Across the big blue sea

An astute, highly intelligent woman I know, became so frustrated on seeing again screaming headlines about some politician's sexual peccadilloes, that she shouted "I want an information revolution!" Like many of us, she's frustrated by the personality and scandal obsessed media here in America, bombarding our eyes, ears and minds with meaningless trivia every day. She wants to read news of substance and meaning that she can share and discuss with her children.

Who can blame her. I share her frustrations, but what could I do, except to say to her "I love you for your mind, let's run away together across the big blue sea, where we'll find such newspapers, culture and history and everlasting love amidst the monuments, museums, fountains, cafes, parks, bakeries and beer taverns." (I'm awaiting her response, as we speak.)

There was some prescience or coincidental timing in my friend's reaction, because at about the same time, Daniel Hen ninger of the Wall Street Jour nal was writing this commentary. But wait, there is more. At the very same time, I was sitting at home, re-reading a book of interviews with Russian poet Joseph Brodsky, where this very issue is raised.

Here are brief excerpts from the Introduction by journalist Cynthia L. Ha ven who collected and edited these interviews in one volume:

Brodsky's interviews reflect as much about the Western sensibility as they do about him, often painfully so. Their frequent repetitiveness shows the monomania of Western journalism - its voyeurism, its vulgar fascination with suffering not its own. [...] The corny CBS "voiceover" sound of typewriter keys clicking- or Morley Safer joining Brodsky as they gaze soulfully out to the Hudson - provide distressing illustration, exemplifying Brodsky's declared enemy "poshlust".

And later, a footnote explaining "poshlust":

Gogol's "poshlust" was defined and extended by Nabokov to include corny trash, vulgar clichés, Philistinism in all its phases, imitations of imitations, bogus profundities," and in contemporary writing, "moth-eaten mythologies, social comment, humanistic messages, political allegories, over-concern with class or race, and the journalistic generalities we all know." Poshlust "is especially vigorous and vicious when the sham is not obvious and when the values it mimics are considered, rightly or wrongly, to belong to the very highest of art, thought or emotion."

And from Wikipedia:

Poshlost' is a Russian word (пошлость) defined by the literary critic Vladimir Alexandrov as a kind of "petty evil or self-satisfied vulgarity" (Alexandrov 1991, p. 106).

Oh, and incidentally, the headline story that so upset my woman friend was about a U.S. Senator getting arrested for public pederasty at an airport bathroom. She asked:

"Is this what men do for fun? Go into restrooms and solicit each other for sex. No wonder the men's restrooms are always a mess."

The way I walk

"Don't dawdle!" one character ordered another in a British mystery television show with actress Diana Rigg in leading role (It went down from there and I didn't watch to the end.) Which brought to mind the Walk. No, not the sixties dance craze, or would be dance craze among 1,000 other wannabe dance crazes. No, the Walk, as in the way people walk.

The way I walk is just the way I walk
The way I talk is just the way i talk
The way I smile is just the way I smile
Touch me baby, and I'll go home wild!

So hiccupped Lux Interior, the lead vocalist of the fabulous Cramps, to the biting strains of electric guitar played by his wife Poison Ivy.

I can tell foreigners straight off the boat, as the saying goes, by the way they walk. I too am recognized as a stranger in strange lands by the way I walk (and I have proofs of that!) But, fully aware of this handicap, after a few weeks there, and some excrutiating effort, I begin to blend. Isn't it our life's purpose, after all, to blend into the background?!

One of the interesting effects of competitive long distance running, which requires high mileage training, is the way it affects one's walk. Having experienced it myself and seen all kinds of amateur long distance runners, I can tell you that many of them walk as if they were in some way crippled, while at the same time they run with the grace of well trained athletes. I suppose that may be because their bodies become more used to running than walking. Go figure!

Each corporate environment I have been in has its way of walking the office corridors. This is an unwritten rule in the corporate world. In one corporation, in an old, traditional industry, the rule was to walk stiffly and fast, as if one were in a hurry to return to one's desk and PRODUCE again. At another corporation, more modern, more hip, and more relaxed, the rule was to walk slowly and at an easy pace, to demonstrate coolness, availability.

One of my co-workers, who is a devil of a competitor at the gym, whether he's running a treadmill or riding a spin bike, is the slowest walker on the corporate floor I've ever seen.

We all remember the Ministry of Funny Walks in the sometimes (OK, often) funny British television show Monty Python.

One of the pieces of advice given to employment candidates is to fake a confident walk when arriving at an interview. It's a good piece of advice, but I must say, though I am quite an expert at it myself, it's never worked for me. Well, the way I walk is just the way I walk, so touch me baby...

Halleluyah, pass the carbon offsets

Here's an interesting article, which leads to another interesting essay on a religious topic: Global... etc

We have met the enemy, again.

I urge to read this article by the Wall Street Journal columnist Daniel Henninger in his column Wonder Land.


And also in today's Journal another worthy article by Jeffrey Zaslow entitled Are We Teaching Our Kids To Be Fearful of Men? (NOTE: if you cannot access it, let me know, and I'll try to have it e-mailed to you.) The war against American men continues.

À propos your precious advice

A Buddhist buys a hotdog. The vendor says, “That’s $4.50.” The Buddhist gives the vendor $5, and the vendor puts it in the cash register. “Hey, where’s my change!?” asks the Buddhist. The vendor replies, “Change comes from within.”

The missing scene

You remember Luis Bunuel's 1972 film The Discreet Charm Of The Bourgeoisie, don't you? If not, quickly, rent it, buy it, see it, you'll love it.
It is a story of a group of wealthy folks in Paris, who repeatedly gather together for dinner, and repeatedly have it interrupted, by some major event.

Here is a story reported recently by Associa ted Press that sounds like a scene missing from the film (NOTE: misspellings and last name abbreviations are mine to deceive copyright violation seeking bots.)

It started about midnight on June 16 when a group of friends was finishing a dinner of marinated steaks and jumbo shrimp on the back patio of a District of Columbia home. That's when a hooded man slid through an open gate and pointed a handgun at the head of a 14-year-old girl.

"Give me your money, or I'll start shooting," he said, according to D.C. police and witnesses.

Everyone froze, including the girl's parents. Then one guest spoke.

"We were just finishing dinner," Cristina "Cha Cha" Ro_, 43, told the man. "Why don't you have a glass of wine with us?"

The intruder had a sip of their Chat eau Malescot St-Exupery and said, "Damn, that's good wine."

The girl's father, Michael Ra_, 51, told the intruder to take the whole glass, and Cristina offered him the whole bottle.

The robber, with his hood down, took another sip and a bite of Came mbert cheese. He put the gun in his sweatpants.

The story then turns even more bizarre.

"I think I may have come to the wrong house," he said before apologizing. "Can I get a hug?"

Cristina, who works at her children's school and lives in Falls Church, Va., stood up and wrapped her arms around the armed man. The four other guests followed.

"Can we have a group hug?" the man asked. The five adults complied.

The man walked away a few moments later with the crystal wine glass in hand. Nothing was stolen, and no one was hurt.

Once he was gone, the group walked into the house, locked the door and stared at each other — speechless. Michael Ra_ called 911, and police came to take a report and dust for fingerprints.

Police classified the case as strange but true. Investigators have not located a suspect. The witnesses thought he might have been high on drugs.

Who's that girl? (I want to meet her!)

One of my Internet e-mail accounts is named after the model and year of a car that I sold through it many years ago. I rarely use it now, never give its address away, and receive only daily mailings from Buy.com and from an office supply company. At one time I received a few spams but those have stopped, an unheard of turn.

Late one recent Tuesday evening, an e-mail was sent to it from a mobile telephone in a far away state, and containing only a photograph of a young woman. No message followed, and opening that e-mail the next morning, I wondered what it was about. Then, later on Wednesday morning, I received a long e-mail that I quote below in its entirety (I have deleted the last names mentioned). The subject line was blank:

This is what was sent to Amy! Kiss my ass David! You are nothing but a womanizing liar that needs to grow up, stop popping pills and hurting people that love you. Love me?? You never did and you will never get the chance. Goodbye....Crystal M____

P.S. Aren't you sick of all this shit yet, I think you & Amy both are addicted to it.


Note: forwarded message attached.

Here's the attached note referred to in the first sentence above:

You may scare David, but you don't scare me. Stop calling me house. Detective S_______ at the Hillsb orough County Police Department has already been notified and will be requesting my phone records, she has also taken a statement from my daughter whom you had no right speaking to that way. I was asked if I would like to press assault charges on you for the threats that you made. I thought of Noah and said no, however, I can at anytime. I was also asked if I would like to press charges on you for soliciting my husband for sex (I did not even know that was a crime, if you were not charging money) again, I said no. This is your written notice, as required by law, to stop harassing my family by, phone, mail or via the internet immediatly.

I told you before I DON'T WANT YOUR HUSBAND, I HAVE MY OWN! HE contacted me 2 weeks ago and there is nothing going on between us. When I came to Georgia (back in 2005), you know as well as I do that he said you two were separated and getting divorced. I had no idea you two were together. If you do have a lawyer, make sure you let him know that. BTW.....you cannot sue someone that has no income. The courts cannot make a family with only one form of income pay anything toward a judgement. They can place a judgement against me to garnish my wages if I were to ever get a job, but I have no plans of doing that in the near future. My best friend is an attorney and has confirmed this for me. I don't speak out of my ass, I do know the law. Besides, you would just be taking from Tim, not me. You would also be taking from my children who are completely innocent. David told me what kind of person you were, I didn't believe it till now. Stop bothering us about something that happened 2 years ago. I never meant to hurt you, David said that you kicked him out and the two of you were not together back then. It's the past...let it go. You guys are separated and getting a divorce for God sakes. I tried to help you and send you the messages last time he contacted me, you crossed a line when you involved my daughter though. I deleted everything this time. I have no use for it and will not have any contact with you or him beyond this point. If you were going to do something like this, it should have been done 2 years ago, not now. I have not contacted you nor him and have done NOTHING wrong or to hurt you since 2005. Hell, the statute of limitations is probably already up. So, take your backwoods drama and leave me out of it. I don't have time to deal with you, him or your drama. Move on and do what is best for your son! All you guys are doing is hurting him.

~Crystal M_____

That was the end of it. No more mysterious e-mails at this address. What to make of it? Your interpretation is as good as mine. The telephone area code, from which the photo was sent, is in one of two Hillsborough Counties in the United States. I suspect that 'David' , in his drugged state (if we to believe Crystal's accusation), was giving out my e-mail address instead of his own, by mistake, or on purpose, making up my address on the spot.

Poet laureate

On August 2, 2007, Charles Simic, 69, who was born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, and immigrated to the country at 16, was named the country’s 15th poet laureate by the Librarian of Congress. He succeeded Donald Hall, a fellow New Englander, who has been poet laureate for the past year. Here are some quotes from newspaper reports and a handful of his poems. (Others can be found on the Internet.)

Simic said his chief poetic preoccupation has been history. "I'm sort of the product of history; Hitler and Stalin were my travel agents," he said. "If they weren't around, I probably would have stayed on the same street where I was born. My family, like millions of others, had to pack up and go, so that has always interested me tremendously: human tragedy and human vileness and stupidity."

Yet he balks at questions about the role of poetry in culture. "That reminds me so much of the way the young Communists in the days of Stalin at big party congresses would ask, 'What is the role of the writer?' " he said.

Simic is known for short, clear poems. His poem "Stone" often appears in anthologies. It begins:

Go inside a stone
That would be my way.
Let somebody else become a dove
Or gnash with a tiger's tooth.
I am happy to be a stone..."

Fear -

Fear passes from man to man
Unknowing,
As one leaf passes its shudder
To another.

All at once the whole tree is trembling.
And there is no sign of the wind.

My Turn to Confess

A dog trying to write a poem on why he barks,
That's me, dear reader!
They were about to kick me out of the library
But I warned them,
My master is invisible and all-powerful.
Still, they kept dragging me out by my tail.

In the meantime, in San Francisco (quote from the metropolitan newspaper):

"Sorry I was late," Lawrence Ferlinghetti apologized to the overflowing crowd at Caffe Trieste. "I was putting more Impeach signs on the upper windows at City Lights."

The crowd cheered.

No, that was not a report from an Agitprop event, but from the San Francisco Poetry Festival (what followed was more angry political rants recited by the 88 year old Mr Ferlinghetti.) Poetry anyone?

Surrealism lives!

Well, of course it does (live.) Long coopted by the advertising industry, it doesn't shock as it did in the 1920s Paris. It sells tampons, toilet tissue, and insurance, among all the consumables we purchase and use.

But this is about the last original surrealist still among the living, Enrico Donati, who is 98 years old, still working and still exhibiting. He associated with Andre Breton, Marcel Duchamp and all the greats of the movement. His seminal work was the Fist (1946) bronze sculpture. Yes, those are two eyeballs staring at you. (There are many reproductions of his work on the Intenret.)

Here's what Mr Donati has to say about young artists today:

"They have no imagination. People think they're geniuses. They stand in their studios and look like little Napoleons. They think 'I'm a genius'. I don't think I'm a genius at all."

In the meantime, in the city of San Francisco, the taxicab driver who holds the city taxi medalion (permit) No. 666, asked the city taxi commision that the number be retired and that he be issued a new medallion. The driver said that the number (the sign of Lucifer himself) brought him nothing but bad luck even though the taxi had been blessed by a qualified friar. The commission voted 5-1 to keep No. 666 on the streets, citing concerns that the case might open a can of worms with other drivers asking that their numbers be retired. After all, San Francisco is a multi-ethnic city and various ethnicities consider many other numbers as unlucky. Incidentally, 666 is the address of SS Peter and Paul's Church on Filbert Street in San Francisco.

Meanwhile, in Hollywood, a well known actor, married (as of this writing) to a well known Hollywood actress has been hired along with his spouse to act in a bio-pic portraying a stormy marriage of some real life characters. Both the actor and the actress, incidentally, have been over the years frequent visitors to the gossip celebrity pages describing their antics and scandals. Here is what the famous actor said recently about the filming:

"All my actor friends warned us, saying, 'Those abusive husband-and-wife scenes are gonna be difficult. It almost scared me into quitting. With those scenes, we'd end up exhausted. But driving home, we'd just look at each other and say, 'We are so normal."'

Kosmos Knows

On Friday afternoon I transferred at the usual station. They were already on the train.

{                       }
{L    doors   R}

................ F| <--- seats
................ E|

A B ...... C D
_ _ ...... _ _ <--- rows of seats

_ _ ...... _ _
_ _ ...... _ _

Two young women in their twenties in seats A and B, made up, well dressed. A young man in his twenties in seat D, T-shirt, fashionable semi punk haircut. A woman in her late thirties in seat E, no make up, lowcut blouse. A man in his late forties in seat F, short sleeve shirt. Caucasian race. They were together, conversing. I entered through door R and sat down two rows behind woman A, looking at her back, both our backs facing the train's direction of travel.

At the next station, another pretty young woman came on waved in by woman B, and sat dawn in seat C. Woman B introduced her to everyone. I heard only that man D is woman's B boyfriend. A minute later, woman E mentioned something about her fiance. Woman C showed everyone a photo on her cell phone. Woman C asked young man D a question, which he answered, and man F jokingly added, "yes he's been in prison". Perhaps he was the young man's father, but no, woman E was too young to be his mother.

The train was noisy, there were other conversations around, and I didn't make out much of their exchanges. I only concluded they were all going for a night on the town, or maybe to a ball game, and that they were unfamiliar with the route. Man F rose and walked over to check a map hanging on the wall past door R. Woman A held a sheet of paper with another map.

And then I noticed. C, D, E, F had all the same noses. (I couldn't see the faces of A and B.) The same bridge, the same nostrils, the same proportions. Class VI. I watched them as they turned, faced me, turned their left and right profiles toward me, and the noses all looked identical. I looked around me at other passengers, to make sure I wasn't hallucinating, and they all had different nose shapes, all classes of shapes represented. The young Chinese man who sat down next to me had a Class II, the Greek nose. A black worker across the isle had a Class III the Nubian nose. A Hispanic woman had a Class V, the Snub nose. I started wishing I had carried a small mirror with me, like when I was sixteen.

Five stations before my destination the train becomes crowded with passengers transferring from another line. The young Chinese man got off and an older white woman took his place beside me. I examined the shape of her nose. Class I, the Roman. I focused at a dozen other noses. All different. Two tall men in their thirties entered and stood by doors L, as all seats were now taken. One of them soon approached woman B and out of the blue asked her where she was from. She answered "From around here", "You're from around here?", he asked. "Yes," she said. The man retreated back to his companion. I checked out these two men's noses. The questioner's companion's nose was shaped the same as the noses of this group.

They finally got off one station before I was to disembark. I could see that woman's B nose was much wider and shorter, the Snub nose, but woman's A nose was the same as the noses of the rest of them.

The woman sitting next to me disembarked as well. A young man, who was standing by our seats took her place. Class III nose, I noted. He turned to me.
"Excuse me, I noticed that you were watching the group that just got off the train," he said.

"Yes. So?" I answered a little embarassed at being caught staring.

"Well, you see I'm a student at the University, working on my Ph.D in Physical Anthropology, and I have a keen interest in people's physiognomies, in fact it's related to my thesis.

"Oh?" I said.

He answered, "Did you by any chance notice those people's ears?"

"Well, to tell you the truth, no," I said, as the train was slowing down. I added "oh, here's my station, goodbye."


(This post was inspired by the memory of Witold Gombrowicz' novel Kosmos.)