On becoming obsolete, and the spring bulb show...

(a mental dance and rumination illustrated with pictures taken yesterday at the annual Spring bulb show held in the 120+ year old conservatory of the Smith College horticultural department.)

My computer, a desk top, is aging.
It is slowing down; it's innards are constantly examined for viruses, but they are not the problem.
It stays updated, but the updates seem to add stress.
It's use of the fan has increased; it tries to keep cool as it deals with changes.
It seems as though it no longer has the ability to quickly process the ever increasing amount of data required for its ability to quickly complete what should be simple tasks.
Sometimes I wonder if all of this is a metaphor for the person who operates it.
I was going to write, "the person who owns it..." but that raises a few uncomfortable questions about the true nature of our relationship.
Certainly, it runs programs designed to keep it trouble free more than it once did.
It runs them so much, in fact, that I often have problems getting it to let me use it.

I've encountered this problem before.
It was solved with the purchase of a newer more powerful computer.
That event was in early May of 2011.
As the purchase was a discounted model from a chain store, I suspect that the computer was introduced the previous year.
Which means that it is old in computer years.
I can't believe I just wrote, "in computer years".
(sigh)

Sometimes it seems that most of the electronics are breaking down.
The tv works without a hitch, but the cable box often refuses to respond to commands as it busily updates the schedule page, or spies on people, or whatever it is really doing when I only want to see what else is on, or to simply change the channel.

Some days the internet pauses, takes a few breaths, and acts as though it is about to demand a vacation. It reminds me of the days when someone on the east coast could tell that it was after 5pm on the west coast - even simple internet searches slowed down when so many people got home and turned on their computers.




Over the last year I've explored streaming audio-visual content from services such as Amazon and Netscape. The hope was that I'd be able to cancel a large portion of my cable-phone-internet package to reduce costs. If there is a holiday, or a storm which keeps a large number of people home, streaming becomes a problem. One never knows where the problem originates, of course. Is it with Comcast, slowing down my service now that they can? Is it due to so much demand that Netscape or Amazon can't handle it? Is it a part of the electronic infrastructure somewhere in between the coast on which I'm located and the coast on which the streaming service originates? The reality is that when there is a problem, there is nothing we can do about it, whether or not we understand why it is happening. Is that a metaphor for life in the current version of America (or the world)?

These aren't new complaints, of course.
A minor problem can now have major repercussions.
I no longer carry more than a couple of dollars on my person.
If my bank's system, or the internet, or the company that screens for fraudulent purchases for the bank, or the grocery store's system hiccups, or is down, for any reason, I wouldn't be able to purchase groceries (this has happened to me couple of times).

The modern way of using plastic cards to access the 1's and 0's that represent money has been frustrating for some time. I still haven't forgotten my attempt some years ago to make a purchase in New Hampshire, a state that borders the state where I reside (Vermont), in a town about a half an hour's drive from my apartment. The purchase was around $100.00, and was for the business for which I worked (to be reimbursed). The purchase was denied. Luckily, this was during banking hours, so I called the bank. They quickly determined that the problem was that I seldom bought anything in New Hampshire, and seldom spent that amount of money on a purchase, so it had been denied as suspicious. They would authorize it so the sale would go through. Only it didn't. Another call to the bank revealed that they paid a company to flag what it considered suspicious activity on an account, and that company hadn't yet released my own funds to make the purchase. They would call the company while I waited on hold. I was eventually told everything was okay. Except it wasn't. All told, it took about 45 minutes to an hour just to be able to spend my own money which was in my own account.

When everything works the way it is intended, the modern electronic digital computer world can be quite an improvement over the old fashioned, low quality, slower analog world in which I grew up.
As long as one can afford it.

So why do I sometimes wish for a simpler time, a more gregarious time when people connected in person rather than through devices, when movies were screen in theatres and watched with a hundred or more friends of the dark in a shared experience?

The older folks always seem to complain that life was simpler, more beautiful, better crafted, more enjoyable, more social, more (fill in the blank) when they were young. That is when they weren't complaining about how difficult it was when they were young.

Now that I am of that older generation, I hear these same contradictory complaints from myself, see them in the things I type out, and revel in the open space, the balance between them, while accepting that there is nothing I can do, and that it doesn't do any good to try to understand. Then I try to understand.

 

Sometimes I wonder if I'm the computer, simply pushed beyond my capacity by the newer programs, that don't work as well as the older programs. If, in short, I am becoming old fashioned, and obsolete. I also wonder if I care about it in the least.

For now it is snowing, yesterday I reveled in the promise of Spring at the annual bulb show , and I plan to spend the rest of today reveling in a world passing away, a world that, like myself, is busy becoming obsolete.

addenda - While uploading the pictures for this post, the internet paused, lost the connection, and the program became stuck trying to upload the last picture. Tomorrow, I'll try to upload pictures from the conservatory rooms that aren't part of the bulb show. If the technology lets me. In the meantime, I'll be left to ponder whether the systems are simply breaking down, or becoming obsolete. I'll try to let pictures of spring flowers distract me. Before they become obsolete too.

A proposal to protect our schoolchildren from gun toting maniacs.

It is difficult to even begin saying something, or anything. "Rampant killings" sounds harsh, or isn't harsh enough, or could possibly be trounced upon for insensitivity at this difficult time. The struggle to use words that won't prove incendiary when noun meets adjective has become stupefying. After yet another massacre by white racist hate mongers incident of the type which has so recently occurred in a Florida high school, it becomes imperative to avoid all of the currently popular social media platforms; they become deadly cesspools of unhinged 'call and response' political insanity. 

One of the first posts I saw after this incident occurred was a 'meme' which condemned liberals who wouldn't let the families involved suffer mourn in peace, insisting instead on using what happened to promote their anti-gun agenda. I should point out that at that moment, I hadn't seen a single post calling for gun control. The issue was raised by the person condemning it.

This reminds me of a number of posts from alt-right wing conservative folks I know. A recent photo of an American flag flying proudly in the breeze was accompanied by text which noted something on the order of "Liberals say this triggers Muslims". I think there was more, but I don't remember if one was supposed to 'share' or 'like' to show support for the flag, country, Christian God, or for possibly murdering the liberals. What struck me is that I live in what is regarded as the most 'liberal' state in the union, but I've never heard anyone, not one single person, make such a suggestion. It's a phony argument that does little more than sow dissention through the use of trite soundbite phrases coupled with what are supposed to be soul stirring images (i.e. propaganda). One might be forgiven for assuming that the flag in the photo was billowing due to all the hot air expounded in its direction. Hot air seems to be all our country's Congress and politicians can muster these days, aside form giving enormous tax breaks to the wealthy and to the corporations. Oh, sure, there is some righteous indignation being spread about, some of it from the lefteous. (Sorry about that one.)

This morning, this image was posted and 'shared' with me:

 

I wrote a couple of lines of commentary about the message on the above t-shirt. As soon as I finished, Blogger closed either of its own accord, or possible outside interference by a deity. I have decided not to tempt fate, becoming a wishy-washy adult who fails to respond to inanity, just in case.

 

The simple fact of the matter is this: the Republicans sold out long ago to moneyed interests who give them millions. The Democrats, many of whom have also enjoyed the same largesse, sputter, putter, mutter, and do nothing substantial.

It remains to us, and to survivors, to do something. The Republicans show every sign of being terrorized by the thought of angry women targeting them. If anyone has any doubts that the protests of the last year haven't been effective, just look at how the White House crew couldn't get out of the line of fire fast enough when it was revealed that they had a wife-beater amongst their midst. Oopsie, it was more than one. I hope women take up this issue. I do not wish to add to their burden, it's just a thought based on the observation that they seem to be the only ones getting any action out of this administration. Outside of the rich, and the corporations, I mean.

Therefore, I am moved to suggest a new approach, based on the line of reasoning previously espoused by some of our finer Republican elected officials. There is a simple, and direct way to solve the problem of adults, or for that matter, kids, taking guns into a school and going on a rampage of destruction.

Arm the kids. And make schools 'open carry'. If every kid in the classroom, hallway, gym, music room, lunchroom, or bathroom was armed, there would be far less incentive to shoot at them; they would be able to shoot back and defend themselves as God intended. No one is going to push their way into a kindergarten with evil intent when there is a roomful of armed preschoolers on hand.  Students will no longer feel comfortable bullying one another, not when their intended target is aiming a glock semiautomatic at their little heads.

Oh, sure, there may be a few problems for teachers when homework assignments are given out, or discipline is required, but so what if we lose a few? It's not like our government wants those kids to get a decent education. If that happened the kids might realize that the folks who should be working to protect them are little more than lying thieving bastards who have set the kids up for a lifetime of menial jobs and starvation wages, lightened now and again by the receipt of a box of canned vegetables to prove that government cares.

I would further suggest that the both the White House and Congress allow open carry of firearms. Then, when the kids go to visit on 'learn about your government day', they might do themselves some good.



The snow this time

Another snow is falling.

I have things to do, but I don't feel like doing them.

Watching the snow is peaceful, even with the roar of traffic going by; the sounds, not of quiet, but of tires on wet asphalt, punctuated by the whirrs of small motors, and the occasional groans of trucks.

I haven't been able to write much, and what I have been able to get out has been in orgasmic spurts on Facebook, commentary meant to attract the reader to news stories that seem important.

There are too many stories.
There is too much to try to understand.
There is too much to think about,
there is just too much.

One night last week, I watched 'Gojira', the 1954 Japanese movie that was altered for release in the United States, where it became known as 'Godzilla'. I dare say everyone knows the outline of the story: a few years after the atomic bomb, a monster arises from the seas, a monster that shows little use for logic, a monster bent on destruction.

Such plots call for a scientist who will quell the beast. In 'Gojira', that role was filled by Takashi Shimura, known to film buffs worldwide for his roles in the films of Akira Kurosawa. In his role as the scientist fighting Godzilla, every time the camera zoomed in for a close-up of his concerned face, all I could see was his face at the end of Kurosawa's 'Ikiru', in which he plays a bureaucrat struggling to find the meaning of life, his life, as he dies of cancer.

The picture I want to use as illustration shows the actor, in the snow, on a child's swing. It has a stock photo company's watermark on it. A lot of photos which used to be considered to be in the public domain are now claimed as the property of such companies. They want to be paid for their use, and the amount they want to be paid, even for a blog almost no one will read, is not cheap. I know the progression of this takeover for a fact, as for several years I have done occasional searches for particular photos, and watched as this has happened. In this case, a 65 year old photo from a Japanese movie is claimed to be under the ownership of a stock photo company. Much of the world seems to be becoming divvied up by owners who were not creators.

The snow outside of my window isn't sticking to the road yet, but is already piling up on the earth which had just started to suffer the appearance of crocus and the earliest signs of Spring.

About two weeks ago, I woke repeatedly throughout the night, which is not at all an unusual occurrence. That evening was different, however, in that every time I woke, I was in the same dream. I only remember the part at the end, from my stirring in the early morning. That's a metaphor, I suppose. In the dream, people were being rounded up. Color was draining out and everything was becoming, well, not black and white, but gray. Gradations of gray. Gray upon gray. People were being rounded up and sent off to somewhere. Younger men were being sent to the army, that much was known. Other people were being sent someplace unknown, to be unknown. I managed to sneak away from the roundup, and made my way down a long corridor which seemed an endless void. There were doors everywhere, lined up neatly, evenly, like some Levittown style apartment house. As I came close to my door, the corridor was flooded with people, people rounding up people, people trying to escape, there was a crush of people. I managed to open the door to my place, and snuck in, hopefully unobserved in the chaos. It was my space without a doubt. Except that my stuff had been largely removed. The furniture that was left had been covered by sheets and tarps, resembling one of those old closed up apartments opened years later with layer upon layer of dust covering everything. That was when I woke up.

The snow covers the world like layers of dust.

I feel stupid. I may have misread the situation, and the intentions of the Trump coterie. I just read several of the comments made by Nikki Haley, the new United States Ambassador to the United Nations. The situation in my country grows more surreal by the day, by the hour. I'd long assumed that the takeover by the reactionary right was an attempt to gut the government, to remove any help given to the working class, to move as much money and resources as possible to the rich, the oligarchs, the robber barons of our time. This seemed like the natural, and predictable, outcome of years of de-regulation, of lies and distortions by media representing the far right. A fight that had used the religious culture wars had paid off, but the cost was Donald Trump and the destruction of the Republican Party. I think I was wrong. I should have kept focus on the religious right. They don't just want to end abortion, or end gay rights (and gays). They don't just want their version of Sharia law, a world in which the husband will rule the home, with an obedient wife to wait on him (if she knows what's good for her - by now a working life in an often corporate culture should have taught women that they are expendable, their roles replaceable).

As I look at the proposed cuts to -this year's - budget, the toll in human misery can easily blind one to the toll on science, on the arts, on international aid, basically everything. I thought these people were simply ignorant of the interdependencies of the world, and had no understanding of the outcome of their actions.

But it's what they want. They are depending on it. Many of this crowd are fundamentalist Christians. The Bible is their word, their God, infallible, and Trump is His servant. They are not here to destroy the world so the United States can take over, so the moneyed class can acquire more than they already have. They are here to destroy the world. Period. They seek nothing less than to force Armageddon; they aren't looking for the end times - they consider that we are already in the end times. They are looking to hasten the end.

Mr. Trump isn't the intransigence and chicanery of the Republican Party come back to haunt them. He is their monster, rising out of the sea of their despair, come to destroy.

And me? I'm just another observer, a loser at life, swinging back and forth in the snow.

Dreams remembered

For the last few days those moments just before waking have provided a continuation of the same dream. I don't remember most of it; Dreams often fade quickly. I can recall that just before waking, in an era in which people with education were suspect, a roundup of intellectuals and dissidents had begun.
I was trying to save people, including myself.

Every morning has seen an intention to write in this space. I have started many posts, and left them abandoned. I am certain of the cause; it starts, much as it always does, with reading the news. It just happened again as I began sipping my coffee on a beautiful late Spring morning during the last official month of winter. The news makes me wonder about the use of winter as a metaphor.

For many years, I have kept a file in the "pictures" section of my computer labelled "Dreams Remembered". It consists entirely of old, often fading, photographs of men together, or women together. They are part of a history intentionally buried. When such images were found, often I would guess after the owner of the photo passed, they were destroyed by concerned family members. A good number of them escaped attention even though the pictures seemed to show affection between the subjects. After all, people note, men and women were freer to show affection to each other in days gone by. Such photos depict good friends, or family members. Yet now, in a more liberal time, many such photos seem to imply other relationships were depicted. They may be mementoes of a more innocent time, but they are also stories lost, or destroyed. For those who can see what is there, they are dreams remembered.

Two civil war soldiers in a hand tinted photo from the Library of Congress, posted to the Shorpy site.

Lest anyone assume that over interpretation is involved, here's a relatively sedate photo in which closeness

is portrayed, but there is no physical contact. Poet Walt Whitman is on the left, Pete Doyle on the right.
Pete Doyle, it should be noted, was Whitman's lover.

Having one's picture taken in those days was expensive. There was only one copy per photograph.

Were these two friends sharing an expense, a memento of a friendship, or something more?

As the process of photography changed and the cost was reduced,

some photographs began to suggest a little more about the nature of a relationship. 

These dreams come to mind due to a four night drama program which has been unfolding on the Disney owned ABC broadcast television network. "When We Rise" is a slightly fictionalized story of three people whose lives intersected in San Francisco, and the parts they played in the gay liberation movement.  The first part was shown on Monday, just a few days after the newly installed U.S. Attorney General rescinded and abandoned the previous administration's policy that allowed transgender teens to use the bathroom of the sex with which they identify. The new Attorney General had promised, just a few days before, that despite his past record in the segregated South, he would uphold civil rights of all Americans. He was passed on a party line vote, "conservative" and reactionary Republicans outnumbering the Democrats. The mini-series episode that night portrayed a time, in the first years after the Stonewall riots, when gay men and women were considered mentally ill, were routinely denied the rights of Americans, were routinely dismissed from their jobs, thrown out of their homes, denied housing, and just as routinely beat up and/or killed by thugs and police alike. I remember all of it, and was not ready for the pain it brought back.

Anita Bryant, pictured above, was a singer and orange juice pitchwoman who campaigned to rescind a Florida law

which banned discrimination of the basis of sexual orientation. She famously said that she would prefer

"my child be dead than homo".

The second night of the mini-series was postponed due to the new President of the United States giving an address to the entire assembled Congress. The speech was remarkable for dropping Mr. Trump's confrontational style, acting like an adult instead of a raving lunatic. The immediate response from the press, which Mr. Trump had constantly belittled, castigated, accused of making up stories (i.e. the unfavorable ones), and declared the enemy of the American People, was overly kind, remarking that he suddenly seemed presidential. They didn't really discuss his misrepresentations, distortions, outright lies, and attempts to cover up what may or may not be the truth.

Last night's episode of 'When We Rise' focused on relationships being built by the story's participants, the elation of the election of a gay man (Harvey Milk) to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, his assassination 11 months later, and the rise of what was being called a 'gay disease'.

The episode ended with one of the principals holding a protest in which people in San Francisco began posting the names of friends and lovers lost to this new disease onto the side of city hall. I've been crying a lot. The memories of the death of dear friends, the men with whom I was forming my family, have been overpowering.

This morning, intent on resuming my post of thoughts arising from the old movies I've been watching, I logged onto my computer to discover news that the new Attorney General had been caught lying about his contacts with Russia. These contacts, as well as a number of others surrounding the new administration, seem to expand into an ever deepening well. There are lies upon lies. As the stories of investigations into these incidents become public, they aren't just denied, the press is accused of making them up to discredit the President. Also in the news were further stories about the new administrator of the Federal Communications Commission and his repeal of polices protecting access to the internet, programs which helped the poor afford the internet in their homes, and rules of privacy which had hemmed in internet providers ability to keep records of what sites and information anyone had accessed. All of this is, of course, in the name of fostering business growth and competition. Such information would never be used to assist in rounding up people.

Other news stories concern the President's travel bans, people being deported due to such criminal backgrounds as having traffic violations, people being detained for hours or days without warrants, people having their identification papers checked as they left a flight which started and ended within the United States, and so forth. When the travel ban was imposed to protests and legal actions across the country, Homeland Security backed the President. They will be getting 15,000 new agents. The Department of Defense will get billions, partially to fund new atomic weapons. Other areas of the budget will have to be cut; these include monies for health care, social security, education, and the arts.

The man in the center of the above photograph is Bix Biderbecke. He is one of the men who was instrumental in the development of jazz. He was an alcoholic who died young, at the age of 28. He was gay.

The natives are restless tonight...

The other night I screened another old favorite which I hadn't seen in years, "Island of Lost Souls". A 1932 opus released in 1933, it melded popular genres of the day; the horror movie ('Dracula', 'The Mummy', 'Frankenstein', 'Freaks'); the horror movie subset of the mad doctor-crazed evil scientist movie ('Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde', 'The Mask of Fu Manchu', 'Chandu the Magician', 'The Invisible Man'), and the Island picture ('Tabu', 'Bird of Paradise', 'The Most Dangerous Game', 'King Kong'). All of the above (as well as a number of others) were released during the first few years after the use of sound was mastered, between 1931 and 1933. Even Mickey Mouse got into the act as in the following: (I always recommend using the full screen option)



All of these movies were released before the production code began to be enforced. Various church groups, as well as other moralist busybodies, had become upset at some of the content of the movies; a censorship was implemented to keep the movies from being censored. If you have trouble with the logic of that statement, I would advise against following the news in this era of Trumpenstein.

Many of these horror stories had originally appeared as novels, with subtexts intended to provoke thought on social movements and concerns of the day. In the hands of the early sound filmmakers, they were turned into grandly visual entertainments with thought provoking subtexts regarding the human condition. That particular horror film cycle occurred during the darkest days of the Depression, and often seem to send a message that some of the people who had created the monstrous worlds in which we found ourselves were victims, too. (The capitalists of industry must have breathed quite a bit easier without the showing of distressed populations in revolt.) In that era of such stories, a satisfactory conclusion often depended upon groups of people working together towards a satisfactory resolution; often including the creators of the monsters. A new horror cycle started in the early 1940's. With the rise of fascism, Nazi Germany, and Imperialist Japan, resolution began to depend on Super Heroes. ( I left out the Italians - no one really paid attention to them, unless they were stock comic relief characters.) The heroes of both eras had egalitarian American values, stood up for their neighbors, as well as anyone being oppressed, and took action without thinking too much about it. A sock in the jaw often started the richly deserved payback. The monsters in our stories are now usually aliens, and resolution is out of our everyman hands - the only role for 'the people' is as victims. These new horrors can only be stopped by the intervention of deus ex machina superheroes, who are now tortured souls full of self doubt and dark thoughts. This is all off the cuff generalization; perhaps it will become its own blog entry some day.

"Island of Lost Souls" is based on H. G. Wells', "The Island of Dr. Moreau". Mr. Wells was not happy with this first adaptation of his 1896 novel. He felt that stressing the horror elements downplayed his themes, which included moral responsibility, human identity, tampering with nature, vivisection, pain and cruelty. The film had changes from the book, one of which, the inclusion of sex in the form of the Panther Woman, was incorporated into later tellings of the tale. The story centered on a (mad?) doctor, who uses his private isolated South Seas island as a research center for his work in speeding up evolution. It will not give much away to note that this process is accomplished by operating on animals and turning them into human beings. The operations are performed without anesthetics. Unsuccessful experiments are ejected from the Doctor's compound, and forced to live on the island. The film struck pay dirt in costuming Dr. Moreau and other (upper class) persons of authority in white, which immediately conjured images of colonial authority over those considered lesser beings than themselves. (In the book, the Doctor and his men are described as wearing blue work clothes.)  By the way, the release of the movie in England was delayed by censorship until the late 1950's, and I think in Australia it didn't see the light of a projector until the 1980's (but I can't find my note on the date). The print broadcast on Tuner Classic Movies, which I believe is available as a Blu Ray DVD from Criterion, was made from a variety of 35mm prints, including a few frames from 16mm. It is easily the best quality I've ever seen on this title. Watching it is still a disturbing and eerie experience.

The role of Doctor Moreau was performed by Charles Laughton. While the movie itself can't be accused of much subtlety in its 70 minutes, Laughton's doctor is part visionary genius, and part insane sadist, sometimes expressed with childlike glee. It set a standard for such roles that has not been often equaled. I seem to recall that Laughton once stated that he based his character on his dentist.

Bela Lugosi played a leader of the island's rejects, the "Sayer of the Law". The Law had been set down by the good doctor. Lugosi and "the natives" would chant in call and response fashion, "What is the law?" "Not to spill blood. Are we not men?" "What is the law?" "Not to go on all fours. Are we not men?" The law is something each creation must learn after it has left "The House of Pain". If you're recognizing a few things that would later show up in association with various 1970's and 1980's rock bands, I should probably note that the movie was also the source of a once popular saying, "The natives are restless tonight." That, by the way, was not a good thing.

 

"I'm not crazy, my reality is just different from yours."

It has been difficult to return to writing here, even to just jot random notes about the movies I've watched. It's not that I don't want to do so, and it's not the laziness of older age; I think my reluctance has more to do with wanting to protect what has become my own little bubble of sanity and security. Movies, after all, have much value as escapism. As the ad campaign for 'That's Entertainment' put it, "Boy, do we need it now".

Ticket Booth, Times Square, 1954. Photo by Frank Oscar Larson.

Last night, the anchor of the CBS News program introduced a segment by saying, "It has been a busy day for presidential statements divorced from reality". My cable box has the capability to 'rewind' whatever has just been shown, kind of like a videotape could be rewound to replay something, or instant replay on a sports program. I had to go back and listen to that introduction again. At first, it was because I couldn't believe the anchor, Scott Pelley, had actually said it. Then I watched it again to savor the moment. And a third time to accurately note the wording of the quote. Frankly, I'm still amazed. It's not something I ever expected to hear on a news report. Certainly not on one of the major networks, and certainly not on CBS, once the center of great reporting by journalists like Edward R. Murrow, and Walter Cronkite, now fallen on the same hard times that beset most news departments under the purview of their networks' entertainment divisions. It would seem that even CBS News has had enough. The sad thing is that most people probably don't realize how important and unprecedented it was to make that statement.

 It is snowing at the moment. It is, as a voice somewhere in the back of my head would put it, "coming down at a pretty good clip". I don't have a particularly wonderful view; Putney Road gets a lot of traffic as it's the main artery going north to the land of shopping malls, empty stores, pizza joints, supermarkets, discount palaces, auto parts, and fast food. A couple of old mid 19th century mansions, once the homes of the local gentry, are in evidence peeking out from under trees, and from behind hedges of evergreen. Even with the traffic, it is still mesmerizing, calling forth the little boy still trapped somewhere within. It's probably the boy who is so entertained by the movies. Certainly the movies lead me to reading a number of books which became favorites. I often bemoan my books being in storage, but I suppose it's better that way. Just before they all got packed into boxes for the trip to a friend's early 18th century barn, I had to sell off quite a few of my best, my favorites, my - yes, friends. It was during a period of unemployment uncertainty and had to be done to raise the necessary emollient for modern life. I don't quite know what I still have left. I would be crushed to discover I sold my Compleat Sherlock Holmes, my annotated copies of Dickens, my reference edition (including manuscript) of 'Alice in Wonderland' and 'Through the Looking-Glass'. The Alice books have been on my mind a lot recently.

The quote which serves as the title for this post is from one of the Alice's. With the beauty of the falling snow visible before me, the image of falling down a rabbit hole into a world of nonsense seems a fit metaphor for the current political situation in these United States. I've occasionally railed against the present unpolitic politic on Facebook, which does not lend itself to writing of more than a few sentences. People seem to read a paragraph or so and move on. People post links to articles with wildly exaggerated headlines they think bolsters their reality, without having read the accompanying story. Only liberals and reporters seem to be bothered by statements which stress "alternative facts", as noted by one of President The Donald's hench spokespeople. I could go on and on, but I don't want to at the moment. I'm feeling peaceful while looking at falling snow, and such moments of peace are few and far between just now.

I'll try to force myself to come back later, or tomorrow, to make a few notes about some of the movies I'm already beginning to forget. After all, tomorrow is another day. (cue swelling music)

Such impermanence.

Okay, here's the thing.

I'm really tired of torturing the language to find ways not to start a post with "I". Such an opening seems far too egotistical. In the long run, however, this blog is about - well, me. My attitudes, my thoughts, my activities, my diatribes against the slings and arrows, my fears (if I want to go that far), and so on and so forth. That's a lot more 'me' than I sometimes find comfortable expressing, or for that matter, reading. In the long run, I suppose this is kind of like scribbling on a fence or a bathroom wall somewhere. I don't really kid myself that I'm all that interesting, or that my thoughts are all that different and are therefore deserving of notice. My writing style isn't especially interesting either. Sometimes I kid myself that distant friends, internet friends, far off family, can occasionally check in and see what is happening in the life and times. Maybe a nephew or niece will one day decide to find out whatever happened to that crazy uncle who, rumor has it, all but ran away to join the circus. It would be nice if they found these ramblings and read just enough to catch the memories, dreams, ideals, and contradictions that make up the old psyche.

I verbally ramble. I am not comfortable with the quick spittle expressions of not quite face to facebook, or tweeting twitterers. My thoughts and words meander. I often feel helplessly old fashioned in this regard. I've no burning desire to be as verbose as Charles Dickens who, after all, was paid by the word. Then again, reading Dickens is a joy in my universe. (I'd have said "in my book" but the books in question were his.) (Ba-da-dumb.)

This morning, I wondered (not for the first time) why I hadn't seen any posts from Delores' blog in about a month. I subscribed to her 'Under the Porch Light', so her posts arrived by email. She had trouble some time back with her electronic interface device, and I had assumed that she was either taking a break, or that such trouble had returned. She was often the only person to leave notes on this page of the electronic universe. I steered my browser to her blog. It is gone, vanished into the sub electronic ether, the online evidence of her being has been removed. There may be any number of very good reasons for this turn of events. Perhaps there was too much information which was used by someone stealing her identity. A hundred quick explanations form in the thought process.

The blogs, facebook accounts, and etc. of people I know or hardly know or would like to know have vanished before. I find it unsettling. These twistings of the ones and zeroes are part of the evidence that we were here, they are expressions of our humanity, a record of our species, the modern equivalent of graffiti etched onto the walls of ancient Egypt. It is unsettling to realize how quickly it all can vanish.

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Today, March 8th, is International Women's Day. I think I've noted it in previous posts. For the last couple of years, I've done my annual radio show about the "all girl" big bands on the weekend closest to this date. This year, I had other plans, as it's the 16th anniversary of my program; I've been giving serious thought to calling it a day and closing down the show. I've thought about doing it a couple of times over the last year or so. The anniversary seems like an appropriate time. Last Saturday's show was going to be a kind of tale in the telling, a history of how the show developed and why I think it might be time to stop. This coming Saturday would be the actual anniversary, the slam bang fabulous finish. Now, my show is on for two hours starting at 6pm on Saturday nights. It's a time when people are making or eating dinner, getting ready to go out, deciding what to watch that night, etc. I've always thought it more of a music show and less talk about the music or the whys and wherefores. So deciding to proceed in such fashion was an exception to the way I've conducted my program. Of course, the guy on at 2 o'clock that afternoon suddenly decided to do a show in which he autobiographically told the story of how he found the music that became important to him, and what meaning it had in his growing into allegedly responsible adulthood. It was a great show. I couldn't follow that act. I'd intended to play a song or two for International Women's Day, but with the last minute change in plans ended up playing about an hour's worth. The remaining hour was more or less just doodling around, not unlike the way the show started out. I still haven't made the decision about the future of the show, I've wavered back and forth. I guess in a way it's my scratchings on the wall.

As always, I hope any listeners enjoy the show.

Paying for the Fiddler

This morning, as I was perusing the New York Times online, I stumbled upon a mention of the current Broadway revival of the musical "Fiddler on the Roof". The mention was in the headline of an article about the lifestyle of one of the show's performers. As I checked to see if I was interested in the article, I noticed a link to the show's review, from which I surmised that the revival started its run a few months ago. That review contained a link to the original production's review from 1964, which I also read.

from the 1964 review
 

I must mention that I subscribe to the New York Times online. Personally, I still I prefer the old fashioned experience of holding a newspaper, folding and turning the pages (and the sound that made), and getting my fingers smudged with rubbed off ink. I liked seeing the ads for products in which I had no interest; graphic concoctions of art and commerce that helped pay the paper's operating expenses. I liked seeing articles that piqued my curiosity, I liked reading opinions that differed from my own. I do not wish to be party to the slow and painful death of newspapers and objective reporting, but the fact of the matter is that the Times is unaffordable for me to purchase on a daily basis. My online fee, acquired during a special promotion, runs $15.00 a month and includes the paper's historical files. I would not be able to afford one month of the paper's Sunday edition for that price. These promotional deals are often set for a number of months, and bear constant watching, as the monthly fee is deducted automatically from my bank account. When the deal expires, one will find one's account charged at a much higher rate without warning. A month isn't really a month - the date on which my subscription fee is deducted from my bank account is a moving target, forever edging forward. At the beginning of this past autumn, the deduction was made during the third week of the month. It is now made within the first few days of the month. This maneuver, of course, is not unique to the Times. My cable/phone/internet bill does the same thing. As that one is a much larger amount, I can't let it be set to automatically deduct lest I be caught short. But the date for that bill still changes, a month is not a month, and the 'due by' date seems to move forward as well. But I digress. 

When I lived in New York City, or within a hour or two of it, I greatly enjoyed going to shows. Reading the original review of 'Fiddler', I started to wonder how much it cost back in 1964 when it debuted. As the review was in a .pdf scan of the paper, I went to the next page to check the theatre listings for the price. In 1964, an orchestra seat for that brand new musical cost $9.40 on a Friday or Saturday night when prices were highest.

As cost is relative, I looked up the minimum wage in 1964. The Federally set minimum in those days was $1.25 an hour. Which means, that forgetting taxes, deductions, and etc. someone earning the minimum wage would have to work for 8 hours to afford one ticket.

The top price for an orchestra seat for the current revival, which is far less than the price of a new show, is $167.00 for a Friday or Saturday night. Someone working at the Federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour would have to work over 23 hours to afford one ticket.

The Broadway Theatre, one of the few theatres whose entrance is actually on Broadway. It was built as a movie palace with a stage. Mickey Mouse made his debut here before it switched to live shows. It returned to movies for the premiere of Disney's 'Fantasia', and once again for the premiere of Cinerama. When I was seeing shows there, the exterior looked quite different. (The first show I saw there was 'Cabaret', back in 1968.) The current façade and marquee are from work done when the neighboring skyscraper was built a few years ago.

My curiosity got the better of me, and I looked to see how much an average orchestra seat for the current hot ticket, the hip-hop infused musical 'Hamilton' would cost. Finding ticket prices is somewhat difficult if one isn't ordering, and for 'Hamilton', tickets are hard to get. I found someone who complained in a letter written last June that the mid-orchestra seats they had just acquired for that November cost $327.00 each. I decided to check the show's website, which claimed that a few seats were indeed available. The cost for next Friday night was well over $1,000.00. I think it was close to $1,200 something, but my eyes and mind boggled. I had to look away.

Armistice Day

Today, November 11th, used to be known as Armistice Day.

Many of my generation can recite the phrase... "on the 11th hour, on the 11th day, of the 11th month...". I occasionally wonder how many people know to what event that phrase refers? The thing is, the import and meaning of that day has changed.

An Armistice is defined as an agreement whereby warring parties end their armed engagments. The quote above refers to the end of fighting on the Western Front of The Great War, now known as World War One. November 11th, 1918 was the unofficial end to the war. The paperwork took awhile longer. It always does. Just between the agreement to end the fighting and the arrival of the fabled hour, another 3,000 soldiers were killed in battle. Thousands more were still to succumb to the remains of the conflict.

In both Great Britain and France, a day of remembrance for those who gave their lives in the service of their countries in the war was declared. It became customary to observe 2 minutes of reverent silence in their honor at the 11th hour on Armistice Day.

Part of the celebration in London

the celebration in Paris

 In the United States, something quite remarkable occurred. In 1919, President Woodrow Wilson declared November 11th be a commemoration of the Armistice; "To us in America, the reflections of Armistice Day will be filled with solemn pride in the heroism of those who died in the country’s service and with gratitude for the victory, both because of the thing from which it has freed us and because of the opportunity it has given America to show her sympathy with peace and justice in the councils of the nations…"

The key phrase is "sympathy with peace". Armistice Day was a celebration of Peace breaking out. It was intended as a day of reflection on the concept of peace and international co-operation.


Soldiers on the Western Front celebrated

Those who think I am off the mark should look no further than the Congress of the United States, when it issued a resolution on Armistice Day in 1926 with the following words;

"Whereas it is fitting that the recurring anniversary of this date should be commemorated with thanksgiving and prayer and exercises designed to perpetuate peace through good will and mutual understanding between nations; and

Whereas the legislatures of twenty-seven of our States have already declared November 11 to be a legal holiday: Therefore be it Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), that the President of the United States is requested to issue a proclamation calling upon the officials to display the flag of the United States on all Government buildings on November 11 and inviting the people of the United States to observe the day in schools and churches, or other suitable places, with appropriate ceremonies of friendly relations with all other peoples."

London

In 1938, the U.S. Congress passed an Act which proclaimed the 11th of November a legal holiday: "a day to be dedicated to the cause of world peace and to be thereafter celebrated and known as 'Armistice Day'."^[

In 1954, not quite 10 years after the end of World War Two, the Congress of the United States changed the meaning of Armistice Day, basically by doing away with it. The President at the time, a member of the conservative Republican Party, was Dwight D. Eisenhower. He had previously been known to most of the world as the General whose careful planning helped defeat the fascists in Italy and Germany, ending the Second World War on the European continent, and freeing the world from the vile machinations of the Nazis. The idea for the change to honor all Veterans of all of the US wars came from a WWII veteran, who led a delegation to the Capitol to express the idea directly to the President, who had been a man of War. This occurred in the greater context of the Red Scare, the early days of the Cold War; the Army-McCarthy hearings were underway. It was around the same month that the words "Under God" were inserted into the Pledge of Allegiance - a recitation required of US school children while saluting the US flag. The Pledge became an official requirement in 1942, after the US was brought into WWII. It had become a contested practice as the clouds of war had gathered over Europe. There were teachers who refused to institute it and quit their profession rather than require the youth of the country to participate in what they regarded as militaristic training. It was originally written by an Admiral who had fought in the Mexican-American war as well as the Civil War. It was then revised by a Baptist minister with socialist leanings.

Americans in London joined the celebration

At any event, while it is fitting that the people who serve their country be honored, a day dedicated to thoughts of peace was turned into a day of commemoration of specifically military service, which in our own day has become, for various reasons, a flag waving celebration of 'warriors' and military service.

Lest we forget, when the bill to allow conscription was passed as we geared up, ummm, prepared for our possible involvement in WWII, there were warnings that we might never get rid of it. Had it not been for conscription, there would have been no standing army to send to Korea, nor to Vietnam. Soldiers of that era were not volunteers. The idea had been promoted that one owed four years of their life and their youth to the government of the geographic bit of space on which they were born.



celebrants in New York City

Now that we have a supposed 'volunteer' army, our military has become a chance for the underclass to get a leg up towards the "better" lifestyle depicted in the movies and on tv. There are many benefits. I have friends and family who served, and whose service was in army camps in Germany, or other non-combat areas. They were able to buy their homes through Federal assistance to veterans. They get healthcare, and a number of other benefits - depending on their geographical location to access them. They are among the first to fly the flag and point out that they "served", even though they never seem to recall the non-combat part. I don't begrudge them their benefits, even though some of them had no choice in the matter.

These days, after our National Guard was sent to war, after the non-traditional battles against Islamic foes, torture (not ours, theirs), beheadings, and other horrors, it seems as though those who served are honored every day, by specially advertised on television sales deals, special insurance rates - business gladly waving the flag for customers - and at sporting events in large Roman style Coliseums, er... sports arenas. As it turned out, these events have been bought and paid for by the government. They aren't about honoring the brave men and women who served, they are propaganda. Our television programs feature action adventures of specialized government units which used to serve those who serve us, but for several years now mostly fight terrorism, often by breaking the rules or fudging the rights of suspects. The excess military equipment from the Iraq war, the Afghanistan war, the Libyan war and etc. has become part of everyday life - given or sold to police departments in my country to preserve the peace - but from whom? A town not far from here, a bit larger than Brattleboro where I live, now has its own tank. Our police, often ex-military people, have a cowboy us versus them mentality. They do not shoot to disarm, they do not shoot to immobilize, they shoot to kill. We've just had the interesting spectacle of a female police officer being exonerated for killing an unarmed civilian. She couldn't see his hands, you see. She demanded that he show her his hands. He was lying face down on the ground. He moved his hands underneath his body. She was certain that he had a gun, so she shot him in the back. A new wrinkle in women warrior rights.

As for our actual warriors, the Republicans in our government (them again!) have cut the budgets which provide for the care of our fighters, then blamed the Democratic government opposition for the lack of care while they wrap themselves in the flag. These Republicans, however, are a world away from anything President Eisenhower would recognize. Once they were a great party, now they are a bowdlerized version of that group, providing lap dog services to the wealthy and corporate elite.

Even though I was a child at the time, I remember President Eisenhower's farewell address. Because I was a child, I didn't understand all of it. But I remember his warning about something he called the "military industrial complex".

The phony cause known as the Iraq war ably served corporate interests, while destroying the minds and bodies of our youth. Those it served well included a company for which the then Vice-President had been Chief Executive Officer. That company earned billions, made more billions vanish into the desert sands of time, and provided services to our soldiers that included such niceties as providing drinking water which wasn't safe. They were but one of many such companies, and their crimes would takes days to list, but since they were making money there have been no trials, no convictions, no investigations, no nothing except their continuing to 'honor' those who serve. Some honor.

So please excuse me for not jumping on the online bandwagon and attempting to wave the flag higher and more ferociously than my friends and neighbors. I won't buy the special coffee that earns money for warriors. I won't buy any of the special products. I don't buy it at all. I'll take time to observe Armistice Day, and think about a time when peace broke out.

pax vobiscum