Long Walks on the Beach

It’s Not Easy Being Green

 

 

L. Stewart Marsden

Control v. the lack of control is a conflict I’ve lived with for most of my life. It’s at the heart of AA’s mantra — and gaining the wisdom to know the difference is, in my experience, a life-long pursuit. In retrospect, I’ve been far more foolish than wise.

I’m hesitant to write these thoughts, as inevitably someone will point out there are no excuses for some/many of what I struggle with. The good news — at least to me — is that I do struggle with them. In a world that seems to have become black and white on so many issues, I’m in that fifty shades of gray area, and I’m not talking about the book and its focus. 

What I absolutely cannot and did not control:

1. When and where I was born;
2. Who comprised my family;
3. What level of social status I was born into;
4. What level of income my family had;
5. What my level of innate intelligence was;
6. What my skill tendencies and talents were/are;
7. When and how I will die;
8. What levels of pain those I love will go through, and whether or not they will endure them;
9. Who I am attracted to;
10. What tragedies will impact my life.

No doubt there are more, but the short list should suffice.

It has taken me these many years (I’m approaching seven decades on this earth) to realize and accept the responsibility that all of the above are not excuses, and that I have either controlled or abdicated control over the effects of those things over which I had no control. In other words, allowed the uncontrollable to control me. It’s the laissez-faire tendency that has been a challenge to overcome. The “well, that’s just who I am” attitude of helpless resolution.

I’m currently watching (binging, really) the Netflix series, “Grace & Frankie.” To mark just how far and to what extent American culture has changed, the show would never have been produced back in the early days of television. That’s not what goes through my head as I watch it, though. What goes through my head are the various elements of the series that I struggle with. I’m supposed to simply be and let be, right? And if I am uncomfortable about various scenarios of the show, that’s an indication there’s something wrong with me, right?

I won’t spoil the series for you with detail, other than the basic plot is two male partners in a law firm announce to their respective wives they are gay, and are divorcing their wives so that the men can marry each other. Archie Bunker would have dropped dead. I’ve never been an Archie Bunker type, but found myself not understanding it, either. 

What does that make me, then? Homophobic? I probably am. And I could probably point to the era into which I was born as an excuse, or the implied revulsion of the Bible over people who act out their same-gender sexual orientations. Or the myriad of conclusions the rigidly straight world makes as an explanation to one recurring question, “Why did God make me this way?” I won’t belabor the responses, which are just as fantastic as dogmatic believers explaining how the world was created in six days. That particular “sin” has found its way to the top of the charts, and has remained so in the religious minds of many.

Still, I admit to being bothered by it. So I’m left with what can I control about this issue? My mouth, for one. Not out of fear of being labeled myself, but making sure whatever I say and however I react is carefully measured for its impact. 

My children are more tolerant of far more than I. I’m not sure that means they are better people than I am — whatever that means — but they are certainly more understanding. They have lived with a variety of change that really wasn’t change for them. 

I grew up when the south was segregated. Separate, but equal, ran the dogma. Bathrooms. Movie theaters. Schools. Water fountains. And my parents hired black women to do various necessary things about the house — even though my mother didn’t work outside the house. Not every white family had maids or people to do yard work. But we did. How do I reconcile that past with what is now the norm? It clearly falls under the controllable part of my life. I wasn’t born a racist. As Rogers and Hammerstein clarified in South Pacific, “You’ve got to be carefully taught.” But I have worked sincerely on that aspect of my life in a variety of ways, yet, I suppose the term racist does apply to me at some levels. 

I grew up when “gay” didn’t refer to someone who preferred to sexually and emotionally connect with members of their own gender. Or when the other parts of LGBT where code words, and not political referendums.

I grew up when sex was not explicit — either in attire or behavior — on the scale it is today. When one-night-stands were not necessarily planned, and when females were more coy than aggressive in relationships. When married TV couples slept in single beds separated by a lamp table.

Grace & Frankie takes shots at many of these, including guns (another sacred cow). That’s probably the only controversial issue I have settled for myself: I don’t and probably won’t ever own one. It’s your right, however. What I cannot understand is how we’ve gotten to the place nearly all school children from kindergarten up have to be drilled in safety procedures to protect them from someone with a gun.

It’s a difficult transition from the world I grew up in to the world in which we now live. My pathway has been along lines that are less absolute. I wouldn’t have either thought of or predicted that when I was sixteen. But when I was eighteen? As I’ve written before, the convergence of civil rights, women’s rights, and Vietnam was the point 9 earthquake that seemed to shake things up forever. Of course, these are not excuses either.

I’ve often looked back to wistfully remember “the good old days.” I realize they weren’t good for everyone; that the agonizingly slow change for the better for them has not been as easy for me and others like me as well. We had to either change as well — or dig in. Many chose to dig in. Others of us have elected to change within. Either choice has its results and/or consequences. Neither is easy.

It’s not easy being green, said someone very wise.

The Phil Mickelson Caveat

 

By L. Stewart Marsden

As expected, sports news talking heads are all abobble about one of the two major take-always from the 2018 U.S. Open Golf Championship at Shinnecock Hills Golf Course this weekend in Southampton, NY.

An aside: Wonder why the nation is not equally outraged by the golf course’s logo? It never came up, somehow.

One has clearly drawn the serious attention away from the other. Phil’s desperate antics on the 13th (ironic, no?) hole in venting his day-long putting frustration by whacking his putted golf ball that was clearly going to end up (oh, who knows where?) drew the commentating from how the PGA screwed up again with an unholy course, already difficult, and made three times more difficult by shaving the grass from the greens.

At least for the moment. While spewing venom at the game’s most likable pro, greens keepers flooded the greens at the end of Round Three after Big Guy Dustin Johnson unceremoniously slipped the balding slopes from what looked like an insurmountable four-stroke lead of -4 to a share of the lead by day’s end at +3.

“Cheater!” cried the pompous PGA elders.

”Horrible precedence,” they added.

So, without due process, Mickelson was hung out to dry. If only he had taken a knee instead of stopping his hockey puck putt!

Did you know that duffers like me make mince-meat of the rules of golf on a regular basis?

Ever hear of the 10-inch rule? According to my brother, you can move your ball to any point within a 10-inch diameter to improve your lie. You won’t find that one in the book.

Ever hear of the Mulligan rule? Or the reincarnated Mulligan?

Ever hear of the “within the putter grip” rule?

The PGA has spent a lot of money trying to get golfers to follow the rules.

Actually, Phil DID follow the rules. Ask any defense lawyer. He gladly took the penalty.

Was it the right thing to do?

Well, if morality is going to enter the conversation, then let’s talk about DJ’s reported dalliances. And what about … TW? How quickly we forget and forgive. Don’t worry, plenty more scarlet letters where Phil’s “C” comes from.

Did you know it’s thought golf was actually a drinking game? At least, the winners were afforded drinking credits. And even that it was banned and against the law to play it? Look it up. It’s on the internet. Gotta be true.

Here’s what would be fair in terms of the controversy over Phil’s sin:

Make him play the remainder of the round, and the next five tournaments in which he plays, right-handed. Now that should be tantamount to cutting off his hands at the wrist. Except Phil is actually right-handed, and I’m sure would adjust. Then cut off one of his feet. “I’m still playing!” Okay, then –– cut off the other foot. “I’m still playing!”

You live by the rules … you die by the rules.

You might look at Phil’s action from a different perspective, however. Isn’t he really saying, I’ve done this that you may be free (of the rules)? Kind of a golfing savior for the rest of us golfing wannabes.

Back to the real problem this weekend: while there was some nasty satisfaction at watching the world’s best golfers get massacred by those gatling gun greens, it was also sad.

PGA:
Please don’t ever do that again! Choose courses for The Open that are indeed challenging and have the respect of each golfer, but don’t make them impossible! I hated looking at the leaderboard this weekend. Don’t go back to Shinnecock Hills until they pledge to

1. plant a few trees back,
2. let the grass on the greens grow a bit.
3. change their logo. How about a shield that has something representing a shin and something that represents a cock?

As it is currently, I’m sure most of the PGA golfers who played the course this weekend felt cuckolded –– by the course AND by the PGA.

 

I hear voices

I Hear Voices

By L. Stewart Marsden

I hear voices. They come from out of nowhere like seeds borne by a dark wind, down into my ears and along the canals, edging further into my head where they take root.

That’s the best description I can give when considering how I come to write a poem, or a short story, or play, or argument about something.

Mysterious; elusive; inexplicable.

I hear the conversations between characters, who verbally spar with each other in my stories or plays. I hear the rhythm and rhyme of thoughts that spin into poems about whatever I’m experiencing. I see the stages where the works take place: an ocean, a mountain, a savanna, a city street. I smell the salt air, the pungent sassafras, the dry grass, the wet pavement. I hear the surrounding sounds of the background: a wave gently crashing onto the sand, the kree of a circling hawk, the rustle of the ocean of grasses, a distant ambulance.

Sometimes the voices are therapeutic. They worm into my subconscious and attack my fears and misgivings and self-doubt. They break the grip of things that seem to want to paralyze me and hold me back. And when those things are exposed to the light — as when Mommy bursts in to turn on the light during a nightmare — there are no ogres or monsters or creepy-crawlies under the bed or tucked into my closet.

Just the words. The poems. The stories.

My tinctures and salves are as imaginary as the ailments they address. Just words and thoughts.

Not all hear the voices. It’s both curse and blessing. Curse in the dead of night when they persist to prattle on until I eventually crawl out from my covers to tap them out onto the screen of my iPad. Blessing in when the effort is complete, and awaits the next step. I can fall back into my bed, deeply exhausted, and the voices are quiet.

You might think it’s madness. I suppose to a degree it is. There’s enough to surviving a lifetime than adding to it more things to read, to consider, to mull over.

But the voices don’t care about that. They want their day, whether they are read or not; appreciated or not; understood or not.

Me? For some reason I’m just one of the many vessels through which they choose to flow.

Next time you’re on a plane, or the subway, or walking a crowded street, or lingering in the shade beside a creek — listen.

Do you hear them?

I hope you do.

And Now a Word …

 

By L. Stewart Marsden

I’ve been amazed at the quality and production value of TV commercials over the past few years. Especially the ones aimed at the national marketplace — though it’s difficult to tell, sometimes.

It used to be that various industries dominated the airways in attempts to bend my mind to buy their products. As a kid, that didn’t work so well. Most were aimed at Mom and Dad. Dinah Shore and Chevrolet (Burt must have liked those). Speedy, the animated drug pusher (although the Drop, drop, fizz, fizz, oh what a relief it is part could have been used for a laxative product as well). Madge and her green “you’re soaking in it!” reveal. The incredibly mesmerizing Comfort Fit bra commercials (as close to skin as it got in the day and much better than National Geographic).

For me they were real bothers (other than the bra commercials), especially if the Lone Ranger was about to ride Silver into a canyon where there were about a hundred bad guys lying in wait. The cliff hanger.

And now a word … That part hasn’t changed. Then, no remotes to click on the “Last” button to toggle to another show. But even that has been taken into consideration today in a last-ditch effort by Madison Avenue, and most of the commercials seem to be synchronized to begin at the same time. I’ve actually surfed through several stations at commercial time and landed on the same commercial, milliseconds separation. Technology!

The only commercials I paid attention to were the rough and gruff cowboys who rode off into the sunset with a Marlboro stuck to their lower lips, the ash about 3 inches long (symbolism?). Or the Chesterfield commercials where doctors told me smoking was safe (https://youtu.be/TOKc6TNwlj4). At the time, a pack of cigarettes could be bought for a quarter from the cigarette vending machine tucked into the Men’s room of a local gas station.

Today, commercials are full of comedy, action, good writing and incredible acting. There are two times a year I look forward to a barrage of commercials willingly: the Super Bowl, and the Clio Awards. The first is an all-out competition between brands to wow and spin us about with ad producers’ incredible creativity and artistry. The second is an industry pat-on-the-back of its blatant efforts to seduce and manipulate.

My current favorite is the All State commercial where a teen enters his parents bedroom to admit a fender-bender (https://youtu.be/zBYTIklIodE) incident. I can identify as both the kid as well as the adult.

The arrival of the industry to this level of entertainment wasn’t overnight. Coca-Cola has been striving for years for the emotional prod for a long time. “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing, https://youtu.be/ib-Qiyklq-Q” is iconic –– as well as the Mean Joe Greene commercial https://youtu.be/xffOCZYX6F8. If you don’t know of these, you are too young and need to be spanked and sent to bed.

There have been ads that leave you puzzled, like the EDS commercial Cat Herders (https://youtu.be/vTwJzTsb2QQ) An example of the medium overwhelming the message. It was banned by somebody or organization for some reason. Probably cat lovers. I don’t remember seeing a disclaimer that no cats were harmed or branded during the production of the ad.

While the tugs and pulls at our senses, sentiments, and savings haven’t changed, I’m glad the commercials have. Launched quite a few acting careers as well, like the I’m a Pepper guy (https://youtu.be/jvCTaccEkMI) who later starred in the best werewolf transformation film ever (albeit the budget must have caused the director to stop the film without the typical beast resolution — https://youtu.be/E7BmQc5QKVs).

There was a time TV was “free.” Of course it was underwritten through advertisers who used the programs to siphon from America’s money gas tanks. But still, it was free to the consumer. Now, alas, not so much (I recently begrudgingly wrote out my monthly cable service fees).

Commercial sponsors once ruled the day, and provided America with much-needed diversion from the day-to-day grind. Now we’re content to spend the big monthly bucks to see our fare without interruption. Or, as the Romans might have said, continuatam scilicet entertainment. And that decision has dire ripple effects:

• On our bladders.
• On fewer trips to the kitchen, hence less consumption of various foods (chips and sodas, which constitute two of the five major American food groups. Pizza and McDonalds and ice cream are the other three).
• On our social interaction skills. There are also other entities currently mastering this demise: Facebook, Twitter, etc.
• On our ability to discern between night and day (if binge-watching).
• On the advertising industry, which will be forced to lay off thousands of writers, directors, producers, actors, and Best Boys.

The result will be that whatever “free” TV remains. The commercials will be local, and you know what that means, right?

https://youtu.be/Gl6F12DWI7o.

Or, https://youtu.be/HqGsT6VM8Vg.

Sorry about that. Too much uninterrupted binging on The Walking Dead.

You get what I mean.

Don’t be a putz. Let’s save the TV commercial industry by giving up those expensive cable TV contracts. And by doing that, save the many careers that will inevitably be eliminated. And if they are, the only commercials we will see will be like the following:

 

 

 

 

It’s Just Music

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s Just Music

By L. Stewart Marsden

At the risk of coming across very ego-centered (as opposed to plain ego-centered), sometimes I surprise myself in a good way.

Much of my married life I was told I am dysthymic. For those unfamiliar with the term, it basically means you live just below the surface of the water emotionally. Like Eeyore, Milne’s classic character of Winnie-the-Pooh fame. In fact, my Ender Wife presented me with a stuffed version of Eeyore, which I still have. I let the dog chew on him.

I’ve always thought the hyperbolic ups and downs of some people I’ve observed were good reason to maintain a more steady disposition, albeit just below the water’s surface. How they are able to tolerate the ups and downs of their emotional roller coasters befuddles me.

They are the Hare, and I am the Tortoise in that way. Yup, yup.

In addition to being dysthymic, I’ve been told I’m an avoider, and a procrastinator. But we can get to that later. None of the labels is very heartening, though.

My retreats are basically three-fold:

1. I play Spider Solitaire and dive into imagined scenarios and conversations during play.
2. I write and/or research for my writing.
3. I play my guitar.

That’s it.

I get no personal satisfaction from playing solitaire other than the brief high from winning — which is not very often (I don’t play the easy versions). My mind tends to run the ravines of what I would like to say or do if I only had the courage. It gets a bit tiresome.

Periodically I write something I am somewhat satisfied with, knowing that ninety percent of writing is actually in the editing and cutting of stuff (boring as well as ego-painful). Writing is never complete, like learning.

But, when I pick up my guitar … something happens.

I absolutely lose myself either in a song I am learning and trying to perfect, or in random rifts with slight variations in notes and chords.

When I was a kid, I used to do the same sort of thing, except on the down-sized ebony Mason & Hamlin grand that was in the living room. I could sit and pluck out tunes and chords for hours.

In the flow of the music it matters very little how good I actually play. I don’t criticize myself on those counts. I am too deeply embedded in the song, whether playing my arrangement of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah (Jeff Beckley did not write it); or Georgia on My Mind by Hoagy Charmichael (neither Willie Nelson nor Ray Charles wrote this); or reliving my teen years playing America (Simon & Garfunkel).

I imagine sitting alone on a stage, a single spotlight illuminating a circle on the floor that encompasses me, and all else dark. I can’t see the audience, but I know they are there. I bend notes and gruff out a lyric with an impure voice — gravelly and frayed on the edges. Every line — every word — has meaning. All I’ve ever learnt from love … Other eyes smile tenderly … “Cathy, I’m lost!” I said, though I knew she was sleeping …

It’s not a high. There isn’t any euphoria. But it’s a damn good place for me, and when I emerge from however long I’ve escaped, I am ready to face reality, and being dysthymic, or emotionally frail, isn’t the portentous thunderstorm on the horizon that it once was.

Plus this process is thousands of dollars cheaper than years of counseling, not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Do you have an instrument?

Do you have a song?

Do you have a place you can curl into (not a fetal position, mind you) and feel safe and snug? One that allows you to empty yourself and to breathe in renewal?

Sounds Zen, doesn’t it?

But it isn’t.

It’s just music.

 

 

 

The Country Needs An Attack By Aliens From Outer Space

 

 

By L. Stewart Marsden

 

I’m at the point with the verbal assault and battery going on in the US between various factions I’ve begun to look skywards and pray for an attack by aliens from outer space.

And you know why, I think.

Whether you are Conservative or Liberal, pro- or anti-gun control –– whichever and whatever niche you have found yourself or those you know (some of whom you love) cudgeled into –– enough is enough!

I’m wondering why we haven’t heard God’s booming voice from the hinterlands warning, “Don’t make me come down there again!”

So, in lieu of a Biblical Armageddon, or the Rapture, or whatever else is portended by gurus and mystics and the Jimmy Bakkers of the world, why not have one of those Independence Day invasions? You know, where spaceships the size of New Zealand hover above all the really big population centers in the world (that’s why I live in the mountains, by the way). Where the President says “Zounds! What’re we gonna do?” And the twenty-two star general with the square jaw and skinhead crew cut shouts “Blow the holy HELL outta them!” Where the US and Russia and China and the Middle East and all of the various other countries stop killing themselves and each other to redirect their angst towards the really, really bad guys?

Seems we need things like real/imagined enemies to keep us focused on something other than ourselves. As wonderful a thing as

Ahhhh! A Giant Alien! Run!

the dismantling of the Berlin Wall was, it has left a huge chasm between ideologues and their extreme points of view (called, opinions, not necessarily facts). It was the focus of Truth, Justice, and the American Way, and everyone (well, maybe not everyone) was glad when it fell. But at least those on either side of the wall focused their attentions on IT, and when IT fell, and when Ron and Nancy rode off into the sunset, there was this void.

Sorry, I saw a rabbit hole.

Anyway, it doesn’t really have to be Martians. It could be Rodan, or Godzilla for that matter. You know, the nightmare beasties that arose from the aftermath of “winning” World War II? Tiny organisms feeding on nuclear soil and water, growing to gargantuan proportions and reeking ironic havoc on the very nations that had a hand in its coming to be in the first place?

My gut feeling tells me that we’ve already seen the beginnings of a different sort of invasion. It hies back to Walt Kelly’s famous words of Pogo: We have met the enemy, and he is us.

Similar to the simple solution to the aliens of H.G. Wells’ mind: lack of immunity on the part of the aliens to earth bacteria.

Our “aliens” have already landed. Thousands upon thousands of years back in time –– who really knows how long ago? And those aliens found the earth rich with possibility. Plenty of space, food sources, fresh water and clean air. And unlike the various creatures they found here that fell into extinction, they were able to adapt to changes in seasons, and move with the availability of sustenance. Then there was plenty of room to move onto once all the trees were cut and the rivers harnessed for commerce and energy.

They populated and expanded and became diverse. And like the first ovum fertilized by a single sperm, divided and multiplied ad infinitum. Except in this case it wasn’t really infinite.

Eventually our earth will convulse and spew those aliens into oblivion and extinction –– those who never applied Dr. Ian Malcom’s famous thoughtful maxim of consideration, we can –– but should we?

“Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!”

It would be far better for us as a species, however, if we had to battle an invisionary force from twenty billion trillion light years away. For that conflict, perhaps we would throw away our pettiness and unite. Redirect our frustrations from each other and towards something we could all agree was truly evil and threatening (from our perspective, of course): the threat being our extinction as a species.

Everyone could do their thing to the maximum. Shoot, kill, pray, scream, run in reaction to one centralized threat –– either towards it or away from it. Wouldn’t matter. Pro-this or pro-that, anti-this or anti-that would become trite and unnecessary.

As it is, I sadly fear we will succumb to our innate nature and Nature will eventually expel us –– the true and most deadly aliens –– from the planet.

I wish we had a choice, but it seems a bit late now. I’d choose the attack by aliens from outer space.

How about you?

 

 

Taking the Count

 

By L. Stewart Marsden

 

Lately I’ve caught myself subconsciously counting things. I don’t know why, I just do.

There are 14 steps from the main floor of my condo where I live to the lower floor. That’s counting the two steps formed by the corner at the bottom of the stairway. Consequently, I take the same number of steps up to my bedroom at night and again in the morning.

When the wall pendulum clock begins to chime, I count along: one … two … three –– until the hour designation has bonged out.

It takes two minutes and thirty-six seconds for the frozen boiled chicken tenders I feed my dogs to thaw. Approximately four minutes for my Mr. Coffee to drip-brew my morning quota of two cups of coffee.

Why? Not why how many, but why do I count?

Perhaps at age 68 I’ve become painfully conscious of things like how much time I have left in my life. I didn’t count everything when I was younger, except things like how many days till my birthday, or Christmas, or until summer.

Now, practically everything is a count:

1. Number of wives;
2. Number of children and grandchildren (that are known of);
3. Number of days until the longest day of daylight;
4. Number of days until the shortest day of daylight†;
5. Number of Christmas cards I get††;
6. Number of age spots;
7. Number of prescribed medicationsß;
8. Number of calories in a meal;
9. Number of calories I eat in a day;
10. Number of times I check my weight;
11. Number of times during the day I think about food;
12. Number of days those leftovers have been in the frig and can I eat them anyhow;
13. Number of times I’ve gotten food poisoning;
14. Number of people I can count on;
15. Number of people who can count on me;
16. Number of years Duke basketball will continue its failed One-and-Done strategy;
17. Number of days 45 can go without embarrassing either himself, his wife, or the nation;
18. Actually, instead of days, use hours or minutes for the previous count;
19. Or maybe seconds;
20. Number of days I can go without showering;
21. Number of times I wear the same clothing without changing;
22. Number of friends I have (which is greatly reduced because of #’s 18 and 19)
23. Number of miles per gallon I get in my hybrid Honda Insight;
24. Number of miles I can go on a tank of gas in my Insight;
25. Number of miles I have to walk on the highway to get five gallons of gas;
26. Number of days I can go with the Check Engine light on without getting nervous;
27. Number of dollars I have to give the mechanic because I didn’t heed the Check Engine light;
28. Number of cans of LeCroix I drink in a day;
29. Number of days I’ve been off Facebook;
30. Number of days I’ve been off Facebook without thinking about Facebook;
31. Number of times I now check my iPhone for text messages having left Facebook;
32. Number of times Bless your heart is uttered in the south;
33. Number of grits in a serving;
34. Number of times the 2nd Amendment is referred to in a day;
35. Number of things I count during the day.

†Only one state where this doesn’t count: Arizona. I don’t mind visiting Arizona … I just don’t want to live there.

††I don’t send Christmas cards, but might have to this year since I left Facebook (see #29)

ßWhich at this point is limited to one prescription, and 99 OTCs for all of the other symptoms I’m self-diagnosing and treating (after all, there’s only one letter difference between the AMA and the AMRA). BTW: you have to do some research to understand this quip.

I don’t actually blame myself for this counting obsession. It’s all around us. And, I suppose, brings some semblance of order to what is otherwise a chaotic and unpredictable time in the nation. It’s in our vernacular. Ensconced in our euphemisms. We’ve done it for countless centuries.

1. Down for the count.
2. Don’t count me out –– or for the optimist, you can count me in.
3. The full count.
4. Don’t count your chickens before they hatch.
5. Count your blessings (bless your heart).
6. Count yourself lucky.
7. The countdown.
8. That doesn’t count.
9. That counts.
10. Nobody’s counting.
11. Look who’s counting.
12. Ad infinitum (which is like trying to determine the true value of π).

I guess I won’t worry about it. It’s a feature of my life, and I can’t count how many times I’ve tried to ignore it –– which is futile. In the long run, it counts for very little anyway.

So I accept the inevitable, and will turn my attention to more important matters, such as how many days until the new season of The Walking Dead launches.

By the way, the word count of this article is 793. I need seven words to make 800.

You can count on it.

 

 

 

 

 

Everyone Gets a Little of it Correctly

 

By L. Stewart Marsden

We’ve witnessed the passing of two world icons over the past weeks: Billy Graham and Stephen Hawking. Polar opposites, one might think. Each convinced of beliefs they deemed pivotal to understanding the universe.

Social media reaction has been varied for both, yet there is an undercurrent of respect for these men, different as they are. And, just perhaps, their similarities outweigh their differences.

Who got it right? Who got it wrong? What happens to those who got it right, and to those who got it wrong?

I wouldn’t touch that with a ten-foot pole. Many already have and hold on stubbornly to their opinion come hell-or-high-water.

For some, the death of Graham signals the end times. Prophecies and words of wisdom are no doubt abounding among some groups. Still others, bent on profiteering from this particular death, are stepping up production of miracle healing water, or prayer cloths, or whatever tangible item is the justifiable reason for someone who can ill-afford it to write a large donation check.

Hawking pooh-poohed religion, preferring the stability of science to the flimsiness of faith. He predicted the extinction of humankind within 100 years, and was convinced humankind had and continues to shoot itself in the toe in so many ways. Air pollution. Nuclear proliferation. Unchecked population growth that is rapidly dismissing the earth’s resources and ability to sustained.

One hundred years. A little over four generations based on the current mean. That would suggest all of this interest in genealogy is a fruitless endeavor.

On the other end of the spectrum, the Sign Watchers have been lining up and checking off the events that will usher in Armageddon and The Rapture. Apparently some feel Graham’s death is one of those events/signs.

Only a handful of mankind seems to care about either when you get right down to it. We’re still bogged down in the mire of right v wrong and other presupposed absolutes.

A friend posted a speculative question: is Stephen Hawking in heaven? That’s based on my friend’s assumption there is a heaven, or afterlife. No one has speculated that about Billy Graham. That would be heresy.

The various TV programs that deal with UFOs and ETs and all of the other out-of-this-world contentions, include the possibility that we will return to our planet of origination, and that we are other-worldly. Like the religionists, there seems to be great effort to separate us from the other animals of the earth, and dismantle what they call the “theory” of evolution. You know, hopping a fast freight from a planet a billion light years away, or being molded from clay during the literal six days of creation are far-better answers to imagining we hail from the genetic materials provided by fish or apes. Someone at some time decided to KISS. Imagine the embarrassment of knit-picking through the hair of your brother or sister, and then eating the mite!

I like the simile of the blind men who attempt to describe an elephant by feeling the animal with their hands.

“The elephant is like a strong tree trunk, thick and massive,” says one. “The elephant is like a snake,” says another. “The elephant is like a thin leather blanket,” supposes a third. “It is like a thick, solid wall,” asserts another. “A rope. The elephant is like a rope.” “The elephant is like a spear,” the last suggests.

Each has a little of what an elephant is correctly. Each is vastly wrong.

In the finality, it won’t matter, I think. Which is kind of the Calvinist position, right? You either are or you are not chosen, which doesn’t change despite your life. (I don’t suppose to understand that slant, and probably have only a little bit of Calvinism correctly).

So, where is Billy Graham now? Where is Stephen Hawking? For that matter, where is Gandhi, or Joan of Arc or William Wallace or Genghis Khan or Columbus or Thomas Becket or Hitler or Marilyn Monroe? Or how about your parents, grandparents and beyond? Where are they?

One of my favorite movie scenes dealing with this is from the movie “Rudy.” Father Cavanaugh has sat down next to the main character, Rudy, after the young man goes to church in frustration at not getting into Notre Dame.

Father Cavanaugh: [in church] Taking your appeal to a higher authority?
Rudy: I’m desperate. If I don’t get in next semester, it’s over. Notre Dame doesn’t accept senior transfers.
Father Cavanaugh: Well, you’ve done a hell of a job kid, chasing down your dream.
Rudy: Who cares what kind of job I did if it doesn’t produce results? It doesn’t mean anything.
Father Cavanaugh: I think you’ll find that it will.
Rudy: Maybe I haven’t prayed enough.
Father Cavanaugh: I don’t think that’s the problem. Praying is something we do in our time, the answers come in God’s time.
Rudy: If I’ve done everything I possibly can, can you help me?
Father Cavanaugh: Son, in thirty-five years of religious study, I’ve come up with only two hard, incontrovertible facts; there is a God, and, I’m not Him.

Whatever you think, whatever you believe, you, too, have a little bit of it correctly. But not all of it.

The Last Hurrah

by L. Stewart Marsden

Winter’s last hurrah blew in over night, and I’m pretty sure once this storm has passed, I can breathe a sigh of relief and look forward to spring.

Meantime, the local bird neighborhood was gathered when I came downstairs this morning with the dogs. They waited patiently (their feeders were bare) as I fed the dogs and slipped on my walking shoes and jacket. And they were on the verge of impatience as I slowly poured a fresh supply of seed into the feeders.

A flock of larger black birds apparently heard the ruckus, and decided to descend upon the feeders, which are not designed for them, but the smaller ones.

Don’t know why, but it upsets me when the big birds bully the smaller ones away. They can always go to the dumps and trash bins –– and aren’t above picking the streets and roads of carrion. I have this impression they could take out a few of the smaller birds if they’d a mind.

I once shot a robin when I was a boy. Like today, it had snowed, and I took my bother’s BB gun into the yard where I spied the bird yards away and aimed at him, well above so as to miss him. The shot didn’t miss the robin, however, and I watched in horror as the pellet arched downward and hit the unintended victim.

Even so, if I had a pellet gun or BB gun, I’d be very tempted to whiz one by the large blackbirds as a warning.

I know … it doesn’t make sense, does it?

As it is, when the big ones try to raid the larder, I step out and shout BAH! in a loud voice. The bullies scatter, yet the smaller birds hang close and swoop down onto the feeder. And I have a fleeting feeling of satisfaction, followed by one of foolishness.