Another way of looking at it

Another way of looking at life's detours.......

What to say to a writer

Nothing else to do but laugh when I read this. I can imagine it's like this in some literary arenas where the air is rarefied, if they're anything like the good ole boys' clubs found in academic circles. Mutual admiration societies, and if you're not part of one, oh well. Too bad for you.  

Vaccination competition

Did I ever mention how much I love Pearls Before Swine (probably a hundred times if I was counting). Stephan Pastis' sense of humor appeals to me. Today's strip was funny in that bizarre nutso way he has of reflecting on what goes on in society. Enjoy. 

In my later years

I am now living like this after years of not living like this. It's not that I was unhappy before (research science used to be a creative profession until it was taken over by bureaucrats), just that I'm happier now that I am working only for myself. I consider myself lucky that I loved what I did for many years (over thirty years working as an academic research scientist), until I didn't anymore due to the bureaucratic infiltration that hit us full on about ten years ago. No regrets about retiring. Moving on has been a happy change!

A necessary reminder

Just a reminder, for those Americans (and any others) who are complaining about the high gas prices.....

No one else is quite like you

Worth remembering especially when you get discouraged.....

Harbingers of spring

How the snowdrops look now as of March 5 this year

How the snowdrops looked on March 16 of last year

Each year in March, the snowdrops make their appearance. They are the harbingers of spring, and my heart is overjoyed each time I see them. They are hardy flowers, poking up through the remaining snow and dead leaves covering the garden. They precede crocuses and hyacinths which make their appearance in April, closer to Easter. 

I love hardy flowers. I love anything that survives a tough environment. In that regard, I'm a fan of berry bushes too, as well as rhododendrons. Raspberry, gooseberry, blackberry, black currant and red currant bushes survive the cold winter and freezing temperatures and bloom like clockwork each year. There is something so heartening about a garden. It gives one something to believe in, especially when it seems that all hope is lost in the world. A garden provides hope. It is a place of renewal. It tells us that we can start again, start over, leave our winter souls behind and embrace the warm sunshine on our faces. I've often wondered what the world would be like without the sun. Life as we know it would end, of course, but I'm sure many people would commit suicide before that eventuality. Who would want to live in perpetual darkness? I suppose there is a good reason that Christ is seen as the light of the world; our souls do not have to live in darkness if we seek him. It seems that more than ever, we need to seek him, since our world is moving toward darkness. I will find him in my garden, that I know.  

The turn of events in the world

I haven't posted this past week, and it's not because I've run out of things to say. It's because I'm shocked by the turn of events in the world. Russia invaded Ukraine and most of the world united against the aggressor Russia. I'm astounded by how fast that happened, both the invasion and the reaction to it. We knew the invasion was coming, but the unity of the reaction impresses me. I'm so heartened to see all of the businesses that are pulling out of Russia, the freezing of Russian assets, etc. While I know that many Russians don't support Putin's decision or his world view, the fact remains that they are the only ones who can end his reign of terror and paranoia. They are the only ones who can rise up against him. It has to come from within their country. I'm all for supporting Ukraine with weapons and military equipment, and if need be, personnel, but only if absolutely necessary. But if we do, the USA and NATO will be part of a new world war, and what will that mean for humanity's future, especially if it becomes a nuclear war?

What has also surprised me is how many wealthy people there are in Russia, all of whom are worried about their wealth and their freedom now that sanctions are a reality. Russian oligarchs. I looked up the word oligarch just to be sure I understood its meaning. An oligarch is 'a person who is part of a small group holding power in a state'. Wikipedia defines Russian oligarchs as 'business oligarchs of the former Soviet republics who rapidly accumulated wealth during the era of Russian privatization in the aftermath of the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the 1990s'. In other words, opportunists who got filthy rich at the expense of the country; they support Putin and their resources help to finance his invasion ( FACT SHEET: The United States Continues to Target Russian Oligarchs Enabling Putin’s War of Choice | The White House). Putin is very wealthy as are many in his cabinet and many of his cronies. Of course they want to preserve their wealth; in that respect they are no different than many American billionaires. The difference is that American billionaires are not considered to be oligarchs, although one can wonder at times about their intelligence and morality (or lack of it). I need only think of Jeff Bezos wanting the city of Rotterdam in the Netherlands to take down a bridge so that he can sail his 458 million dollar yacht out of the city (Rotterdam to partly dismantle historic bridge for Jeff Bezos’s superyacht | Netherlands | The Guardian). Rotterdam surprisingly enough has agreed to do that. Or Kim Kardashian paying 150 million dollars for her new private jet. People are starving in the world and they use amounts of money that 99% of the world population will never see during their entire lives.  

I'm not shocked about how power corrupts or about how absolute power corrupts absolutely. One need only take a look at some toxic workplaces to understand this. Unchecked power wreaks havoc on a workplace, just as it wreaks havoc on a country. One must stand up to power-hungry bullies and aggressors, but it seldom happens if they have the power. Toxic workplaces are like toxic countries, just on a smaller scale. You do as you're told or else. The 'or else' can be everything from being fired to being harassed, frozen out of the majority, or mocked. Imagine working for Trump and getting on his wrong side; we've all witnessed how he treated those he considered to be 'disloyal'. Luckily for the USA, its founders built in a set of checks and balances so that the president would never have absolute power. They did not want a king as leader of America. Trump is fascinated by authoritarian leaders like Putin; you could wonder if he wants to be in the same position, the undisputed leader with absolute power. 

The uncomfortable truth is that many people view the extremely wealthy as successful and good people. I'm sure a number of them are, but many aren't. Many are just plain amoral, unconcerned with the right and wrong of a particular issue. And men like Jeffrey Epstein, Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby and OJ Simpson, who are just plain immoral, who behave evilly because they think (know) they can get away with their abhorrent behavior. What surprises me are the number of people living in borderline poverty who think people like Trump, Bezos, or Gates really care about them. What don't they understand? Trump, Bezos, Gates, and other wealthy people do not represent them. They actually have no idea about how the other 99% of people in the world live. How can they, when if they want to travel, they hop on their private jets and avoid what the rest of us have to deal with anytime we want to travel--traffic on the way to the airport, queues at the airport, the economy section of the plane that packs people together like sardines. During the recent pandemic, they were not crammed into their tiny apartments in Manhattan or the Bronx, they were ensconced in their beach houses or vacation houses far from overpopulated cities. 

I don't envy the wealthy, I never have. I grew up with people who did, who wondered why they weren't wealthier, why they couldn't have what their wealthy friends had. I never cared too much about money. Had I cared, I certainly wouldn't have chosen an academic career. Scientists made very little money when I was starting out. I chose my career based on my interest in it, but I did of course know that it would pay me enough so that I could live and take care of myself. Most people think this way. I am appreciative of the innovation and jobs that the wealthy create when they start companies based on their innovative ideas, but at some point their wealth gets the upper hand and things get out of hand. They forget where they came from and they surround themselves with people who preferably don't remind them of where they came from. 

Putin seems to have forgotten where he came from. He is interested in preserving his power and wealth like most right-wing ultraconservatives. He may have been a communist once but no longer. He will kill many innocent people to protect his power and wealth. He is not interested in what is good for Russia, only in what is good for himself. He is both amoral and immoral and the world will eventually be better off without him. How that happens is anyone's guess. I am very grateful for all of the unnamed diplomats in the world who work tirelessly to preserve peace and prevent war. I never understood before what an important role they play in preserving the fragile peace in the world. God bless them. 

Some quotes about evil

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. --Edmund Burke

Indifference, to me, is the epitome of evil. --Elie Wiesel

He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it. --Martin Luther King, Jr.

It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways. --Buddha

Ignorance, the root and stem of all evil. --Plato

The only good is knowledge, and the only evil is ignorance. --Herodotus

Evil is unspectacular and always human, and shares our bed and eats at our own table. --W. H. Auden

Each of us has a vision of good and of evil. We have to encourage people to move towards what they think is good... Everyone has his own idea of good and evil and must choose to follow the good and fight evil as he conceives them. That would be enough to make the world a better place. --Pope Francis

Fear is pain arising from the anticipation of evil. --Aristotle

Boredom is the root of all evil - the despairing refusal to be oneself. --Soren Kierkegaard

Evil is whatever distracts. --Franz Kafka

I define a 'good person' as somebody who is fully conscious of their own limitations. They know their strengths, but they also know their 'shadow' - they know their weaknesses. In other words, they understand that there is no good without bad. Good and evil are really one, but we have broken them up in our consciousness. We polarize them. --John Bradshaw

All good is hard. All evil is easy. Dying, losing, cheating, and mediocrity is easy. Stay away from easy. --Scott Alexander

It is not enough for us to restrain from doing evil, unless we shall also do good. --St. Jerome

The bad man desires arbitrary power. What moves the evil man is the love of injustice. --John Rawls

The belief that there is only one truth, and that oneself is in possession of it, is the root of all evil in the world. --Max Born

I believe the root of all evil is abuse of power. --Patricia Cornwell

Another great Pearls Before Swine--The Game of Covid Life

 Pretty much sums it up!

The modern dance film Ritual In Transfigured Time from 1946

I am a Friend of Untermyer Gardens (located in Yonkers New York), and I often receive emails from Stephen F. Byrns who is the President of the Untermyer Gardens Conservancy. He sent out an email this week that included this clip of a modern dance film from 1946 called Ritual in Transfigured Time by Maya Deren, who was an American experimental avant-garde filmmaker. Born in the Ukraine, she was also a choreographer, dancer, film theorist, poet, lecturer, writer, and photographer (info from Wikipedia). 

The reason Byrns included the film clip was because Deren filmed the dance at Untermyer Gardens. I found the film to be moving and quite mesmerizing, almost menacing in some places. I'd never heard of Deren before, but I'm glad I know about her now. 

Every now and then

 No words necessary.....

Update from the home front February 2022

It's been six months since I stopped working. Six peaceful months of not having to answer to someone else. Six months of reorganizing the way I look at my life and what I want to do with my free time. I don't think there was ever any doubt in my mind that I wanted to focus full-time on writing. So far that seems to be working out well. I just submitted a poetry collection (in Norwegian) to a publisher here in Oslo and am hoping for a positive response. If they don't want to publish it, I'll self-publish it as a Norwegian e-book and then I'll self-publish the English translation on Amazon. I've already translated all the poems into English so it's ready to go at any point. This poetry collection is entitled Movements Through the Landscape (Bevegelser gjennom landskapet in Norwegian). 

I've also finished writing my garden book as well as my book about growing up in Tarrytown NY. I started the latter well over ten years ago, but what with working full-time, personal challenges and other obligations, it's taken a while to finish it. Now I need to find a publisher for this book as well. I'm thinking about self-publishing my garden book. I tried to get a literary agent interested in it last summer but no go. The publishing world can be as elitist in many ways as the world of academia that I happily left behind. Once you get your foot in the door as a published author, your books continue to get published even though they may not be anywhere near as good as your last one. But that's life. As my friend's father used to say, don't let the turkeys get you down. Good advice. Another piece of good advice for building self-esteem and believing in yourself is to stay off social media. It's just a time-waster and a negative spiral that will drag you down. I'd cancel my social media accounts without any problem except that I have enjoyable contact with a number of American friends and family and I'd miss that. We'll see what time brings.

Here's to a productive 2022 for every creative soul I know. Creativity is hard work but it's incredibly rewarding, no matter what type of creativity it is. 

Wendell Berry's The Peace of Wild Things

I found this the other day online and it resonated with me. Wendell Berry is a well-known American poet who is a firm believer in the importance of man's connection to the land via small-scale farming, and who lives that belief. You can read more about him online here: Wendell Berry - Wikipedia

I loved this poem and wanted to share it with you. 

Men who leave and men who stay

We're back in Elena Ferrante territory today. Apologies to her for paraphrasing one of the book titles in her Neapolitan quadrilogy--Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay. I finished Days of Abandonment today; it was written in 2002, prior to the Neapolitan quadrilogy. The latter books are more riveting than Days of Abandonment, but Days of Abandonment has its riveting moments as well.

Men don't come off very well in Ferrante's books. They are mostly sexual predators at heart, constantly looking at other women, faithless, disloyal, and uncaring opportunists. They are not child-friendly nor are they really interested in family life. As Olga in Days of Abandonment says to Mario, who has abandoned her and their two children for a woman almost half his age (Carla), "you are an opportunist and a traitor". Which he is. Unfortunately he is not much more than that as written by Ferrante. The book is really about Olga and her breakdown after he leaves her. She must cope with all of the mess while taking care of her two children Gianni and Ilaria and the family dog Otto. She doesn't do a very good job of any of it and she knows it. Her identity unravels and she is forced to do the work of finding out who she is at the age of thirty-eight. She doesn't particularly like what she sees--a woman who gave up her writing career and her identity to marry Mario and have children. The roles of wife and mother became her identities. She thought her marriage was happy; perhaps it was. Even if marriages are happy, one partner can always be unfaithful and stay in the marriage, or be unfaithful and leave. Mario does both, actually. He starts his affair with Carla when she is still a teenager and leaves Olga for her when Carla turns twenty. He closes the door on one life and begins another. He does not tell Olga where he is or with whom he is living. She doesn't even get to know where he is living and does not find out about Carla until midway through the book. And then all the pieces come together for her. The description of her breakdown is disturbing and uncomfortable, perhaps as it should be, but it dragged on too long for my taste. Otto dies after being poisoned with something he ate that was laced with strychnine while Olga was out walking him in the park. Her son Gianni becomes ill with a high fever. She feels like she is falling apart. But this experience made its point. 'The only way out is through'. By the time Olga has gotten through it, she discovers she no longer loves Mario. It's as though she has stepped outside her own life and become an observer. She watches as her children visit Mario and meet Carla, she listens as they praise Carla, she eventually deals with Mario adult to adult, she reclaims her identity as a writer, she listens to him complain that his children will ruin his relationship with Carla, and she finds that she really doesn't care about any of it. She understands that Mario is an opportunist and a traitor and tells him that. She no longer needs him. In other words, she grew up. She grew out of a stale banal marriage that her husband abandoned years ago in secret. She stepped out from under Mario's shadow. The patriarchal dominance that has ruled her life for so long is gone. She finds that she does not want to date or be social or be with other men, at least not if she has no say in how these events are to happen. But eventually she starts an affair with the older musician who lives below her and that is how the book ends. She is nearly forty and she is writing again. The rest of it is just the life around her in all its messiness and discomfort. She learns to live with both. Days of Abandonment is an angry book, but the anger is directed both at Mario and at herself for giving up so much of herself. No one asked her to do that; she chose the prison of the wife/mother identity and became entrapped. She could have continued writing, she could have insisted that Mario help more with the children. So many things she should have done, but she didn't. She tries to understand why Mario left her, and discovers that she really didn't know him. She constructed the idea of a happy marriage around them; his idea of what their marriage was did not seem to interest her. Or if it did, she ignored his attempts to break free. But in any case, nothing she could have done would have kept Mario from straying. He was a man who leaves, not one who stays. 

There is autobiographical content in her novels to be sure. Exactly where, in which novels, remains a mystery and that's fine with me. Ferrante writes under a pseudonym for reasons that only she alone knows. This places most of the focus on the stories, where it should be. But after having read a number of her books--the Neapolitan quadrilogy, Troubling Love, Days of Abandonment, and The Lying Life of Adults, it seems to me that she has dealt with a number of emotional and psychological issues (traumas?) that have preoccupied her throughout her life, through her writing. Men cannot be trusted to be faithful since they leave their wives for other (often younger) women. Love is mostly about sexual bonding and less about loyalty and empathy. Mothers and daughters have volatile relationships; mothers love their daughters but are also jealous of them, particularly if the daughters have the chance to pursue higher education while they did not. The relationships between mothers and children generally are also precarious; they are fraught with frustration, weariness, irritation and real anger in addition to the maternal bond of love. Ferrante makes it clear that children change everything in a marriage, for better and/or for worse. Her ambivalence about the roles of wife and mother is clear throughout her writing. She has no qualms about bringing up the 'worse'--being chained to these small beings who demand attention and love, the banality of childcare, the reduction of woman's role to wife and mother and not much else. Ferrante is an Italian novelist but her novels are international bestsellers, which is illustrative of just how relevant her themes are on a global level. The interesting thing is that Days of Abandonment was written in 2002; it could have been written in the 1970s, when the women's movement was dealing with many of the same issues--women's identities, self-realization, marriage versus single life, having children or not. It tells me that the issues that women face now are not so much different than those they faced in the 1970s or those that our mothers faced in their generation. Men left their wives and children back in the 1950s and 1960s too, for many of the same reasons as they do now. If you ask them directly, they will answer selfishly. They want a woman who is sexually exciting, who is interested in sex. They want a woman who pays attention to them. What they want is often at odds with what they get from marriage and family, where there is often limited time for both sex and personal attention. And so it goes. As long as couples have children and children become the focus of marriage, there will always be men who leave and men who stay. And perhaps women who leave and women who stay. Perhaps it's worth repeating that one should choose one's life partner carefully and marry a person who is faithful and loving. But how do you know that when you marry? How can you be sure of how the future will turn out? You can't, so you do the best you can and commit to the choice you make. How it turns out is often the stuff of novels.