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Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis

Avery Corman's The Old Neighborhood

I can unequivocally recommend The Old Neighborhood by Avery Corman, published in 1980. It's one of those books that comes as close to perfect as an author can get. I imagine that when Corman wrote it, he finished it and understood that he had written a little masterpiece. Because it really is a little gem, for reasons that are almost too complex to put into words. The feelings the book engenders are those feelings that make one desperate to hang onto those aspects of life that one doesn't understand are truly important in the making of ourselves until we are much older. When we are young we are often so desperate to get away from the town and/or home where we grew up, for reasons that make sense--we need to let go of our childhood in order to become functioning adults--but at the same time we don't understand until much later how much those times formed us and even how much we miss them. 

I lived in the Bronx from 1980 until 1985, in and around the area where Corman's protagonist, Steven Robbins, grew up and eventually left. So I understand why many people did not want to stay there, even though the neighborhoods north of 200th street and the Grand Concourse were safe for the most part. I enjoyed my time there, but I would never have wanted to settle there permanently. By the time I lived there, much of the lower Bronx looked like a war zone, with decrepit and destroyed buildings and debris everywhere. It was not like that in the 1940s. But still, most young people growing up there in the 1940s and 50s wanted to leave the old neighborhood in their quest to become successful. That meant moving to Manhattan. Steven Robbins leaves his humble beginnings behind after being offered an ad-job in California. He becomes a successful advertising man, marrying a beautiful woman--Beverly--along the way, and raising two daughters with her. They live first in California, where she grew up, and then move to New York when he is offered an ad-job he can't refuse. Beverly is no slouch, and she eventually finds her niche in terms of using her art education. They both become successful after a time, but they end up growing apart as a result. It is Beverly who wants out of the marriage; Steven is perfectly willing to put the effort in to save it. But they're at different places in their lives when they divorce; after a summer apart at Beverly's request, she tells Steven that she wants only more success, whereas Steven, who has not been happy with his success in quite a long time, doesn't really know what he wants to do with his life. He just knows two things--that he doesn't want to work in advertising anymore, and that he doesn't want to lose Beverly, but he does.  

Corman writes matter-of-factly and succinctly for the most part, but there are parts that tug at your heartstrings, especially when he describes Steven's relationship with Sam the Bookie and his experiences playing basketball with the locals. Steven finds the happiness he's looking for when he returns to live in the Bronx area where he grew up after he and Beverly divorce. It draws him out of his lethargy and depression. He rediscovers himself and what matters to him. But eventually the people around him there change, die, or move on, and he faces another emotional life upheaval. He ends up moving to Manhattan and opening a collectibles/antiques store called The Old Neighborhood, where one can find items from a distant past. You can go home again or you can carry home within you, Corman says, and you can be happy. But you cannot hang onto the past anymore than you can hang onto a dead relationship or outmoded ideas. Life has a way of changing you, pushing you onward, and that is where the melancholy seeps in. Because we do change and move on, even if we sometimes think we have remained the same person no matter what. We haven't. Perhaps our values remain the same, because they were formed by the upbringing we had. But we are not the same. Even if we return to where we grew up, we cannot recapture what was. That would be the wrong reason for returning. But we can appreciate it for what it meant and means to us, for what it tells us about ourselves and why it makes us happy, we can savor the memories and relationships, and then let it go like we must let go of all things eventually. Life is about stepping out into the unknown, about taking risks, about trying and failing and trying again. Sometimes we get it right, and sometimes we don't. Corman understands that, and he has written a lovely story about a man who found himself and what mattered to him at mid-life.  Well-worth reading. 

Missing linear TV

It's strange, I never thought I'd say it, but I miss linear TV--good old regular TV--where the programs shown follow a predetermined program schedule like in the old days. For example, The X-Files was shown on Fridays of each week on the Fox channel if I remember correctly, so you definitely had something to look forward to each week. We own a smart TV and have subscriptions to several streaming channels, among them Netflix and MAX. But lately, I'm just plain tired of being able to watch television movies or series whenever I'd like, in whatever order I'd like. It's not so much the streaming aspect that bothers me as the overwhelming content and mediocre quality of most of it. Trying to find something to watch has become a chore. Satiation--there's too much of everything leading to that overfilled feeling--too many crime series, all with the same motifs and modus operandi. Rogue policeman or -woman stumbles onto a bizarre case, usually involving a serial killer who ends up targeting said policeman. Or there are kidnapped and missing children, pedophile rings, slave rings involving the capture and torment of women, etc. All presented in a commonplace way, as though this kind of criminal activity goes on all the time. It doesn't. I've had enough of it. I don't want to watch this as entertainment, because it's simply not entertaining. As I said, there's too much of it. Satiation. Too much of a good thing, although I'm not sure I'd define much of the programming as 'good'. Most of it borders on junk. 

With some few exceptions, the episodes of streaming series are usually available all at one time, to be binged if one would like to. I don't like to, nor do I want to. The exceptions are to be found on MAX--My Brilliant Friend and The Gilded Age are two that come to mind. Upon their release, each episode is shown one at a time, one per week, and that's fine because it gives us something to look forward to. I suppose the appeal of Netflix is that you can watch as many episodes as you like all at one time; apparently younger people like to binge-watch shows. I don't want to. I'll watch an hour or so of television, and then I get restless and want to do something else. Read for example. There are so many classic books just waiting to be read, and I want to read them. 

Linear television created natural boundaries so that we didn't overdo television watching. Whether you liked it or not, you had to wait to see the next episode the following week. That's how we grew up, and I miss that. It prevented us from sitting in front of the television for hours at a time, mindlessly flipping through hundreds of channels, desperate to find something to watch. I remember my parents when we were teenagers; we maybe watched a show or movie together, and then the television was turned off and we read in the evenings. Or found something else to do. We had homework to do, so the television was never turned on before we had finished it. And we knew that, so we did our work and were rewarded. My parents understood that their time was limited, and they didn't fill their limited free time with useless television programs. Having said that, we did manage to watch a lot of the popular series of the day. So it's not that we didn't watch television, it's rather that television had its place in our lives. The television wasn't on 24/7 the way it is now in many people's lives. And that was a good thing. I miss those days. 

Rage in society

I've been thinking about rage for some time. The world is teeming with rage-filled people. Every day, there is another news story about a terrorist attack, someone being stabbed, shot, pushed in front of a subway train, terrorized by an ex-husband, murdered by an ex-husband, not to mention road rage and the inability to make a mistake in traffic without possibly losing your life over it. The list of rage-induced behaviors is long and everyone has an unfortunate story to tell. When you've been the recipient of another's rage, it's not likely that you'll forget it any time soon, if you live to tell the tale. 

What is rage? It is defined as violent uncontrollable anger. You certainly understand viscerally what rage is when you are unfortunate enough to experience it via another human being. Both men and women feel rage, but men are more likely to express their rage outwardly (acts of aggression) whereas women are less impulsive. Perhaps women weigh the consequences more, for various reasons. For women, not acting on their rage is often smarter, especially if the other person (usually a man) is likely to use violence against them in his rage outburst. It makes more sense to try to be a peacemaker in the interest of self-preservation; I would guess that is true for many women who would rather not end up bloodied and bruised at the hands of an angry man. The children of abusive parents learn that lesson very young; they learn to deflect, distract, and to dilute others' anger (and sometimes their own) in order to avoid potential abuse. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Women can say the same when dealing with violent men. 

There is such a thing as righteous anger. Righteous anger stems from a perception of injustice, that an injustice has been done to oneself, another person, another group of people. Righteous anger is not frowned upon as long as it does not lead to wanton violence and killing of those perpetrating the injustices. In our civilized societies, there are laws and courts to deal with the perpetrators of injustice. Those who hurt others out of their uncontrollable rage should pay the price--jail. We may rejoice when a perpetrator experiences karma--gets paid back for his or her transgression--but it still is best that they are dealt with under the law. We don't want vigilante justice to take hold in society. We had that once in the early days of our nation, and it was a brutal daily life for many people, especially when the vigilantes were the self-appointed 'sheriffs'. That didn't work out well. 

The anger in society is out of control. One need only witness the wars, conflicts, outward threats, veiled threats, and otherwise hostile interactions between nations, religions, leaders, etc. Aggressive rhetoric promotes aggression. Why do we elect politicians who foment hostility and aggression, even violence? Why is the world filled with angry old male politicians? Why do we want to be led by them? I'm not saying that women are necessarily better leaders, they're not. But in our civilized nations, more women should have the chance to lead countries. Nor am I saying that anger has no purpose, but continual anger lived out on a daily basis means that random acts of violent aggression, often with fatal incomes, will only increase. Is that what we want? Is that the world we want for our children and grandchildren? It is possible to identify societal problems, enforce laws, and promote peace without resorting to violence and vigilante thinking. It is possible to use anger constructively. More people should invest in anger management courses; I think they'd benefit from them. And perhaps it's time to kick the habit of watching too many violent tv series that depict murder and violence of all kinds graphically. I for one am mighty tired of all these kinds of shows and the behaviors they depict--indiscriminate use of guns and knives, stalking, murder, torture, serial killing, rape, kidnapping, home invasions, abuse of women, spousal abuse, and rage of all kinds. Why is this entertainment, day in and day out? What does it do to the minds of those who watch this as entertainment? It certainly is not entertainment. 

 

A view of January that I can agree with

Those of us who enjoy December and the Christmas season do not look forward to the month of January (this describes me, in any case). This was posted on the Happy Gardens Facebook site; I don't know who the creator is. 

Plants make it all alright

This describes me perfectly!

My wish for the new year

Wishing all my readers a very happy and healthy new year! Hopefully these words from Peggy Toney Horton will inspire you.......

The obsession with evaluating and rating things

A very apt commentary on the state of affairs in society right now. Thank you again, Pearls Before Swine and Stephan Pastis. It's true that no matter what we do or buy, someone is waiting in the wings to ask us 'how'd we do?' The silliest is when I've bought trivial items and the companies that sell them want to know what I think of them. Why? Is it important in the general scheme of things? How did we manage before? I'm not necessarily opposed to rating a hotel stay or customer service at a restaurant, but I refuse to be pressured into it. And often it feels like we're being pressured into it when companies send email after email to remind you to rate them. Sometimes I really don't want to rate anything at all. So if I don't want to do it, I don't. 

Winter darkness

I probably write a post about winter darkness each year, and each year I end up feeling the same way about winter darkness as I did the year before, so I put pen to paper to say that I don't like it. The winter days are too short, the nights are too long. It gets dark between 3:30 and 4 pm, and stays dark until around 8 am when light starts to filter through the clouds. The sun doesn't formally rise however until after 9 am. This morning sunrise was at 9:19 am and sunset was at 3:19 pm. That amounts to six hours of daylight and eighteen hours of darkness. 

Sometimes I wake up (unwillingly) in the middle of the night, turn on the light, and look at the clock. I did that this morning; the clock showed 6:30 am and it was still pitch black outside. I thought to myself, I can get through December and January, but after that, I'm ready for the light and warmth of spring. Imagine a world without the sun. Imagine our planet trying to survive without the warming sun. I wouldn't want to live in that world. It's no wonder our ancestors feared the dark and worshipped the sun. I would have done the same. 

You never know what's lurking in the dark, and even if it's not a real danger or threat, there is a tendency when I wake up in the middle of the night for my thoughts to veer in a pensive direction. Normally I wouldn't mind that, but in the middle of the night, I do. Because my mind races with all sorts of thoughts, blown out of proportion, that seem almost trivial and silly in the light of day. One thing I've learned--don't make any important life decisions at 3 am in pitch darkness. That's never a good idea. 

Darkness evokes feelings of emptiness, sadness, fear, loneliness and depression. Fear of the unknown, the void, the emptiness. Fear of not mattering to a soul, fear of being alone in the universe. Darkness feels all-encompassing, as though it will envelope and swallow you. Summer darkness is less intense than winter darkness, but I still don't like it. Daylight and sunlight bring feelings of contentment, happiness, safety, togetherness and joy. Daylight ushers in a lightness of spirit. In the daylight, in the warmth of the sun, I feel the sense of possibility--that anything can be tackled as long as there is light. 

Rat and the modern lifestyle

My laugh for the day, thanks to Stephan Pastis and Pearls Before Swine......I always get a kick out of Rat. 

Meeting my little robin friend again

I try to visit my garden every other day or so to ensure that the bird feeders are filled. When I went there today, the feeders were nearly empty. I refilled them all, and then sat on the bench and watched as the little birds flew to the feeder to eat. I was surprised by a visit from a larger bird--a black thrush. He made his presence known and kept the small birds at bay as he ate. Such is the way of nature. After he left, I made sure there was still plenty of seeds. 

The nicest part of my visits is meeting my little robin friend again. When I first arrived in the garden today, he was the first one to greet me. Of course I can't rule out that he views me as 'matmor' (literally translated = food mother), but nevertheless, I find him to be just adorable. Today he hovered around me and let me take a few videos and photos of him at the feeding station. When I walked away from it to go sit down on the bench, which is a bit of a distance from the station, he followed me and perched himself in the ninebark bush next to the greenhouse, all the while watching me. He is curious and quite friendly. How attached you can become to such little creatures. God's creatures. It would break my heart if anything ever happened to him, so I hope and pray that it won't, and that he'll survive the winter and make it into spring. Hopefully he'll reunite with his mate (if he has one). I haven't seen her, whereas I've seen him, usually solo, hanging around my garden for the past two years or so. 

Here is a video from today's visit so you can get to see him. He seems to be a contented little bird. 

Loneliness and longing

At Christmas mass last night, the priest gave a short sermon about God's longing for us. He meant that God did not want to be alone, he wants to be with man whom he has created. He seeks us. He wants us to accept him into our lives. Somehow, when he said this in just this way, I felt a certain empathy for God. I thought--was it possible for the divine to feel loneliness? Or is loneliness just a human emotion? I don't think so, but how can we ever know? The only thing I know is that when I feel lonely, it has more to do with my spirit and less to do with the corporeal. When I feel lonely, I also long for fellowship but mostly for understanding. In this context, loneliness is associated with the longing to be understood by those around me but also by the divine. It's possible to feel alienated from both at times, thus creating a feeling of loneliness (longing). God also wants man to understand him as much as is humanly possible. So that makes me wonder if our feelings are (a small) part of what defines the 'divine'. Lots of questions, but no answers, as always when it comes to faith and spirituality. We accept a lot on trust, and that's fine. But I like the idea that God can feel loneliness; after all, if he created all things, then he understands loneliness, and he understands that loneliness is part of the human condition. 

I like the priest who celebrated mass last night because he seems to be a peaceful, non-combative soul, not aggressive in speech or manner. He does not attack his congregation with fire-and-brimstone sermons, but engages them in a kind way with sermons that speak of the power of love (agape). I found myself thinking of Pope Francis, who seems to be made of the same cloth. Francis recently exhorted priests to shorten their sermons, which is wonderful advice, especially for priests who insist on just repeating the words of the gospels and not offering any reflections on the relevance of the gospel words. We don't need the gospel words reiterated verbatim; we're perfectly capable of understanding the words. I want a reflective approach to sermons, or you can mostly skip them in my opinion. In the world we live in now, we need more priests who are willing to truly reflect on the words of the gospels and offer advice on how to live with faith in a world such as ours. 

I wrote to a friend of mine recently who is going through a tough time that having hope for change, hope that things can get better, is the essence of our faith. A message of redemption--that it's never too late to change the path we're on or to ask for forgiveness or to make amends. That is the message of Easter but also of Christmas. We wait during Advent for the birth of a being who was sent to us by God. We open our hearts to this baby in the hope that we will be blessed and transformed. Babies and small children can do that to you--open your heart and transform your spirit. No wonder that God decided that Christ would start life as a baby. When you think about it, it makes perfect sense. But in order to be transformed, we need to accept ourselves for who we are with all our faults and peccadilloes and to ask God to enter our lives. Sounds easy, but for many people, it's not. But by accepting him into our lives, the loneliness associated with the longing to be understood can lessen. 

Merry Christmas from our house to yours

 

Reflections on his life from Camus

Here's to hope, faith, persistence and resilience at Christmastime and in the new year......

Reflections on life from Albert Camus. 

“My dear, 

In the midst of hate, 

I found there was, within me, 

an invincible love. 

In the midst of tears, 

I found there was, within me, 

an invincible smile. 

In the midst of chaos, 

I found there was, within me, 

an invincible calm. 

I realized, through it all, that; 

In the midst of winter,

I found there was, within me, 

an invincible summer. 

And that makes me happy. 

For it says that no matter 

how hard the world pushes 

against me, within me, 

there’s something stronger,

something better, 

pushing right back. 

Truly yours, 

Albert Camus,” Summer in Algiers

The Spinners--It's a Shame

I saw the movie The Holiday again recently, and one of the main characters had this song as his cell phone ringtone. I grew up with this music and hearing the song again brought me right back to that time. It's a great song by a great group--The Spinners. They don't make music like this anymore. Enjoy.......