough Road. I insisted that Adele was the one confusing the price of the two homes. She told me, without any hesitation, that I was wrong. Our guests were utterly delighted and amused by this exchange. What did Adele and I do? We bet. Then, Adele went to the multiple listing site and, low and behold, with a peep that rose to the level of a shy mouse I heard the words, “I was wrong”. But, we were in the midst of a conversation so the table hardly heard what Adele said. “Would you please repeat that so everyone can hear”, I cajoled. “I was wrong”, a barely louder confession was uttered to laughter around.

Mind you, Adele did not say, “You were right”, which is likely the next level of self-discovery, admitting that one is wrong by congratulating the party that was correct. Joyfully, this did not feel like a victory because Adele and I have found a way of resolve with a sidebar of ‘funny’ thrown in. But, it does make me wonder about (and here is the question of the day) if it is more common for men or women to be more self-righteous. I know there are a lot of jokes made about men never hearing the words, “You’re right”. Or, conversely, the charge that men should learn to say ‘yes’ to make women happy because they will get their way anyway. But, what is the truth of the matter?

In any case, what is your experience, ladies and gentlemen? Is your wife more right than you, husbands? Do you find that your wife has a better memory for past events? Is she Hermione Gingold to your Maurice Chevalier…”Ah, I remember it well”. (see the wonderful movie, GIGI)

PANDEMIC DIARY

More thoughts of a 75 year old
May 1, 2021

CHECKING THE BACK OF A RECENT HAIRCUT

1. There is only one beauty - the beauty of the moment.

2. Corruption follows the sense of entitlement that comes from the belief that life should be easy.

3. Feet get you to where you need to go; heart gets you where you dream of going.

4. Do not despair of Covid, it has taught us the ways in which we are One.

5. Pancakes were likely the earliest and most widely prepared Stone Age food. That flipped me out.

6. Wouldn’t you like to see how Ivanka Trump looks in a smart, orange horizontal-striped outfit?

7. I recently read a great deal on cryptocurrencies and have come away totally flummoxed.

8. We can now travel to Mars but cannot figure out a way to not act like jackasses.

9. Isn’t Matt Gaetz justification enough for the right to abortion.

10. If you had to lose either hearing or seeing, would you rather not see stupidity or hear stupidity?

A BEFORE COVID OUTFIT

PANDEMIC DIARY

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME
April 15, 2021

I celebrated my 75th birthday on April 15. These are some random thoughts inspired by this event:

1. The bigger lies than the “Big Lie” are the lies we tell ourselves.

2. The horizon appears ever closer; twenty-four hours pass quicker.

3. What matters, matters less, and less matters.

4. It’s a pity that drinking heavily has consequences.

5. I shave the hairs on my nose once a week.

6. The average 75 yr. old in excellent health has an optimal statistical risk factor of 17.4% of a heart incident.

7. I am convinced there is nothing cute about a squirrel.

8. Religion has always seemed useless to me. Now it appears downright dangerous.

9. Our greatest vulnerabilities are the susceptibilities to the hurts of our past.

10. If our home galaxy, the Milky Way, contains at least 100 billion stars, and the observable universe contains at least 100 billion galaxies…How much toilet paper is used daily?

11. I used to ‘stop’ in order to slow down; now that I am slowing down I don’t like it one bit.

12. Philosophy is simply a way of wasting time on “what if’s”.

13. I used to look at my face in the mirror. My private excuse for sporting a beard is that I no longer have to do that as often.

14. No doubt I am wiser…and nobody seems to care.

15. I used to be attracted to women. Now, I am appreciative of women.
    

STAY IN GOOD HEALTH EVERYONE1

PANDEMIC DIARY

A “MOO”-T POINT
February 24, 2021

On January 6, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, revealed that candidates for a challenging university entry exam would have to read a 54-page booklet, learn and memorize all the facts and figures related to the various properties of India’s cows, know as “gaumata”. Properties such as: emotions, intelligence, wisdom, usefulness and physical features. Intended to venerate their national species of bovines, Prime Minister Modi went on to compare his country’s cows to New Jersey Gurnsey cows which he called” dirty, lazy and emotionless creatures who sit idly all day and are prone to diseases because they’re unhygienic.” He also made public statements like:

“Whenever any unknown person comes near desi cow, she will immediately stand,” the booklet said. “The jersey cow, however, displays no emotions.” 

“Indian cows maintain hygiene, [are] hardy and clever enough not to sit at dirty places,”

“Jersey cows are known to be very lazy and highly prone to diseases. It has also been seen that they attract infection by not being hygienic enough.”

Members of Modi’s cabinet and government took exception to these childish and empty-headed assertions. They accused Modi of misappropriating the cow, held in esteem as a religious icon, for political purposes.

I thought this subject perfect fodder for the limerick:

How sacred was Lord Krishna’s cow
On knees to bovine did he bow
On the highest placed rung
Revered even their dung
Which is why they were never his chow.

Prime Minister Modi, of India
Who’s religion is thoroughly Hindia
Declared “our cow’s smarter”
Venerated their farta
Then himself let loose with some windia.

PANDEMIC DIARY

PIECES OF A MARRIAGE
February 15, 2021

Yesterday was Valentine’s Day. Adele and I exchanged Valentine’s Day cards. I thanked Adele for ‘seeing’ me; Adele thanked me for my patience. In my card was written, “I couldn’t ask for anything better than loving and being loved by you”. Adele’s card read, “I couldn’t ask for a better man to share this amazing adventure with.” These sentiments, however truly felt and experienced, overlook (intentionally so for this occasion) exactly what goes in to making a marriage work. In every marriage each party endures. Marriage endures. In this Sunday’s New York Times, under the caption of '“Modern Love” was an article by Michelle White in which she describes a time during the pressures of the Covid pandemic when her husband felt he could no longer take it and “packed a suitcase and a brown paper bag of food and moved into an Airbnb some two miles away.” She describes how her “quarter-century-long marriage was faltering”. Remember, this column is called Modern Love. And, so, to absolve you of any projection and pain I will tell you at the outset that on Day 109 after Jason, her husband left, they had resolved their issues and were reunited in their home.

“We had stood on the edge, teetered and stumbled. When he had wanted to jump, I’d pull him back. When I stepped forward, he grabbed me. Ultimately, we held hands, each keeping the other from falling until we could turn around and choose each other again. We have learned enough to know that the cliff is always there, and that to love is to choose and keep choosing.”

Each morning Adele and I select some classical music piece to listen to while we have coffee, do the puzzles, read the paper and latest news, etc. Yesterday, I came across the album from the movie “Pieces of a Woman”, music composed by genius Howard Shore, who composed the music for The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. The music is stunning: romantic, melodic, turbulent, pensive and moving. Its highs and lows, its ins and outs reminded me, on this Valentine’s Day, of all that we in love go through to preserve and hold onto that love.

Love is never a straight line. (Neither does a straight line exist in nature) It’s not a direct flight with no stopovers. Marriage is never easy even as it is rewarding; never the same and never predictable. And, clearly, even though we may be at it for a long time, it takes work until the end. It takes ‘seeing’ the other person, as well as patience. As Adele said, many years ago, “Commitment is its own reward”. We have to be willing to choose that each day.

HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY TO ALL

PANDEMIC DIARY

DO YOU HAIKU?
February 11, 2021

A haiku is traditionally a Japanese poem consisting of three short lines that do not rhyme. The origins of haiku poems can be traced back as far as the 9th century. A haiku is considered to be more than a type of poem; it is a way of looking at the physical world and seeing something deeper, like the very nature of existence. The standard format is counted in “mora” or units considered like syllables except in Japanese the intonations translate to differences in the classic 5-7-5 structure, as used here. Typically, the first two lines express two different related ideas. The third line might refer to nature, seasonal attributes, or spiritual abstractions. I have utilized, as well, ideas relating to the pandemic and experiences and thoughts related to our current circumstance. Haiku should leave the reader with a strong feeling or impression. Have you ever written a Haiku? Maybe you want to give it a try?

1. Wake up to sunlight
   Take endless walks…endlessly
   Wander not of heart.

2. I hold her hand near
   Did I disinfect with wipes?
   April’s showers bring…

3. Religious fervor
   Sweet mustard barbecue sauce
   Get them while you can.

4. Politicians lie
   Comedians make us laugh
   A three-humped Camel.

5. Disease, death, and doom
   Do not inhale; only exhale
   Feel the ocean’s spray.

6. Valentine’s Day soon
   Roses display Love’s layers
   How little time left.

7. Two plus two is four.
   At times it does not add up.
   The maze has us choose.

8. Jesus is Saviour
   Life is but a Purple Rain
   Apple Crumb Donuts.

9. Raspberry preserves
   Little seeds caught between teeth
   Rinse, gargle, and spit.

10. Pump air in your tires
    Dreaming of a White Pizza
    Naught’s perfectly round.

11. Ocean’s rolling waves
    Dolphins jolly leaping. Splash!
    Silence churns beneath.
    

PANDEMIC DIARY

DID YOU ASK FIRST?
February 6, 2021

DID YOU ASK, FIRST?

Did you ask, first?
Did you think beyond
what you wanted…to bear?
Precedence is not a presumption
of right; the right stolen from
those who cannot choose;
the yet to be, who you say
represent our future
stolen from their bliss.

Did you ask, first?
Do you think it my desire to be involuntarily
pressed into reincarnation’s
suffering cycles plucked from
Excellent Eternal Freedom,
prodded, pulsated and
pushed through cramped, constricted
canals, inverted, slapped, squeezed,
and shocked from timeless
black into brazen light.

Whose interests did the
doctor hold in her hands?
For whose life were precautions
provided? Whose cries were louder?
Whose pleas?
Not the voiceless.
I certainly was not consulted.
I knew from the start Mother’s limbic
milk upset my better euphoria.

Is knowing so superior to Being’s bloom?
The pomegranate did not abet the Fall.
Can’t beauty exist without description?
Do we need to abduct eternity’s future?
In the end, what do we really know?
What end does life speak to?
What life does death substantiate?
Life is a mythology that only death defines.

Thankfully, there has been wet
dog kisses; the shimmering of dew dappled
grass fields; the lapping of burbling
brooks; jungle orchids crazy varieties;
puddles to plunge in; and, mud
to conspire with to
anger parental authorities.
Poop is always good for
a laugh since they never
thought to ask.

PANDEMIC DIARY

AMANDA GORMAN
January 21, 2021

Maybe this is a male thing. For that I sincerely apologize. I have neither been proficient or clever enough at screening my feelings. Nor do I embarrass readily, leaving others to ‘opinionize’ and struggle with issues of political and social correctness. It is not that I am shameless, rather I think I may say things that others think but won’t say. This is a case in point. Amanda Gorman. It is not that I did not hear her heart first and foremost. It is not that I wasn’t struck by her easy intelligence or moved by her profound social insights. I was aware, who could not be, that Ms. Gorman represents the best of a poetic experience - lyrical, articulate, logical, musical, engaging and building crescendo-like to a worthy and memorable climax. All that is true.

But, never hearing of her; never having heard her name spoken; never having seen her; never having watched her ‘perform’, it was love at first sight. Ms. Gorman vibrated vibrancy; a youthful (not naive) sense of hope; a vision, not dispersed or scattered, rather collected and formulated foreseeable. Her graceful gestures of hands rolled like water; her rhythm galloped like Queen’s horses; her ability to soften the emphatic and emphasize the enduring. All these qualities of a life lived, not one yet to be lived; of a life’s worth of experience, not mere experience that informs life to come. Gorman is a phenomenon. Able to learn from the works of Langston Hughes, Nikki Giovanni, Robert Hayden, Phyllis Wheatley, Lin Manuel Miranda and deliver to the beat of a ‘poetry slam’. She delivered generations of suffering in a golden goblet of words poised on the silken cloth of time.

Dare I say she is beautiful? May I say that? Of course I can…and will. Her face lights up with grace and hope. Her enthusiasm is polished. Her bows filled with humility and gratitude. All this appropriately distracts from her driving ambition, an aspiration to be of service, to see justice done so that justice…just is. Her possibilities excited me to no end. Kamala Harris had to wait and oblige the power structure for so many years to become “the first” - the first female Vice-President; the first Asian-American Vice-President; the first Black Vice-President. And here, at 22 years, Amanda Gorman is the first Youth National Poet Laureate.

What can I say? I am a sucker for beauty in all its forms. And, shame on me for falling heads over heels for her smile, her warmth and generosity. I will look forward to more of her work. I hope to watch her grow and contribute. To see what more she has in store.

PANDEMIC DIARY

A NEW DAY
January 19, 2021

This is the last day of Trump’s presidency. (lower case intentional) On the evening of election day for the Georgia Senate seats, I stayed up as late as I was able until my physical exhaustion collided with my emotional unease as it appeared more than likely that the final outcome of the Georgia Senate Race would not be finalized until the early morning hours. Despite my respect and affection for Steve Kornacki, the brilliant and lovably frenetic statistician/analyst on MSNBC, I could no longer parse the numbers in a manner that informed me with any confidence of the outcome of these races. However, the last thing I remember watching was the image of a brightly jacketed, cap-wearing James Carville who entrances with his political savvy and succulent Southern drawl, effectively declaring the race over and the forecast that the Dems would win both seats. That assured projection, like a child’s lullaby, lulled me to sleep.

As we all know now, both Warnock and Osoff won those seats and provided a sweeter taste to what might have been a very bitter cup of coffee that morning. Still, even that early news was not nearly as sweet as today. I just finished watching the ceremony President-to-be Joe Biden requested as his last formal act before becoming President of the United States - an observance of the over 400,000 Americans who died from the Covid-19 pandemic. It was, I sense in keeping with the values of the man, a quiet commemoration in which a humble nurse from Detroit, Michigan sang Amazing Grace and Joe Biden delivered a brief and heartfelt message to the family’s and friends of love ones who died from this wretched contagion. Then, alongside the Lincoln Reflecting Pool, 400 candles were lit each representing 1,000 lost souls whose lives were brightly shimmering in the water, like the glimmer of a comforting memory.

Today will also be a time of reflection. Inauguration Day. There is normally a passing of a symbolic baton, the baton of democracy, of a peaceful transition, the baton of continuity, and the baton of unity. This administration has dropped the baton, stepped on, demeaned, cursed, defiled and abused it. In a way, it is appropriate and fitting that the ‘orangeman’ will not be attending the Inauguration. There is nothing I can think of that he has accomplished, no words that he has spoken, no gesture he has made, no morality he has displayed, no ethics he has lived by that I would wish to be passed on. May his non-attendance be a full and complete break with this past.

I extend to our newly elected team, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, my very best wishes for a successful four years. May the United States of America once again work for common cause - peace, justice, equality and prosperity for all.

PANDEMIC DIARY

WHAT IS EXPECTED OF ME?
January 12, 2021

A PINT OF EFFORT

What is expected of me?
What feelings merit your attention?
Do you have any attention to give?
What’s gotten us here in the first place?

I hesitate saying I am more right than you?
Your insanity is not an excuse for ignorance?
Neither is ignorance any excuse for delusion?
In any case, doesn’t Truth still matter?

What do you need to be convinced?
Will my understanding you alienate?
Will my opposition make you violent?
Must I believe what you believe?

Who is manipulating you as you claim?
What is the nature of your oppression?
You already carry a loaded gun.
Would you be more secure with a mortar?

Do you think they are on your side?
Have you noticed how they use and then turn on each other?
Is it your impression you will never be betrayed?
Will you only learn after they have forsaken you?

You speak endlessly about religion, don’t you?
You do know that we are a secular nation of laws?
Is anyone preventing you from practicing your faith?
Or, must your God, alone, speak for all of us?

Any chance we can get to know one another?
Yes. I am Jewish. Yes. I grew up in New York City.
Yes. I voted for Hilary. Yes. I supported Colin Kaepernick.
I’ll take that as a No!

What choices do we have, you and I?
Yes. I do believe reparations are appropriate.
Yes. Every person in the U.S. has the right to a vote.
Our opportunities appear to be fading rapidly.

I am curious what occurs after the burning and looting and killing?
Do you possess a plan following the violent overthrow?
Who amongst you will lead and will you become just like them?
Can you conceive of a coalition of evangelicals, white supremacists, and fascists?

Tell me, what kind of beer do you usually order?
IPA’s are my preference also. New England or
West Coast? Oh. Well, what difference does it make?
You mean…Oh, come on…I really can’t buy you a beer?

PANDEMIC DIARY

LIKE FATHER; LIKE SON
January 7, 2021

“Daddy, daddy, come here”

“What is it, Donnie. Is everything OK”

“Look, daddy” (Donnie points to the toilet, while daddy looks inside)

“Donnie, that’s marvelous. You should be so proud of yourself. Is that all yours”? (Donnie nods) Well, remember that. No one else can create what you create. When it comes out well, let the world know about it. And, when it doesn’t come out so well, flush the toilet and get rid of it so no one sees it. Do you understand me, Donald?”

“Oh, yes daddy. Did I do good daddy”

“You did better than good. That is the greatest poop I have ever seen. Everything you do is the greatest, Donny. Don’t ever forget that”

“OK, daddy. I won’t.” (Donnie shows some doubt)

(seeing the doubt on Donnie’s face)

“What’s wrong, son”

“Well, daddy…it’s just shit”

“Ahh. I see. You think that your shit is just like everyone else’s”

“I just thought…”

“Stop right there, son. Your shit is like no one else’s in the whole wide world. And, you will realize that when you get a little older. You will be one of just a few men who the world will come to know as the greatest “shitters” that ever lived. You are a Trump. And, Trump shit don’t smell”

“Smells to me, daddy”

“But, that’s the sweet smell of greatness. Smell it again. But, this time smell it and say to yourself, “There can be nothing less than the best coming out of me. That it starts with a little shit and gets shittier over time. Now, smell it again, Donnie”

“It smells different, daddy”

“Of course it does, Donnie. And, one day you will take a shit on the whole world. People will know you far and wide. They will say, ‘Here comes that shit, now”. Many people will want to be a part of your shit. You will let them. But, if your shit starts to smell to them, just get rid of them. Curse them. Blame them. Then, without warning or hesitation, look them in the eye and tell them in no uncertain terms, “YOU’RE FIRED!” The rest of those followers can be allowed to hang on and tag along so later when you get in trouble for shit you’ve done, you will always have someone on hand to blame for that shit.”

(Donnie face begins to cringe in pain)

“What’s wrong, son. Do you not believe in what I am telling you?

“That’s not it, daddy.”

“Then, what is it Don?”

“I have to make more poop, daddy. And, this time it will be even greater than the last.”

“That’s my boy! I’ll stand right here by your side. Like father…like son.”

“No, daddy. I can make this shit up all by myself. No one can shit things up like me, daddy. I think people from every country will know me as the greatest shithead ever. Daddy?”

“Yes, Donnie”

“I want to shit up the world”.

“You will, Donnie. You most certainly will.”

PANDEMIC DIARY

MANATEES
January 1, 2021

Manatees are large, fully aquatic, mostly herbivorous marine mammals. They carry with them the uncomplimentary moniker of ‘sea cows’, which in this age of political correctness offends both the manatees and half the human population. What they have lost in the pantheon of God’s incredible diversity they have gained in copious measures of lovableness. It may be that when so much of everything is so very wrong that once patched together everything seems so sympathetically right. The manatees appearance immediately invokes mercy, the feeling that, like for the rest of us, life isn’t exactly fair. The manatee’s snout is huge and flattened as if it rammed into sea window. Its eyes are set on either side of its head, which assists in its seeing peripherally with acute awareness. But the manatees head is indistinguishable from its blimp-like body, so its nostrils look like where its eyes should be. Hair grows all over, so its elephantine skin looks like an all-over scalp. It moves by flapping its fins which are its legs. Or, are they legs that look like fins. In either case, its paddles are up front and struggle in dog paddle fashion to move its lagging body like a bus with the two rear wheels missing.

In all respects, manatees might be the stuff of nightmares were they in any way threatening. Yet, they are sympathetic. The original ‘gentle giants’, they are curious, friendly, and enjoy human interaction. I am reminded of Gary, a social reject in high school because of his size. Gary was a large person. Overwieght. Oh, the hell with social correctness; he was a fat boy…ginormous. Likely, in the background of his life, there was some trauma leading to an emotional blindspot, a psychological emptiness and a resulting drive to ‘fill’ himself. Whatever the cause of his enormity, Gary was sensitive and warm and trustworthy. He envied the popular kids for their social skills and wanted to be part of, if only on the periphery, a circle of friends on the “in”. But, Gary, sadly, would never be admitted “in”.

Or, so you would think. Gary might have been experiencing turmoil inside, but on the outside even if he was not ‘in’, he was never alone. Girls loved Gary. Girls flocked to Gary. Maybe Gary was not a threat or didn’t place unreasonable, uncomfortable demands on his gal friends. But, he was, by all appearances, popular and well-liked by the “hottest babes” in the school., who seemed to be intimate with him. He never appeared depressed, sorrowful, or on the ‘out’, because he was always surrounded by some of the most attractive girls in the high school. Not an oddity who invoked pity or compassion, Gary was self-composed and knew how to mix with the opposite sex. So, even as he desired to be accepted by the most popular boys, those same boys wanted to know what Gary’s secret was. The “in crowd” ended up crowding around Gary in order to hang with the girls.

Manatees are kind of like the Gary’s of the Sea. They remain by themselves receiving no invitations by the densely popular “schools” of fish to join in their coordinated, syncopated swaying since they sadly could never replicate the sequences. Spending their time alone, wallowing in warm seawaters until temperatures rise making it dangerously warm, they then paddle into the inlets for its cooler waters. While settling near and around the pylons of the pier they are observed by guests at the Manatee Visitors Center in Apollo, Florida who also can enter a tank and swim with the big guys. Here, the manatees seem truly in their element. All of a sudden, its the fish that are on the ‘outs’, all attention bequeathed to the manatees.

Gary and I were not exactly friends. Gary showed signs of liking me. He would walk up to me, oddly from behind, as if we were in mid-conversation. I was averse to this surprise attack of public familiarity. I confess, I’m not sure I was brave enough to reciprocate even if I were inclined to do so. It’s not as if the cost to myself would be high, since I was not in the ‘in’ crowd either. But, did I wish, like a rip-tide, to be washed, adrift, further out from the communal portion of sea? No. That’s why I became a politician. I, too, wanted to be liked. But, whereas, Gary discovered a social niche, I attempted to remain above the fray and talk my way into acceptance with smug aloofness and superiority. Not a great plan. I was a part of the socially disenfranchised who the world of high schoolers so cruelly dismissed because of some errant personality quirk or conspicuous physical attribute.

I decided to run for President of the General Organization (G.O.), the schools student-body congress, as it were. This is where petitions were submitted, laws were made and passed, announcements were delivered over the loud speaker, and intermediaries assigned to talk with teachers about complaints and demands. (Of course, complaining got you nowhere and demands were a full stop) My election platform was instituting a weekly school dance. On stage I attempted to present myself with confidence while the other candidates stood there like they were in a police lineup. When called upon, instead of starting my spiel , I began dancing the Lindy Hop (without a partner) and asked the question, “Who wants a place to be with your friends on Friday evenings? Let’s have a weekly dance.”

I would win going away, however, not without serious consequences. The next day on my way to class a group of guys whose names reflected the Bronx in the 1960”s, Blacky, Apollo, Blaze and, most assuringly, Killer came up to me representing the Castle Hill Avenue Gang. They told me that they all got together and decided to vote for me. There was a proviso. If I didn’t get that weekly dance they would have it in for me. “D’jou got that?” Yeah, I got it. I nearly shit in my pants. Now, what do I do? Mr. Paul Frum, teacher advisor to the G.O. had already told me following my onstage performance that it was highly unlikely the school district would ever approve such a plan because of the cost and the requirements that teachers would need to be assigned as observers. “But maybe we can add a dance halfway through the term?” Maybe. Yeah.

My very existence was on the line when it suddenly came to me. Make it so if my platform promise cannot be met, it won’t be my fault. I went right back to the gang members and told them, “I have a great idea”.

“Hey, Blacky, why don’t you represent the student body and make the case for a dance every week. The teachers might listen to you. We can go together. Suggest that kids that no place to go and just hang out getting into trouble and that the dance would be a good place to bring gang members together instead of fighting in the streets.”

It was brilliant. Blacky wore his faux leather jacket with his collar up and used his best Bronx English doing everything a human being could possibly do to dismantle any hope of a weekly dance other than bringing a coffin, hammer and nails to the meeting. A week later, Mr Frum announced that along with the year-end dance there would be a dance at the end of the first school term and before the Chanukah and Christmas holidays break.

I was a hero. Blacky and the gang thought it was so cool that, “Blacky represent. Yeah” We didn’t get all that I had aspired to. I was still not part of the in crowd. But Gary and I started talking to one another. And, I had a new ‘gang’ of admirers.

Nothing like working your way up in the world.

PANDEMIC DIARY

DOES IT FOR ME
DECEMBER 29, 2020

Adele and I leave for the beach on Thursday morning. More specifically, we are headed to Siesta Key, a miles long, fine white-sand slip of island, a short ride across a bridge from the mainland City of Sarasota, Florida.

SIESTA KEY

ORCHARD BEACH, BRONX NEW YORK

I was thinking what it was about the beach that so moves me. I have always loved the beach. When I was in my early teens, my friends and I would head out to Orchard Beach in the Bronx. We used to jokingly cough up the name of the beach, “Horseshit Beach” as a joke. But, as public beaches went in the 1940’s and 1950’s, Orchard Beach was luxurious. What did we know? Yes, people used to smoke and not even bother to bury their cigarette butts. And, yes, it was the time of the “Boom Boxes” and you could hardly escape the loud thumping of the bass lines. It most definitely was crowded. During high season it was not uncommon for stretches of the beach to be fully quilted with blankets right up next to one another in a crazy patchwork of colors that made walking to the water nearly impossible without stepping onto someone else’s blanket or accidentally kicking sand onto someone’s prone body. Still, were were not detracted or turned away. To my friends and I, it earned its claim as “The Riviera of the Bronx” with pride.

“The beach is not a place to work; to read, write or to think.”
Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea

At the time, I was dating Cynthia Miller.. She was the love of my teenage life. We were together all the time. Then, the summer came. We were in high school, and my underdeveloped body (I couldn’t find my biceps) could not go one on one with the Adonis-like builds and well-oiled tanned older guys, who seemed to live at the beach when they weren’t working. With skin like mahogany, cool friends, and money folded to fit in those tiny pockets of their bathing suits, they nestled in pose under “invitation-only” umbrellas that the feminine specie gravitated to and were too much for me to compete with. I lost Cynthia to the sea…and an extremely good looking young man who became a NYC police officer.

Historical records indicate that ‘vacationing at the beach’ was not really a concept until the late 1700’s in Europe. Due to road construction and improved means of transportation it simply became easier to get to the sea. However, there is also evidence that the ancient Greeks enjoyed lying on sandy shores, which in Greece were readily available given island life. This story about Diogenes the Cynic reveals some light as to their delight:

Alexander the Great was coming through Corinth to gather the Greeks for his invasion of Persia. While there he saw Diogenes on the beach. Diogenes had a reputation for being the happiest man in the world. Alexander came to him and offered to give Diogenes anything he desired if he would join the fight. Diogenes asked only for Alexander to step aside, he was blocking the sun.

As you can see [below], images from 5th century frescos from Paestum shows a youth jumping from what appears to be a diving tower. There is also literary evidence for occasional swimming races. Plato considered a man who didn’t know how to swim the same as an uneducated man. Aristotle thought that swimming in the sea is better for the health than swimming in lakes and rivers. He was also in favor of cold water over warm.

Going to the beach might not have been convenient for our distant relatives, neither had it a place in antiquarian vacation planning, but man’s/woman’s relationship with the sea and shore shows a historic respect for what pleasures it provides.

Nothing profound here. Simply saying how much we are looking forward to getting to our place and to say Bon Voyage. My next communication will be from Siesta Key. Let’s all be safe and smart in these last days of this pandemic. That is my wish for all this New Year’s. Oh, yes, one more thing. Here’s to a
Warnock and Ossoff sweep. Fingers crossed.

“In every out-thrust headland, in every curving beach, in every grain of sand there is the story of the earth.” Rachel Carson

PANDEMIC DIARY

HAIR TODAY; GONE TOMORROW?
DECEMBER 26, 2020

There is a recent phenomena occurring having to do with hair. Women are getting their hair cut less frequently. Men are growing their hair, intentionally. Covid is preventing women from getting their hair cut as they wish; whereas, men are allowing their hair to grow and choosing not to cut their hair. Has Covid inspired the “caveman” in us guys. After all, we are stuck in our abodes. Granted, our ‘caves’ have heating and plumbing. We have home delivery and ‘curbside pickup’. We have Netflix and Hulu and Prime. And, we can take walks around the neighborhood without the threat of a Woolly Mammoth (which possessed quite a hair growth) chasing us over bone-strewn plains.

So, what explains this development? A CEO of a billion-dollar publicly traded firm recently noted that he’s conscious of trying to recapture a little bit of his youth. There seems evidence that older men face more health issues and worse outcomes from this home-bound isolation. Maybe hair growth reminds them of a time less grim.

Some men are reporting that they are relating to their children differently. Virtual visits keep the headshot in prime focus. Their kid’s hair is front and center. Growing hair makes it more likely to relate to your kids who themselves likely had already let their hair grow longer. It adds to a more mature male’s “cool” factor. Other men report that letting their hair grow is like stepping on the gas pedal. It gives a sense of movement to life, as if you are moving on or keeping up. To what, I am not sure. At least, where the last four years have felt static, one can perceive that they are forward moving.

For some of us, this is a literal return to former days. At fourteen, I attended Judo classes in Greenwich Village in New York. Traveling on my own to Broadway and 8th Street, I would walk to Washington Square Park and watch the men and women play chess on concrete table with inset chess boards; or attend local chess tournaments at the Village Chess Club;

I would walk in and out of the streets becoming part of the ‘hippie generation’; at 15, I would go to ‘Cafe Wha?’ in the late afternoon for poetry reading;

Cafe Reggio for an expresso; at 17, I would slip into Marie’s Crisis in the evening, a gay bar with a piano where the room filled early with actors and singers and the evenings passed singing show tunes into the wee hours. If the picture makes this look like fun, I can assure you it was even more fun than it looks.

Witnessing a young Bob Dylan at The Bitter End;

Nina Simone at The Fillmore East and Richie Havens at The Cafe Au Go Go;

more poetry readings at The Gaslight Cafe and Cafe Why Not?; smoking weed on the corner of MacDougal Street and Minetta Lane;

and, then when I was of drinking age, I would commune with the intelligentsia at The White Horse Tavern where Dylan Thomas held court in the early 50’s.

Twice a year, I would roam a village perimeter, spending hours at the Bi-annual Greenwich Village Art Show; and greeting shop owners I knew from the frequency of my visits.

Then, there were the protests and the advocacies - against the Vietnam War and for the use of Marijuana.

My life seemed to revolve around opposition and proposition. I met Allan Ginsburg during one protest event and, out of admiration that bordered on idolatry, at the age of fourteen, followed he and his friends to the Gas Light Cafe, the first cafe to hold poetry readings and a major hangout of the Beat Generation leadership;

The Village became a second home to me. I was an integral part of something so big and vital and important. It seemed as if at every turn there was the sound of a drumbeat or the strumming of a guitar.

Music was indispensable to our activities. The anger, frustration, hardness and violence we experienced could all be expressed in music. Indoors at cafes you could expect a guitar playing picking at his guitar sitting on a stool; outside at a cafe, don’t be surprised if there was a jazz saxophonist playing on the corner for pennies.

Hair was who we were. Hair is what identified us. Hair forced a Broadway musical to be written. The Hell’s Angels grew their hair long and tied in pony tails. Women danced nearly nude in the fountains of Washington Square Park, their heads tilted back in transcendental-like swooning while their hair swung in long arcs. Hair was natural. It appeared everywhere on the body. Men showed off their hair. Women, in defiance, let their underarm hairs grow and let their legs grow hair. Hair was defiance. Hair was strength. Hair was power.

Each strand of my hair is a memory.

I am building a new relationship with my hair.

PANDEMIC DIARY

“ANNUS HORRIBILLIS”

December 25, 2020

{Inspired by the Daily Stoic]

A woman, over 2,000 years ago today, alone, frightened and frail, in a small outlying village within the Roman Empire, hobbled her way to a stable to give birth to a child whom she placed in a manger. 150 years ago, a war of citizen soldiers was fought as one side sought to free their fellow man and in the dank, snow-driven trenches below the level of the mayhem of battle celebrated Christmas. Nearly one century ago, a depression of unequaled financial ruin befell a nation throwing its citizens into untold poverty, dire hunger, and desperation. Yet, around the world, even those most perilously in need cobbled together shards food and necessities to give hope to their families and children. In 2017, Adele and I climbed the tower at the corner of Ackerstrasse and Bernauerstrasse in Berlin, the location of the line between the American and Soviet sectors where over 50 years ago armed Soviet forces patrolled residential streets threatening arrest or torture or worse to those who dared to commemorate the birth of those who believed in the Savior. And, today, we are, in a modern way and due to a modern pandemic, patched together, fabricating as best we can some semblance of evidence of our strength and belief in our humanity and the power of our will to keep ourselves safe and whole and not disintegrate into despair.

Is there anything we can learn, anything we can do to have the virus magically go away. Is there a unity of purpose that can unite us, healing our differences, permitting a clear path to solidarity? Can we be assured of a brighter tomorrow.

Actually, no.

That would be highly unrealistic.

SENECA

But, all is not lost. Let us look to Seneca. Born in the same year as Jesus, who lived in another distant province of Rome and who turned out to be an equally great thinker, influential philosopher and eloquent orator, who would say that just as fire tests gold, misfortune tries brave men. Here are some quotes that are suitable to our times and circumstance:

“You have passed through life without an opponent—no one can ever know what you are capable of, not even you.”

“Constant misfortune brings this one blessing: to whom it always assails, it eventually fortifies."

"Two elements must therefore be rooted out once for all, - the fear of future suffering, and the recollection of past suffering; since the latter no longer concerns me, and the former concerns me not yet."

As we approach the close of this '“annus horribillis”, we wonder what is in store for us in 2021? Will we survive the pandemic? Can we restore government that is honest and transparent? Will we be able to move about our communities, visit with family and friends and travel to far-off places? Although we cannot know the answers, we know the principles of a lives well-lived, the only realistic way to bring about peaceful resolution in these contentious times, to model the behavior you desire. To live the love we all wish to feel. To be patient and wise. To be true to yourself. To act with courage on behalf of Truth. To continually discover beauty in small things. To be of service to others. To hear what others mean rather than what they are saying, as difficult as that may be. And, always be grateful because there is always something to be grateful for.

HAVE A HAPPY HOLIDAY AND A HEALTHY NEW YEAR.

PEACE ALL.

PANDEMIC DIARY

COMPETITION VS. COOPERATION
December 12, 2020

In last Sunday’s NY Times (Dec. 6) Suzanne Simard has written a marvelous article on ‘The Social Life of Forests’. Let me say at the outset, I do not wish to engage in ontological discourses and debates about sentience and what consciousness is or is not. Not at this time. I do not wish this because the forests are places of wonder where the natural world appears to take on and act with awareness. What that awareness is, is anybody’s guess.

Her theories, aggressively rejected by her community of scientists who, and this will not surprise you, was made up of elderly white men or young, ambitious white men seeking to occupy the places of the aging ones. Along comes this brilliant, curious individual, raised in Canada’s “old-growth” forests whose research took her in a direction that was about a 180 degree turn from acknowledged, accepted, and bequeathed science that she was minimally scoffed at or dismissed. But, she persisted rejecting the advise of her male peers, [“Why don’t you study growth and yield?”] believing instead “the forest was more than a collection of trees”.

Simard, over the past 40 years has gone on to change our understanding of the relationships between trees, the earth around it, and the ground beneath it. She, early on, observed that where loggers clear cut sections of forest, taking with the trees upturned soil and underbrush, the newly planted saplings and trees, with no competition and contrary to the assumption that they would thrive, were found to be more vulnerable to disease and climactic stress than the crowded old-growth trees. These saplings had open space, area to grow, and plenty of sun. Why were they so frail?

Simard turned her attention to what was happening underground. What she unearthered was buried in the soil - an underground partnership between trees and fungi known as mycorrhizas - threadlike fungi that “envelop and fuse with tree roots, helping them extract water and nutrients in exchange for some of the carbon-rich sugars the trees make through photosynthesis.” She further discovered that webs of root and fungi are threaded throughout forests floors which (by tracing DNA in root tips) link every tree in a forest regardless of specie.

“Carbon, water, nutrients, alarm signals, hormones can pass from tree to tree through these subterranean circuits.” Resources are observed to flow from the oldest [senior?] and largest trees to the youngest and smallest. A network of signals generated by one tree can notify other trees nearby of danger. Trees in their final stage of life bestow a substantial share of its nutrients to its healthy neighboring trees. Simard attributes these ‘behaviors’ to “perception” explaining that “trees sense nearby animals and plants and alter their behavior accordingly.” Many in the scientific community disputed her conclusions wondering why trees of different species would assist other species at their own expense - a benevolence that seemed contradictory to Darwinian evolution. This suggestion by Simard of ‘inter-specie-dependence’ stoked intense debate of old: “Is cooperation as central to evolution as competition?”

Simard sees the world as intricately bound by “infinite biological pathways” whereby species are “interdependent like yin and yang”. What was her conjecture is now fairly well accepted, that “resources travel among trees and other plants connected by mycorrhizal networks which Simard likens to the human brain. For sure, many questions remain to be investigated and substantiated, not the least of which is “why resources are exchanged in the first place especially when those trees are not closely related.” Toby Kiers, a professor of evolutionary biology at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam suggests that although we can objectively observe how plants benefit from intricate networking, that what is missed is “the constant struggle to maximize each plant’s individual payoff.” He sees this ‘sharing’ of nutrients as complex trades and deal making, classic ‘give and take’ that includes embargoes and bribes and can lead to conflict among plants.

Nonetheless, this understanding of trees as social creatures can inform our future, not only in grasping the vitality and value of forests to humans, but also appreciating what can be learned from this knowledge and applied to our lives. Or, as Simard states, “There aren’t even separate species. Everything in the forest is the forest.”

PANDEMIC DIARY

HAVE YOU NOTICED?
December 7, 2020

[Please take a moment. On this date in 1941, the Japanese Air Command attacked the United States Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, killing 2,403 Americans including 63 civilians. As of yesterday evening, more than 283,700 American lives have been taken by Covid-19. On December 3, over 2,857 human beings died directly from Covid or Covid-related risks factors. That translates to more deaths than a Pearl Harbor every day; a 9/11 attack each and every a day; and, three times the highest number of single day deaths from Polio in 1952.]

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This morning I woke up, swung my feet around, slipped on my sweats, slid into my slippers, ambled my way to the bathroom, traipsed to the toilet, strolled to the sink and washed my face, brushed my teeth, got my arm caught in the sleeve stretching on my hoody and stumbled downstairs while my eyes played a game of “they’re opened; now, they’re closed”. It was not a good night. I went to bed at 10-, awoke at 11:30 and could not fall back to sleep. So, I went to Alex’ room and turned on the television which, next to Melatonin, is the best sleep aid ever invented. I eventually returned to bed at 2:30 AM and slept fitfully until 6 AM.

Still dark, I dragged my weary, half-awake body downstairs to the living room and collapsed on the couch. a I opened my eyes and there, poised on our coffee table not two feet from my eyeballs, stood a sculpture of a dancing woman. She has been dancing there for years. Sculpted by a dear friend, Will, who has since deceased, I took a closer look than I had for a very long time. Hand sculpted, the lady stands about 18” high. Actuancelly, she’s not standing. She is twirling, one leg on toe point and the other arched around the straight leg to emphasize the movement. Will was a painter and we often spoke of art: what it is, from where it derives, art’s purpose, and what’s not art. Will was adamant about art and the creative life.

When Will died, I was invited to his home where his children and extended family were staying while deciding how to divvy up stuff and what to keep and what not. I was there with another of Will’s closest friends, and the family was gracious enough to separate what they wanted and offered that we each select one or two of Will’s paintings for memory’s sake. I selected two paintings. We stayed a while longer and gracefully indicated our departure to allow the family to get on with their work, when I spotted the dancing lady sculpture. Not a particularly commanding piece, it nonetheless had Will’s hands all over it. I walked around this statuette and thought, “Would it now be impolite, even insulting, to ask for this piece? Maybe I should offer to give one of the paintings back?” I felt forced to make a sudden decision at the door. I turned around, returned a couple of steps back into the living area, and humbly asked if this was an item they wished to keep for themselves. Everyone of the family member’s gestured, “No. If you like it, please, take it.”

She is no doubt a bit “twerky” in her movement. At certain angles she appears as if she desperately requires a hip replacement. I understand the depicted attitudes and personalities of ballet instructors portrayed in film. Even I, at moments, want to scream, “Stand up straight. Bring your right arm up. For God’s sake, point your toes.” She bulges in places like a tumescent growth. And, I always feel as if her one foot will not support her for a moment more.

Still, I find her lovely. She strikes me as being in upright repose. She is moving in space with relaxed sleepiness almost. Its not that she doesn’t care, she does. Its that she is dreamily spinning, like all and everything is whirling - our atoms; the planets; stars in space; the whole of space as we know it is spiraling. No wonder she is dizzy, off-balance, maybe trying to recapture her stasis. Maybe she is simply ecstatic.

By his hand. Dear will. A human being I so loved and admired. Flawed and brilliant. Annoying and talented. Wise and incredibly prideful. By his hand. I thought about the other items we have in our home. Have I looked at them recently? Have I really taken notice? Do I take the time to enjoy their presence in my life? Do I recall what they meant to me at point of purchase and what they mean for me now? Indeed, I do.