“spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings” Wordsworth

Here’s to the dads who stayed
 – to the dads who played
(so tired !)
who needed sleep but could keep on
building or singing or drawing.
Here’s to the dads who prayed.

Here’s to the dads who read
– to the dads who said
books were good
and that we should
read and think and wonder.
Here’s to the dads who led.

Here’s to the men who loved
– who kept a roof above
our thick heads instead of
moving on to greener things –
foreign fruits and such.
Here’s to the men we love.

Sunscreen: More than skin deep

A definite low-point in my life was the time my doctor announced that the mole was malignant melanoma. He had scooped off and dropped into a jar my lovely inner-thigh mole, all the while declaring that it looked fine and was probably nothing. Just a precaution. That was years ago, and while melanoma is extremely virulent, my chances for survival are excellent. Who knows?

Any way, I had to make some adjustments since my favorite place is the ocean and my sport is tennis. I wear sunscreen and visors and stay out of the sun when I can. 

I learned some things. Did you know that “mela” is Greek for “black?” And that a current cancer didn’t happen last week. It was those summers on the beach when I blistered up at the age of eight or nine and on. Apparently we weren’t designed to go around half naked for hours having fun in the sun. Nobody knew. Also, candidate John McCain had it a few years back –lots of Arizona sun, I guess.

So I was interested in the March ‘08 report from the CDC on how MOST sunscreens are damaging to the skin, the hormones, birth weight, and more. Bad news. Everyone tested had the insidious chemical oxybenzone in his urine. This also involves make-up and moisturizer that contain sunscreen.  Children are particularly vulnerable.

Solution? Capitalism will ensure that safe products abound shortly as people become informed. For now, my research shows that products using the old zinc oxide/titanium dioxide formula are the ones to choose. I did not see a single usable product at my local drugstore chain. I bought Neutrogena Sensitive Skin 30 at the grocery store, and it seems to be alright. It was $10.00 for FOUR OUNCES!

Some online sources are on top of this and have products available, but I was in a hurry.

Here’s more about the report http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-schmich-zorn-09-may09,1,615350.column

Wondering about a mole? Here are pictures and a measuring guide  http://www.skincancerguide.ca/melanoma/images/melanoma_images.html

The Longest Day

My husband loves to talk about battles — military, not so much personal. So today he sat shirtless, ready to mow grass, while I read aloud from a fact sheet on June 6 — Operation Overlord — D Day.

It’s an interesting historical study. More importantly, it does us good, I think, to reflect and remember the great purposes of our nation — times when we united because we had to — or be destroyed along with our allies in the world.

We should be sure that our history teachers are including some time about this event in their classes: something about the horrors of the Holocaust, Nazi ideology, and evil totalitarian leaders and their regimes.

And I would hope that teachers and parents emphasize what had to be done to stop the progress of ideas that are bad for humanity, that threaten human dignity and freedom.

And that brings us to the individuals who landed on those beaches on that inclement day charging an open beach with a fiercely determined enemy armed and looking on from high cliffs. What courage that took. I for one want to add this brief memory in thanks for their sacrifice in accomplishing this, not ideal, but successful mission.

John Stuart Mill:

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature, and has no chance of being free unless made or kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

a few links

http://www.skylighters.org/photos/robertcapa.html Capa photos — a photographer who landed with the troops and his work

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/photo_gallery/3779127.stm from the BBC — video with Prince Charles watching a reinactment, plus linked interviews with veterans who report on the carnage among other things

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLjEKKvV78s YouTube — more photos with stirring music — 1:59

http://www.eisenhower.archives.gov/dl/dday/ddaypage.html – the Eisenhour archives, lots of info and links

Interview with a vampire reader

Chastened for criticizing a novel I had not read, I set out to read said novel, Rice’s Interview with a Vampire, and thus be able to discuss it from an informed point of view. ((See my post s on must reads and/or what constitutes a literary classic along with the comments.)

I’ll start with a positive. Rice is a good raconteur. Her narrative style is the right blend of dialogue, narration, and description. The disturbed, repellent characters are depicted in great detail and carefully drawn. Places, too, are vividly portrayed.

I’m forcing myself to finish the book. The subject matter is lurid and objectionable, dark and macabre. But this isn’t just a ghost story. Its insidious side is evinced in that the vampires are attractive, naturally, and the act of sucking blood is depicted as highly sensual — the ultimate experience.  That’s disgusting and for me offensive. Descriptive tales of how a person is tracked down and drained of his life blood, often with great pleasure in a spirit of fun, is reprehensible and appeals, as does such prurient literature to the basest nature. 

I’ve read 200 pages and I can’t find anything to take away from the book, nothing here enriches, elevates, informs, or pleases. It’s like falling deeper and deeper into a dark bottomless hole. What is Rice’s purpose?

I’m waiting to read any criticism until after I’ve finished, sometime Monday maybe. I’ve been told that there is heavy-duty philosophy here and perhaps I’ll find it in those remaining 150 pages.

Life after teaching

Dear Paisley and Plaid (are you one or two?),

I majored in English, and by your erudite commentary and precise, exquisite style (and lots of time to blog) I suspect that you, too, may be an English major. I recently resigned my position teaching eighth-grade speech and rhetoric because of, well, it was the principal of the thing!

What do I do now?

Well, English Major,

Here are some jobs with real possiblilites for people like us — lovers of literature and all things written or verbal. Starting pay may not be up to scale with what you are used to as a teacher and therefore the greatest influence on the nation’s future, but as they told us in Intro. to Education I,, II, and III,  ”Money isn’t everything!”

Many of these TOP TEN jobs can be done concurrently.  Good Luck!

Bohemian artiste — with a perpetual scarf — make commentary on the bourgeois masses
Novelist writing from personal experience — make that a novella-ist – you only taught eighth grade
Ghost writer for people with experiences
Elopement planner — It’s much more than just load up and go!
Student at  Online Law School — Go OLS!
Guru — field TBD
Consultant  — all trades (How hard can it be? You’ve read Dostoevsky.)
Amish clothing designer
Torch singer - You enter, late of course, 9:20, sing, sleep till noon
Academic advisor –pass out free t-shirt s–  ”For Heaven’s Sake Major in Computer Science”
Mansion sitter — 15,000 sq. ft. and up

Out of the question list. You should stay away from this field:
Anything medical including dental work — the sounds, the smells, the sick people, mouth insides, nurses

And be sure to check out this link to 25 very odd jobs that you might pursue as well –
http://blog.sixwise.com/blogs/vaszily-brian/archive/2007/03/08/the-world-s-25-oddest-jobs.aspx

 

Millay’s Figs

Edna St. Vincent Millay wrote two short poems, “First Fig” and “Second Fig,” which are both often quoted as was the case of “First Fig” by Heath Ledger’s father on the death of his son.

First Fig
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends-
It gives a lovely light. 

The poem is little more than applying a cliche to the carpe diem theme. Most interesting is the speaker’s addressing both her foes and her friends. Why must her enemies know of the frenetic but exhilarating “lovely light,” her life’s burning up? So that they will envy her, living well being the most delicious revenge.

What about her friends? They have played a part in her passion play, and she tells them that it’s okay - that a short but sweet life has been “lovely.” No regrets.

Somewhere along the way emotional and psychological “burnout” has become fashionable - even sought after. The brief, spent, wasted lives of celebrities are romanticized. Audiences, friends and foes, can’t get their fill of the “lovely life.” Millay knew this having lived allegedly as a promiscuous bisexual in an era when such behaviors were kept private. Two lengthy biographies of the poet, born in 1892, were published a couple of years ago.

Also from her A Few Figs From Thistles (1922) collection is “Second Fig,” a darker poem taking its imagery from an allusion to Jesus’ parable of the wise man who, able to plan ahead and arm himself against trouble, builds his “house” or life on a solid foundation, the rock. He is contrasted to the foolish man, who builds upon the infirm, shifting sand.

Here’s Millay’s take”

Safe upon the solid rock the ugly houses stand:
Come and see my shining palace built upon the sand! 

The speaker is clearly familiar with and even understands the parable’s lesson, but shuns it in favor of the flash of her “shining palace” while fully knowing its instability and hence its danger. And as in First Fig, she involves others: “Come and see,” she beckons. This is the darker side of the carpe diem philosophy.

 

Call me a quitter.

I phoned my dad to tell him I had stopped smoking.        He called me a quitter.     (Steven Pearl)

In my family the worst thing next to folk dancing and incest was quitting. It didn’t matter that you hated it. “Don’t be a quitter.”  The idea was that if you made a committment to someone or something, you were obligated FOR LIFE or until the gig was up. Don’t sign up if you don’t intend to  . . .  and so on.

It’s not hard to discern the origins and practicality of such a dictum. Many events and activities in life shouldn’t be entered into lightly, as they say, and should be thought out so thoroughly that the necessity of quitting is precluded. Naturally. Given.

My parents were right not to let me quit the tough courses in high school. I wanted to, thinking “Current Events” and “Home and Family” would make me hip and prepare me for “life.” I was right not to let my daughter quit band when the going got tough, and it was requiring hours of memorizing scales and practicing difficult pieces. She’ll confirm my rightness. But I may not have been right in not letting my son quit certain sports.

My husband was out of the state for a few days a couple of weeks ago. In his absence I took a job. I had turned down a couple of offers, but this was a dream job that I really wanted in the priciest boutique in town. The owner and I hit it off, even supported the same presidential candidate, so after a two-hour interview I had the offer. I would help her manage the store. Best friends to be.

“What were you expecting in terms of salary?”
Well, uh, . . .  “I was thinking $$$. Is that doable?”
“Yes. We can do that.”
“Great!”

But walking to my car after closing that first day, I realized that I had made a mistake, lured yet again by the promise of easy.  I was actually running. The projects that I’m working on are getting harder. I spend a great deal of time working through tutorials. It’s too much sometimes. But it’s satisfying, and it suits me.

So I quit the first week. I needed to. Not quitting would have been taking the easy way out and sacrificing what I’ve wanted to accomplish for years.

I fully support not picking up activities (or people!) with little thought and then abandoning them.  By their nature many things demand sticking with it until the end. Marriage is one. Childbearing is one. But t-ball is not. Your college major is not. (I changed five times.) Leaving a job if you can afford to is not.

So call me a quitter.  It wasn’t easy given my upbringing.  But I’m taking my chances and trusting my instinct that it was the right call.

Plagiarism: I finally get it

Looking over my dashboard, I noticed some incoming links carrying the same title as one of my recent posts. I clicked it, and found a blog called “Just Being Rich” and there was my own post, “Big Hat. No Cattle.” Others have borrowed posts before, but always with attribution. Of course. But here, it began by saying that here is an interesting post by “Jonathan . . . ” somebody and then the text. My text. My idea. His name and no mention of me. Neither could I leave a comment. (not sure how he did that)

 When I taught English, I always emphasized the concept of intellectual property. Using the example of their tennis racket or car being stolen, I’d then move to “mind properties” and show students how important are one’s ideas and expressions. I can buy another purse or pair of golf shoes. But for someone to claim the creations of my intellect  — the self that originates ideas, that thinks — is so unethical and dishonest.

Ironically, I’ve always said that experience is the best way to learn. I’ve been plagiarized, and I finally get it.

Then is anybody wrong any more?

 The New York Times book review page (linked by RSS right) presents three editors’ lists of their ten recommendations for reading from 2007.  Most interesting is the editor’s note that “editing ain’t what it used to be.” A Harmony Books release displays a misspelled subtitle (since then corrected) on a hardcover book, “Finding Faith Without Fanatacism.” That in itself would make a good essay on carelessness, but it gets worse. The book, by Brad Hirschfield, has for its title, “You Don’t Have to be Wrong for Me to be Right.”Hirschfield is a renowned Orthodox Rabbi, speaker, activist, and author, who is committed to (from bradhirschfield.com) “teaching inclusiveness, celebrating diversity, and promoting acceptance. Grounded in biblical and Judaic scholarship, and interwoven with personal stories, You Don’t Have to Be Wrong for Me to Be Right provides a pragmatic path to peace, understanding, and hope that appeals to the common wisdom of all religions, asking important questions like:

• How can we make room for other cultures and beliefs?
• How can we balance commitment and openness?
• How can we create a world with less violence and division?”

The world may not be completely black and white in all areas. Circumstances sometimes dictate deviation from conventional thinking. But when it comes to faith, (assuming he means religious faith — in God) everyone may be wrong, or everyone may be right. But if there is disagreement, somebody has to be wrong ultimately.  If we start there, I can get behind the “world peace” theme to a degree. 

When I see a title and blurb like this (I haven’t read the book and don’t plan to) I fear that the usual suspects (Americans, Anglo-anything, Christianity) may be blamed for the world’s ills. Or if not blamed, be called upon to engage in yet more citizen-of-the-world groupthink and swallow whole chunks of what we know to be false. Or smile politely while our fellow man, that we supposedly care so much about, walks in darkness.

Bun Intended —

It’s not a misprint. When I have time, I plan my restaurant, which has actually been in the planning stages for about 4 years.  The actual planning includes research. So far that means eating mainly. Beyond that, I may read websites designed for foodies and restaurateurs.

After reading the article from the NY-Times linked here, we started on a roll of  restaurant names based on puns.  How about “Black Thai?”

The punny names are located in the COMMENTS. Some of these have to be made up.  Caution: a few are for mature readers, but the article is for all.

http://dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/05/11/when-looks-deceive/