November 30, 1945 fell on a Friday. It was the second "good" Friday that year for my grandparents and for the rest of my father's family. At Fort Dix, New Jersey on that day, after three long years and twenty three days, Dad was honorably discharged from his service in the United States Army.
What happens to a person after three years? When advancing from the age of twenty nine to that of thirty two, changes are often nearly imperceptible in normal times and circumstances. Clearly, the greatest event in human history, really the hugest cluster of cataclysmic and violent man-made events ever and collectively known as World War II, was anything but a normal period in human affairs. Though thankfully, no one could nor did personally experience all of the horrors and atrocities that befell all of Europe, Russia, the Pacific, most of the Far and some of the Middle East, North Africa, the North Atlantic and other outposts of Allied and Axis interests, still, one individual, particularly a combat soldier, could easily absorb enough of the global maelstrom within his relatively little corner of the world for thousands of lifetimes over. In the case of my Dad this was true; he "saw his share" of "man's inhumanity to man" and the inevitable fruit from this poisonous tree of mankind's transgressions against nature as well as himself, were a kind of produce my father could not ignore but which he chose not to taste (and which was most terribly foreign and repugnant to him compared to the literal produce that in peacetime, as a fruit and vegetable vendor, he lovingly presented to his customers). Gratitude, not bitterness, were so much a part of Dad's character, and abominations of the battlefield and the tribulations of innocent civilians caught up in the vicious crossfires in the places where he fought and served: North Africa, Sicily, Italy, Southern France, again in Italy and Austria: all these experiences seemed to deepen his natural compassion and afforded him so many opportunities to express it. Whether humanely interrogating a captured Italian enemy soldier or helping to feed some of the monks in the destroyed abbey at Monte Cassino, Dad, though his stock in trade as a soldier was death, his focus was, in the particular, to alleviate pain and suffering and ultimately to accomplish the same unimpeded, once the monster of Nazism was slain.
Change was inevitable. He and the world were never to return to the old order once victory was declared. Immutable scars, both seen and unseen, made him, though still a young man, wise beyond his years. Together with all other G.I.s, adjustment to peacetime and a transformed America, though eagerly looked forward to, would result in widely varying degrees of success, depending on the spiritual wealth of each individual, and usually hinging on the loving support systems of families and friends back home. Once again, and in this regard, dad was lucky: as lucky as he had been during the war. There was so much worth fighting for and the fact that it was intact, like a lovely homestead in a hurricane that one feared for while so far away…. a place one delightedly rediscovers untouched by an evil fury, an incredibly beautiful flower that silently but fairly shouted its affirmation of life over death: all this was a special gift. My mother was waiting for Dad as well as for her brothers and other family friends to come home safely, but she was not consciously aware that her life would change forever in eighteen months. Dad may have not envisioned their union at the time either. Though she was "the girl next door" nearly literally, theirs was a platonic friendship, but most importantly, it was a true friendship that timeliness and the hand of God or fate, if you will, helped to grow like an offshoot of that aforementioned beautiful blossom of our preserved nation, watered anew by a hard won peace and the deepest aspirations of the welcomers and the sorely missed welcomed.
My brother, and then I, in about two and four and a half years respectively, were the new fruits of a new wife and her peaceable husband, a fruit and produce man returned to the livelihood that his father had taught him and to a land that still holds the greatest promise for a world that yet longs for freedom while it remains, seemingly forever tempted by the seductions of the totalitarian and enslaving mindsets. Of my Dad, I can only say: like "Abou Ben Adhem" (the title of a poem he loved), and like all the Forces of Light, "may his (their) tribe increase."
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Miss Elizabeth June Thornburg
For the first time, I viewed the other evening in its entirety, the film "Annie Get Your Gun." Released the year that I was born, am proud to share the same birth year, in a manner of speaking, with this great American mid-century musical that exuberantly, sentimentally and spectacularly tells the tale of Annie Oakley through the unmatched talents of both Howard Kheel and the exquisitely generous Betty Hutton, one of our National Treasures, who, had she lived to 110 would have left us too soon. Atomic energy had nothing on Betty and she gave ecstatically and deliriously as well as unstintingly. Her psyche's transmission had but one gear: 7th (as in, audiences were in seventh heaven when she performed) and it was in "drive" and forward, all the way and all the time when she was behind the wheel. Somehow she never seemed manic, just a cut above even the best of us who only imagine that we have cornered the market on enthusiasm and a zest for living; her vitality and comedic genius was infectious and irresistible and her unabashed plea to be loved that came through so unmistakably with each loving effort, could have failed to touch only the coldest of hearts, given her awesome display of both theatrical majesty and human vulnerability. Like Garland and Monroe or Holiday or Seberg, the sorrows of life were perhaps the joys of art for Miss Hutton, nee Elizabeth June Thornburg. She, her mother and her sister were abandoned by her father when she was a small child. He entered their lives again only when news of his suicide reached them when she was eighteen. Struggling during the Great Depression, the three of them worked in a speakeasy that her mother owned and run-ins with the police were frequent as were encounters with unsavory characters who patronized the illicit tavern. No doubt these formative years of a hardscrabble, knockabout existence toughened Betty's exterior and her ambition and talent were surely whetted and honed, respectively, by adversity as she successfully met and eventually conquered the challenges that lay ahead.
She freely confessed in interviews in later years that her marriage to her career as a genuine "triple threat" performer inevitably was destructive of many of her personal relationships. Four marriages, all ending in divorce, depression, estrangement from her children, a nervous breakdown in 1967 after the death, in a house fire, of her alcoholic mother, her own substance abuse, a suicide attempt, and various stops and starts to her faltering career in the 1960s: all were part of a pattern that was somehow slowly and torturously reversed and which led to a new and radically different path for Betty. Rehabilitation included the ministrations of a Fr. Maguire whom she credited with saving her life. Her conversion to Catholicism occurred also in this period. She worked as a cook in a parish rectory's kitchen then and several years later was reported to be happily serving as a hostess in a jai alai arena. She eventually returned to show business on a limited basis and granted a very few interviews in the last thirty years of her life, the last recorded one with Robert Osbourne of the Turner Classic Movies network in 2000. It was rebroadcast at about the time of her death in 2007 and I watched it then. When I recently viewed her in an old episode of the television program "What's My Line?" of easily over fifty years ago, I was struck by the similarity of her behavior on each occasion. In the Osbourne interview Betty often repeated, with almost child-like intensity that her interviewer was a wonderful man, one of the kindest persons she had ever met and that she loved him very much. Also shared was the fact that she was nearly paralyzed by fear and seriously considered canceling the interview. Finally coaxed and reassured, she appeared and, as mentioned, expressed her love for him several times and throughout the proceeding. During the circa 1956 program in which she was the celebrity mystery guest, it was revealed (besides her identity, which was correctly and fairly quickly guessed by panelist Fred Allen) by the show's host John Daly, with as much "show" as "tell", that Betty's anxiety was such that she had implored him, successfully, to hold both of her hands in his until her identity was revealed to the panelists. Daly held up their entwined fingers from behind his desk to a delighted audience with a charming assurance to his wife: "Mrs. Daly, don't you mind now" (a bonus delight for me to be reminded of a time when fidelity was valued so highly that even theatrical affection could come with a disclaimer). After nearly half a century, Betty, unlike most of us, had never stopped openly asking the question that most of us silently pose every day of our lives to someone (even to someone who isn't there): "please love me."
Finally, in "Annie Get Your Gun" it was decided that the character of Miss Oakley would be an outgoing, naive kind of bumpkin (likely unlike the reserved real life sharpshooter) particularly in affairs of the heart. Comical, over-the-top, broad and wonderful, Betty's acting talents, and again, her likability, sincerity and softness precluded any chance of a cartoonish performance that any lesser star would have had great difficulty avoiding. When she guilelessly eyeballs Frank Butler (Kheel) and is struck by the thunderbolt of a crushing crush on him, the hilarity of her "goo-goo" eyes and sighs is immeasurably heightened by the truth she expresses: of youthful adoration conjoined with a healthy libido. Betty Hutton, we miss you and love you forever. And we'll hold your hands, God willing, one day for as long as you wish or until the end of time. Thanks for being our angel then, now and always.
She freely confessed in interviews in later years that her marriage to her career as a genuine "triple threat" performer inevitably was destructive of many of her personal relationships. Four marriages, all ending in divorce, depression, estrangement from her children, a nervous breakdown in 1967 after the death, in a house fire, of her alcoholic mother, her own substance abuse, a suicide attempt, and various stops and starts to her faltering career in the 1960s: all were part of a pattern that was somehow slowly and torturously reversed and which led to a new and radically different path for Betty. Rehabilitation included the ministrations of a Fr. Maguire whom she credited with saving her life. Her conversion to Catholicism occurred also in this period. She worked as a cook in a parish rectory's kitchen then and several years later was reported to be happily serving as a hostess in a jai alai arena. She eventually returned to show business on a limited basis and granted a very few interviews in the last thirty years of her life, the last recorded one with Robert Osbourne of the Turner Classic Movies network in 2000. It was rebroadcast at about the time of her death in 2007 and I watched it then. When I recently viewed her in an old episode of the television program "What's My Line?" of easily over fifty years ago, I was struck by the similarity of her behavior on each occasion. In the Osbourne interview Betty often repeated, with almost child-like intensity that her interviewer was a wonderful man, one of the kindest persons she had ever met and that she loved him very much. Also shared was the fact that she was nearly paralyzed by fear and seriously considered canceling the interview. Finally coaxed and reassured, she appeared and, as mentioned, expressed her love for him several times and throughout the proceeding. During the circa 1956 program in which she was the celebrity mystery guest, it was revealed (besides her identity, which was correctly and fairly quickly guessed by panelist Fred Allen) by the show's host John Daly, with as much "show" as "tell", that Betty's anxiety was such that she had implored him, successfully, to hold both of her hands in his until her identity was revealed to the panelists. Daly held up their entwined fingers from behind his desk to a delighted audience with a charming assurance to his wife: "Mrs. Daly, don't you mind now" (a bonus delight for me to be reminded of a time when fidelity was valued so highly that even theatrical affection could come with a disclaimer). After nearly half a century, Betty, unlike most of us, had never stopped openly asking the question that most of us silently pose every day of our lives to someone (even to someone who isn't there): "please love me."
Finally, in "Annie Get Your Gun" it was decided that the character of Miss Oakley would be an outgoing, naive kind of bumpkin (likely unlike the reserved real life sharpshooter) particularly in affairs of the heart. Comical, over-the-top, broad and wonderful, Betty's acting talents, and again, her likability, sincerity and softness precluded any chance of a cartoonish performance that any lesser star would have had great difficulty avoiding. When she guilelessly eyeballs Frank Butler (Kheel) and is struck by the thunderbolt of a crushing crush on him, the hilarity of her "goo-goo" eyes and sighs is immeasurably heightened by the truth she expresses: of youthful adoration conjoined with a healthy libido. Betty Hutton, we miss you and love you forever. And we'll hold your hands, God willing, one day for as long as you wish or until the end of time. Thanks for being our angel then, now and always.
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Scumbags In Charge
Yes, I know. That is an offensive word in the above title. I hope to use it in the spirit of the late comedic genius George Carlin, mindful, as he was, that gratuitous use of verbal filth can be a "no-no" unless its author has a brilliantly funny point (in his case, such points were countless). I don't doubt for a moment that my usual stuffy efforts to persuade will not be in the same league with ol' George's H-bombs (and F-bombs) of mirth and that all I can hope for is to have made a valid point or two about vituperation, "dirty" words and the unpleasant beings among us who merit this particular epithet and similar ones (before a mug of hot coffee or a "click" onto another blogger's page is reckoned by you, dear reader, as the only way to stay awake).
I remember when I first learned the meaning of the compound word from male members of my peer group. I had not yet reached puberty (then about three summers into the future) and a malevolent connotation of the word was communicated to me by them. This was disturbing and frightening. "Scum" was already understood to refer to something vile, but I was not sure exactly even what that was. "Pond scum" was an unknown term for a city kid and the coining of the term as a highly insulting description of a morally bankrupt individual would not occur until the 1980s as far as I can recall. Also, the emotionally neutral term referring to any white or frothy collection of unwanted substance on the surface of certain boiling foodstuffs was not within the ken of a kid whose parents performed all the culinary tasks in the kitchen at that time.
Anyway, my "teachers" presented to me a crash course in the meaning of this receptacle and its contents. Again, both were conveyed to my young and inexperienced self as dirty and revolting things: my companions' vague descriptions of the "bag" only unsettling me more. My vision was of a kind of miniature hot water bottle (or a tinier version of that circular ice filled bag that an actor like William Powell in a 1930s mad ball comedy placed on his noggin to combat a hangover) that had to remain hidden from view along with its abominable load. All this further heightened my already growing fears about sexuality and adulthood. Why and how would one collect this fluid? Is it toxic? Does scum then only refer to what will come out of my penis in the near future? Can I forego this rite of passage? "No" I was told. "You can ignore it for awhile, but sooner or later you will experience it and have to deal with it." Someone, after all of these scary and confusing reports remarked, almost as an aside, that it would "feel good when it came out of you." At that point, my anxiety was so developed by my imagination that I concluded that "feeling good" might entail some chaotic, uncontrollable event, something akin to being tickled mercilessly until one realized that the laughing would never stop (not far off as a purely erotic description or fantasy, but totally lacking in any understanding of the expression of the beauty and divinity of the reproductive act, of course). I guess this may be how superstition and puritanism derived some of their powers. How unfortunate to have had as educators, those hardly more informed than myself and well short of the wisdom that would have best shepherded a kind of lamb who could have been reassured that there was no slaughter in the offing along the journey to becoming a man.
It is interesting to note, that after this episode of more than fifty years ago, my miseducation was after all, revealed to be not completely devoid of certain truths. That is, any bodily fluid or waste, once expelled, is not regarded as sanitary or usually anything but disgusting. This is not an exclusively Victorian or repressed world view. Also, a condom is, when viewed simply and dispassionately, an unnatural device with no commonsensical reason, as far as a child could see, to be used to clothe one's "pee-pee." Though probably nearly as old as the first copulation in history, the bag baffles the guileless of any age. Its user seeks to thwart nature, and as with most human manipulation, unpleasantness always seems to be right around the corner, regardless of the success or failure of the device's purpose. Highly functional (at least generally and in its intent), it speaks to our unfailing inclination to try to control events even at the expense of unbridled carnal pleasure and, obviously, the creation of a new human being. The "bag" is, consequently for me, a repugnant object philosophically if not physically: the former adverb referring not to any "ick" factor but again, to the simple but ugly perversion of thwarting the medium by which human life may continue. The latter adverb could only be applied positively ( as in "attractive" rather than "repugnant" object) , I feel, by some pretentious so-called artist who in the tradition of "Piss Christ" and other Mapplethorpe-type phony art might argue for the "beauty" of the intensely green thorax of a house fly in proximity to a sun drenched, richly brown pile of dung and, by that logic, the supposed loveliness of a flesh colored, flattened, torn and wrinkled cylinder of rubber or lamb's skin, a full moon's rays causing its contents to glisten on a city sidewalk with "high" inducing gasoline fumes dispersing slowly from the recent proximity of the "bag" to a "muscle" car whose driver just "peeled out" a nano second after "peeling it off." So, confident, though prayerfully, that these cultural misfits are still a tiny minority (the "artistes" that is…. the neanderthals who negotiate tons of sheet metal along streets and highways with the help of high compression internal combustion engines will always be with us, and in abundance, despite employing, ironically, prophylactics to "have their cake and eat it too"….I am not THAT delusional) I do feel safe in averring the following as a societal consensus: "scumbag" is a joltingly and exceedingly unpleasant word. And as a richly deserved term of contempt, it should be applied to describe only a very few persons, though it's awfully tempting to increase the use of its application as an appellation, given the state of the world in 2011 A.D.
Well, who are the top scumbags today? The truly scary thought is that a huge plurality of them (if not a majority) would proudly step forward rather than shrink back if one began a roll call: the militancy and self-congratulatory habits of the stupid, despicable and narcissistic now having reached pandemic proportions. Well, before naming names, I'll state unequivocally that this dubious "badge" or "bag" of distinction needs to be awarded, as the title of this blog implies, only to powerful persons, those "in charge" who have royally screwed these United States, the world and the vast majority of us who, though also sinners indeed, have by and large, because of our relative impotence in affairs of state, and as effectual leaders in ethics and religion or grand finance, have amassed mostly just a relatively few tons of venial peccadilloes and have only, in a few cases earned the slightly less odious title of "Pond Scum" (post 1980, non-lacustrine meaning of the term). Some politicians are difficult to place, i.e. in either the S.B. or P.S. category. By the way, for concision and space, as well as for the more puissant effect of minimal use of "dirty" word vituperations, the above abbreviations will from now on and herein be primarily used. An excellent example of a "borderline" case (in more ways than one), is the thoroughly unpleasant fellow from Massachusetts, the very recently announced resigner from Congress, Mr. Barney Frank. For all his sustained nastiness, wrongheadedness on ALL issues vital to America's best interests and even his major role in nearly successfully destroying the U.S. economy with his "bananas banking" schemes (his handiwork still capable, like a terminal disease, of accomplishing, whether intentionally or not, the goals, now in sight, born from his poisonings), we can only decorate ol' Barney with the highest ranking in the also-ran league of vileness. Let's ceremoniously place on his shoulders the epaulets of a five star general in the Army of Pond Scum, oops…P.S. (the promotion that I hereby bestow upon him sure as hell ain't P.C.). Bravo Barney! Only his distaste and weariness for the coming 2012 campaign/war against the radical Left (him and his buddies) bumps Frank from S.B. status, though he no doubt would have been a mere buck private in that more loathsome man's army of S.B.s.
No brainer, genuine S.B.'s? A card carrying member must be living and still in power, i.e. causing mayhem and great suffering in the here and now. But to give an idea of the degree of dastardliness required, here's a short list of former but relatively recent members whose incredibly richly deserved demises or incarcerations are the sole reasons that they no longer are the urgent objects of good men's wrath or brightly listed names on a current Grand Marquee of Shameful Ones:
1.Osama bin Laden; 2.Saddam Hussein; 3.Moammar al-Khaddafy; 4.Bernard Madoff; 5.Orenthal James Simpson (shall never forgive the sullying of that happy childhood memory for so many of us and of its abbreviation…. one of the world's favorite breakfast beverages, plus epitome of good health, goodness, flavor and good taste: orange juice and its having to share its initials with this horrific psychopathic murderer).
….And, in the category of unalloyed, warts and all TOP S.B.'s IN THE WORLD TODAY……the envelope please!
Well, complete the list of names as you see fit, Mr. & Ms. Blog-ee. Again, dirty words/names should be used sparingly and sometimes the exposure of and confrontation with evil (though so often vital and never to be shrunk from when push comes to shove) can be especially effective strategies through stony silences and determined shunning that can choke off the oxygen of these S.B.s (a.k.a. S.O.B.s) who should not be permitted to share this planet's supply of it. You know who you are!
I remember when I first learned the meaning of the compound word from male members of my peer group. I had not yet reached puberty (then about three summers into the future) and a malevolent connotation of the word was communicated to me by them. This was disturbing and frightening. "Scum" was already understood to refer to something vile, but I was not sure exactly even what that was. "Pond scum" was an unknown term for a city kid and the coining of the term as a highly insulting description of a morally bankrupt individual would not occur until the 1980s as far as I can recall. Also, the emotionally neutral term referring to any white or frothy collection of unwanted substance on the surface of certain boiling foodstuffs was not within the ken of a kid whose parents performed all the culinary tasks in the kitchen at that time.
Anyway, my "teachers" presented to me a crash course in the meaning of this receptacle and its contents. Again, both were conveyed to my young and inexperienced self as dirty and revolting things: my companions' vague descriptions of the "bag" only unsettling me more. My vision was of a kind of miniature hot water bottle (or a tinier version of that circular ice filled bag that an actor like William Powell in a 1930s mad ball comedy placed on his noggin to combat a hangover) that had to remain hidden from view along with its abominable load. All this further heightened my already growing fears about sexuality and adulthood. Why and how would one collect this fluid? Is it toxic? Does scum then only refer to what will come out of my penis in the near future? Can I forego this rite of passage? "No" I was told. "You can ignore it for awhile, but sooner or later you will experience it and have to deal with it." Someone, after all of these scary and confusing reports remarked, almost as an aside, that it would "feel good when it came out of you." At that point, my anxiety was so developed by my imagination that I concluded that "feeling good" might entail some chaotic, uncontrollable event, something akin to being tickled mercilessly until one realized that the laughing would never stop (not far off as a purely erotic description or fantasy, but totally lacking in any understanding of the expression of the beauty and divinity of the reproductive act, of course). I guess this may be how superstition and puritanism derived some of their powers. How unfortunate to have had as educators, those hardly more informed than myself and well short of the wisdom that would have best shepherded a kind of lamb who could have been reassured that there was no slaughter in the offing along the journey to becoming a man.
It is interesting to note, that after this episode of more than fifty years ago, my miseducation was after all, revealed to be not completely devoid of certain truths. That is, any bodily fluid or waste, once expelled, is not regarded as sanitary or usually anything but disgusting. This is not an exclusively Victorian or repressed world view. Also, a condom is, when viewed simply and dispassionately, an unnatural device with no commonsensical reason, as far as a child could see, to be used to clothe one's "pee-pee." Though probably nearly as old as the first copulation in history, the bag baffles the guileless of any age. Its user seeks to thwart nature, and as with most human manipulation, unpleasantness always seems to be right around the corner, regardless of the success or failure of the device's purpose. Highly functional (at least generally and in its intent), it speaks to our unfailing inclination to try to control events even at the expense of unbridled carnal pleasure and, obviously, the creation of a new human being. The "bag" is, consequently for me, a repugnant object philosophically if not physically: the former adverb referring not to any "ick" factor but again, to the simple but ugly perversion of thwarting the medium by which human life may continue. The latter adverb could only be applied positively ( as in "attractive" rather than "repugnant" object) , I feel, by some pretentious so-called artist who in the tradition of "Piss Christ" and other Mapplethorpe-type phony art might argue for the "beauty" of the intensely green thorax of a house fly in proximity to a sun drenched, richly brown pile of dung and, by that logic, the supposed loveliness of a flesh colored, flattened, torn and wrinkled cylinder of rubber or lamb's skin, a full moon's rays causing its contents to glisten on a city sidewalk with "high" inducing gasoline fumes dispersing slowly from the recent proximity of the "bag" to a "muscle" car whose driver just "peeled out" a nano second after "peeling it off." So, confident, though prayerfully, that these cultural misfits are still a tiny minority (the "artistes" that is…. the neanderthals who negotiate tons of sheet metal along streets and highways with the help of high compression internal combustion engines will always be with us, and in abundance, despite employing, ironically, prophylactics to "have their cake and eat it too"….I am not THAT delusional) I do feel safe in averring the following as a societal consensus: "scumbag" is a joltingly and exceedingly unpleasant word. And as a richly deserved term of contempt, it should be applied to describe only a very few persons, though it's awfully tempting to increase the use of its application as an appellation, given the state of the world in 2011 A.D.
Well, who are the top scumbags today? The truly scary thought is that a huge plurality of them (if not a majority) would proudly step forward rather than shrink back if one began a roll call: the militancy and self-congratulatory habits of the stupid, despicable and narcissistic now having reached pandemic proportions. Well, before naming names, I'll state unequivocally that this dubious "badge" or "bag" of distinction needs to be awarded, as the title of this blog implies, only to powerful persons, those "in charge" who have royally screwed these United States, the world and the vast majority of us who, though also sinners indeed, have by and large, because of our relative impotence in affairs of state, and as effectual leaders in ethics and religion or grand finance, have amassed mostly just a relatively few tons of venial peccadilloes and have only, in a few cases earned the slightly less odious title of "Pond Scum" (post 1980, non-lacustrine meaning of the term). Some politicians are difficult to place, i.e. in either the S.B. or P.S. category. By the way, for concision and space, as well as for the more puissant effect of minimal use of "dirty" word vituperations, the above abbreviations will from now on and herein be primarily used. An excellent example of a "borderline" case (in more ways than one), is the thoroughly unpleasant fellow from Massachusetts, the very recently announced resigner from Congress, Mr. Barney Frank. For all his sustained nastiness, wrongheadedness on ALL issues vital to America's best interests and even his major role in nearly successfully destroying the U.S. economy with his "bananas banking" schemes (his handiwork still capable, like a terminal disease, of accomplishing, whether intentionally or not, the goals, now in sight, born from his poisonings), we can only decorate ol' Barney with the highest ranking in the also-ran league of vileness. Let's ceremoniously place on his shoulders the epaulets of a five star general in the Army of Pond Scum, oops…P.S. (the promotion that I hereby bestow upon him sure as hell ain't P.C.). Bravo Barney! Only his distaste and weariness for the coming 2012 campaign/war against the radical Left (him and his buddies) bumps Frank from S.B. status, though he no doubt would have been a mere buck private in that more loathsome man's army of S.B.s.
No brainer, genuine S.B.'s? A card carrying member must be living and still in power, i.e. causing mayhem and great suffering in the here and now. But to give an idea of the degree of dastardliness required, here's a short list of former but relatively recent members whose incredibly richly deserved demises or incarcerations are the sole reasons that they no longer are the urgent objects of good men's wrath or brightly listed names on a current Grand Marquee of Shameful Ones:
1.Osama bin Laden; 2.Saddam Hussein; 3.Moammar al-Khaddafy; 4.Bernard Madoff; 5.Orenthal James Simpson (shall never forgive the sullying of that happy childhood memory for so many of us and of its abbreviation…. one of the world's favorite breakfast beverages, plus epitome of good health, goodness, flavor and good taste: orange juice and its having to share its initials with this horrific psychopathic murderer).
….And, in the category of unalloyed, warts and all TOP S.B.'s IN THE WORLD TODAY……the envelope please!
Well, complete the list of names as you see fit, Mr. & Ms. Blog-ee. Again, dirty words/names should be used sparingly and sometimes the exposure of and confrontation with evil (though so often vital and never to be shrunk from when push comes to shove) can be especially effective strategies through stony silences and determined shunning that can choke off the oxygen of these S.B.s (a.k.a. S.O.B.s) who should not be permitted to share this planet's supply of it. You know who you are!
Friday, November 25, 2011
Quiet
It is the day after Thanksgiving. I click off my television and its interminably and colossally boring broadcasts about something dubbed "Black Friday." Now one may truly be thankful. There are hardly any cars at this moment on the street where I live. I do not hear a sound. This is most unusual and wonderful. Alas! The peace was just shattered by a honking horn. One mustn't talk too loudly about good news. Gremlins will always notice, it seems, and place their greasy fingerprints on your little park bench of tranquility that you lovingly dabbed with a sleepy powder blue shade of forgetfulness and upon which you foolishly placed a "WET PAINT" sign.
Okay, stillness again…. and I won't celebrate or shout about it. Will just enjoy its no doubt, short-lived presence and pretend I'm in Comatose, Oklahoma (pop. 14). Am not a numerologist, but I like that number for some reason. Perhaps my childhood baseball hero, Gil Hodges' uniform's number has something to do with it. Why "The Sooner State?" Maybe it's the imagined tranquility of a quintessentially middle American place where boisterousness and shouting is positive and purposeful like when statehood is achieved, one's Laurie has become one's girl and Judd has gone the way, providentially, of the snake under the Virgin Mary's feet.
The sandman is a pal o' mine but I've given him short shrift in recent months. Soon we'll revive our friendship and a rich dream life will hopefully work its curative magic again to set right the current imbalance between consciousness and oblivion. Stephen Foster's "Beautiful Dreamer" (1864) has always had a special place in my heart, even as a child. Also, Kellette and Kenbrovin's "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" (1918) struck a chord as well with my younger (pre-kindergarten) self. Somehow, I "got" the melancholia and wistfulness of the tune. Peace at a price? As I blew bubbles from a toy bottle of soap with the little plastic wand that enabled my floating creations to dance and wiggle, I became aware that my pleasure had a cost: fragile spheres of playmates that played with me only briefly. I had to breathe life into them, literally and often, to have any more than short-lived company. This endeavor, alone in our family garden at dusk on a summer's day only heightened my precocious meditations:
"Fortune's always hiding,
I've looked everywhere.
I'm forever blowing bubbles,
Pretty bubbles in the air."
Okay, stillness again…. and I won't celebrate or shout about it. Will just enjoy its no doubt, short-lived presence and pretend I'm in Comatose, Oklahoma (pop. 14). Am not a numerologist, but I like that number for some reason. Perhaps my childhood baseball hero, Gil Hodges' uniform's number has something to do with it. Why "The Sooner State?" Maybe it's the imagined tranquility of a quintessentially middle American place where boisterousness and shouting is positive and purposeful like when statehood is achieved, one's Laurie has become one's girl and Judd has gone the way, providentially, of the snake under the Virgin Mary's feet.
The sandman is a pal o' mine but I've given him short shrift in recent months. Soon we'll revive our friendship and a rich dream life will hopefully work its curative magic again to set right the current imbalance between consciousness and oblivion. Stephen Foster's "Beautiful Dreamer" (1864) has always had a special place in my heart, even as a child. Also, Kellette and Kenbrovin's "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" (1918) struck a chord as well with my younger (pre-kindergarten) self. Somehow, I "got" the melancholia and wistfulness of the tune. Peace at a price? As I blew bubbles from a toy bottle of soap with the little plastic wand that enabled my floating creations to dance and wiggle, I became aware that my pleasure had a cost: fragile spheres of playmates that played with me only briefly. I had to breathe life into them, literally and often, to have any more than short-lived company. This endeavor, alone in our family garden at dusk on a summer's day only heightened my precocious meditations:
"Fortune's always hiding,
I've looked everywhere.
I'm forever blowing bubbles,
Pretty bubbles in the air."
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Sitting and Spitting or Stewing and Brewing?
As a New Yorker did you ever silently decide that there was no reasoning with any Homo sapiens within your ken or geographical comfort zone? That is, did you ever reckon that you did not have the shoe leather or the psychic energy to channel your inner Diogenes and start trekking in search of that honest or at least intelligent and considerate man or woman? You DID decide that you would not bludgeon or garrote the next insensitive lout who either blocked your driveway, used your unlocked garbage pail to place his rubbish (indifferent to and usually wrong about the correct recyclable receptacle of yours to cram with his trash), or eschewed his pooper scooper in favor of allowing his beloved Fido to express himself with canine artistry in the form of steaming, brown minarets of most unfortunately placed (along your sidewalk and directly in front of your front door) organic waste. But you DID reserve the right to fantasize the righting of these wrongs (and banish insomnia, in a way more effective than counting sheep or draining a warm glass of milk), by machine gunning as you drift off (in the best 1929 Chicago traditions of wielders of the then latest in "chopper" firepower) all of the above mentioned bozos who routinely send the quality of life, in particular: your life….into the toilet (where, in my utopia, even canines would unfailingly park their poop).
"It's NATURAL!" So goes the modern cry of purveyors of all kinds of foodstuffs in the 21st century. The word has been appropriated by many and applied more and more with only a positive connotation (something like the nineteenth century love affair with literary genres that extolled the virtues of the "noble savage") to numerous objects and behaviors that only yesterday were deemed rude, inappropriate, tasteless, brutish, ugly and most importantly: demonstrative of incredibly thinly veiled contempt for one's fellow man. Well, yes, the sentiments of nearly unvarnished animosity are mutual, but this blogger's views of some (not all) of his fellow pilgrims are wholly justified by their boorish acts (as well as sins of omission) witnessed every day. The psychological truism that correctly asserts that people behave toward you pretty much as you behave toward them is only a useful blueprint for coping if certain fundamental, shared values are there and are ever likely to blossom with the slightest prod in the form of decency or turning of the other cheek (in the real world where I live, in the form of picking up other's trash, or tolerating someone's running of a red light: "Gee, I guess he needs to express himself creatively or destructively…and, oh, let me walk around and pick up the thousands of bits of refuse tossed by others each and every day that magically blow into my front garden along with cigarette butts deliberately tossed there since my postage stamp plot of greenery is clearly viewed as one big convenient soil-filled ashtray. Gee, I'm glad to oblige and make life a bit more convenient for my unfortunate neighbors bitten by the litterbug."). No, this form of cheek turning is both useless and the H.O.V. lane of the superhighway to downtown Masochism, as the anonymity of life in New York renders any selfless deeds in the service of sanitation and beauty, acts of supreme indifference to the transient pedestrian, worker enroute to his job, hygienically challenged neighbor or certainly any vagrant enroute to his next handout or bottle of Sneaky Pete.
So, what to do? Spitting is no fun. To avoid the double standard of behaving like one's tormentors, one must expectorate into one's handkerchief. Boy, this "civilization thing" is hard work! (Note to all the reprobates out there: begin by at least learning this fact.) Stewing could lead to boiling over. Surely, we don't want any Vesuvius-like outbursts. Poilcemen and E.M.S. workers with straight jackets at the ready will not empathize with my stories about the years of provocations. Brewing (a cup of coffee) may prove helpful, but then again, insomnia and hyperactivity may result as one broods while turning over and over in one's brain, all the kaleidoscopic instances of slights and "arrows of outrageous fortune." At such a point the mowing down of the barbarians with a phantom AK-47 will not suffice to bring tranquility or an embrace by the sweet arms of Morpheus. One is left sitting. If hemorhhoids are non-existent or a distant memory, this may work for a while, provided that one has a good book or a well developed regimen of meditation and a good pair of ear plugs. Noise pollution in the Wormy Big Apple is another subject for another blog entry, but it is worthy of another round of bellyaching. Don't sit too long and certainly don't watch too much television. Mr. Newt Minnow, may have had a particularly nerdy moniker, but it had nothing to do with the accuracy and continuing, immutable truth about his famous remark about the boob tube: it was (and remains more so than ever), a "vast wasteland." Just channel surfing the literally hundreds of choices on my cable set each evening proves this fact over and over again. Talent and creativity in America is becoming as shriveled and atrophied as the muscularity of our morals. And regarding that honesty issue: there's nothing LESS real than an exceedingly contrived "reality" show (shades of that Bolshevik/Majority Big Lie, and for that matter, the "99%" claim of the cretins of the Occupy Wall Street crowd). By process of elimination, my survival strategy has emerged: a bracing single fresh cup of java in the a.m. after a good night's sleep, brief viewing of the weather channel on the t.v. in order to confirm the availability of a clement day and thus a promising walk toward the remaining strip of greenbelt in my neighborhood, with ear plugs in place, clothespin on my proboscis, and a blinder for each eye as I place a hand on the shoulder of a Rent-A-Diogenes who has the stomach for the journey. His fee will include a fresh pair of New Balance sneakers for me, more a prayerful pun about "a contemplation devoutly to be wished", i.e., a renewed America (not so out of whack in so many ways), than comfortable footwear to aid the spiritual quest. It will be the blind leading the blind, but that inner vision of truth must be relied upon to get out of this funk along with a faith and trust along the lines of that parlor game of my young adulthood whereby one relaxed and fell backward, trusting to the loving arms of one's fellow partygoers. Wait, I've no health insurance.
"It's NATURAL!" So goes the modern cry of purveyors of all kinds of foodstuffs in the 21st century. The word has been appropriated by many and applied more and more with only a positive connotation (something like the nineteenth century love affair with literary genres that extolled the virtues of the "noble savage") to numerous objects and behaviors that only yesterday were deemed rude, inappropriate, tasteless, brutish, ugly and most importantly: demonstrative of incredibly thinly veiled contempt for one's fellow man. Well, yes, the sentiments of nearly unvarnished animosity are mutual, but this blogger's views of some (not all) of his fellow pilgrims are wholly justified by their boorish acts (as well as sins of omission) witnessed every day. The psychological truism that correctly asserts that people behave toward you pretty much as you behave toward them is only a useful blueprint for coping if certain fundamental, shared values are there and are ever likely to blossom with the slightest prod in the form of decency or turning of the other cheek (in the real world where I live, in the form of picking up other's trash, or tolerating someone's running of a red light: "Gee, I guess he needs to express himself creatively or destructively…and, oh, let me walk around and pick up the thousands of bits of refuse tossed by others each and every day that magically blow into my front garden along with cigarette butts deliberately tossed there since my postage stamp plot of greenery is clearly viewed as one big convenient soil-filled ashtray. Gee, I'm glad to oblige and make life a bit more convenient for my unfortunate neighbors bitten by the litterbug."). No, this form of cheek turning is both useless and the H.O.V. lane of the superhighway to downtown Masochism, as the anonymity of life in New York renders any selfless deeds in the service of sanitation and beauty, acts of supreme indifference to the transient pedestrian, worker enroute to his job, hygienically challenged neighbor or certainly any vagrant enroute to his next handout or bottle of Sneaky Pete.
So, what to do? Spitting is no fun. To avoid the double standard of behaving like one's tormentors, one must expectorate into one's handkerchief. Boy, this "civilization thing" is hard work! (Note to all the reprobates out there: begin by at least learning this fact.) Stewing could lead to boiling over. Surely, we don't want any Vesuvius-like outbursts. Poilcemen and E.M.S. workers with straight jackets at the ready will not empathize with my stories about the years of provocations. Brewing (a cup of coffee) may prove helpful, but then again, insomnia and hyperactivity may result as one broods while turning over and over in one's brain, all the kaleidoscopic instances of slights and "arrows of outrageous fortune." At such a point the mowing down of the barbarians with a phantom AK-47 will not suffice to bring tranquility or an embrace by the sweet arms of Morpheus. One is left sitting. If hemorhhoids are non-existent or a distant memory, this may work for a while, provided that one has a good book or a well developed regimen of meditation and a good pair of ear plugs. Noise pollution in the Wormy Big Apple is another subject for another blog entry, but it is worthy of another round of bellyaching. Don't sit too long and certainly don't watch too much television. Mr. Newt Minnow, may have had a particularly nerdy moniker, but it had nothing to do with the accuracy and continuing, immutable truth about his famous remark about the boob tube: it was (and remains more so than ever), a "vast wasteland." Just channel surfing the literally hundreds of choices on my cable set each evening proves this fact over and over again. Talent and creativity in America is becoming as shriveled and atrophied as the muscularity of our morals. And regarding that honesty issue: there's nothing LESS real than an exceedingly contrived "reality" show (shades of that Bolshevik/Majority Big Lie, and for that matter, the "99%" claim of the cretins of the Occupy Wall Street crowd). By process of elimination, my survival strategy has emerged: a bracing single fresh cup of java in the a.m. after a good night's sleep, brief viewing of the weather channel on the t.v. in order to confirm the availability of a clement day and thus a promising walk toward the remaining strip of greenbelt in my neighborhood, with ear plugs in place, clothespin on my proboscis, and a blinder for each eye as I place a hand on the shoulder of a Rent-A-Diogenes who has the stomach for the journey. His fee will include a fresh pair of New Balance sneakers for me, more a prayerful pun about "a contemplation devoutly to be wished", i.e., a renewed America (not so out of whack in so many ways), than comfortable footwear to aid the spiritual quest. It will be the blind leading the blind, but that inner vision of truth must be relied upon to get out of this funk along with a faith and trust along the lines of that parlor game of my young adulthood whereby one relaxed and fell backward, trusting to the loving arms of one's fellow partygoers. Wait, I've no health insurance.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Three Hundred Sixty Three Days 'Til "The Year of Jubilo"*
There once was a U. S. of A.
'Twas peopled by folks who did pray.
And they worked and played hard, Their nest eggs they did guard
From spendthrifts down ol' D.C. way.
Sticking to their guns and the Lord
Such doings made one B.O. bored.
But the actual stink
Is from how he does think.
This lefty is out of his gourd.
So come 2012 we shall see
If folks really dig bein' free.
Will The Snake Oil man Continue his scam?
Or Freedom's Cry force him to flee?
*With apologies to the noble shade of Henry Clay Work ("Work??!!" Thus spake Maynard G. 'Occupy Wall St.' Krebs).
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