Year End Review - 2011

1/2/11, a bit late for the review, but here it is anyway, it's been cooking for awhile. First of all, I want to agree with Amy Goodman, "Democracy Now"* and "Time: magazine, that 2011 was the year of the protester. All over the Globe, but especially on Wall Street and in Wisconsin for me/us. Unfortunately the protests are being carried out by less than 1% of the populations, while the power rests solidly within the l% who control the wealth, the military and police, the lobby driven power structure, eg. legislators.

So 2012 and beyond is time to hunker down, build up the number of protesters and activists to turn around what has so long been accumulating at the so-called "top." To be "fed up" is one thing, to act, of course, is another. Especially when actions are seen as possible loss factors for personal jobs, benefits, social services and the like. We have been driven into a defensive position by the forces of the 1%, and this has been reinforced by our conservative natures, our unwillingness to take chances for c h a n g e.

I want to suggest as my candidate for book of the year Sheldon S. Wolin's "Democracy Inc.," a powerfully researched and written work which documents how we have slid into a "Managed Democracy and the Spector of Inverted Totalitarianism" - the subtitle, of course. We need tough documentation and planning rather the reliance 0n well meaning rhetoric about the situation we are in; and we need the requisite tough advice on how to get out of the predicaments we are wallowing around in. It is show and tell time, and Wolin's book is one of those which cuts through the rhetoric and nonsense to let us know how to proceed.

I want to wish everyone a good, strong, activist year ahead. Thinking about the news item this week that 50% of the American population is approaching the poverty levels approximated by our government, and then some sayings I first heard during the depression in the thirties came to mind: "better safe than sorry," "beggars can't be choosers," and "don't kick a gift horse in the mouth" .... * look at Amy Goodman's website for today: Democracy Now.com.

"Electronic Mankind"

At 80 you have to doubt your memory sometimes, and I seem to remember having mentioned a man named John Stiles and his odyssey trip around the U.S. with a team of donkeys and mules recently (?). Forgive me if there is some redundancy here. His classic statement about "electronic mankind" having begun to live in a "global concentration camp," would seem to be the utterance of the ultimate luddite.

His feeling is that "nobody is questioning if we should be doing all this. The only question being asked is can we? And without your bar-code microchip laser beam tattooed implant and your holy trinity of personal computer, cable TV, and telephone, you won't be able to participate in the system at all." (This is from the book "Home Work - Hand Built Shelter" by Lloyd Kahn). The "trinity" is kind of quaint, but instructive.

How do we proceed? Well, as an octogenarian I know that my own options are considerably lessened since I am less and less comfortable with the trinities and the communication assumptions/options. Undoubtedly there are people older than I am who are totally conversant and operational within the electronic grid and hemisphere. I know my younger wife is dealing with an educational system which is making it harder and harder just to function with a MacIntosh computer. Where do we go from here, and how will the built-in obsolescence of electronic devices play out with a population which is sinking quickly into poverty. Upgrades, off the grid, anyone?

Ineffable

Poets, musicians, writers of all kinds take on the ineffable. Just now I'm thinking about Henry Miller's clown character in "Smile at the Foot of the Ladder," that is, perhaps, where I first saw the word in print (?). Right now reading a biography of the great, great Wisconsin poet, "Lorine Niedecker; A Poet's Life," I am constantly reminded of how poets go within this area of description by the poems given in the text.

So much of life is indescribable, and yet we have to try to describe. Looking up at the clear, winter night sky last night I was completely dumbfounded by what I saw. Describe it? I might have to be a Lorine Niedecker or Henry Miller to pull that off. But then it needn't be described, perhaps just pointed to. Luckily we had the electric coop take our the yard light a few years ago, and so the so-called "stars" are there.

The sad fact of our lives is that so much in our media/electronic world view is not ineffable, is all too commercial, literal, "in your face." Sometimes on PBS the indescribable is present and much appreciated. Scientists too appreciate it and present it in their programs. May I suggest that you share your appreciation of it with young people and children, so that they will pass on this appreciation to those to come. Thank you.

Rear View Mirror vision

In the late sixties there was a so-called "media guru" named Marshall McLuhan ("medium is the message," etc.). He taught in Toronto, I was teaching in Buffalo, we were almost neighbors. Anyway, I was teaching a communication course and his seminal text was definitely to be understood by the students. One of his metaphors was speeding into the future looking in the rear view mirror.

I was doing multimedia shows at the time and had one wherein the split screen had a series of rear view shots/slides, and next to that was a l6mm sequence of speed ed up big city night traffic. It was affective at the time, and now I find myself trapezing around in the metaphor with the endless rear view mirror thinking, media and news going on. Our communities, our nation, the world is in such rough shape and we are still doing this insane dance.

How can we possibly afford this? Do we think that we can avoid the consequences or our actions and in actions by denial and cover up? What is that old saying about "Chickens coming home to roost." They are already roosted, by the way; the scary fact is that the rear view vision going on is electronic, digital.

"Leaving Mood"

Toronzo cannon's "Leaving Mood" is featured in an article in the recent edition of "Rhythm & News" published by the Jazz Record Mart in Chicago. This publication is free for signing up for it, primarily to make known recordings for sale, but some of the writing is excellent, especially some of liner notes quoted, often with a street English twist I particularly like.

Leaving a scene is a common theme in the blues, and as Toronzo comments in the liner notes that he "didn't want it to be the regular old, 'okay, this baby left him,' or "His baby givin' him the blues, and he's got his suitcase at the door, and he's leavin' ... " There's a zillion versions of this theme, and I'm looking forward to Toronzo's.

One of mine happened when I was sailing out of Seattle for the Orient. One night I went in a tropical type of bar frequented by sailors and saw a woman I'd seen in a local bookshop (that was different!). She was with a girlfriend and I bought them both a drink, then they invited me to sit with them. I took her out a couple of times before we sailed, found out she was a school teacher, real smart, definitely had something to teach me.

We exchanged letters and next time in port there she was waiting for ship (real different).

Again we exchanged letters and notes and the next time into Seattle not only was she not dock side, but she had left town. I talked to her landlady, "she left the end of the month." Called the school district, she had resigned. I was a little dumbfounded and so sent her a letter with a request that it be forwarded to her (never came back, no answer). To this day it is a mystery,

and when I ran into her friend in the tropical bar a little later she said that she thinks she went "home" to Eastern Washington. No leaving mood for this one, just left. I missed her for awhile.

ps. You can get this publication by calling 1-800-684-3480, especially for Jazz & Blues buffs

Routine

At 80 I depend upon my Day Timers daily organizer, plus calendars and a weekly and daily sheet combination. Obviously these assist my memory, but more than that they allow me to get things done. This isn't new, but it is more necessary than in the past. In part I resent them as I would resent "crutches;" it would be better for me not to spend the precious time on them, but it pays off.

Many years ago on one particular ship I was on, I had the good occasion to have a mentor who had attended the University of Chicago (Philosophy) and prided himself in being organized. He encouraged me to take advantage of shipboard life to get studying done, physical fitness and diet, and to prepare myself for what I imagined might be my future. Part of this depended upon using the watch schedule to be called when you wanted to get things done (other than work, eg. the watch, as well as those).

While on this ship I read an article on the philosopher Santayana in which he extolled routine as a way to get things done. He took this to some extremes, eg. having the same thing for lunch each day so that he wouldn't have waste time on the decision making necessary to have variety there. When I speak with people today it seems that for many of them a lack of routine is essential for them to feel "free," to allow their self preoccupation a "long leash" so that their lives can be led with minimal introspection.

My hope is that people will find their balances with all of this, a "middle way" of sorts. Spontaneity has its' place, undoubtedly, "living in the present" much to offer. At 80 my time for this may return in another incarnation (?).

The Roberts and The Webbs

The Webbs and Roberts were as different to me as night and day. Both had their dark and light sides, but to visit them was to be in different countries, cultures. The Webbs were from Idaho, Mormon country, not only with an Old Testament quality to their belief system and life style, but a kind of stoic, common sense notion of what reality was. The Roberts were from Oklahoma and Louisiana, Grandmother Nellie May had Mary Baker Eddy by her bedside, along with the Bible, but the atmosphere was more open, not at all Biblical, more experimental and free wheeling in my memory.

Food and drink were more lavish in the Roberts realm, Grandfather made wine from the grapes he grew in the backyard. The Webbs were tea tottlers, my memory is of fresh baked bread and cookies, sometime cakes, bean soup ( lima bean soup with Ketsup), and saltine crackers. Both grandfathers were good vegetable growers and I have fond memories of working with both of them in our victory garden, and with Grandfather Roberts in his.

Because my parents were so young I had a lot of time with both sets, and because I was the firstborn grandchild, and a boy, my Grandfather Roberts lavished trips and outings on me

(a library trip is mentioned elsewhere in the BLOG). He sometimes unveiled portraits for clients in their homes and took me along for the ride. He wanted me to listen to Caruso sing arias and read to me from history books, for example H.G. Wells.

Looking back I think I was unfair to the Webbs because they were not as flashy, not so "interesting." But they were there for me all the way, and the uncles and aunts and their married partners were all good, interesting people. Uncle Jess was particularly important; having married Aunt Haroldeen and being childless, he/they became important to me because

I was available to them and they to me. I wish everyone could be as fortunate as I was with my grandparents and uncles and aunts, and that they could live near them and savor their influences. Perhaps that will be the case again in the future, I hope so.