To stay cheerful in the midst of a gloomy task, fraught with immeasurable responsibility, is no small feat; and yet what is needed more than cheerfulness? Nothing succeeds if high spirits has no part in it. Excess strength alone is the proof of strength. A revaluation of all values: this question mark, so black,…
Who doesn’t want to be loved? The desire/need to be loved and to love is universal for all humans. Maybe the principle holds for all living things. For a blade of grass, or a rose, — I cannot say. I have observed that mammals seek out love, affectionate response. A dog understands a kind…
We are on the edge of a storm according to a writer in The Atlantic and another in The Federalist. At the end of today’s edition of the NYT The Daily update of articles, I read a paragraph that stated that we are locked in a cold “civil war” as a nation. The journalist…
Monday, a week before Labor Day. It’s early, and all is quiet outside. Traffic is minimal. The atmosphere is like a relative silence before an anticipated storm breaks with fury and unforeseeable destruction. There has been civil unrest in Portland, Oregon and Kenosha, Wisconsin. In those places members of Trump-world, armed, and intent on…
As mentioned previously, I did not watch the Republican convention. It was widely known that the Party was intent upon rebranding the brash, petulant, infantile Trump, as a stolid law n’ order leader, — “just the man that we need.” I can’t stomach the lies. A lesson of life, learned by dint of experience,…
For a Monday, why not take a break from the political chatter, from the reports of extensive wild fire damage in California, from reports of twin hurricanes that threaten Texas and Louisiana, and from the propaganda storm about to envelop us? The last is a reference to the Republican Party MAGA convention. Yesterday in…
I watched a 1972 Bob Fosse movie Cabaret last night with my wife. I don’t usually prefer musicals. I confess to a negligible background in music which constrains my appreciation of many varieties of musical expression. This movie impressed me as a layered, complex piece of story telling. The musical pieces, served to show…
The pressure of circumstances forces choices. Those “choices” are less free than I formerly believed. Free will!? I doubt it. I am aware of the juxtaposition of the impress of past events and encounters within my psyche. Does not the mind reflexively select to act upon the factors offering the best chances of survival? …
43 If one shifts the center of gravity of life out of life into the ‘Beyond’ – into nothingness one has deprived life as such of its center of gravity. The great lie of personal immortality destroys all rationality, all naturalness of instinct, all that is salutary, all that is life-furthering, all that holds…
Yesterday I went for a short drive to Geneva as is my habit to do some reading, sitting on the ground under a maple tree in front of the old court house. Gazing at the great old Civil War memorial statue that dominates the view from the courthouse, — the mood came over me…
