Insensitive

Autumn Leaves: half - green, half - red simultaneously!
Someone asked me the other day if I thought that increased tolerance of public incivility was leading to an increase in individual anger? We're all treated rudely by store clerks and so - called "civil" servants from time to time, if not daily, right? Thinking of impersonal insensitivity reminded me of this 90s single that laments a more intimate version of the same tendency:

Insensitive
How do you cool your lips, after a summer's kiss?
How do you rid the sweat, after the body bliss?
How do you turn your eyes, from the romantic glare?
How do you block the sound of a voice
You'd know anywhere?

Oh, I really should've known
By the time you drove me home
By the vagueness in your eyes, your casual goodbyes
By the chill in your embrace
The expression on your face that told me
Maybe you might have some advice to give
On how to be insensitive
Insensitive
Insensitive

How do you numb your skin, after the warmest touch?
How do you slow your blood, after the body rush?
How do you free your soul, after you've found a friend?
How do you teach your heart it's a crime to fall in love again?

Oh, you probably won't remember me
It's probably ancient history
I'm one of the chosen few
Who went ahead and fell for you
I'm out of vogue, I'm out of touch
I fell too fast, I feel too much
I thought that you might have some advice to give
On how to be insensitive

Oh, I really should've known
By the time you drove me home
By the vagueness in your eyes, your casual goodbyes
By the chill in your embrace
The expression on your face that told me
Maybe you might have some advice to give
On how to be insensitive

~ Jann Arden, Canadian singer - songwriter (b 1962)

Jann Arden sings from the heart;
poet Sharon Olds writes from the gut:

Sex Without Love
How do they do it, the ones who make love
without love? Beautiful as dancers,
gliding over each other like ice-skaters
over the ice, fingers hooked
inside each other's bodies, faces
red as steak, wine, wet as the
children at birth whose mothers are going to
give them away. How do they come to the
come to the come to the God come to the
still waters, and not love
the one who came there with them, light
rising slowly as steam off their joined
skin? These are the true religious,
the purists, the pros, the ones who will not
accept a false Messiah, love the
priest instead of the God. They do not
mistake the lover for their own pleasure,
they are like great runners: they know they are alone
with the road surface, the cold, the wind,
the fit of their shoes, their over-all cardio-
vascular health--just factors, like the partner
in the bed, and not the truth, which is the
single body alone in the universe
against its own best time.

~ Sharon Olds, American Poet (b 1942)

Once again, I'm reminded of the narcissistic Little Chap, always focused on himself in Stop the World, I Want to Get Off. At the end, rather than stopping the world, he simply admits that "the only person I ever really loved was me." Could that be the problem? As Coach once advised his daughter Kelly in one of my favorite episodes, being insensitive doesn't always prevent you from getting what you want; it just means that, sometimes, you'll have it all alone.

Longly, Longingly

"His midriff yearned then upward, sank within him,
yearned more longly longingly."

~ James Joyce, Ulysses, 172 - 73
Coming across the above line in Ulysses in 1978, inspired me to attempt a poem on the same gut sensation:

The Ache You Wear

You fall into her arms like crying,
feel her lips in your hair,
soothing like a parent
and something else.

Wooden and broken,
you lean rigidly.
Your forehead rests against breasts
which must be like your own.

With each soft motion,
the ache you wear like a brace
begins to melt, drips
slowly down your back.

Like congestion, it seeps inside,
fills the space between every rib,
then tatters into loose bits
that choke upward and sink within you.

Yearning for a familiarity,
you move toward this woman
and this one comfort
after taking leave of him.

For this time you fall away
from any pain.
Thick rags are floating
now in your stomach.

More visceral imagery
on my current post

~ "Longly, Longingly" ~

@ The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker:
A Fortnightly [every 14th & 28th] Literary Blog of
Connection & Coincidence; Custom & Ceremony

Happy Birthday Paul Girl

Peggy Carriker Rosenbluth ~ Paul Girl Era
In honor of my sister's birthday, I took a moment to re-read one of our favorite essays: Paul Girl, by Anna Quindlen. You should too, it will bring a smile to your face, especially if you're old enough to remember at least one appearance of The Beatles on the Ed Sullivan show.

Just the other day, Peg and I were asking ourselves, "Are we OLD or WHAT?!" Over the decades, we have gaged our place in history with the query, "Do you remember seeing the Beatles on Ed Sullivan?" (Gleefully, yes.) Or, even earlier, "Do you remember when JFK was shot?" (Sadly, yes).

In 1985, an unexpected indicator came up at a grad school party when a stranger inquired if I was young? or old? What did he mean? "Well, lets put it this way," he replied, "did you have to learn to use a slide rule in high school?" Despite my eternally youthful appearance (remember, I was a mere 28 years old at the time), when I said "yes," he declared "OLD!" I had to laugh! Not long after that, I saw some high school kids at a fundraising flea market selling old books and lab equipment, including "antique" slide rules; so, I guess the party guy's assessment was not far off the mark.

But getting back to the Beatles and the 60s. Quindlen recalls that you had four choices in 1964 -- you could be "a Paul girl, a John girl, a George girl or a Ringo girl . . .

The girls who picked George as their favorite Beatle were self-contained, serious, with a touch of the wallflower and a bit of the mystic. The ones who chose John were aggressive, irreverent, the smart mouths, the wisecrackers. Ringo got anyone who was really determined to distinguish herself, the kind of girl who would wear wax fangs or weird clothes, who would choose the boy at the back of the band, with the big nose and the strange looks.

Paul got the little ladies - like me. He was cute in a mainstream way, funny in a mainstream way, a public persona not much different from the most popular boys in the class. He was for girls who were traditional, predictable, who played by the rules."

I loved my sister's response when I first shared Quindlen's essay with her twenty years ago: "I was (still am) a 'Beatles Girl.' I like to believe I'm a combination of all of the best parts. A down - to - earth, mystical, irreverent, and wax fangs type of person. But mostly I'm a (Sir) Paul Girl."

And me? Yes, a Paul Girl -- but in a George ("Give Me Love Give Me Peace on Earth"), Ringo ("Thomas the Tank"), John ("Imagine") and Yoko ("Woman is the Nigger of the World") kind of way.

Like the Model Peg Made!

~~~~~~~~~~

P.S.
Previous
Anna Quindlen Posts

Mind the Gap

Take This Quiz!

Do You Think It Is?

Camera, Memory Keeper, Time Machine

Fairy Tale

Your House, Of Course

Homebody Anybody

Homebody Somebody

Play With This

Veterans Eve

I have spent the last few weeks looking through stacks of family papers that have come into my possession over the years, including all the army pension documents of my great - grandfather James Sankey Lindsey (1846 - 1921) who came home sick from the Civil War with untreated measles (contracted by his entire division: Company B, 185th Ohio Infantry) from which he never fully recovered (chronic kidney & digestive ailments).

He spent the remainder of his life petitioning the government for a decent pension in return for his service to the Union at a very young age and was met with resistance at every turn. Shameful! The funds were finally granted in 1912, nine years before his death, in the amount of $15.50 per month (would be approx $373 per month in today's economy). Imagine how much taxpayer $$ was wasted in repeatedly denying his rightful claim instead of granting it outright! And how many people were employed in the wasteful task of telling him -- and doubtless thousands of others Veterans -- "No" instead of "Yes."

That's what I'm going to be thinking about this year on Veterans Day.

Civil War Veteran James Sankey Lindsey & Family ~ c. 1911

My maternal grandfather -- Paul Jones Lindsey -- is the tall,
handsome brother in the middle of the back row.
His brother -- Samuel Gordon Lindsey -- sitting on the front,
right-hand side, beside his mother -- was killed in France in WW I.

Sam, with his mother, my great - grandmother
Sarah Elisabeth Hartman Lindsey ~ c. 1916


My grandfather
Paul Jones Lindsey ~ 1922

Not Used Algebra

Or . . . . maybe you did and you didn't know it!

One day when I was having trouble parallel parking, my little son Ben (age 7 at the time, back in 1997) piped up from the backseat, "Mommy, maybe you just didn't do your math right!"

Now how did he know that parallel parking is a math problem? Of course, it might be geometry rather than algebra! But either way, I think that was the day I realized that Ben was a Boy Genius, though there may have been a few earlier indications!

Also Child Chef!

Lurking and Lingering

Photos above and below
by Missouri Photographer Jay Beets

Ray Bradbury: “It was a small town by a small river and a small lake in a small northern part of a Midwest state. There wasn't so much wilderness around you couldn't see the town. But on the other hand there wasn't so much town you couldn't see and feel and touch and smell the wilderness. The town was full of trees. And dry grass and dead flowers now that autumn was here. And full of fences to walk on and sidewalks to skate on and a large ravine to tumble in and yell across. . . . The ravine, filled with varieties of night sounds, lurkings of black-ink stream and creek, lingerings of autumns that rolled over in fire and bronze and died a thousand years ago" (from The Halloween Tree 3, 15, emphasis added).

Jay and I both agreed that, although Bradbury's story
is set in Illinois, it sure does sound like Kirksville, Missouri,
with our favorites: Thousand Hills Lake & The Chariton River!

Current Post on Kitti's List:
Mr. Pumpkin, Mr. Halloween & Mr. Moundshroud

For more Bradbury, see also
"Godspeed October" & "Day of the Dead"

Extra Hour

i do not worry if briefer days grow briefest . . .
i do not worry if longer nights grow longest . . .
e.e. cummings

Sunset

Moonset

Sunrise
Not by the sun’s arithmetic
or my own
can I make the days
go fast enough.
Yet there are those
who beg God daily
for an extra hour.
I wish for them no solitude,
no time apart from what they love,
and let them have their extra hour.

Rod McKuen (see also)

Last year when I posted this McKuen poem for the time change and wrote, "Yay! for the extra hour," my friend Tim responded, "I pretend every hour of this day is the extra hour! Time to get back to putting up Christmas decorations!" It's true, with Halloween over, the holidays hurtle forward!

In the next poem, try substituting Kooser's opening of "this Valentine's Day," with "this midnight of the extra hour," and suddenly it becomes perfect for the last night of Daylight Savings Time:

For You, Friend

this Valentine's Day, I intend to stand
for as long as I can on a kitchen stool
and hold back the hands of the clock,
so that wherever you are, you may walk
even more lightly in your loveliness;
so that the weak, mid-February sun
(whose chill I will feel from the face
of the clock) cannot in any way
lessen the lights in your hair, and the wind
(whose subtle insistence I will feel
in the minute hand) cannot tighten
the corners of your smile. People
drearily walking the winter streets
will long remember this day:
how they glanced up to see you
there in a storefront window, glorious,
strolling along on the outside of time.

Ted Kooser, from Valentines (see also)

To conclude, how timely that the hour change should come on Halloween Night this year! Or, more precisely, in the early hours of All Saints' Day, leading to this poem for tomorrow:

In the Elegy Season

Haze, char, and the weather of All Souls’:
A giant absence mopes upon the trees:
Leaves cast in casual potpourris
Whisper their scents from pits and cellar-holes.

Or brewed in gulleys, steeped in wells, they spend
In chilly steam their last aromas, yield
From shallow hells a revenance of field
And orchard air. And now the envious mind

Which could not hold the summer in my head
While bounded by that blazing circumstance
Parades these barrens in a golden trance,
Remembering the wealthy season dead,

And by an autumn inspiration makes
A summer all its own. Green boughs arise
Through all the boundless backward of the eyes,
And the soul bathes in warm conceptual lakes.

Less proud than this, my body leans an ear
Past cold and colder weather after wings’
Soft commotion, the sudden race of springs,
The goddess’ tread heard on the dayward stair,

Longs for the brush of the freighted air, for smells
Of grass and cordial lilac, for the sight
Of green leaves building into the light
And azure water hoisting out of wells.

by Richard Wilbur (see also)

Costume Ideas from Days of Yore

My Two Older Sibs
American Gothic ~ 1955

I wasn't born yet so can't recall this particular occasion.
Were these costumes really for Halloween . . .
or perhaps just a summertime Tableau Vivant?

Us Four Little Kids
Trick or Treating in Clover Meadows ~ 1967

I can't decide . . . should this one go in
the "Little Kids" album or the "Halloween" album
or the "Embarrassing Childhood Moments" album?

Yin Yang
College Days ~ 1979

Golden Dome
The Notre Dame Years ~ 1987

Newlyweds ~ 1989

Re - purposing the lobster nose:
Baby Ben's Costume ~ 1991

Out for a Spin

"For when time takes you out for a spin in his car
You'll be hard-pressed to stop him from going too far
And be left by the roadside, for all your good deeds . . ."
~ X.J. Kennedy ~

Halloween Hearse

"I wonder if death will come like a faded star
wrapped in fur and heavily made up,
her skeletal driver silent by the car.
'Darling, get in, we just thought we'd stop -- "
she'll say as he is opening the door
and with a ghoulish grin she pats the seat --
Even though we haven't met before
I've always felt that someday we would meet" " . . .
~ Harold Witt ~
from "Sunset Boulevard"

Cartoon by Trashlands

"Because I could not stop for Death -
He kindly stopped for me . . . "
~ Emily Dickinson ~

MORE FROM THESE POEMS & POETS

on my current post

~ "Stopping For Death" ~

@ The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker:
A Fortnightly [every 14th & 28th] Literary Blog of
Connection & Coincidence; Custom & Ceremony

Allergic to Celery? That's Just So Euro!

Halloween Snack: Celery & Carrot Stick Cat

"Celery is among a small group of foods (headed by peanuts) that appear to provoke the most severe allergic reactions; for people with celery allergy, exposure can cause potentially fatal anaphylactic shock. The allergen does not appear to be destroyed at cooking temperatures. Celery root—commonly eaten as celeriac, or put into drinks—is known to contain more allergen than the stalk. Seeds contain the highest levels of allergen content. Exercise-induced anaphylaxis may be exacerbated. An allergic reaction also may be triggered by eating foods that have been processed with machines that have previously processed celery, making avoiding such foods difficult. In contrast with peanut allergy being most prevalent in the US, celery allergy is most prevalent in Central Europe. In the European Union, foods that contain or may contain celery, even in trace amounts, must be clearly marked as such" (Info. from Wikipedia, emphasis added).

After living free of allergies for over fifty years, I seem to have developed the above allergic reaction to both raw celery and raw carrots. This blog post is the result of my quest to figure out why my throat was suddenly and painfully constricting after every celery or carrot stick. An hour or so of googling revealed that there are those who have it much worse, for I came across plenty of cautionary advice to avoid all celery, always checking which products contain dried celery, and so forth.

I, however, haven't noticed a reaction to dried or cooked celery; nor have I known myself to suffer from any of the various tree and plant allergies that often precede the raw celery / carrot allergy. Likewise, the wide range of symptoms such as rashes around the face, tingling and itching of lips and gums have never bothered me. What has happened is the restricted breathing and the horrible feeling that no matter how much air I try to gulp, I am going to keel over and have some kind of heart attack right in the middle of making the spaghetti sauce. In fact, these incidents have occurred more often than not when I was home alone, chopping up celery / carrots for a recipe and sampling a few fresh bites while cooking.

But not anymore.

I know it seems a shame to give up such a healthy low - cal snack, and it feels almost ridiculous or even rude to decline the crudities. On the other hand, if you've experienced that hard knot in your chest and that terrible, scary, helpless feeling in your throat more than once or twice, you won't be the least bit tempted, despite the risk of appearing persnickety or the enticing beauty of the celery heart!

Celery Heart Art

And now a poem -- for there's bound to be a poem about everything, even celery! -- from Ted Kooser's book of Valentines

THE CELERY HEART

CELERY HEARTS: 98 CENTS
—Placard at Hinky Dinky

Surely it misses those long fly balls of light
its leaves once leapt to catch, or longs to run
its roots out into the salty darkness.

What once looked like a Roman fountain
is now a ruin of fallen columns
bedded on ice. Its only consolations are,

at regular intervals, the hiss of mist,
and at times the warm and reassuring squeeze
of passing hand. But better this, by far,

than to be the sullen heart of artichoke,
stripped of its knives and heavy armor
and mummified for eons in a jar of brine.

Ted Kooser (b 1939)
American Poet Laureate from 2004 to 2006

Little Black Pantherlet

Why we just had to bring home our little black Pantherlet,
James B. Fuqua!

"The black panther is not a distinct species, but is the common name for melanistic specimens of the genus, most often encountered in leopard and jaguar [and cougar]."

When I learned that instead of a separate species, black panther refers to any of the Big Cats (genus Panthera) whose coloring is all - black, that's when it dawned on me that an all - black house cat could properly be called a Pantherlet! As Christopher Smart writes in one of my favorite poems,
"My Cat Jeoffry":
For he is of the tribe of Tiger.
For the Cherub Cat is a term of the Angel Tiger.

Cherub Pantherlet

We adopted our pantherlet in April 2012 and named him James B. "Fuqua," because our older son Ben would begin his Ph.D. that fall at Duke University in the business school, named after John Brooks Fuqua. The university itself was founded by James Buchanan Duke. So we named our kitten -- who was joining our family just as Ben was leaving for grad school -- after a combination of the two founders, with his "B" standing for Bagheera, after the panther in The Jungle Book.

My friend Cate calls him "Little Duke."
And Ben always calls him "James."

Early Days

Good ~ Luck!
And more to come . . .

What if God was One of Us?

A Trick or Treat Parody of Christ at Heart’s Door
Original by Warner Sallman

How could we have ever doubted?
Of course, Jesus Loves Halloween!
Hmmm, could this explain the whereabouts of the plastic orange
jack - o - lantern that went missing from my front porch last week?*
One Of Us

If God had a name what would it be?
And would you call it to his face?
If you were faced with him
In all his glory
What would you ask if you had just one question?

*And yeah, yeah, God is great
Yeah, yeah, God is good
Yeah, yeah, yeah-yeah-yeah

What if God was one of us?
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make his way home

If God had a face what would it look like?
And would you want to see
If seeing meant that
you would have to believe
in things like heaven and in Jesus and the saints
and all the prophets (*)

Trying to make his way home
Back up to heaven all alone
Nobody calling on the phone
'cept for the Pope maybe in Rome(*)

Just trying to make his way home
Like a holy rolling stone
Back up to heaven all alone
Just trying to make his way home
Nobody calling on the phone
'cept for the Pope maybe in Rome

sung by Joan Osborne
written by Eric Bazilian

*Gerry says, "That's why I said 'Sweet Jesus' when
you told me that the pumpkin had been stolen." Haha!

"Without your pulling it the tide comes in . . . "

Moon Phases & Tides
Without You
What a fool I was, what a dominated fool
To think that you were the Earth and sky
What a fool I was, what an addlepated fool
What a mutton-headed dote was I

No, my reverberating friend
You are not the beginning and the end

There'll be spring every year without you
England still will be here without you
There'll be fruit on the tree
And a shore by the sea
There'll be crumpets and tea without you

Art and music will thrive without you
Somehow Keats will survive without you
And there still will be rain on that plain down in Spain
Even that will remain without you,
I can do without you!

You, dear friend, who talk so well
You can go to Hartford, Hereford and Hampshire
They can still rule the land without you
Windsor Castle will stand without you
And without much ado we can
All muddle through without you

Without your pulling it the tide comes in
Without your twirling it, the Earth can spin
Without your pushing them, the clouds roll by
If they can do without you, ducky, so can I

I shall not feel alone without you
I can stand on my own without you
So go back in your shell
I can do bloody well
Without you

Lerner & Loewe

This favorite song, plus readings
by Wayne Muller, Esther Hillesum, Saxon N. White Kessinger
and from the movie Birdman
on my current post

~ "The Galaxy Will Manage" ~

@ The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker:
A Fortnightly [every 14th & 28th] Literary Blog of
Connection & Coincidence; Custom & Ceremony

Plenty to Read

"But will you woo this wild cat?" *

Fuqua & Complete Works
of Shakespeare in Two Volumes
These books were a graduation present to me from
my friend Marietta when I graduated from highschool.
My friend Joni gave the Complete Sonnets to finish out the set!
They knew me well!

**********************
Bringing you up to date on
kittislist.blogspot.com

October: The Not So Grand Test of Virtue
George Orwell & Wayne Muller

September: Paper Roses, Paper Moons, Paper Towns
John Green: Queries & Favorites

August: Guest Blog: HiyaKiyah
Kiyah Rosenbluth on Paper Towns, The One and Only Ivan,
and Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

July: Guest Blog: Critical Mode
Tammy Sandel on The Agony and The Ecstasy
* Thanks to Cousin Nick for this caption!
~ from The Taming of the Shrew (I, ii, 169)

Sedum Sunrise, Kansas Sunset

“At sunrise everything is luminous but not clear.”

~ from A River Runs Through It
Norman Maclean (1902 - 1990)
American author & scholar

"I always say that the times in my life when I've been
happiest are the times when I've seen, like, a sunset."

Chris Evans (b 1981)
American actor & director

Whether or not you're a fan of the movies,
this comment about the sunset says it all --
so existentialist yet so casual at the same time!

Listen to Your Sons!

Some Exotic Early Autumn Visitors to Our Back Yard!

Such a beautiful Wednesday in October,
made even better by my new lawn ornaments
and some entertaining input from my children.

Hump Day Advice from my older son Ben:

"Time is money. And money is power. And power corrupts.
So it's important that I waste a bunch of time today
to maintain my integrity.
Winning!"
Plus an inspiring song, contributed by my younger son Sam. I was listening to one of his old mix cds while exercising and came across this tune:

Sign of a Victory
(Official 2010 FIFA World Cup™ Anthem)

Sung by R. Kelly & the Soweto Spiritual Singers

I can see the colors of the rainbow
And I can feel the sun on my face
I see the light at the end of the tunnel
And I can feel heaven in its place

And that's the sign of a victory
That's the sign of a victory

I can feel the spirit of the nations
And I can feel my wings riding the winds, yeah
I see the finish line just up ahead now
And I can feel it rising deep within

And that's the sign of a victory
And that's the sign of a victory

Now I can see the distance of your journey
And how you fought with all your might
You open your eyes to global warming
And through it all, you sacrificed your life

That's the sign of a victory, hey
That's the sign of a victory

Oh, if we believe, we can achieve anything
Including the impossible, this I know
So let's lift up our heads, yeah, and raise the flag, yeah
And scream like you want to win, now let the games begin

That's the sign of a victory, yeah
That's the sign of a victory, yeah
That's the sign of a victory, oh
That's the sign of a victory, yeah

That's it, when you keep on fighting
After you lost your strength
That's the sign of a victory, yes, it is

When darkness is all around you
You still find your way
That's the sign of a victory
Oh, you got the victory, sing

Come on and sing
Lift up your voice and sing
Stand up, oh yeah, stand up
Common goal, sign of a victory

Oh, that's the sign of a victory

Music & lyrics by R. Kelly
***************

Additional Flamingo Posts

Winter Solstice Flamingos

Merry Christmas Neighbor

Listen to Your Sons!

Living United

The Sooner You Fall Behind . . .

. . . the more time you have to catch up!

I have mugs with each of the above quotations. They both appeared on my desk in the early days of grad school. I glanced around at my office mates and said, "Are these for me?"

They all shrugged and said, "If the mug fits . . . "

I never did know who got them for me, but I've managed to hang on to them for thirty - five years now! In the meantime, I've broken so many other mugs (in fact, several just recently!) but never these two!

The height / depth of my mid - life crisis
was admitting to myself that I will never
get all my reading done in this lifetime!
Maybe in the next . . .

Road Trip

"Once again it was jolly autumn weather,
and the road was quiet, with few cars passing.
The air was like sweetbriar . . .
We two seemed the only tramps on the road."

~ from Down and Out in Paris and London (177)
George Orwell (1903 - 50)
English writer and social critic

"On the old highway maps of America, the main routes were red and the back roads blue. Now even the colors are changing. But in those brevities just before dawn and a little after dusk - times neither day nor night - the old roads return to the sky some of its color. Then, in truth, they carry a mysterious cast of blue, and it's that time when the pull of the blue highway is strongest, when the open road is a beckoning, a strangeness, a place where you can lose yourself."

~ from Blue Highways: A Journey into America
William Least Heat Moon (b 1939)
American travel writer and historian

"And when I'd seen all the sights,
there was the moon so round
Go home, said the man in the moon, go home
Go home, said the man in the moon, go home
Because it's getting sorta late, and I'll soon put out my light
So go home, said the man in the moon, go home

We didn't know who we were, we didn't know what we did
We were just on the road"

~ from "On the Road"
Sung by Michael Johnson (b 1944)
American singer, song - writer, guitarist

*****************

Recent travels with my twin brother:
Frederick & Baltimore, Maryland
Neosho, Missouri
Caney & Coffeyville & Independence, Kansas
Bartlesville, Oklahoma
Blue Springs & Kansas City, Missouri
Where to next?

The Usual Selves That I Have Known

My Nephews, Having Fun with Their Dad

Ron ~ Jerrod ~ Dan

A Memorial Tribute for Ronald Ben Rosenbluth
31 March 1951 - 20 June 2015
given by his son, Daniel J. Rosenbluth
In 1986, when I was eight years old, my father and I were in a car accident that by all rights should have killed us both. The particulars aren't important; what's important is that Dad's only concern was making sure I was safe.

Twenty - nine years later, on a sunny day in late June, I held Dad's hand as he passed away. I couldn't save him; all I could do was try to reassure him that the rest of us would be okay, and watch as the strongest man I've ever known slipped away in front of me.

I'll never forget what Dad told me the day w e found that his illness was terminal. "It's not your fault," he said. "You were there with me every step of the way, and I will continue to fight with whatever tools they give me." And he did. Even to the very end, he tried to carry on. But it wasn't enough; even two liters of my bone marrow did nothing to stop the cancer, and a week later, he was gone. My hero, the man who gave his family more than I will ever be able to repay, was eaten alive by his own body. Shakespeare once wrote:

"Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off . . .
Do not forever with thy vailèd lids
Seek for thy noble father in the dust.
Thou know’st ’tis common. All that lives must die,
Passing through nature to eternity."
That didn't make Hamlet feel any better, and it didn't help me either.

Nothing I can say or do will ever make it okay for any of us. Dad loved us, and we loved him. But we an take comfort in the fact that his legacy will on through us. He gave us humor, wisdom, and most importantly, he gave us unconditional love. My father was many things -- solider, engineer, husband, father, student and teacher -- but the most important thing I can think of is simply this: He was Ronald Ben Rosenbluth. He was everything I want to be, and if I can be even half the man that he was, then I hope he'll be proud, wherever he may be.

I love you, Dad.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dan is right, nothing will ever take away the sadness or make it okay, but thankfully we have many shared memories to look back on and to carry forward as we go. However, when my brother Bruce quoted the following poem at Ron's funeral service . . .

Sing Well! ~ by Joyce Grenfell
If I should die before the rest of you,
Break not a flower, nor inscribe a stone,
Nor, when I’m gone, speak in a Sunday voice,
But be the usual selves that I have known,
Weep if you must:
Parting is hell,
But life goes on
So . . . sing as well!
[emphasis added]

. . . the following songs came to mind:

"Those Were The Days" - Mary Hopkin, 1968
"Light a Light" - Janis Ian, 1974
"Seasons In The Sun" - Terry Jacks, 1974

Read more Eulogies for Ron on my current post

~ "We Had Fun, Didn't We? " ~

@ The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker:
A Fortnightly [every 14th & 28th] Literary Blog of
Connection & Coincidence; Custom & Ceremony

Wisdoom

A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte with Tablet
by Matt Wuerker @ Politico
[one of many Seurat parodies]

Highlights from Dawn or Doom2
September 24 - 25, 2015
1.Lance Duerfahrd: "We all know what the light of Dawn looks like, but what is the light emitted by Doom? It is the light of a fading rectangle; the light of the cell phone is the light of Doom."

Duerfahrd began by showing a mural, similar to the above parody, in which all of Seurat's figures are holding cell phones, and comparing it to the original, in which all they gaze at the distant horizon:

In the parody, as in contemporary life, "Verizon has replaced horizon." Haha!

Dawn: the hypnotism of the horizon takes you outside of yourself

Doom: the hypnotism of the cell phone is a threat to attention

Dawn: the hypnotism of the movie screen allows you to access parts of yourself you hadn't thought about, it will to affect your perception if you let it

Doom: the cell phone is an "emerging technology" because, even though we put it away, it re-enters the atmosphere every 76 seconds (as opposed to Halley's Comet every 76 years -- get it?!)

2. Data Driven Artificial Intelligence

How about when you order a black turtleneck sweater online, and then for the next three weeks your computer screen is filled with ads for black turtlenecks? This doesn't make me feel that my computer is smart; it makes me feel that my computer is stupid. Otherwise, it might know that I'm only going to order a black turtleneck every year or so -- not every day.

The wry Deep Thoughts of Jack Handey illustrate the potential for error in data driven logic: "If you saw two guys named Hambone and Flippy, which one would you think liked dolphins the most? I'd say Flippy, wouldn't you? You'd be wrong, though. It's Hambone."

My computer knows no irony and errs consistently in its choice of Flippy!

Humans can talk their way into a connection that's real; can computers do that?

3. Things to think about for next year's movie night:

Was Her --in which fictional computers discuss dental appointments and Great Books -- one of the most entertaining movies of 2013 or one of the scariest?

Or how about WALL - E (2008) with his capacity to democritize yet destroy via nostalgia

4. Melodramatic Movie Dystopias vs Reality

Instead of the Paranormal Activity film series, how about a movie called Normal Activity?

Or how about a cop show with no arrests? That would be more like it! Ha!

5. Wisdoom

I was unable to ascertain whether the word "wisdoom," as displayed on the overhead projector in one of the lectures, was an unintentional misspelling or an intentional pun. Either way, it captures the essence of "Dawn or Doom" and serves as a one - word reminder, in case we had forgotten, that "In much wisdom is much grief: and those who increase knowledge increase sorrow" (from Ecclesiastes 1: 18).

"Wisdoom" also brought to mind that old proverb: "It's an ill wind that blows nobody any good." Even when something is bad, someone will usually benefit in some way. "For," as Tennessee Williams says, "there is no lie that contains no part of truth." Conversely, it would have to be an extremely good wind that blew no ill. No matter how good something is, it may bring harm as well.

Same with Dawn or Doom.

5. Xuedong Huang: To close the gap between machines and humans, the last mile is so hard; will it be possible? We overestimate what technology can do in one year and underestimate what it can do in ten years; so, best to focus instead on the five - year horizon.

Or, as Gerry McCartney has been saying for years: We always overestimate technology's impact in the short term and underestimate its impact in the long term.

Previous Posts

Twister

Dawn or Doom2

Dawn or Doom?

Safe Home


RE Lafayette Murals,
see also:

My blog
Mae's blog
Tin Can Telephone
Wabash