Make a quick list: Syria, Iraq, Oklahoma tea partiers, Texas anti-gay politicos, Republican move off to the extreme right, blaming Obama for everything, McCain on war/peace/anything, talk radio, talking heads on Fox, Pat Robertson, religions that honor ignorance, violence towards women everywhere, stupidity about science, Bush 43, neo-conservatives and their views, the Tea Party fools,
wars in Middle East/Africa/Crimea/Ukraine/etc., unrestrained capitalism, the 1% resisting giving the poor a living minimum wage, etc. etc. etc.
It is Friday the 13th and a Full Moon -- and the world is "madder" than usual.
Friday, June 13, 2014
Thursday, June 12, 2014
Berlin...and Dachau
I lived for a too-brief time in Europe during the 1960's. Going to "college" at Loyola University in Rome during that time allowed for quire a bit of travel time throughout the Continent. And my favorite city in the world during that time -- was Berlin -- a choice of many a weekend train ride from Italy. This was the time before the Wall came down obviously, and I used my many trips there to walk nearly the entire city -- from barricade to barricade.
The zoo, the Kurfurstendamm, the night clubs, the history, the theatre, the life, the food, the beer-- were all much suited to me. It was in Berlin that I first noticed the easy mixing of races in couples in countless social settings. In Berlin I first noticed the wildness of sexual experimentation and conquest. In Berlin I also first understood "history" -- for good of for bad -- with the bombed-out cathedral there, the many indicators or WW II, and the frank and horrible admission of the Holocaust. But only later when I visited Dachau did I really understand the fight in Europe in WW II. The large scale pictures and remaining buildings at Dachau are burned into my memory in a visceral and permanent way.
I don't feel at all superior to the acts portrayed and indicated there -- I feel sorry, on behalf of humanity, for all those who died -- and for all those who were "guilty." We were all as guilty as those German military leaders who instigated the pogrom -- the world was complicit by willful ignorance and cultural stupidity. We chose not to know...
The zoo, the Kurfurstendamm, the night clubs, the history, the theatre, the life, the food, the beer-- were all much suited to me. It was in Berlin that I first noticed the easy mixing of races in couples in countless social settings. In Berlin I first noticed the wildness of sexual experimentation and conquest. In Berlin I also first understood "history" -- for good of for bad -- with the bombed-out cathedral there, the many indicators or WW II, and the frank and horrible admission of the Holocaust. But only later when I visited Dachau did I really understand the fight in Europe in WW II. The large scale pictures and remaining buildings at Dachau are burned into my memory in a visceral and permanent way.
I don't feel at all superior to the acts portrayed and indicated there -- I feel sorry, on behalf of humanity, for all those who died -- and for all those who were "guilty." We were all as guilty as those German military leaders who instigated the pogrom -- the world was complicit by willful ignorance and cultural stupidity. We chose not to know...
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Puritanical America
I have long thought that America is still encrusted with Puritanical guilt, and rife with Puritanical "opinions" about sex. Such opinions are the root of many people's seeming disgust over any "sex" that is outside the norm.
Puritanical thinking establishes that norm as a strict pseudo-biblical aversion to sex outside of marriage, any sex that uses contraception, any "gay" sex, any sexual positions or placements outside of the "missionary," and any sex that challenges the current "within the contract" thinking. Sex is bigger than religion -- more basic, more human, more of our nature -- it is as essential as eating, sleeping, or any elemental physiological function.
Every constrictive religion (like Puritanism, Catholicism, Muslim teaching, etc.) tries to shape sex within and only within its own cultural habits. So all birth control is forbidden for use by Catholics; and yet the majority of Catholics use and understand the necessity for birth control. All sex outside of approved rituals is forbidden to Muslims; and yet Muslim women continue to strain the bonds of gender-driven control.
What should we as individuals be doing about our sexual desires? We should be using our intelligence, our emotions, and our own innate understanding of our human nature
to dictate and control our own actions. That should be the reason why certain acts should be forbidden: incest, or sexual snuff films, or sex with children for example.
Sex is not a sin -- it is a gift that humans have been given to use, wisely and in respectful control. Men and women should have equal control over their own sexuality.
Puritanical thinking establishes that norm as a strict pseudo-biblical aversion to sex outside of marriage, any sex that uses contraception, any "gay" sex, any sexual positions or placements outside of the "missionary," and any sex that challenges the current "within the contract" thinking. Sex is bigger than religion -- more basic, more human, more of our nature -- it is as essential as eating, sleeping, or any elemental physiological function.
Every constrictive religion (like Puritanism, Catholicism, Muslim teaching, etc.) tries to shape sex within and only within its own cultural habits. So all birth control is forbidden for use by Catholics; and yet the majority of Catholics use and understand the necessity for birth control. All sex outside of approved rituals is forbidden to Muslims; and yet Muslim women continue to strain the bonds of gender-driven control.
What should we as individuals be doing about our sexual desires? We should be using our intelligence, our emotions, and our own innate understanding of our human nature
to dictate and control our own actions. That should be the reason why certain acts should be forbidden: incest, or sexual snuff films, or sex with children for example.
Sex is not a sin -- it is a gift that humans have been given to use, wisely and in respectful control. Men and women should have equal control over their own sexuality.
Thursday, June 5, 2014
Don't Read This...Now!
Started this blog a long time ago not knowing if anyone would ever read it. And frankly, I don't care if anyone ever does read it.
Why?
I am writing it for me -- to assuage my own sensibilities; to ponder my own questions; to regret my own actions. It is only tangentially about life, the world, the way other people are, or just about things. That fact doesn't make it any less important -- it just makes it mine first, yours only if you want it to be.
This blog is also an instrument of my own personal history -- my past, my ideas, my mistakes, my triumphs. It will never be a comprehensive history, nor a particularly focused one. My thinking is pretty much all over the block. But it will be an honest one -- an honest portrayal of what is troubling me at a given moment in time.
Why?
I am writing it for me -- to assuage my own sensibilities; to ponder my own questions; to regret my own actions. It is only tangentially about life, the world, the way other people are, or just about things. That fact doesn't make it any less important -- it just makes it mine first, yours only if you want it to be.
This blog is also an instrument of my own personal history -- my past, my ideas, my mistakes, my triumphs. It will never be a comprehensive history, nor a particularly focused one. My thinking is pretty much all over the block. But it will be an honest one -- an honest portrayal of what is troubling me at a given moment in time.
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Missing Lost Loves
Without getting maudlin -- I miss Sheila N. Mrochinski. She died in December, 2006 and she was the center of my life. She was not the only woman I have ever loved, but she was the truest, the finest, the most compassionate and forgiving.
There were other "chances" both before Sheila and after. Before She there was a whole range of women I knew and respected at Interlochen --- I was unready or unable to commit during that time, so lovers like Helen, or Kathryn, or Jeanne, or Pat "went away" and lived their own lives without me. Some other women flitted into my life during that time for a few moments: Peggy, and Carlene, and a few others -- they did not "stick." Kris, Kate, and even Tina were especially disappointing and enervating during that same time frame.
And all those women cycled through my life during the 9 years I was at Interlochen.
So many "chances" and so many choices; so many successes and so many failures.
There were other "chances" both before Sheila and after. Before She there was a whole range of women I knew and respected at Interlochen --- I was unready or unable to commit during that time, so lovers like Helen, or Kathryn, or Jeanne, or Pat "went away" and lived their own lives without me. Some other women flitted into my life during that time for a few moments: Peggy, and Carlene, and a few others -- they did not "stick." Kris, Kate, and even Tina were especially disappointing and enervating during that same time frame.
And all those women cycled through my life during the 9 years I was at Interlochen.
So many "chances" and so many choices; so many successes and so many failures.
Tuesday, June 3, 2014
A New Sadness
Observation of people -- usually in an airport, park, or some other public place -- is one of the things I do for exhilaration. Last weekend I spied a young woman carefully walking into a touristy area, dragging herself behind a "walker" (the kind usually given to stroke victims, or very aged people, etc.). I watched her for more than a half an hour as she plied inexorably forward, step by step, to her destination.
She was quite young -- in her early 20's probably -- and yet incredibly infirm, fragile, even frail looking. She disappeared finally down a pedestian mall in St. Augustine (St. Georges Street -- which claims to be one of the oldest streets in that city) after a long and painstaking peripateia.
Hours later as I moved down that same street to meet my friends for dinner at the Columbia Restaurant, I espied her again. She was perched atop a low wall -- legs crossed firmly under her as she sat, walker at her side -- facing a group of shops: ice cream shop, bar, restaurant -- which could only be called "young peoples' places." She sat there catlike -- waiting to talk to people/waiting to be noticed: but even though the pedestian mall was crowded she sat untouched and unspoken to. It evoked in me a kind of small sadness.
How long would she sit there until she saw someone she knew -- or they saw her -- and spoke to her! Was she hoping that someone she didn't know would speak to her? Was she waiting for someone, or something, to happen? Was this a ritual for more than just a Friday night? I wanted to come back tomorrow, and the next day, to see if she was still there. I wondered in my head what she was doing there. Did she just need to be near people and not shut up in her small apartment? Did she just need to be seen -- to acknowledge that she was still alive, still trying, still hoping? What was the rest of her story -- I wonder.
She was quite young -- in her early 20's probably -- and yet incredibly infirm, fragile, even frail looking. She disappeared finally down a pedestian mall in St. Augustine (St. Georges Street -- which claims to be one of the oldest streets in that city) after a long and painstaking peripateia.
Hours later as I moved down that same street to meet my friends for dinner at the Columbia Restaurant, I espied her again. She was perched atop a low wall -- legs crossed firmly under her as she sat, walker at her side -- facing a group of shops: ice cream shop, bar, restaurant -- which could only be called "young peoples' places." She sat there catlike -- waiting to talk to people/waiting to be noticed: but even though the pedestian mall was crowded she sat untouched and unspoken to. It evoked in me a kind of small sadness.
How long would she sit there until she saw someone she knew -- or they saw her -- and spoke to her! Was she hoping that someone she didn't know would speak to her? Was she waiting for someone, or something, to happen? Was this a ritual for more than just a Friday night? I wanted to come back tomorrow, and the next day, to see if she was still there. I wondered in my head what she was doing there. Did she just need to be near people and not shut up in her small apartment? Did she just need to be seen -- to acknowledge that she was still alive, still trying, still hoping? What was the rest of her story -- I wonder.
Monday, June 2, 2014
Reading Minds...and Behaviors
I have taken so many "trips" in the past few years, mostly on behalf of my jobs --- but I always remember glimpses, moments, "pictures" of people I have met. Not so much as part of my job -- but on the periphery: at airports, in public squares, in downtown parks, or while waiting for my "work assignments" to arrive.
This past weekend was no exception and absolutely typical. In the downtown park, just across from the pretentious Casa Monica Hotel (a Kessler "boutique" hotel -- like the Mansion on Forsyth Park near my home in Savannah) in St. Augustine, Florida; I saw this elderly man: with two small backpacks, a too-thick summer jacket to ward off the impending rain, and a heavy hand-carved cane to bolster an obviously weakened left leg. I observed this man over several hours -- as he "patrolled" the park, looking for quickly-thrown away food in the public garbage cans (no digging in them, just looking at the "surface layer.") I believe he may have even been watching those "cans" for fresh refuse. He had sharp intelligent eyes, a quick facial manner, and slow careful limb movements. I would estimate his age to be nearly 80 -- and his home to be nearby, though probably not permanently.
He was a careful survivor -- and by the neat look of him, probably former military -- probably homeless, probably alone. I was drawn to him because of his careful patterns; but also because of his obvious care with his time and energy. He seemed an enviable person -- clear in his thinking, and focused in his intentions. He would survive that day and many more like it because he was what he was. I envied him.
This past weekend was no exception and absolutely typical. In the downtown park, just across from the pretentious Casa Monica Hotel (a Kessler "boutique" hotel -- like the Mansion on Forsyth Park near my home in Savannah) in St. Augustine, Florida; I saw this elderly man: with two small backpacks, a too-thick summer jacket to ward off the impending rain, and a heavy hand-carved cane to bolster an obviously weakened left leg. I observed this man over several hours -- as he "patrolled" the park, looking for quickly-thrown away food in the public garbage cans (no digging in them, just looking at the "surface layer.") I believe he may have even been watching those "cans" for fresh refuse. He had sharp intelligent eyes, a quick facial manner, and slow careful limb movements. I would estimate his age to be nearly 80 -- and his home to be nearby, though probably not permanently.
He was a careful survivor -- and by the neat look of him, probably former military -- probably homeless, probably alone. I was drawn to him because of his careful patterns; but also because of his obvious care with his time and energy. He seemed an enviable person -- clear in his thinking, and focused in his intentions. He would survive that day and many more like it because he was what he was. I envied him.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)