Original anecdotes, commentary, rumination, and occasional pontification.
MAY 19, 2020 – This morning I saw the CNN headline, “America’s Covid-19 response is the most American thing ever.” The image featured a woman waving a large American flag, seated atop a parked jeep. The sub-headline read, “The country’s conflicting behavior in the face of coronavirus is a symptom of a national value that …
MAY 18, 2020 – When I was a kid, whistling was common. My dad was a virtuoso whistler. The forte and mezzo-forte allegro and allegretto parts he whistled conventionally, that is, through puckered lips. The piano and mezzo-piano andante and largo pieces he whistled through his teeth. He was the only whistler I ever heard …
MAY 17, 2020 – Often I dream about the book I’m currently reading. I fully anticipate this when I’m reading—“What part of this book, what scene, what subplot, what character will wend its way into my dreams tonight?” And then some weird and whacky version of the book does, in fact . . . er, …
MAY 16, 2020 – This past week I had three political conversations: one with a strong Trump supporter, two with vehement anti-Trumpsters. The Trump supporter was convinced that Corvid-19 was hatched in a Chinese lab and aimed at bringing us down; that our best foil is a re-opened economy. One of the anti-Trumpsters, meanwhile, was …
MAY 15, 2020 – I’m now in week four of my Garage Clean-up Project. It’s a puzzle for which the solution keeps changing; an art studio of endless possibilities—all accompanied by . . . radio. In this regard I could be more creative, more productive. I could assemble a playlist of favorite “songs” . . …
MAY 14, 2020 – Paradoxically, one way to distract yourself from The Virus is to read all the lengthy articles on the subject by epidemiologists, statisticians, and the world’s leading conspiracy theorists. Personally, I’ve checked out of the discussions. This wasn’t the case early in The Crisis. I found myself sucked into all sorts of …
MAY 13, 2020 – A person doesn’t have to look far to see “stupid.” Even if one hasn’t checked the news lately, one can do a “self-reveal.” Specifically, recently when I asked (stupidly) our four-year old granddaughter what she thought made “Grandpa look so old” (she’d been joking that I looked old), she said spontaneously, …
MAY 12, 2020 – Usually I’m sequestered from the nonsense that reigns supreme elsewhere on the good ship America. This morning, however, sudden zig-zags in the vessel’s course prompted me to leave the quiet of my stateroom to have a look. The air smelled sulfuric. Blindfolded passengers with bad hair, bulging eyes, and carrots jammed …
MAY 10, 2020 – Yesterday was Mom’s Day, so I couldn’t much talk about Dad, who’d died a decade ago yesterday. For the first year after his death, I dreamt about him every single night. Then, consistent with the tradition of so many cultures, my one-year of mourning was completed. Dad’s nightly appearance in my …
MAY 10, 2020 – (Excerpt from Inheritance – Chapter Five: “Talking Out Loud” by the blogger) – When I was in third grade, Mother returned to the University of Minnesota to study piano pedagogy with Miles Mauney. After acing the program she marketed herself as a piano teacher. She printed flyers and conscripted me to …
MAY 9, 2020 – I’m pleased to announce that I’ve now slogged through 59 installments of the 60-episode Netflix series, Bolívar. I’m saving the final segment for some special occasion—perhaps the return of democracy and economic prosperity to El Libertado’s homeland, Venezuela. Actually, I know how the story ends: Bolívar dies and all goes to …
MAY 8, 2020 – On the 75th Anniversary of V-E Day, I wonder: should I think of “V-E” as “Victory in Europe” and dwell upon its lessons or . . . should I view today as “Very Easy” and live obliviously? If like Simon the Simpleton I don’t care about the portents of history and …
MAY 7, 2020 – I’ve lost track of the days, let alone hours, I’ve spent on my Garage Clean-up Project—not to mention the times I’ve cited it on this blog. I’m so deep into the project I’ll suffer the bends if I emerge too quickly. Apparently garage clean-ups and clean-outs have become the new norm. …
MAY 6, 2020 – I write this from the back porch, where I can see the slow, then sudden progress of spring in this part of the world—the greening of the grass, a small insurgency of dandelions, blossom buds on the neighbor’s apple tree, lilacs showing visual hints of future fragrance, small tender leaves emerging …
MAY 5, 2020 – The most influential book of my life is If I Ran the Circus by Dr. Seuss. This book still fires my imagination as no other . . . literature . . . does. The story: A happy-go-lucky kid named Morris McGurk plays by the high, rickety, wooden fence surrounding a vacant …
MAY 4, 2020 – My wife often observes how some see the glass half empty while others see it half full. The latter group, she says, are more likely to seize victory from the jaws of defeat. Generally, I’m a “glass half full” person. When the forecast is “partly cloudy,” I think, “partly sunny.” If …
MAY 3, 2020 – With ample time now on hand, I figured it was now time to clean house, er, “garage.” Ours had long rivaled the Caine’s. They were the family that lived in a modern, flat-roofed house at the end of a long drive on a large river lot directly across the street from …
MAY 2, 2020 – Perhaps you and I see the same images. Perhaps we don’t, for we live in the Disunited States of America. In any case, witness gun-toting protesters in Michigan and beach crowds in California. “What?” They say. “A killer virus is afoot? It’ll take time . . . and patience . . …
MAY 1, 2020 – In school I got “schooled” in the First Amendment. It was essential for a free, civil, and democratic society. Now I’m unsure. My uncertainty, however, is not because I’ve lost faith in the foundational precept of our democracy. I’ve always understood the First Amendment as a “mixed water” faucet, from which …
APRIL 30, 2020 – (Cont.) . . . For the past few days leading up to that fateful day, town road crews had been hard at work on the streets north of Rice, putting down a coat of oil, then a thin blanket of sand. On the day at hand, it was our street’s turn. …
APRIL 29, 2020 – I was but six when I witnessed my first power play—not as in hockey but as in one man pulling rank on another. It occurred at about 1:00 on a hot, beautiful summer afternoon. I know the time, because that’s when our neighbor, Bob Ehlen, would’ve been heading back to his …
APRIL 28, 2020 – Recently my wife observed that in these times the neighborhood sounds like the neighborhood of our childhood—ours, not our sons’. Young kids are playing outside, making lots of old-fashioned noise. My wife thinks this is good. I suppose so, except when I’m trying to read out on the porch and the …
APRIL 27, 2020 – Earlier this month (See 4/5, 4/6 posts) I wrote about the classic, Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. I mentioned that Don Simón Rodriguez, the boyhood tutor of Simón Bolívar, El Libertador, had said of Defoe’s classic, “Everything you need to know is in this book.” I’m now three-quarters into the account …
APRIL 26, 2020 – Recently, down our alley I encountered our hotshot lawyer-neighbor sweeping furiously his garage floor—and immersing himself in a cloud of dust. I imagined him trying to destroy a hostile witness on cross-ex(amination). I also imagined my grandfather disapproving the way Mr. Hotshot was handling the broom. Born in 1895 Grandpa Holman …
APRIL 25, 2020 – Feeling outraged that America’s led by a village idiot, I think about this day in Portugal in 1974. That’s when the military initiated the largely bloodless “Carnation Revolution”—named so because citizens stuck carnations into rifle barrels of soldiers guarding the streets. It signaled the end of Estado Novo—the “New State”—under the …