Crosswalk America

Seeing

@ Duck and Decanter in Phoenix, AZ

June was Monday Night at the Movies at First Church, First UMC Phoenix. I don’t know if that is what it was called, but that’s how I think of it. The theme was where God was seen (by us) in the movie.

One of the movies we watched was the HBO movie Temple Grandin. The movie was based on the life of Mary Temple Grandin. It is an impressive film about a very impressive person. Temple sees the world differently from most of us and the film made that clear. See could, for example, ‘see’ the heat on her arrival in Phoenix and asked if people actually lived in Phoenix. At times, I can almost see the heat here, in Phoenix, and ask similar questions.

In the movie Temple asked another question that I also identified with. When an animal or person died, she would ask “Where did [he, it] go?” Lots of folks believe they know the answer to that question. Me, I’m not so sure. I read in the Old and New Testaments various answers to the question. I believe the Quran has some answers. Buddhists also have answers, but still I remain skeptical. Oh, it’s easy enough to say “Heaven”, “a better place” or “Paradise”. Really? And, exactly what do those destinations look like? I don’t know. It seems that there are many answers.

Temple ‘sees’ visually in her mind, yet, she cannot see where the life force goes when it departs the body, just as I cannot.

I have played Sudoku online at Sudoku.com.au for several years now. Often members leave brief messages that include a time stamp. On day, I noticed that one of the regulars had solved a really difficult puzzle in less than three minutes. I sent her a message asking how she had managed to solve it so quickly. I thought of her reply while I was watching Temple Grandin. She told me that the puzzles have an option be solved as a jumbled picture puzzle. She is an artist and so solving the puzzles as a jumbled picture puzzle was usually very easy for her.

Hmm, that’s something new.

I wonder if the artist can see where beings go when they die.

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God & Country

I know a man. He is a likeable, friendly 60 something. I have known him and his wife for at least a decade.  Always, I smile when I chance to meet up with him. I haven’t seen his wife since she went into an Alzheimer’s care facility a few years ago. My friend is always upbeat and positive although I know the daily visits with his wife trouble him.  Although he retired from the military sometime ago, I suspect he soldiers on doing his duty just as he did for more than 20 years.

Last week he had a nice lapel pin on. It was a U.S. flag, brightly colored red, white and blue, artfully draped over a gold cross. When asked about it by another friend, he said “...  to him it stood for God and country”.  I thought about saying something but didn’t. Whatever I said wouldn’t change anything and quite possibly would antagonize him. He is my friend and I am still glad to see him when we meet. Still, I am conscious of the pang I felt when he linked “God and country”. He is not alone of course. Most “Christians” would probably link the two if asked. But, I always wonder how citizens that are Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Wiccan, or whatever, might feel about country being joined to Jesus in some operation right out Frankenstein.

Maybe, they feel the same as I do about it.

Maybe, the same feeling is felt by the Sunni rebels in Syria towards the Assad family who belong to the Alawite sect of Shia Islam.

Or maybe it was like how the Shia majority in Iraq felt about the Sunni Saddam Hussein.

I can guess that Jews in Eastern Europe felt the same unease living in the Christian nations of Russia, Poland, and Germany.

After the Islamic Moors were kicked out of Spain (by the point of the sword) in 1492, Spanish Jews probably had a similar feeling until they too were told to leave or become Christian. They were robbed, raped and in general abused as they left.

When the Pope gave most of the new world to Spain, Native Americans in the Spanish portion automatically became Catholic – only Catholics lived in Spain and Spanish possessions – they had similar feelings no doubt.

Good things rarely happen for minorities in lands where laws are made because “god says so”. Especially if the god that is doing the saying isn’t your God.

 

 

Philomena

 

@ Duck and Decanter in Phoenix, AZ

Barb, my wife, and I went to the movies on Thanksgiving Day. A friend had given us a gift card (with a voucher for popcorn) and so it just seemed the thing to do. Here in Phoenix, the day was gorgeous if a bit chilly at 74. Yeah, I know, but the wind was blowing.

The movie, Philomena, was the best I have seen in awhile. Why IMDb only rated it 7.8, I don’t have a clue. It is better than 7.8. The New York Post’s film critic also dissed it. He did such a hatchet job on it that Philomena Lee, the woman whose search the film was about, replied to his review in writing. You can read about that here.

The film is the story of how a young Irish girl came to give up her baby (born out of wedlock). Fifty years of total silence later, she begins talking about her experience and eventually meets Martin Sixsmith who helps her with the search for her son. At the core of the story is the complicity of the Roman Catholic Abby (pictures here) where  Philomena Lee was sent to have her child in separating (by selling the boy for adoption) him from Philomena  and then in covering up the less than righteous act.

Although freedom of religion is guaranteed by the Irish Constitution, Ireland is a Roman Catholic country and the laws reflect the large majority of Roman Catholics. In the 1950’s The Roman Catholic Church held a special position in the Irish Republic which was taken away in 1972. So then, at the time Philomena Lee became pregnant, she not only was ostracized by the conservative Church and society, but also had no protection under the law. It was legal for the Abby to “sell” her son, Michael A. Hess. They called it adoption, of course, but it took money to “adopt”. Lots of Americans had money in the 1950’s. There were many Irish children “adopted” by wealthy Americans.

Later, as society’s view of such shenanigans changed there was a convenient fire at the Abby that destroyed all records of such adoptions. The fire did not burn the paper that Philomena had signed giving up all parental rights. The film brought out the fact that the “fire” had been a bonfire and the only damage was to the records. This is eerily similar to the scandal of priests abusing children in current times. I am not singling out the Catholic Church here. In Canada there was the scandal of abuse of native Canadians in church run schools. In this country many Protestant churches supported first slavery, and then segregation. Such things happen distressingly often.

And, it is not just with religious institutions that we have wrongs that happen. I’ll mention just a few diverse secular instances.

·         The pedophilia scandal at Penn State.

·         MPs in England cheating with expense claims.

·         Politicians in the US circumventing election laws.

·         The sexual abuse in the US military.

I could make the list much longer. So, if our churches and religious institutions are no different than our secular institutions, why do we need/have them?

In the case at hand, Philomena and her son, someone at the Abby realized that evil had been done, hence, the bonfire. Destruction of records, (White House tape erasure, the Abby bonfire), book burnings, and refusals to make data public are done because of fear that something will become known. Protection of institution or person has become more important than anything else. They have in effect become god. Just like Jesus.

Seems odd a Christian church would replace Jesus with itself.

Just when I was getting good at my job...

@ Duck and Decanter in Phoenix, AZ

I have been working at the Justa Center for something more than a year now. There are two of us that work as Veterans Advocates. Joe, the other Advocate, and I started the same day. We found out that we have several things in common. We were born in the same month, the same year and drive autos of the same make, model and year. We also share a passion for both our jobs and the Justa Center. Other those facts, we are as different as can be. Joe was career army and I served one enlistment in the Navy. While we both did a tour in Vietnam, Joe ended his career after the first Gulf War. Then, of course, he was an officer and I was enlisted. Veterans, especially homeless one, are near and dear to our hearts.

 

We are just now getting comfortable doing our jobs. There is a steep learning curve in dealing with vets and their needs. There is another steep curve in learning how to help homeless folk. It has taken a while to come to grips with how we can and how we can’t help. A hard lesson for both of us was having to tell a vet that we couldn’t help him and that it was time to get help somewhere other than the Justa Center. There are many reasons why we can’t help the homeless, both vets and non vets. Drugs, alcohol, mental illness are a few of the reasons. The most common is that an individual is just not willing to participate in their own life. We are grateful for those we can help and saddened by those we can’t help. We’re getting pretty good at helping.

 

Last week we heard that the Mayor of Phoenix, Gregg Stanton, is leading Phoenix in an effort to end chronic homelessness among veterans. See a video here. It isn’t clear to me how he is going to do this. He is throwing a lot of money at the problem. The goal is to have no more homeless by February 2014.

 

Getting homeless into housing first, makes a lot of sense. It is a good start. Imagine being homeless and holding down a regular job. Keeping people off the streets is harder. Housing requires income. It is easier to get and keep a job if you have housing. The vets Joe and I see are all over 55. Pretty tough getting a job if you are older than 55, especially for laborers or others that have had physically demanding trades. Those with physical or mental illness have an even more difficult time of it. Have I mentioned that here in Arizona, we don’t house mentally ill unless they are a threat to others or themselves? It is too expensive. Unfortunately we sometimes make mistakes in defining the line. At any rate, there are a lot of people who cannot care for themselves on the streets. A good percentage of them are veterans.

 

A lot of the older ones that Joe and I visit with have been on the streets ever since Vietnam. PTSD and the effects of Agent Orange we not acknowledged until long after they were discharged. Even Gulf War, Iraq and Afghanistan vets find PTSD a hindrance to holding employment. Mostly, it is: if no income, no home, sooner or later.

 

I didn’t hear if Mayor Stanton is going to help with income. So, while I applaud his initiative, Joe and I are just going to keep on doing our job as best we can.

 

Joe and I don’t care if a veteran hasn’t been chronically homeless. We think no one should have to sleep under the stars or in a shelter even once. Especially, those that served in the armed forces.

 

I wonder: How does this fit with Jesus’ prediction that we would always have the poor with us?

 

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Better Late - than Never

I have been back some time now from Australia. In Australia, I attended the Common Dreams Conference in Canberra where I wrote several posts, but did not for one reason or another publish.

Here is the first as written on 24 September. Minor edits are included.

 

@Common Dreams Conference ANU Campus, Canberra, ACT Australia

 

The conference starts today. Check in is at 3:00 pm. I tried at 1:15 was politely told to move along. Ordinarily, I would have just walked around the campus getting acquainted with the lay of the land. It is too cold, windy, with the possibility of showers. Nasty outside. I am warming my heels in a coffee shop/eatery. I am too old to fit in here, although I can spot other Common Dreamers or professors sitting in out of the wind.

I came early to do things such as add funds to the bus pass Judy, my landlord for the week, loaned me. Then there was the matter of replacing my wireless mouse that found its way to Barb’s suitcase and an early return to the states. Another bummer. The first two weeks in Oz was great with only minor glitches. The morning we left the hotel in Melbourne was the turning point. We had the wrong time for our flight to Sydney. We were late; the error was easily rectified with the exchange of a hundred dollar bill. Actually it was two fifties, AUD. My leaving my Australian phone in the limo that transported us to the airport was not so readily fixed. Then, my bag was overweight. Books and papers, wireless mouse, meds and other items unceremoniously transferred to Barb’s suitcase. Not all of managed to migrate back to mine after we landed in Sydney.

I’m a little grouchy. I’m cold. I spent yesterday trying to retrieve the phone, grocery shopping and trying to find free WIFI. Two McDonalds in Canberra with free WIFI. I was forced to try one after finding out that the Mall’s free version only lasted 30 minutes. The first one had unreliable connections. Found the 2^nd store and was able to do most of what I needed to do. Canberra is completely different in the WIFI situation than the other Australian cities I have visited.

Sydney, and Melbourne are big cites of over 4 million each while Canberra is only about 300,000. I don’t think that makes the difference, though. Cairns, don’t pronounce the “r”, is about half the size of Canberra. I found Cairns just as cosmopolitan as the larger cities. Two factors that come to mind is that Canberra has no building older than 100 years. It is also an inland city; the others are on the coast. Historically coastal cities are almost universally more cosmopolitan than inland cities.

Canberra’s commerce is the government of Australia and that also lends itself to certain stodginess. Less hustle and bustle for sure. At any rate, Canberra exudes a provincial air of being out of touch with real life. There are no Starbucks either. The coffee isn’t the reason for my wistfulness. Drinks rivaling those of that chain’s are available in plentitude. No, the thing about Starbucks is the Starbucks card.  I found that my card was good in Australia and even better, the exchange rate was better than any bank I could find. Ah, how good is that? If there is a Starbucks in this provincial backwater, I haven’t been able to find it. The good news is: the McDonalds that has the free WIFI has coffee as good as Starbucks.

I wonder if Jesus found Jerusalem as backwards as I find Canberra. I note that he did not find his disciples in Jerusalem. What he found there was hidebound traditionalists wedded to the old ways. They killed him for preaching a new way.

When I first learned that Canberra, like Washington DC, was deliberately set aside to be a national capitol, I thought: “How cool”.

Maybe, it is because the power leaders come from elsewhere unlike in Jerusalem where the leaders were from there. At least the religious leaders. Although, that particular tactic hasn’t appear to have worked for the Vatican.  Or in Washington DC. Jesus’ disciples seem to have come from Capernaum and the immediate area surrounding. While not a seaport, Capernaum was a fishing port on the Sea of Galilee. It also was close for communication and trade with the cities of the Decapolis. It is easy to imagine fishermen, such as Simone Peter, trading with merchants from larger cities. Funny thing about traders, they accept others who are not like themselves. Pissing merchants or suppliers off means no deals. In such environments, people become used to others with different ideas, looks and even gods.

When Jesus came preaching his good news, the fishermen could look past their prejudices and see the possibilities. They saw the future and embraced it.

 

I wonder...if we (the USA) could move the nation’s capitol to, say, San Francisco. Australia is on its own here.

Throw away

Throw away

@ Home in Phoenix, AZ

 

I took a woman, diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, to Haven Senior Horizons several days ago. Haven is an adult and elderly psychiatric care facility. The woman, let’s call her Cassie, was looking forward to going. Cassie knows she has dementia and she and I talked about memory, meds and other discomforts that come with age. Our laughter was of the nervous kind that tried to hide the fear inside both of us. Cassie did seem to be comforted by my sharing frustrations with not always being able to remember details or names. I have a diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment which I like to poke fun at. In my case, I see a neurologist every three or four months to check on progress. I take a med that seems to help the memory. The good news, for me, is that I was rejected for a study. My memory is too good. Still, Cassie liked knowing that she is not alone in growing old ungracefully.

 

Cassie has a family. I am not sure how large a family, but I know it includes at least one daughter and some siblings. She had been living with her family until recently. Cindy apparently had a little resentment about the family because they were no longer willing to care for her. With not much income she became homeless. I had talked with Cassie before and attempted to get phone numbers of family members. Mostly she was unwilling to give me any numbers except for her daughter. She said her daughter had been in a very bad auto accident recently and could not help her. We did reach a friend of hers in California that Cassie asked to help get Cassie’s personal stuff from storage and send it to her.

 

On the day we went to Haven, Cassie was waiting for laundry to be finished at the Justa Center. Members can have one load of laundry done a week. The load has to fit in a milk crate. Not much for a week’s wear. It wasn’t done yet so Cassie and I went to the shelter she had been staying at and gathered her belongings there. The total belongings at the shelter consisted of one carry on suitcase, clothes in a 5 inch high, 36 inch by 24 inch plastic bin stowed underneath the cot she sleep in. The clothes we placed in a black plastic garbage bag.

 

While Cassie was filling the bag, I looked around the shelter. It is a shelter for women located in an industrial area. The room with the beds is large with industrial lighting, cement floors, block walls and one large screen TV with a couple of couches and chairs clustered around it. I would guess around a hundred beds, all the same size – smaller than twin – with plastic bins beneath them. The only other personal items were bottles of water beside some of the bins. Outside the ground is completely paved with concrete. Another industrial building butts up against the concrete. Chain link fences topped with razor wire close off the street on one side and the concrete yards opposite to the road. Benches, various vans, some chairs with large metal cigarette ashtrays are scattered around the periphery of the yard. The temperature gage in my car registered 107 F as we loaded Cassie’s stuff and walker into my car.

 

I went in with Cassie and carried her belongings. Then I drove back and fetched her clean clothes. We had forgotten her small case with meds, so I retrieved that also. Back at Haven, I was told that Cassie had too much stuff and that they could not store it. I told them that Cassie would not be going back to the shelter and couldn’t store it there either. What will happen to her things?

 

I don’t know the answer to that. Don’t know where Cassie will go after Haven. I know Cassie has anxiety; she takes meds for it. Anxiety is common in older people and especially with dementia. I don’t think throwing her possessions away will help that. I hope she is able to keep them.

 

⁵⁷ As they were walking along the road, a man said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.”

⁵⁸ Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”

Luke 9:57-59

New International Version (NIV)

 

Cassie already has no place to lay her head.

 

²² When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

 

Luke 18

New International Version (NIV)

 

She is almost there; only a few belongings to throw away (or be thrown away for her) before she has nothing.

Again....

@ Duck and Decanter in Phoenix, AZ

I am beginning to think that no one in Washington DC has ever read any history. The last one, that I know about that had, was John F. Kennedy. He created some discussion when he referred to the Mexican-American War as an imperialistic war. Lots of people, mostly politicians, who had never bothered to look at the facts about that war, were upset. Later, he too seemed to forget any lessons to be learned from history.

His lapse was Vietnam. The French gave us a very clear example of what would happen in Vietnam. Ðiên Biên Phú was in the newsreels in 1954, and the subsequent end of French rule in Vietnam later made the newspapers as well as the history books. I read both. I think John. F. Kennedy did too, but apparently he forgot. The military brass either didn’t read about it or they forgot because by 1964 we were in full fledged war – never declared. Seems like, Congress discussed the hell out of it, but never really did anything about it. The country was divided. We lost, of course.

We came out of the war scarred. The military was in really bad shape by 1975.We had lots of draft dodgers in Canada, lots of chemical abuse in and out of the military. Most of us felt a sense of disgrace at having lost a war. (I don’t know if that’s really true – I did, and most people I talked to in the years after did.) The country in general faced a tough times with the long lines caused by OPEC demanding to get paid better. Economically, times were tough.

Eventually the economy got better. I think the military got better – I wasn’t in it, so this is an outside opinion. Colin Powell had learned lessons in Vietnam and rose to the top. Dessert Storm, when we and our allies kicked Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait was the proof of how much better. But, again we made a big mistake. We didn’t finish the job. Opinion, theories, excuses, and explanations about why we didn’t are plentiful. I think we could have, should have. It was dangerous to leave. Having left, we should have stayed away. We didn’t.

We should not have returned. The time for that was past. When we went back it was harder and more expensive.  We won but also got embroiled in Afghanistan. Not only didn’t we learn from the French, we didn’t learn from the Russians. I think they were there for ten years. Russian supply lines were a lot shorter and didn’t have in ocean in the way. They lost. What are we going to get out of Afghanistan even if we leave on speaking terms with whoever is running the country? They are not going be thankful.  And, it is costing a lot of American lives to leave. Money too, I think. Nothing has changed fundamentally. I have read that the poppy trade is coming back as the big cash crop in Afghanistan. The Taliban is coming back.

The big loser in this latest ignoring lessons of history is the budget. The Iraq and Afghanistan wars have cost us a bundle. It is hard to balance a budget if you are paying billions to finance wars. But, not to worry. Congress isn’t even trying to come up with a budget. The result of doing nothing is the present sequester where funds are automatically cut from government operations.

You would think that by not working on the budget, congress would have lots of time to work on other problems that plague our country. Not yet. In 2012, congress passed the fewest laws since records began to be kept. They are on track to do even worse this year.

But they are busy talking. Talking about things like what to do in Syria. Senator John McCain even visited there. That worries me. We can’t afford another war. Even a limited one. And, when did a war ever remain limited?

The personnel in military have been running multiple deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan. That is hard on the troops. Suicide rates are way up. PTSD care for returning vets is out of sight. Family problems within the military are at very high levels. All those National Guard called up with their units have financial problems because they earn a lot less in the near East than they do at home in the US. How do you raise kids with mothers or fathers disappearing for months, multiple times? How do you maintain a marriage with that happening? Then there is the death toll. That is really hard for the families, not to mention the person doing the dying.

Meanwhile, the Tea Party (an unorganized rabble of especially poor historians) wants to shut the government down because they are pissed about The Affordable Healthcare Act. Not since slave owners, poor white Southerners and other malcontents fired on Fort Sumter because the country as a whole elected Abe Lincoln president, has such a “do it my way or else” attitude been seen in American politics.

Oh, not the same?

It is.

The idiots that started the civil war did so because they were afraid that Lincoln would abolish slavery. Lincoln hadn’t even taken office yet. Still, they fired on federal troops because they were afraid he might. Never mind that the people they fired on were just doing their job. Never mind that slavery was only defensible from an economic standpoint (i.e. the slave owners had paid good money for the slaves). Otherwise it was against every decent human standard as well as the idea that every man had the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And, it was just plain evil. That innocent, God fearing people whose only sin was that they had elected a president in accordance with the constitution, would die never occurred to them. The reason that abolishing slavery was so wrong to them was “states rights”. They said: the federal government had no right to interfere with the states right to do anything even if it was evil. Now mind you, no interference had taken place, but they were afraid it might. What to do? Take their ball and go home. No matter what the cost.

The war mongers never gave Lincoln a chance.

The Tea party is determined to not give The Affordable HealthCare Act (I am NOT going to call it Obama care) a chance. Will it work? I don’t know. They don’t either, but by damn they don’t want even the chance to find out. What we have now isn’t working too well. Maybe, they haven’t noticed.

I have some questions for everyone that is so dead set against it.

Do you have poor people in your state that cannot pay for medical care?

Is anyone that got laid off last year without insurance?

Have anyone that is now homeless because they paid for cancer treatment?

 

Arizona does. Our Governor, Jan Brewer, knows Arizona can answer yes to all of those questions. Taking a lot of flack, she got Arizona to opt in. It was the right thing to do. We will find out...unless the Tea Party and fellow travelers start another civil war.

 

Here is one last lesson from the past.

“If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand.”

Jesus of Nazareth, ca 30 CE as recorded in Mark 3:25 sometime around 55 to 60 CE.

 

That statement has been proven over and over ever since it was penned.

 

 

 

 

 

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Out of touch.

@ Duck and Decanter in Phoenix, AZ

This photo is from The USS Ramsey West Pac cruise, ca 1968, but it could have been taken by any sailor between 1964 and 1975  in any other Olongapo City bar. It could have been of me.

I am NOT a 60’s guy. I missed the sixties, or at least most of it. First there was the US Navy and Vietnam. Then family life, with kids, and learning how to work for a living mixed in with going back to school. I’m not complaining, I’m just explaining that what was happening in the civilian world or the latest music was not high on my priority list. Besides which, Country music seemed a better fit with Phoenix. Anyway, it’s hard for me to be nostalgic about that time. Especially the music.

Regardless of that when, Barb, my wife, suggested we go to the Happy Together 2013 Tour  with another couple, I was all for it.

 

According to examiner.com: “The Happy Together 2013 Tour will bring together five of Baby Boomers’ favorite musical acts: The Turtles featuring Flo and Eddie, Gary Puckett & the Union Gap, Mark Lindsay, formerly of Paul Revere and the Raiders, Chuck Negron, formerly of Three Dog Night, and Gary Lewis & the Playboys.

 

I should also mention that I am not a baby boomer – I am older than any baby boomer. In fact, I am just a tad younger than Chuck Negron.

Anyway, the performance was awful. Even, painful at times. None of those guys should be singing. Chuck Negron did the best. Maybe, I was influenced by the fact that I knew most of his songs.  Three Dog Night didn’t form until 1967, and if I have my facts straight, didn’t take off until 1969. It was then more of a seventies’ band than a sixties’ band. He made up for the best singing by a really bad fake hairpiece. Chuck performs regularly which probably helps his singing. I hope he has better hair days in his other gigs.

I could remember words to about half of the songs. Mostly that is because I do sometimes listen to 60’s music on satellite radio. Others, I could associate with times and places where I was in those years. The majority of those I heard while sipping San Miguel beer in Olongapo, PI. I suppose that counts as nostalgia. If so, I did get some good out of the performance. (See what nostalgia is good for.) The backup band, consisting of two guitarists, a drummer and keyboard player, were younger and much better. Had they played loud enough to bury the singers’ voices it would have been better. I also enjoyed the reactions of the three baby boomers I was with. They acknowledged that those in the performance had lost “it” as we rode home listening to the 60’s on satellite radio.

It was as if the Happy Together 2013 Tour performers were locked into the 1960s and the only change was that they had lost “it”. The audience too, seemed to be locked in that time because there was applause after every song with people standing politely. I thought of several parallels. The first was the Emperor’s new clothes by Hans Christian Anderson. Someone needed to tell everyone connected to the tour that there was nothing left of their voices.

I thought also about Christianity and THE Church and how the Happy Together 2013 Tour could serve as a parable. I imagined Jesus sitting down to a meal with me and some gay and lesbian friends.

“There were some men that God had given great talent. Because of their abilities and hard work, they became rich and famous. They gave much pleasure, and many worshipped at their feet. A generation passed and still they sang. The same voices sang the same words to the same worshippers, but it was not the same. They and the world around them had changed. If you have ears, listen! 2000, (and more), year old words sung, (in a different language), have to be listened to differently. Only the melody is the same, and it must be played with new hands to sound as it did then.”

Being as dense as a stone and rather slow, (like Peter), I asked:” Lord, is the melody then more important than the words?”

He had compassion for me and said: “Only the melody can be danced to. Go, dance the dance of life. Be not as those men or those who worshiped them, singing and hearing with old voices and ears; listen to young voices with new ears. Listen, learn, and dance in the world of today, not as it was in past generations.”

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Foibles of the great

@ Duck and Decanter in Phoenix, AZ

I started this post last month. I don’t like it much which is why it has taken me so long to put it up. Rereading it, I found that it is not what I started out to write about. There are five people in the cast. I admire all of them. They are, in fact, great Americans. They all had flaws as human beings. They were contemporaries. They all served in WWII (although one was technically a civilian – the President of The United States is a civilian although he is also Commander in Chief of the armed forces). Much has been made of the “Greatest Generation”, those people who grew up in the depression and then went on to win WWII. Three of those, I write of, were the leaders of that generation. John Fitzgerald Kennedy is briefly mentioned here; he was of the Greatest Generation, but I mention him only in relation to his predecessors. Nixon is also mentioned, and like Kennedy was a member of the Greatest Generation, and mentioned only as VP to his President.

I encourage you to read “One last time they gather, the Greatest Generation”. This is a Guardian article from 2004. It is told from the British perspective, but it is also true of the Americans of that time.

 

What follows is the original unliked post–

 

It never ceases to amaze me how investigating the facts about stuff that I already know can throw my mind into tornado mode. I start to check on a few minor facts and wind up completely destroying an edifice of imagined knowledge accumulated over a lifetime of being curious.

In the case at hand, I stared with reading the Wikipedia entry for Dwight Eisenhower and was ‘sorta’ comparing his presidency with that of his predecessor, Harry Truman - HST, when I decided to check on the accuracy of my memory bank contents on the subject of Harry’s presidency.

My memories of Ike, Dwight Eisenhower, were mostly factual with only minor corrections needed. Truman was a completely different story. I was in high school during Ike’s last term as president and so was of the right age to learn and retain understanding of the presidency, history and the man. The views and history I read of Ike were mostly positive. Those I read of Truman and his presidency were not so much. Then too, I have actual memories of Ike’s 2^nd term, fewer of his first and almost none of Truman’s tenure. My age was the major determining factor of retention.

Historians were slow to appreciate HST’s presidency as well as the man. Congress refused to pass most of his legislation, especially those parts of it labeled “Fair Deal”.

 

I am an old guy. I am, in fact, old enough to remember both Dwight Eisenhower and Harry Truman as President. My memories of Ike, Dwight Eisenhower, are considerably more vivid than those of HST, Harry Truman. Still, I have recollections of newsreel footage of Harry campaigning from the platform of a train car, and him in Guam meeting General Douglas MacArthur.

 

These memories were reinforced by my later reading of his presidency. First, there was the incredible victory in the presidential race of 1945 over Dewey. Everyone expected Dewey to win. So much so that the Chicago Tribune, (and others) printed a front page announcing that Truman had lost. As a teenager, I read of the sign on Harry’s desk in the oval office. It read “The buck stops here”. Later, I read of how MacArthur really pissed off the President by keeping him waiting for MacArthur at the airfield in Guam. Later on, Harry, as Commander in Chief, fired the general. Mostly, the firing was because MacArthur communicated with members of Congress about issues between him and his superiors including Truman. The President told the imperious MacArthur to get lost. I suspect that Harry found pleasure in doing so.

These snapshots paint a picture of a plain spoken man that did not quit when the going got tough, took responsibility for his own actions and the actions of his subordinates. I often wonder if his relationship with MacArthur set the tone for his relations with Ike. The two presidents seemed to have a mutual dislike of one another and HST told Ike almost nothing about what was going on before Eisenhower was inaugurated. Ike in his turn heartily disliked his replacement, JFK. Was the dislike because of Harry’s treatment of Ike? I have read copious amounts of these presidential transitions and I can’t recall such simple explanations of why there were these dislikes among these men who were all seasoned politicians. The most surprising thing to me is that their personal animosities came out in such petty ways. Eisenhower was successful as the supreme allied commander, (in Europe), because he was very good at handling prima donna generals, (Patton, Montgomery, de Gaulle), that did not get along with each other. (He was also a tremendously good organizer.) As a civilian, Ike seems to have lost the ability to make everyone play nice. Even with his Vice-President, Nixon, there were disagreements and a visible rift. (Nixon had served in the military even though he was a Quaker and could have been a conscious objector.)

 

When I get snarky, I try to be extra careful in my relations with others. I know that I am not thinking correctly and that I am apt to allow my minor prejudices’ affect how I treat others. I have been rather unsettled lately and have instituted my snarky-rule. I’m not sure why the crotchetiness. The temps have been above 105 for a while and I notice that most people, including me, seem to lose their cool in the heat. Yes, pun intended. Maybe it’s just because today is the longest day of the year and as Shakespeare noted, things get a bit weird around this day. In modern times even normally polite people drive erratically, forget turn signals, change lanes suddenly for no apparent reason, and act without regard to other drivers. In my case it could be that my meds need adjusting. Who knows?

I try to monitor these feelings because if I just let them go I find myself developing dislikes for types of people and if I let go long enough they turn into resentments that fester in my consciousness.

Whatever the reason, I have trouble in remembering the second commandment – to Love my neighbor as myself. So, I find myself snarling at strangers and even people I like and admire. Later, after I recover my politeness and humanity, I usually repent and feel somewhat guilty. Later still, I comfort myself by saying “I am only human”.

I don’t believe that Harry or Ike ever felt remorse for the petty actions and dislikes they had towards each other, MacArthur, (in HST’s case), or JFK and Nixon, (in Ike’s case). I admire both Presidents greatly but find it difficult to accept the feet of clay I see. And yet, they too are only human. It is doubtful that MacArthur ever felt he was in the wrong, Kennedy died too young to know about and if Nixon truly repented of his actions, I missed it.

 

I wonder if not repenting of such feelings is a hallmark of greatness.

 

There is an oddity about the cast I have assembled here. Truman was a Southern Baptist. Eisenhower was an Episcopalian.  Nixon was a Quaker, and possibly the most religious of them all. Kennedy, famously, was a Roman Catholic. I am not sure what religion MacArthur was. From what I have read of him, I suspect that he would have had no God but himself. Still, all of them did great things.

 

I am humbled realizing that they could have snits and dislikes just as I do.

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Random thoughts about human Sexuality

^{@Brueggers Bagels, Phoenix}

⁶ How beautiful you are and how pleasing,
    my love, with your delights!
⁷ Your stature is like that of the palm,
    and your breasts like clusters of fruit.
⁸ I said, “I will climb the palm tree;
    I will take hold of its fruit.”
May your breasts be like clusters of grapes on the vine,
    the fragrance of your breath like apples,
⁹     and your mouth like the best wine.

 Song of Songs Book 7

I first read these verses as a teenager. Asking my pastor about them and the Book Song of Solomon, I was told that the book was an allegory for Christ and the Church and their love for one another. Maybe, I thought. Still, they seemed pretty graphic to a 1950’s teenager. I gave up on understanding the meaning.

Some thirty years later, I was reading a novel, and two of the characters repeated parts of the book to each other. I knew, instantly then, the true meaning of the book. It had nothing to do with Jesus and his church. It was about men, women, love and sex. Indeed, it is a celebration of love and sex.

The Song of Solomon (AKA the Song of Songs) popped into my thoughts as I was reading a blog about unfaithfulness.  The blog or column was written by a man that was a son of a father that had cheated. He remembered growing up with problems caused by the father’s infidelity. He swore he never would never cheat– and did, of course.

Most people I know condemn unfaithfulness and express the view that sex is wonderful but best between people that love each other. The Song of Solomon viewpoint. The Song goes a bit further and implies that the woman should be a virgin. Except for the virginity bit, many in modern western culture would agree if asked. Why then, is there so much straying by people in marriage or committed relationships?

The breach of the ideal appears to be as universal as the ideal.

And, not just in modern times. Homer said that the war with Troy was started because of Helen, (married at the time), hooking up with Paris. Roman history is full of examples such as Mark Anthony and Cleopatra. Precocious Churchill figured out that his mother fooled around by keen observation. The twenties had The Great Gatsby, the thirties had FDR, and the forties had Ike. The fifties music is full of sex and the sixties even more so. I lost track of what the seventies, eighties, nineties and millennial decades did with sex except to note that there was and is lots of it around. Public figures, pastors, televangelists, presidents, us commoners, all partake of sex. It seems prevalent at all levels of society.

I’m not going to bore you with statistics; you can goggle them for yourself. I will say “everyone doesn’t fool around”.  But why do so many? Many are monogamous but many are not. Is sex a cultural or a biologic thing? I am convinced that humans are hardwired for sex which means that sex itself (including being gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered or just plain queer) is a biologic deal. What about monogamy, polygamy, polyandry, celibacy, or “open” marriages? Is it OK to have multiple sexual partners serially with or without the sacrament of marriage? Is marriage a sacrament? Where does the hard wiring end and the cultural begin.

I don’t know the answers to any of the questions I have asked. I had thought that by the time I achieved my present age, 70, I would know. Sex is still in my life. Not to the extent it was, but still around. I think sexual thoughts, and feel sexual desires. I am working on my third and last marriage. I am just as clueless about the whole business as I was as a teenager. As a teen, I professed to believe that sex outside marriage was wrong. That belief did not stop me from trying to get in my girlfriends’ pants.

Experience has taught me that there is more to life than fulfilling my sexual desires. I am not sure that if I had the body, including hormones, of a teenager and my present state of mind, I would do the same things I did when younger. I like to think not, but hormones have a way of letting our bodies ignore our minds. I wonder if that is to reason why monogamy is more preached than practiced in the United States. Could it be that simple? I’m not sure. Rarely is anything about human beings simple.

Then again, today I am not convinced that sex before marriage is necessarily a bad thing. The sex I had before, outside of or in marriage did not cause any permanent harm to me or anyone else. So perhaps, I would just not feel guilty. If I did believe it was wrong, I would hope, I would not engage in it. The knowledge of what I did when younger reminds me that I don’t always manage to do what I believe to be the right thing.

I know people that have been celibate, others that have “cheated” in their marriages or committed relationships. I also know people that have remained monogamous throughout long marriages.  In my personal experience, practice of sexual conduct doesn’t seem to be related to sexual orientation, race or religious belief. It just seems to be related to being human. Some humans are monogamous. Some are faithful and others unfaithful to that ideal. I think it works for some and not for others.

Problems arise only when the biological impulses cause humans to cross cultural or religious lines. Then we feel guilty and ashamed.

What about me? I am hardwired to be straight – heterosexual. I have decided, through trial and error, that being - serially - monogamous is good for me, and that too works for me.

Apparently it doesn’t work for everyone. I am willing to accept that others have their own trials and errors, and so I don’t bother to read about it in the news.

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