Heno, dwi'n llawn o feddyliau, yn llawn o farddoniaeth
ond hefyd, yn llawn o wisgi...
tonight when I came home
the light was blinking on my archaic answering machine
an integral piece of my equally ancient telephone
hardly anyone calls me on this device now
except a few stalwart telemarketers
I entered my office
which sits at the rear of my long house
it's an old house, see
on a narrow lot
when I come home and park at the back, about the first thing I see is the old phone
So I saw the light was blinking
and I asked myself who had died or was in the hospital
the list of potential tragedies was long
I braced myself and ignored the blinking red light for a while
busying myself with the mail, the toilet, my fresh glass of Eagle Rare
Oh yes, and a small handful of spiced gumdrops
Note to self: I now understand why old people like bad tasting candy.
When finally I came to my ancient telephony device
and pressed the big, blue stop/play button
I took a deep breath
Was it about my mother? My neighbor? Someone in the Welsh Society?
Who had died? Who had chosen tonight to beg for help and not called the cell?
To my utter relief it was from one of my Welsh students
saying she wasn't sure when class was
no one I knew had died
no one had suffered an infarction
all was right with the world
and I could sit back and enjoy my Eagle Rare...
dissabte, d’abril 18, 2009
dimarts, de desembre 16, 2008
Friends,
Remember the three roses of my life: the yellow rose for Marggie; the peach rose for Dee-Dee; and the wild rose for me.
Remember the yellow rose clinging to the white concrete block wall growing between the windows alongside Ott Thomas' garage in the small side yard at 111 N. 9th Street. It was Marggie's favorite rose whenever she sat on the side steps with her fat little feet on the flagstone. It grew tall and proud there, and when she was gone, taken away in a sudden infarct of the brain, we always thought of her when we saw one. At those times when I have left a flower at her grave, it's always been a yellow rose.
Also in the yard was a peach rose, and one time one came to grow entwined with the yellow. The peach rose was Dee-Dee's favorite rose, and like the two sisters, the peach and yellow over time grew to wrap around each other. When Dee-Dee went to sleep with the Great Question Mark late in the winter of 1994, she lay in her silver seraglio clasping a peach rose. And at those times when I have left a flower at her grave, it's always been a peach rose.
And for me the wild rose because I've always loved its fragrance. In the feral valley where I grew up, an old wild rose bush grew alongside our house, and in the house I bought for myself, in the front yard grows another fine old wild rose whose perfume filters along the street through late spring and early summer. It always reminds me of my childhood and the two sisters who saved me from boredom and self-loathing.
When I die, lay three roses to remember me: the yellow, the peach and the wild rose. Since wild roses are hard to make behave, if I come to take my trip to have tea with the Question Mark at an inopportune time, make mine a red rose, and then lay those three roses across each other. In the eternal sleep of the unknown, I would like my journey to end where it began: in the embrace of those two sisters.
Remember the three roses of my life: the yellow rose for Marggie; the peach rose for Dee-Dee; and the wild rose for me.
Remember the yellow rose clinging to the white concrete block wall growing between the windows alongside Ott Thomas' garage in the small side yard at 111 N. 9th Street. It was Marggie's favorite rose whenever she sat on the side steps with her fat little feet on the flagstone. It grew tall and proud there, and when she was gone, taken away in a sudden infarct of the brain, we always thought of her when we saw one. At those times when I have left a flower at her grave, it's always been a yellow rose.
Also in the yard was a peach rose, and one time one came to grow entwined with the yellow. The peach rose was Dee-Dee's favorite rose, and like the two sisters, the peach and yellow over time grew to wrap around each other. When Dee-Dee went to sleep with the Great Question Mark late in the winter of 1994, she lay in her silver seraglio clasping a peach rose. And at those times when I have left a flower at her grave, it's always been a peach rose.
And for me the wild rose because I've always loved its fragrance. In the feral valley where I grew up, an old wild rose bush grew alongside our house, and in the house I bought for myself, in the front yard grows another fine old wild rose whose perfume filters along the street through late spring and early summer. It always reminds me of my childhood and the two sisters who saved me from boredom and self-loathing.
When I die, lay three roses to remember me: the yellow, the peach and the wild rose. Since wild roses are hard to make behave, if I come to take my trip to have tea with the Question Mark at an inopportune time, make mine a red rose, and then lay those three roses across each other. In the eternal sleep of the unknown, I would like my journey to end where it began: in the embrace of those two sisters.
dissabte, de setembre 06, 2008
Hunanddarluniad (English)
Sloth is my predilection. I would rather sit around all the time and stare off into space, sleep, let my brain rot in front of the television. This, I fear, is my mother's gift to me. My brain is genetically wired to desire apathy and vapidity. At least on some level it is.
On some other level, it's geared wildly toward pleasure. All physical pleasures that don't exhaust or kill. The taste of morbier or the fire of bourbon. The loveliest launch of semen across the face of a lover. An hour long massage. A full belly. A good and willful shit.
Yet again, it longs for supremacy over others. I have an abiding longing to be right. But to be right, I can't sit around all day and drink bourbon and take good and willful shits after a nice, long fuck. I must also be productive and successful, even a little bit wealthy.
When I finally rouse myself to be useful and productive, I usually have more energy to be about it than others. I find that I spend long hours at various works, good works for the common good, for the good of my tribes: my work tribe, my church tribe, my Welsh tribe, my neighborhood tribe, etc.
Another gift from my mother, but one she purchased at the Future-Nutcase-Store with my father's credit card: Anxiety. Deep and roaming. It lives with me like a fetid lump of puke on the bathroom floor... one of those pukes that colonizes the provinces of the toilet like the lost tribe of Israel - always showing up when you least expect it and long after you thought it was gone for good.
There's no way to deny Anxiety forever. It's hard-wired into me like breathing. I spend many long hours tempting my fear to be real. I stand it down as though it were Goliath. I David it daily with Valerian Root, booze and Pennsylvania German tenacity.
Life's a stage...
I play the role of my aunty when her boyfriend stuck a gun in her side and told her to come away with him or he would shoot. "Go ahead and kill me then," she said. So do I. Every day Anxiety says my heart is stopping, my lungs are filling, my food is poisoned. So I say to Anxiety, "Then do it, kill me. If this my time then take me into the Question Mark. Let me know who was right: the boring and listless skeptics or the fundies who cling to their primitive religions like crabs to the crotch of the cosmos."
Just like her boyfriend did, Anxiety lets me go, backing down like a momma's boy bully. My Anxiety desires life, and it can't live without me, so it backs down every time. When I finally die, it will go with me into the furnace at the crematorium and be extinguished with me.
Yet, I do not find the emptiness others do. No hopelessness. I just find a not-knowing-ness. I take my vitamins and do my exercises, check my blood levels of this and that every year just to buy myself a little more time. Death may lead to a million things, but it may also lead to nothing. I see no reason to rush for no reason. The others can keep their novenas and jihads, their smug self-righteous platitudes whether based in myth or so-called facts.
I always remember the wise words of the Druid of Landévenec, who said to the Abbot of Landévennec, "When we cross that final threshold, we may both find out we were wrong." So tomorrow I will awake in the morning and curse the very existence of the unviverse, but when i finally pull myself into the shower then anoint myself like a modern day Roman with oils and tinctures, I will embrace the day as though I were a Viking praying to live to fight another day...
On some other level, it's geared wildly toward pleasure. All physical pleasures that don't exhaust or kill. The taste of morbier or the fire of bourbon. The loveliest launch of semen across the face of a lover. An hour long massage. A full belly. A good and willful shit.
Yet again, it longs for supremacy over others. I have an abiding longing to be right. But to be right, I can't sit around all day and drink bourbon and take good and willful shits after a nice, long fuck. I must also be productive and successful, even a little bit wealthy.
When I finally rouse myself to be useful and productive, I usually have more energy to be about it than others. I find that I spend long hours at various works, good works for the common good, for the good of my tribes: my work tribe, my church tribe, my Welsh tribe, my neighborhood tribe, etc.
Another gift from my mother, but one she purchased at the Future-Nutcase-Store with my father's credit card: Anxiety. Deep and roaming. It lives with me like a fetid lump of puke on the bathroom floor... one of those pukes that colonizes the provinces of the toilet like the lost tribe of Israel - always showing up when you least expect it and long after you thought it was gone for good.
There's no way to deny Anxiety forever. It's hard-wired into me like breathing. I spend many long hours tempting my fear to be real. I stand it down as though it were Goliath. I David it daily with Valerian Root, booze and Pennsylvania German tenacity.
Life's a stage...
I play the role of my aunty when her boyfriend stuck a gun in her side and told her to come away with him or he would shoot. "Go ahead and kill me then," she said. So do I. Every day Anxiety says my heart is stopping, my lungs are filling, my food is poisoned. So I say to Anxiety, "Then do it, kill me. If this my time then take me into the Question Mark. Let me know who was right: the boring and listless skeptics or the fundies who cling to their primitive religions like crabs to the crotch of the cosmos."
Just like her boyfriend did, Anxiety lets me go, backing down like a momma's boy bully. My Anxiety desires life, and it can't live without me, so it backs down every time. When I finally die, it will go with me into the furnace at the crematorium and be extinguished with me.
Yet, I do not find the emptiness others do. No hopelessness. I just find a not-knowing-ness. I take my vitamins and do my exercises, check my blood levels of this and that every year just to buy myself a little more time. Death may lead to a million things, but it may also lead to nothing. I see no reason to rush for no reason. The others can keep their novenas and jihads, their smug self-righteous platitudes whether based in myth or so-called facts.
I always remember the wise words of the Druid of Landévenec, who said to the Abbot of Landévennec, "When we cross that final threshold, we may both find out we were wrong." So tomorrow I will awake in the morning and curse the very existence of the unviverse, but when i finally pull myself into the shower then anoint myself like a modern day Roman with oils and tinctures, I will embrace the day as though I were a Viking praying to live to fight another day...
dimecres, d’agost 20, 2008
Englyn i mi? (Cymraeg / English)
Oddi ar fedd yn ardal Granville, Efrog Newydd, a Poultney y Mynydd Glas...
(A grave poem from the region of Granville, NY and Poultney, VT...)
Yn fy nghwsg, caf fy ngwasgu - i ddedwydd
Freuddwydio am Gymru
Drwy nos y caf deyrnasu
Oddifewn i'r dyddiau fu.
In my sleep I surrendur - to dream sweet
Dreams about Wales
All night I reign king
Of the happiness of days gone by.
- Dewi Glyn Dulas
Oddi ar fedd David Morris, fu farw ym 1895, yn 40 oed. / From the grave of David Morris, who died in 1896 at the age of 40.
(A grave poem from the region of Granville, NY and Poultney, VT...)
Yn fy nghwsg, caf fy ngwasgu - i ddedwydd
Freuddwydio am Gymru
Drwy nos y caf deyrnasu
Oddifewn i'r dyddiau fu.
In my sleep I surrendur - to dream sweet
Dreams about Wales
All night I reign king
Of the happiness of days gone by.
- Dewi Glyn Dulas
Oddi ar fedd David Morris, fu farw ym 1895, yn 40 oed. / From the grave of David Morris, who died in 1896 at the age of 40.
dimarts, d’agost 05, 2008
Coaxing out the Sun
"Only my childhood was real. The rest is just a dream." -Kate Roberts
There was magic in my valley. I remember it well from when I was a boy: the deep musk of the woods that filtered from tall pines, the tall fern fronds arching over narrow, shaded paths and small streams, bitter wild blueberries and small ponds choked with lilies. The valley where I was raised was wild and barely tamed. Old men came to the valley long ago and settled small villages; they cleared the land and raised animals and grew food, but in the fullness of time, their age passed, and the trees came back to the land. What once was farmland was now feral forest. Long black racers and copperheads staked claim in the rocks and meadows, and the deer and bears were occasionally accompanied by some lascivious mountain lion or lynx. Like all magic places, the good was twinned with the bad in a fitting double helix of life and death, love and fear. The humans, of course, ruled the land. My great grandfather Fish went out on the wolf clearings, and yearly hunting of anything that roamed the woodlands only began to die out with my generation.
Our lives were in and on the land: we raised crops, and the old men hunted. We all fished, and we all raised fowl. In season we would go down to the brooks and streams and gather elderberries and blackberries. My father would make wine from local grapes and herbs. The air in our valley was always heady except in the coldest part of winter when large swaths of it would ice over as clandestine springs would gurgle forth some small amount of water that would freeze. In the gentrified places, willow trees absorbed this dross, but if the willow should die sometime, then in January meadows and back fields could become large ice skating rinks. When the warm weather came back, the valley would awaken with blossoms from the many trees and bushes people planted around their homes. At our house we had apple, cherry, plum, crabapple, and peach trees that bore fruit, and a chestnut tree that dropped its myriad land mines at the end of summer. Like the spring air was thick with the smell of flowering plants, the summer was thick with must and piny musk and drying mud. The fall was a natural pot pourri of millions of dying plants and smoke rising from wood fires as the cold weather approached.
In such a place, magic is real. It lives in the trees and streams as surely as grubs and eels. It saturates the valley floor like the hundred and ten springs, brooks and races that feed into the big creek at the heart of the valley. If you sing into the wind that runs down the valley from the Mountain, you can call up the sun, and in our valley we always wanted sun: sun in the summer for the crops and sun in the cold months to chase away winter's drafts. When the trees grew back after the likes of Joseph Barton and Ulysses Fish had succumbed to the Great Question Mark, they took their revenge, growing tall and thick and blocking out the sun much of the year. In our valley, except in deep winter and the gooey slide from winter into spring, we lived under a thick canopy of mixed forest. Even in the winter, such light as there was was often absorbed by the conifers who became more common as we felled the other trees for our fires.
When I was a boy, I was certain I could call the sun out from behind the clouds. I spent long hours outside, often in the woods, away from the noise and tumult of the house. When the clouds would overtake the sun, I would sing a song in Welsh, the language of my ancestors: Dewch allan i ni haul, dewch, dewch, dewch. "Come out to us, sun, come, come, come," it made no sense to sing to the sun in English. The trees were old, but the valley and stream were older, and the sun oldest still. If people long ago could sing the sun from the clouds, it would have been in a language like Welsh. English was too young, too juvenile and worse still for the old families in the valley a sign of a woeful change. While we all spoke English, we spoke our own kind. English, proper English, belonged to the invading outsiders who had begun to consume all the land, our valley inclusive, with subdivisions and strip malls. Like my great grandfather had done to the wolves, the outsiders were doing to our little world, clearing us out one acre at a time.
For years I would sing the sun back, and most of the time it worked. Once in a while I guess it had to rain or snow, although we could never suffer a real drought even if it never rained again: the valley was thick it springs. I knew of five on our land alone. When I was younger, I always assumed my ability to sing the sun back was a family trait a quantum or genetic inheritance that came from our Celtic past, but I had no proof of this. If either of my parents were possessed of magic, they never let on. The valley was as rife with stories of witches and demonic possession as it was with springs; indeed our land was even home to the mysterious "pillars" of Bartonsville, which were not pillars at all, but an acre-large arrangement of small standing stones which were most likely some kind of Native prayer wheel built before General Sullivan marched across the valley in the Colonial Era. Perhaps my magic came from the land itself, my body filled with deep minerals from the water and infected by myriad spores of countless fungi that thrived in all sectors of the valley. To be honest, I am not given to know.
Nonetheless it was a magic power I possessed. I assumed that if my Mother possessed any magic powers she would use them quite openly and malevolently. She always believed she was really an Irish gypsy despite the fact that in reality none of our family was actually Irish. However had she been a gypsy, to be sure she would have been their witch and would certainly have used her magic for dubious purposes. More than that, she could never keep a secret. Even if she had suspected she had magic powers, she would have been bragging about them all over the county.
My father, on the other hand, was a sullen, brooding man of few words. He liked to keep to himself most often sequestering himself in the garage, which as long as I could remember never housed a car, but instead an assortment of junk in one half and our wood supply in the other. Detached, it lay at the bottom of the hill several hundred feet from the house and had no water, heat or electricity. Like some modern day hermit, he would spend his free time there with his beer and blessed freedom from my mother who, if she thought for one minute that he had any magic powers, would harangue him until he begged for sweet mercy. To be sure, he was safer there than in the house. Since he never had much to say, he never fessed up about any magic powers, but one cool November day around three in the afternoon or so, as I came from around the back of the house on some errand (perhaps on some excuse to escape from my mother for fifteen minutes) I observed my old man standing in the driveway with his back toward me looking up at a patch of beleaguered sunlight trying to break through the clouds. He was unaware of my presence up on the hill, and I was able to observe him raising his arms toward the sunlight, and I could swear I heard his old, low voice singing the same melody that I had sung to bring out the sun. Just as he finished, the clouds parted, and we were treated to a late November afternoon of sunshine.
Since my father never had much to say, I didn't see any reason to bring it up. If I had, most likely he would have grunted and said, "Get me another beer, will 'ya, Sonny?" But to this day I can still see his old tired shoulders in that worn out denim jacket, his long, thin gray hair on his gnarled old head looking up at that tired autumn sun and him coaxing it out to shine down on our valley.
There was magic in my valley. I remember it well from when I was a boy: the deep musk of the woods that filtered from tall pines, the tall fern fronds arching over narrow, shaded paths and small streams, bitter wild blueberries and small ponds choked with lilies. The valley where I was raised was wild and barely tamed. Old men came to the valley long ago and settled small villages; they cleared the land and raised animals and grew food, but in the fullness of time, their age passed, and the trees came back to the land. What once was farmland was now feral forest. Long black racers and copperheads staked claim in the rocks and meadows, and the deer and bears were occasionally accompanied by some lascivious mountain lion or lynx. Like all magic places, the good was twinned with the bad in a fitting double helix of life and death, love and fear. The humans, of course, ruled the land. My great grandfather Fish went out on the wolf clearings, and yearly hunting of anything that roamed the woodlands only began to die out with my generation.
Our lives were in and on the land: we raised crops, and the old men hunted. We all fished, and we all raised fowl. In season we would go down to the brooks and streams and gather elderberries and blackberries. My father would make wine from local grapes and herbs. The air in our valley was always heady except in the coldest part of winter when large swaths of it would ice over as clandestine springs would gurgle forth some small amount of water that would freeze. In the gentrified places, willow trees absorbed this dross, but if the willow should die sometime, then in January meadows and back fields could become large ice skating rinks. When the warm weather came back, the valley would awaken with blossoms from the many trees and bushes people planted around their homes. At our house we had apple, cherry, plum, crabapple, and peach trees that bore fruit, and a chestnut tree that dropped its myriad land mines at the end of summer. Like the spring air was thick with the smell of flowering plants, the summer was thick with must and piny musk and drying mud. The fall was a natural pot pourri of millions of dying plants and smoke rising from wood fires as the cold weather approached.
In such a place, magic is real. It lives in the trees and streams as surely as grubs and eels. It saturates the valley floor like the hundred and ten springs, brooks and races that feed into the big creek at the heart of the valley. If you sing into the wind that runs down the valley from the Mountain, you can call up the sun, and in our valley we always wanted sun: sun in the summer for the crops and sun in the cold months to chase away winter's drafts. When the trees grew back after the likes of Joseph Barton and Ulysses Fish had succumbed to the Great Question Mark, they took their revenge, growing tall and thick and blocking out the sun much of the year. In our valley, except in deep winter and the gooey slide from winter into spring, we lived under a thick canopy of mixed forest. Even in the winter, such light as there was was often absorbed by the conifers who became more common as we felled the other trees for our fires.
When I was a boy, I was certain I could call the sun out from behind the clouds. I spent long hours outside, often in the woods, away from the noise and tumult of the house. When the clouds would overtake the sun, I would sing a song in Welsh, the language of my ancestors: Dewch allan i ni haul, dewch, dewch, dewch. "Come out to us, sun, come, come, come," it made no sense to sing to the sun in English. The trees were old, but the valley and stream were older, and the sun oldest still. If people long ago could sing the sun from the clouds, it would have been in a language like Welsh. English was too young, too juvenile and worse still for the old families in the valley a sign of a woeful change. While we all spoke English, we spoke our own kind. English, proper English, belonged to the invading outsiders who had begun to consume all the land, our valley inclusive, with subdivisions and strip malls. Like my great grandfather had done to the wolves, the outsiders were doing to our little world, clearing us out one acre at a time.
For years I would sing the sun back, and most of the time it worked. Once in a while I guess it had to rain or snow, although we could never suffer a real drought even if it never rained again: the valley was thick it springs. I knew of five on our land alone. When I was younger, I always assumed my ability to sing the sun back was a family trait a quantum or genetic inheritance that came from our Celtic past, but I had no proof of this. If either of my parents were possessed of magic, they never let on. The valley was as rife with stories of witches and demonic possession as it was with springs; indeed our land was even home to the mysterious "pillars" of Bartonsville, which were not pillars at all, but an acre-large arrangement of small standing stones which were most likely some kind of Native prayer wheel built before General Sullivan marched across the valley in the Colonial Era. Perhaps my magic came from the land itself, my body filled with deep minerals from the water and infected by myriad spores of countless fungi that thrived in all sectors of the valley. To be honest, I am not given to know.
Nonetheless it was a magic power I possessed. I assumed that if my Mother possessed any magic powers she would use them quite openly and malevolently. She always believed she was really an Irish gypsy despite the fact that in reality none of our family was actually Irish. However had she been a gypsy, to be sure she would have been their witch and would certainly have used her magic for dubious purposes. More than that, she could never keep a secret. Even if she had suspected she had magic powers, she would have been bragging about them all over the county.
My father, on the other hand, was a sullen, brooding man of few words. He liked to keep to himself most often sequestering himself in the garage, which as long as I could remember never housed a car, but instead an assortment of junk in one half and our wood supply in the other. Detached, it lay at the bottom of the hill several hundred feet from the house and had no water, heat or electricity. Like some modern day hermit, he would spend his free time there with his beer and blessed freedom from my mother who, if she thought for one minute that he had any magic powers, would harangue him until he begged for sweet mercy. To be sure, he was safer there than in the house. Since he never had much to say, he never fessed up about any magic powers, but one cool November day around three in the afternoon or so, as I came from around the back of the house on some errand (perhaps on some excuse to escape from my mother for fifteen minutes) I observed my old man standing in the driveway with his back toward me looking up at a patch of beleaguered sunlight trying to break through the clouds. He was unaware of my presence up on the hill, and I was able to observe him raising his arms toward the sunlight, and I could swear I heard his old, low voice singing the same melody that I had sung to bring out the sun. Just as he finished, the clouds parted, and we were treated to a late November afternoon of sunshine.
Since my father never had much to say, I didn't see any reason to bring it up. If I had, most likely he would have grunted and said, "Get me another beer, will 'ya, Sonny?" But to this day I can still see his old tired shoulders in that worn out denim jacket, his long, thin gray hair on his gnarled old head looking up at that tired autumn sun and him coaxing it out to shine down on our valley.
dimarts, de juliol 08, 2008
Response to a Comment from Americymru
Interesting interview! I was interested especially in what Carwyn had to say about the Senedd. I was working with the infamous Barbara Martin of New Orleans back in the day when the the Senedd was a mere dream and Barbara was schlepping Dafydd Wigley all over the US. It's hard to believe it's been nearly 10 years already. To me, as an American, the Senedd is a beacon for Welsh democracy, a Welsh democracy those of us who worked with the now defunct Plaid Cymru North America Branch longed to see in our adopted or actual ancestral homeland. I can still remember sitting up all night to send out the email newsletter (I was the Newsletter Editor, that was my function back then) telling our members who had email (it was still a rather novel concept at the time) what had happened during the election. When the final votes were tallied, I sent out the "Victory" email. To be sure, the Senedd has a long way to go, but in fewer than ten short years, it's come a fair distance. I'm so proud of what the Senedd has accomplished that I can overlook some of its gaffs. I'm still hopeful that it will take a harder stand on homes for native Welsh folks (Sorry guys, I do support the motives of Cymuned...) and for the language. Then again, we must remember it's the job of the Senedd to represent all Wales, Cymry Cymraeg and English speaking Welsh alike. Sitting over here in the balmy summer of Upstate New York and looking back, the transformation that Wales has experienced since the 1950's is amazing: from a politically integral part of England to colony, to client state and now to a fledgling democracy trying to "devolve" (what a demeaning term, thanks so much to Whitehall) fully from the UK.
When I was a boy they said two things over and over: 1) The Welsh language will be dead soon. 2) Wales will never be free.
The first is surely a joke of the past now. I will die in world where Welsh is spoken. And, more and more, it looks like one day before I die, Wales will take its place in Europe...
When I was a boy they said two things over and over: 1) The Welsh language will be dead soon. 2) Wales will never be free.
The first is surely a joke of the past now. I will die in world where Welsh is spoken. And, more and more, it looks like one day before I die, Wales will take its place in Europe...
dilluns, de juny 30, 2008
Second Response to T
You make some very interesting counterpoints, but I'm not sure they fit the Novella/Skeptics-question. Novella and his merry team of debunkers are not taking on the Catholic Church and Islam; instead they are taking on the far more harmless (perhaps even gormless) ghost hunters and psychic mediums. Perhaps I should have been clearer there myself. To be blunt, I find that most people who put "Critical Thinking" in their Blog titles as capable of real critical thinking as those on the Christian Right. The main difference in the genre of their doctrines is that the so-called Skeptics are able to couch their manifestos in small and often disconnected bits of Scientific methodology, through which means they seem to know something others do not. The critical thinker observes and evaluates the information before him or her and makes an educated and informed opinion, but does not usually find the need to beat others' (i.e. the general public) over the head with that opinion. A hornswoggler with PhD or an MD sells a snake oil not much different to anyone else's. People with deeply held beliefs, even those rooted in Science, do not make the most reasoned people. As I say, having wandered around the Internet reading up on Dr. Novella, I give him credit where credit is due. Having an objective eye on questions which are near and dear to his heart he is not, however. Personally, I think he would be a lot more convincing without his website and other sundry talismans such as a podcast. Here he has moved from the realm of the academy into the realm of the three-ring circus and his main objective would appear to be finding adherents. The collective force of the academy cultivating a generation of real critical thinkers is a more noteworthy endeavor than opening a spate of websites and coffee clutches for the middle classes convincing them to chortle smugly as silly ghost hunters and sundry folks traipse about the planet believing in things which may or may not be there. Novella and his ilk (as are any deeply invested in establishing bases of social power) are full of what Plato would call "spiritedness" which is a craving for the security of absolute power and control. What I find remarkably tragic is that he is positioned, at least theoretically, to help build a generation of critical thinkers by taking his small part in the classroom. Instead he would rather razzle-dazzle sundry folks.
I will however VEHEMENTLY disagree with your position on the meaningfulness or meaninglessness of life, and when I get out to Portland perhaps we will have some long, drunken rants in person about this topic. Objectively speaking, there is no way, if the Skeptics' world view is correct, to find any sort of deeper meaning, or even transient meaning in life. You and I are lucky souls, all in all well bred and well fed and from a rich country. If we're lucky, we may live long lives. However, if this is all there is, whatever transient meaning we create in life is ultimately pointless. Our time on earth will make no appreciable difference in this infinitely large cosmos. All the love, the sorrow, the struggles and triumphs of all mankind will be swallowed by a bloated and dying Sol. Even if humanity were to escape the Solar System and colonize all that our eyes can see, some day, the universe itself will cease to exist.
Indeed, you and I are free to find meaning in a life that ends after 50, 60, 70 years. But what of the child who dies of starvation in the Sudan? What of the young, hopeful mother killed by an exploding shell in Tikrit? Meaning, such as they were creating it, arbitrarily ends through no fault of their own. And yet, those of us who live 100 years, we still meet the same basic end. The parade is only going to one place for all of us after all. So if this is all there is, if life's final disappointment is, as Peggy Lee would say, on its way, then no, life has, ultimately, no meaning. We are an accident of the cosmos; our thoughts and dreams no more than accidental by-products of a wholly accidental life. Whether we kill each other slowly or quickly, we do so nonetheless. Even if we were to live in peace for 10,000 years, it would make no difference. In short, the notion that each of us makes "individual meaning" in such a paradigm is a cloying and trite cop-out... a card-board match lit in the wake of a hurricane.
And, I must admit, that such may be the reality in which we live. I've always been given over to Science. I like relatively hard and fast answers (although one must caution to say "relatively" since even experiments done in succession with all controls firmly in place will show variances in results!). Indeed, I'm a huge fan of Science, and even now regularly read and research scientific interests of mine. At the end of the day though, while Science tells us a lot about "how" the cosmos works, it remains silent on "why". There is still a lot of mystery out there, and I don't think the day has dawned when it's time to close the human heart and mind to pondering the possibilities offered to us by the great Question! You are my sweet, dear, intelligent and artistically brilliant T. I couldn't care less about Dr. Novella and his well-meaning but meaningless adherents. However I do worry about you, and this new world you're wandering into so self-assuredly. If there's one thing I've learned so far in my life of pain and loss, and I think you know what I mean, is that tomorrow is worth getting up for because it's a mystery and our lives are along the way to solving it. Science does not have all the answers. Religion, I'm sure has fewer, though still some. Become a brilliant Scientist my lovely T., but don't lose your soul along the way!To me it is logical to say this: From where we stand today there is still much we do not know. One's school of beliefs may be proven wrong in the end, but to believe only in one idea and one ideal is clearly wrong. We all die sometime, some time sooner rather than later, when we do, then, PERHAPS, we know...
At least that's what I say to myself when I observe the corpse of someone I knew in a coffin.
"Now he knows."
I will however VEHEMENTLY disagree with your position on the meaningfulness or meaninglessness of life, and when I get out to Portland perhaps we will have some long, drunken rants in person about this topic. Objectively speaking, there is no way, if the Skeptics' world view is correct, to find any sort of deeper meaning, or even transient meaning in life. You and I are lucky souls, all in all well bred and well fed and from a rich country. If we're lucky, we may live long lives. However, if this is all there is, whatever transient meaning we create in life is ultimately pointless. Our time on earth will make no appreciable difference in this infinitely large cosmos. All the love, the sorrow, the struggles and triumphs of all mankind will be swallowed by a bloated and dying Sol. Even if humanity were to escape the Solar System and colonize all that our eyes can see, some day, the universe itself will cease to exist.
Indeed, you and I are free to find meaning in a life that ends after 50, 60, 70 years. But what of the child who dies of starvation in the Sudan? What of the young, hopeful mother killed by an exploding shell in Tikrit? Meaning, such as they were creating it, arbitrarily ends through no fault of their own. And yet, those of us who live 100 years, we still meet the same basic end. The parade is only going to one place for all of us after all. So if this is all there is, if life's final disappointment is, as Peggy Lee would say, on its way, then no, life has, ultimately, no meaning. We are an accident of the cosmos; our thoughts and dreams no more than accidental by-products of a wholly accidental life. Whether we kill each other slowly or quickly, we do so nonetheless. Even if we were to live in peace for 10,000 years, it would make no difference. In short, the notion that each of us makes "individual meaning" in such a paradigm is a cloying and trite cop-out... a card-board match lit in the wake of a hurricane.
And, I must admit, that such may be the reality in which we live. I've always been given over to Science. I like relatively hard and fast answers (although one must caution to say "relatively" since even experiments done in succession with all controls firmly in place will show variances in results!). Indeed, I'm a huge fan of Science, and even now regularly read and research scientific interests of mine. At the end of the day though, while Science tells us a lot about "how" the cosmos works, it remains silent on "why". There is still a lot of mystery out there, and I don't think the day has dawned when it's time to close the human heart and mind to pondering the possibilities offered to us by the great Question! You are my sweet, dear, intelligent and artistically brilliant T. I couldn't care less about Dr. Novella and his well-meaning but meaningless adherents. However I do worry about you, and this new world you're wandering into so self-assuredly. If there's one thing I've learned so far in my life of pain and loss, and I think you know what I mean, is that tomorrow is worth getting up for because it's a mystery and our lives are along the way to solving it. Science does not have all the answers. Religion, I'm sure has fewer, though still some. Become a brilliant Scientist my lovely T., but don't lose your soul along the way!To me it is logical to say this: From where we stand today there is still much we do not know. One's school of beliefs may be proven wrong in the end, but to believe only in one idea and one ideal is clearly wrong. We all die sometime, some time sooner rather than later, when we do, then, PERHAPS, we know...
At least that's what I say to myself when I observe the corpse of someone I knew in a coffin.
"Now he knows."
dijous, de juny 26, 2008
Response to T.C.
Hmmm, I've been reading some of these posts you leave behind, and I must confess a modicum of distress and concern. While clearly Dr. Novella is an intelligent and classically trained medical scholar and practitioner, he is also a man on a mission, a zealot. I've known many intelligent, educated self-proclaimed skeptics over the years who, like Dr. Novella appears to be, turn out in reality to be cynics. Not content to stick to their research and to things which science can solve, in a desperate search for temporary meaning in a transient world, they turn on the hapless victims of the same quest for meaning who are looking for something to believe in, but who have chosen "alternative" and certainly unprovable positions. Of course, some of these individuals really are charlatans. On the other hand, many, if not most, are sincere seekers of meaning in a world where God is, if not dead, on life support. The so-called skeptics and their minor militia of debunkers seem to scour the planet in search of anything science cannot, at present state, prove and pillage it in effigy, planting the ever-so-winsome banner of Nietzche in the wreckage left behind.
What I find so ironic about Dr. Novella is that he is a man supposedly dedicated to preserving life, and yet, what world does he offer to his erstwhile patients? Evidently one in which while one's life may be extended as much as humanly possible, one ultimately meets the same wretched fist at the end of the valley as the baby who died at birth. This cohort of intelligent, although rather narrow-minded people, smile gleefully as science extends a life and a consciousness which they ultimately deem as visceral, fleeting, and at the end of the day, while many of them will make shallow statements to the contrary, must be meaningless, pointless. IF, all there is to our lives is the observable and quantifiable, IF these unreflective adherents to Nihilism are correct, then what is the possible harm in letting people believe in something that may not be real? What? A person's life may be cut short? Possibly. On the other hand, medical treatments kill plenty of people every day in science's best attempts to prolong the ever-so-brief journey into eternal night. The best they can offer the world then a gleeful smile proclaiming: We were right and you were wrong! Now we shuffle off the same as you... but... but, we've set you free. Indeed, free to die in a world of worry and sadness that this is all there is. It's almost as though they take some sort of sadistic pleasure in crushing the last treasure in Pandora's box.
And while their message is generally bleak to say the least, they pursue their victims with the fervor of the Inquisition. At the end of the day, their resolute closed-mindedness, their self-righteous indignation, their smugness, puts them in the same social paradigm as the Conservative Right. They choose to proclaim rather than to observe and experience. They choose to mock rather than to listen.
As the Druid said to Gwenole when he took his leave: When we each cross that final threshold, we may both find that we were wrong. To me, that's sage advice, and a dose of which would go a long way on blogs like Neurologica.
Incidentally, it would be interesting to see Dr. Novella's tax return some time...
This response is in reference to: http://www.theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=309
What I find so ironic about Dr. Novella is that he is a man supposedly dedicated to preserving life, and yet, what world does he offer to his erstwhile patients? Evidently one in which while one's life may be extended as much as humanly possible, one ultimately meets the same wretched fist at the end of the valley as the baby who died at birth. This cohort of intelligent, although rather narrow-minded people, smile gleefully as science extends a life and a consciousness which they ultimately deem as visceral, fleeting, and at the end of the day, while many of them will make shallow statements to the contrary, must be meaningless, pointless. IF, all there is to our lives is the observable and quantifiable, IF these unreflective adherents to Nihilism are correct, then what is the possible harm in letting people believe in something that may not be real? What? A person's life may be cut short? Possibly. On the other hand, medical treatments kill plenty of people every day in science's best attempts to prolong the ever-so-brief journey into eternal night. The best they can offer the world then a gleeful smile proclaiming: We were right and you were wrong! Now we shuffle off the same as you... but... but, we've set you free. Indeed, free to die in a world of worry and sadness that this is all there is. It's almost as though they take some sort of sadistic pleasure in crushing the last treasure in Pandora's box.
And while their message is generally bleak to say the least, they pursue their victims with the fervor of the Inquisition. At the end of the day, their resolute closed-mindedness, their self-righteous indignation, their smugness, puts them in the same social paradigm as the Conservative Right. They choose to proclaim rather than to observe and experience. They choose to mock rather than to listen.
As the Druid said to Gwenole when he took his leave: When we each cross that final threshold, we may both find that we were wrong. To me, that's sage advice, and a dose of which would go a long way on blogs like Neurologica.
Incidentally, it would be interesting to see Dr. Novella's tax return some time...
This response is in reference to: http://www.theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=309
dimecres, de març 19, 2008
Yn Nhiriogaeth y Bedw a'r Helyg
yr hendre'
tiriogaeth werdd
a nentydd bychain cùl
yn llifo dros fryniau
o bant i bridd tamp
wybren las olau
a'r haul yn gwenu mewn haf poeth
cân brogaod yn dal yn swyn imi
efo awel iach y nos
hon yw'r tir rhwng y Bedw a'r Helyg
meithrinfa felys i hogyn di-bres
coed oedd yn derynasau annwyl
lle treuliwn i oriau maith yn creu fyd ar ôl byd
anturau braf mewn hudol fan
o hyd rwyf yn cofio'r cylch a chynefin
hon oedd tir fy mreudwydion
hon oedd tir fy nhylwyth
hon oedd tir tamp a gwylltaidd
a hon yw'r tir lle mae olion fy nhad
lle 'nes i adael ei luwch yn gynnes o hyd o'r amlosga
lluwch 'naeth ddal at fy sanau fel gwagies i'r cist bach du
(Bywyd oll dyn, ei gofion, ei feddylion, ei ofnau
i gyd mewn cist bach...)
fy mrawd wrth f'ymyl
a'r tywydd yn chwilboeth
haf tebyg i'n hardal ni
a'r bedw a'r helyg wedi pydru hefyd erbyn hyn
fel 'naeth hud y tir farw fel heneiddies i
eu holion yn rŵan yn lluwch
lluwch sy'n bwydo coed newydd
pinwydd tal a gwyrdd
yn union fel mae olion tad yn eu 'neud
ond rŵan imi
yng nghyn-diriogaeth y Bedw a'r Helyg
dim ond ysbrydion sy'n crwydro'r allt
sy'n sipian o'r nentydd sisial
a chlywed cân y llyffantod
ond cofio wyf o hyd
sut le oedd hi gynt
ac er fy nghywilydd
'swn i wrth fy modd i grwydro'r hen le 'to
a phrofi unwaith eto sut lanc oeddwn i
****
the old home
a green close
drained by narrow streams
flowing along the hills
from spring valley to soggy bog
under a shock of blue sky
the sun shining in hot summers
the chirp of tree-frogs singing
in the cool breeze of the night
this is the land between the Birches and Willows
a sweet nursery to me, a penniless child
the woods were a kind sovereignty
where I would spend long hours creating world upon world
worthy journeys in a place of spirits
still I remember the trees and streams and their souls
this was the land of my dreams
this was the land of my people
this was a wildish and wet land
and this is land where my father's remains are
where I laid his ashes still warm from the crematorium
ashes that clung to my socks as I emptied the small black box
(the whole life of a man, his memories, his thoughts, his fears
all in a little box...)
my brother was at my side
the weather was hot and humid
typical for my native soil
by now though the birches and willows have rotted too
as the soul of the land withered, witness to my aging
their remains now too are nothing more than dust
still dust that nourishes new trees
pines that are tall and green
my father's ashes now do the same kind of work
but left to me now
in the former territory of the Birches and Willows
are only ghosts who wander the big hill
taking draughts from the whispering streams
though I still remember
what kind of place it was then
and despite my logic and my philosophy
I would gladly go to it again and wander the woods
and remember who I used to be
tiriogaeth werdd
a nentydd bychain cùl
yn llifo dros fryniau
o bant i bridd tamp
wybren las olau
a'r haul yn gwenu mewn haf poeth
cân brogaod yn dal yn swyn imi
efo awel iach y nos
hon yw'r tir rhwng y Bedw a'r Helyg
meithrinfa felys i hogyn di-bres
coed oedd yn derynasau annwyl
lle treuliwn i oriau maith yn creu fyd ar ôl byd
anturau braf mewn hudol fan
o hyd rwyf yn cofio'r cylch a chynefin
hon oedd tir fy mreudwydion
hon oedd tir fy nhylwyth
hon oedd tir tamp a gwylltaidd
a hon yw'r tir lle mae olion fy nhad
lle 'nes i adael ei luwch yn gynnes o hyd o'r amlosga
lluwch 'naeth ddal at fy sanau fel gwagies i'r cist bach du
(Bywyd oll dyn, ei gofion, ei feddylion, ei ofnau
i gyd mewn cist bach...)
fy mrawd wrth f'ymyl
a'r tywydd yn chwilboeth
haf tebyg i'n hardal ni
a'r bedw a'r helyg wedi pydru hefyd erbyn hyn
fel 'naeth hud y tir farw fel heneiddies i
eu holion yn rŵan yn lluwch
lluwch sy'n bwydo coed newydd
pinwydd tal a gwyrdd
yn union fel mae olion tad yn eu 'neud
ond rŵan imi
yng nghyn-diriogaeth y Bedw a'r Helyg
dim ond ysbrydion sy'n crwydro'r allt
sy'n sipian o'r nentydd sisial
a chlywed cân y llyffantod
ond cofio wyf o hyd
sut le oedd hi gynt
ac er fy nghywilydd
'swn i wrth fy modd i grwydro'r hen le 'to
a phrofi unwaith eto sut lanc oeddwn i
****
the old home
a green close
drained by narrow streams
flowing along the hills
from spring valley to soggy bog
under a shock of blue sky
the sun shining in hot summers
the chirp of tree-frogs singing
in the cool breeze of the night
this is the land between the Birches and Willows
a sweet nursery to me, a penniless child
the woods were a kind sovereignty
where I would spend long hours creating world upon world
worthy journeys in a place of spirits
still I remember the trees and streams and their souls
this was the land of my dreams
this was the land of my people
this was a wildish and wet land
and this is land where my father's remains are
where I laid his ashes still warm from the crematorium
ashes that clung to my socks as I emptied the small black box
(the whole life of a man, his memories, his thoughts, his fears
all in a little box...)
my brother was at my side
the weather was hot and humid
typical for my native soil
by now though the birches and willows have rotted too
as the soul of the land withered, witness to my aging
their remains now too are nothing more than dust
still dust that nourishes new trees
pines that are tall and green
my father's ashes now do the same kind of work
but left to me now
in the former territory of the Birches and Willows
are only ghosts who wander the big hill
taking draughts from the whispering streams
though I still remember
what kind of place it was then
and despite my logic and my philosophy
I would gladly go to it again and wander the woods
and remember who I used to be
diumenge, de novembre 18, 2007
These old ghosts cling about my ankles
still I have buried you all
now memory
when I die you will all die with me
there will be no one else to laud or laugh at you
I will tear your collective pasts down into the soil with me
I grew up in a distant land
all that we were is lost now
I watched it all fade and wither
with each coffin lowered into the ground
each death one more nail in the lid
until finally I was left a man beset by shades and sorrow
No matter how I tried
I could not hold on to the past
begrudgingly relinquishing my grasp
as a world that took centuries to build
died in fewer than thirty years
In our world a wasp's nest in the dining room brought luck
and a ham bone in your pocket kept you out of the poor house
the Bellsnickler might come as easily as Santa Claus on Christmas
and Pigbears brought gifts on Easter
we burned a bayberry candle on New Year's Eve
Old ladies hid jewels under their davenports
in Victorian front parlors
Great Grandma Sandt went up in one wheel in her buggy
as she charged to see an ailing sister in another town
old men drove cattle from the creek to the slaughterhouse
right along Sarah Street
in August heat, horses failed while men bricked the streets
in our world there was a good town and bad town
and we came from the good
the winters were cold
and we lived by wood fires
in season we could take elderberries
gooseberries, raspberries, blueberries
cherries, apples, peaches
rhubarb, grapes and Queen Anne's Lace
up from the land and down from the trees and bushes
and make jellies, jams, pies, and wine
and in the season we'd cull the foul
feasting in the cold months on their flesh
little guinea hens and succulent goose
there was no escaping our attachment to the land
nor to the waters where we could fish for trout and bass
And yet soon, no one else will remember all this
and when I die
all that land ever was, and all the stories it ever told
will die with me.
still I have buried you all
now memory
when I die you will all die with me
there will be no one else to laud or laugh at you
I will tear your collective pasts down into the soil with me
I grew up in a distant land
all that we were is lost now
I watched it all fade and wither
with each coffin lowered into the ground
each death one more nail in the lid
until finally I was left a man beset by shades and sorrow
No matter how I tried
I could not hold on to the past
begrudgingly relinquishing my grasp
as a world that took centuries to build
died in fewer than thirty years
In our world a wasp's nest in the dining room brought luck
and a ham bone in your pocket kept you out of the poor house
the Bellsnickler might come as easily as Santa Claus on Christmas
and Pigbears brought gifts on Easter
we burned a bayberry candle on New Year's Eve
Old ladies hid jewels under their davenports
in Victorian front parlors
Great Grandma Sandt went up in one wheel in her buggy
as she charged to see an ailing sister in another town
old men drove cattle from the creek to the slaughterhouse
right along Sarah Street
in August heat, horses failed while men bricked the streets
in our world there was a good town and bad town
and we came from the good
the winters were cold
and we lived by wood fires
in season we could take elderberries
gooseberries, raspberries, blueberries
cherries, apples, peaches
rhubarb, grapes and Queen Anne's Lace
up from the land and down from the trees and bushes
and make jellies, jams, pies, and wine
and in the season we'd cull the foul
feasting in the cold months on their flesh
little guinea hens and succulent goose
there was no escaping our attachment to the land
nor to the waters where we could fish for trout and bass
And yet soon, no one else will remember all this
and when I die
all that land ever was, and all the stories it ever told
will die with me.
dimarts, d’agost 28, 2007
Une pensée furtive avant de me coucher (French)
Ce soir, si je meurs, mon seuel regret: je n'ai pas été aimé par un bon garçon. Oui, mes dieux, j'ai essayé, et ça mainte fois, mais je fais quelque chose de mauvais, de très mauvais evidemment, car aucun ne vient me regarder comme quelqu'un de sérieux, où en même temps des exemplaires plus pauvres, plus gros, plus laids, moins intelligents, et toute sorte de combinaison de ces belles qualités peuvent bien trouver pas seulement un amour mais plusieurs! Est-ce que je suis vraiment maudit, alors? Est-ce qu'il faut passer le reste de mes jours ainsi? Si oui, mon seul soulagement est que cette pauvre situation présente la vraie possibilité que vous existez et que vous me détestez. Comme on dirait, un indice sérieux. J'espère bien que ça vous rend contents, de me voir souffrir, de me voir faillir seul, la fin de mes journées prise en mourant seule à mes logements, mes restes pourris trouvés par des inconnus, ou bien par des voisins agités par l'odeur de mon chagrin. Autrement je pourrais bien partir de ce monde parmi les étangers dans un hôpital avec personne pour entendre mes dernières paroles. Ah oui, c'est vrai ces deux scénarios peuvent bien se passer même si j'avais un bel amant de longue durée. Mais au moins, avec lui dans mon passé, mes dernières pensées seraient beaucoup plus douces.
Et si vous existez, je vais certainement demander ce que j'ai fait pour mériter cette condamnation. La seule chose que je veux depuis mon adolescence, la seule chose que je voulais plus que ma carrière, que mes biens, m'a évitée, et mon coeur devient un pauvre mendiant, sans solaz, certainement condamné à mourir plus pauvre qu'il est né. Tout ce que j'ai fait, tout ce que j'ai accomplis, je vais toujours demander si je n'aurais pas fait plus avec un autre à mes côtés...
Et si vous existez, je vais certainement demander ce que j'ai fait pour mériter cette condamnation. La seule chose que je veux depuis mon adolescence, la seule chose que je voulais plus que ma carrière, que mes biens, m'a évitée, et mon coeur devient un pauvre mendiant, sans solaz, certainement condamné à mourir plus pauvre qu'il est né. Tout ce que j'ai fait, tout ce que j'ai accomplis, je vais toujours demander si je n'aurais pas fait plus avec un autre à mes côtés...
divendres, d’agost 24, 2007
Last Song (English)
When they sing my last song
when they scatter my dust atop the clay of the Earth
when they hang my memory with the others upon the Great Question Mark
let them say of me: he drank deep
let them say of me: he ate well
let them say of me: he strove for goodness
let them say of me: he tried to make the world a better place
but let them not say of me: in matters of love he did not try....
when they scatter my dust atop the clay of the Earth
when they hang my memory with the others upon the Great Question Mark
let them say of me: he drank deep
let them say of me: he ate well
let them say of me: he strove for goodness
let them say of me: he tried to make the world a better place
but let them not say of me: in matters of love he did not try....
More Good Eats in the City Where Sin Never Sleeps (English)
More fine treats for the finicky palate..
Last night Barbara and I went to Iris in uptown New Orleans at Riverbend. It was a small, albeit midly pretentious bistro, but they could make a great Grey Goose Martini and the had a Cantaloupe Mojito as aspecial that was to die for. For my opener, I ordered foie gras, prepared closely to the old world style. It was very pleasant, but I think they could have stuffed that goose for a bit longer! Then I had a mixed greens salad with shitake mushrooms and a house dressing that was very nice. Then for my main course I had sea scallops with Bak Choi and grapefruit wedges; all in all the meal was very light, but very pleasant. Finally for dessert I had honeydew melon sorbet, a very nice foil to the light summery dishes I'd had for my meal, especially considering the 97 degree temperature outside!
Tonight we went to a place not far from Irish, in fact in the same building as Lebanon's Cafe (which is in front of Iris) called the Fiesta Bistro. At first, neither Barbara nor I thought the place would be all the good, but we figured we would try it on a whim, figuring that we had been to so many nice places, we were bound to hit a bad one sooner or later. We were both wrong! In fact the menu was relaly wonderful, a nice combination of Spanish and Mexican (although the waiter, a young swain from Syracuse of all places, informed us that all the Mexican elements would be vanishing in due course and the menu would be just Spanish.). I ordered a couple tapas and some tacos for my meal, accompanied by two lovely frozen margaritas (you can get lovely daiquris and margaritas all over New Orleans, and many places have incredible early bird specials on these, although nothing as grand as those 50 cent martinis at La Petite Grocery). For my first tapa I had stuffed mushrooms, filled with olives, pinenuts, garlic and tomatoes sitting in a lovely drizzle of balsamico. Next I had a manchego cheese and red pepper empanada, followed by m main course, two tacos, one steak one chicken, both of which I topped with some lovely spicey salsa. Finally for dessert, I had a flan and espresso. The flan was a little over the top, and therefore disappointing; I would have prefered a more traditional flan. However, over all the meal was very good, and very inexpensive: 52$ for both of us. In fact with the excpetion of Iris, all the meals we have had this week were rather inexpensive. As I am wont to do, I tend to add things on to my meal and make it more expensives, but really, it would have been possible to eat for around 25$ at five of the six restaurants and still get a fabulous meal. New Orleans has so many restaurants, and with the reduced tourist trade after Katrina, and now even moreso due to the hot weather, many have spectacular offers.
Last night Barbara and I went to Iris in uptown New Orleans at Riverbend. It was a small, albeit midly pretentious bistro, but they could make a great Grey Goose Martini and the had a Cantaloupe Mojito as aspecial that was to die for. For my opener, I ordered foie gras, prepared closely to the old world style. It was very pleasant, but I think they could have stuffed that goose for a bit longer! Then I had a mixed greens salad with shitake mushrooms and a house dressing that was very nice. Then for my main course I had sea scallops with Bak Choi and grapefruit wedges; all in all the meal was very light, but very pleasant. Finally for dessert I had honeydew melon sorbet, a very nice foil to the light summery dishes I'd had for my meal, especially considering the 97 degree temperature outside!
Tonight we went to a place not far from Irish, in fact in the same building as Lebanon's Cafe (which is in front of Iris) called the Fiesta Bistro. At first, neither Barbara nor I thought the place would be all the good, but we figured we would try it on a whim, figuring that we had been to so many nice places, we were bound to hit a bad one sooner or later. We were both wrong! In fact the menu was relaly wonderful, a nice combination of Spanish and Mexican (although the waiter, a young swain from Syracuse of all places, informed us that all the Mexican elements would be vanishing in due course and the menu would be just Spanish.). I ordered a couple tapas and some tacos for my meal, accompanied by two lovely frozen margaritas (you can get lovely daiquris and margaritas all over New Orleans, and many places have incredible early bird specials on these, although nothing as grand as those 50 cent martinis at La Petite Grocery). For my first tapa I had stuffed mushrooms, filled with olives, pinenuts, garlic and tomatoes sitting in a lovely drizzle of balsamico. Next I had a manchego cheese and red pepper empanada, followed by m main course, two tacos, one steak one chicken, both of which I topped with some lovely spicey salsa. Finally for dessert, I had a flan and espresso. The flan was a little over the top, and therefore disappointing; I would have prefered a more traditional flan. However, over all the meal was very good, and very inexpensive: 52$ for both of us. In fact with the excpetion of Iris, all the meals we have had this week were rather inexpensive. As I am wont to do, I tend to add things on to my meal and make it more expensives, but really, it would have been possible to eat for around 25$ at five of the six restaurants and still get a fabulous meal. New Orleans has so many restaurants, and with the reduced tourist trade after Katrina, and now even moreso due to the hot weather, many have spectacular offers.
dimecres, d’agost 22, 2007
Food in the Big Easy (English)
As damaged as she is, as so totally dysfyunctional as she is, New Orleans can still serve up awesome food.
On my first night here, Barbara and I went to a local Lebanese restaurant, Lebanon's Cafe. In fact the cafe is owned by an Iraqi, but the food seems to keep with the Lebanese theme. I ordered their bake kibbe platter which came with a mixed greens salad, hummus, tahini sauce and two large kibbes. It was excellent, but only the beginning of what we would have so far this week.
Monday night we went to a small, rather newly opened restuarant on the corner of Magazine and Milan called Ignatius, which serves a lot of traditional New Orleans dishes. I had the special of the night, red beans and rice with sausage, accompanied by a ceasar salad. For dessert I had their bourbon bread pudding, really a super meal.
Tuesday we went to a reastaurant located near Ignatius, called La Petite Grocery. They had a fantastic prix fixe menu for 20$, with choice of appetizer, entree and dessert. They also had 50cent martinis! I chose a 50cent martini, which was made with Skyy vodka, not the best, but for 50 cents..., and I chose a celery heart and apple salad with walnuts, blue cheese and a white wine dressing as my appetizer. For my main course I had a filet mignon with stilton on a bed of asparagus and fingerling potatoes. For dessert I had an apple tart with creole creme cheese icecream on top. Over all it was a ravishing meal.
Tonight we went to the Upperline, on the corner of Upperline and Prytania. For openers I had their watercress salad followed by New Orleans veal grillades on cheddar grits, absolutely fantastic! For dessert I had their version of bread pudding complete with pralines, again excellent. Hopefully we'll get a few more excellent meals before I leave New Orleans for this trip.
On my first night here, Barbara and I went to a local Lebanese restaurant, Lebanon's Cafe. In fact the cafe is owned by an Iraqi, but the food seems to keep with the Lebanese theme. I ordered their bake kibbe platter which came with a mixed greens salad, hummus, tahini sauce and two large kibbes. It was excellent, but only the beginning of what we would have so far this week.
Monday night we went to a small, rather newly opened restuarant on the corner of Magazine and Milan called Ignatius, which serves a lot of traditional New Orleans dishes. I had the special of the night, red beans and rice with sausage, accompanied by a ceasar salad. For dessert I had their bourbon bread pudding, really a super meal.
Tuesday we went to a reastaurant located near Ignatius, called La Petite Grocery. They had a fantastic prix fixe menu for 20$, with choice of appetizer, entree and dessert. They also had 50cent martinis! I chose a 50cent martini, which was made with Skyy vodka, not the best, but for 50 cents..., and I chose a celery heart and apple salad with walnuts, blue cheese and a white wine dressing as my appetizer. For my main course I had a filet mignon with stilton on a bed of asparagus and fingerling potatoes. For dessert I had an apple tart with creole creme cheese icecream on top. Over all it was a ravishing meal.
Tonight we went to the Upperline, on the corner of Upperline and Prytania. For openers I had their watercress salad followed by New Orleans veal grillades on cheddar grits, absolutely fantastic! For dessert I had their version of bread pudding complete with pralines, again excellent. Hopefully we'll get a few more excellent meals before I leave New Orleans for this trip.
Further Reflections on New Orleans (English)
New Orleans may indeed be beset by a dinge that's darker and deeper than the one with which she was bemantled before Katrina, but at her heart, she is still New Orleans. It ocurred to me this afternoon as I stood in the Audubon Aquarium looking out over the Big Muddy from the relative comfort of wheezing air condensers that New Orleans was pretty much being ignored by much of America. She has fallen from whatever little grace she clung to before the Hurricane, but that may not be a bad thing. For many years, the city lived on the edge of the American conscience, and it was only in the latter half of the twentieth century that she entered into a zone closer to the center of American identity. Clearly, while many Americans as individuals rushed to help save her citizens and her culture, among them the many millions who have been touched by her unique spirit, the government of her country has not done nearly enough to stabilize her, despite the fact that she is the only city of note between Florida and the giant metropolis of Texas.
Again, that may not be a bad thing, for in the past she has been battered, and on her own she has come back, even more unique than before. I suspect that she is rallying her internal strength for another century or two, and perhaps when America is ready, she will be able to take her place near the center of our minds again.
Again, that may not be a bad thing, for in the past she has been battered, and on her own she has come back, even more unique than before. I suspect that she is rallying her internal strength for another century or two, and perhaps when America is ready, she will be able to take her place near the center of our minds again.
dilluns, d’agost 20, 2007
Post Card from New Orleans: The Old Grey Mare (English)
Today was my first full day in New Orleans, and I decided to see how the old girl was faring, now nearly two years after Katrina. My orginal plan for the afternoon was to spend it in the cool halls of the New Orleans Museum of Art, since with the deep humidity and 92 degree temperature, a contemplative day felt more appealing to me than sauntering about in the blazing heat.
I was sadly disappointed when I arrived at the museum and discovered that it was closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. I decided to use my new found free time to begin wandering around the city in my hired car, a metallic blue PT Cruiser, complete with very efficient air conditioning. I began my survey of the city in City Park, where the museum is located. A great deal of work has been done along the once beautiful oak allee to bring it back to something like its former glory. Sadly, its former glory now seems lost for ever, since all the of oaks along the allee were destroyed by the flooding the winds. To look at the museum from afar now is odd; it seems stark and cold, even in the deep Southern Louisiana heat. The rest of City Park is still a shambles; the swampy jungle from which it and the rest of the city were carved over the last three centuries is quickly gaining control of sidewalks, roads, parklands, and the city itself is essentially bankrupt, unable to keep on top of rebuilding and maintenance at the same time.
After City Park, I drove through some of neighborhoods along Lake Pontchatrain which were all but bourgeois ghost towns last year. Now it is clear that life is returning to them, albeit slowly. Nothing like the heart of New Orleans, it is reasonable that this area would be slower to recover from the devastation. Still, with blinking traffic lights and many fine, suburban homes still boarded up, you still get the impression of a Frankencity, with some parts alive and well, and other parts being drug along. I still have more of the affected areas to visit, but I decided to drive out into the suburbs themselves and see how life was carrying on there. I drove out into Jefferson Parish to see a place barely affected by the storm. Still, one shouldn't think of Jefferson Parish as a suburb like ones in the northeast. New Orleans is a little but more European and a lot more Carribean than the rest of the US. Its suburbs are a huge mix of affluent, working class and desperately poor; in this sense of the neighborhoods of Jefferson Parish had changed little since the pre-Katrina days. A lot of it is poor and working class, a tell-tale collection of sorry box stores, trailers and ticky-tacky one family homes clinging to the edge of oblivion, essentially mere feet above sea and river level, and sometimes below them.
Upon returning to Orleans Parish, I decided I would drive along St. Charles Avenue down into the French Quarter. Driving along St. Charles, one is reminded of the grand New Orleans that was. It was hardly affected by the storm, and if anything it has become grander in the days since Katrina. Almost everyone of it's grand homes is in excellent repair, most with fresh coats of paint and vibrant flowers in their gardens. However even driving along St. Charles, one is reminded of New Orleans' mixed heritage, and it's colorful past. In the best of times driving along the city's main thoroughfares was something like I imagine driving in Belize City or some other third world nation might be. There are always traffic jams, throngs of humanity clinging to street corners, often walking in front of cars, and invariably something stupid going on. Today, the traffic light one of the primary intersections at St. Charles and Napoleon wasn't working properly, perhaps due to the continued restoration of the St. Charles Streetcar line. Fortunately, New Orleans still has some of her old soul left, and thousands of cars were able to ford the four lanes of traffic on Napoleon and the two on St. Charles without any mishap, at least none that I could see. As I proceeded down the avenue, another light was out as well, but this was a less traversed intersesction.
As I approached Lee Cirlce, I was impressed to see that now only had the neighborhood managed to survive, it was thriving. Many new resturants and shops were open, all freshly painted and apparently doing well. Clearly, while only 60% (about 265,000 people) of the population has returned to the city, the tourists are back, since at no point could the city's population ever have supported its massive retail and dining infrastructure. Arriving in the Quarter I found the tourists, not in droves, but in sufficient numbers for August, traditionally one of the area's off-seasons. I drove in and out of the Qaurter's narrow streets noticing that, while the place still didn't have all its former verve, by large and far it had recovered.
One of the most notable differences in the city today is how the racial make up has changed. Current Mayor Nagin promised that it would be a chocolate city once more, but in fact it's more cafe au lait, much whiter than it was, less black, and certainky more Hispanic; indeed many of the new businesses near Lee Circle have an Hispanic theme, as do many along Magazine Street. My little auto-tour took a good two hours even so, and there's still more of the city to inspect between my own touristic endeavours.
I was sadly disappointed when I arrived at the museum and discovered that it was closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. I decided to use my new found free time to begin wandering around the city in my hired car, a metallic blue PT Cruiser, complete with very efficient air conditioning. I began my survey of the city in City Park, where the museum is located. A great deal of work has been done along the once beautiful oak allee to bring it back to something like its former glory. Sadly, its former glory now seems lost for ever, since all the of oaks along the allee were destroyed by the flooding the winds. To look at the museum from afar now is odd; it seems stark and cold, even in the deep Southern Louisiana heat. The rest of City Park is still a shambles; the swampy jungle from which it and the rest of the city were carved over the last three centuries is quickly gaining control of sidewalks, roads, parklands, and the city itself is essentially bankrupt, unable to keep on top of rebuilding and maintenance at the same time.
After City Park, I drove through some of neighborhoods along Lake Pontchatrain which were all but bourgeois ghost towns last year. Now it is clear that life is returning to them, albeit slowly. Nothing like the heart of New Orleans, it is reasonable that this area would be slower to recover from the devastation. Still, with blinking traffic lights and many fine, suburban homes still boarded up, you still get the impression of a Frankencity, with some parts alive and well, and other parts being drug along. I still have more of the affected areas to visit, but I decided to drive out into the suburbs themselves and see how life was carrying on there. I drove out into Jefferson Parish to see a place barely affected by the storm. Still, one shouldn't think of Jefferson Parish as a suburb like ones in the northeast. New Orleans is a little but more European and a lot more Carribean than the rest of the US. Its suburbs are a huge mix of affluent, working class and desperately poor; in this sense of the neighborhoods of Jefferson Parish had changed little since the pre-Katrina days. A lot of it is poor and working class, a tell-tale collection of sorry box stores, trailers and ticky-tacky one family homes clinging to the edge of oblivion, essentially mere feet above sea and river level, and sometimes below them.
Upon returning to Orleans Parish, I decided I would drive along St. Charles Avenue down into the French Quarter. Driving along St. Charles, one is reminded of the grand New Orleans that was. It was hardly affected by the storm, and if anything it has become grander in the days since Katrina. Almost everyone of it's grand homes is in excellent repair, most with fresh coats of paint and vibrant flowers in their gardens. However even driving along St. Charles, one is reminded of New Orleans' mixed heritage, and it's colorful past. In the best of times driving along the city's main thoroughfares was something like I imagine driving in Belize City or some other third world nation might be. There are always traffic jams, throngs of humanity clinging to street corners, often walking in front of cars, and invariably something stupid going on. Today, the traffic light one of the primary intersections at St. Charles and Napoleon wasn't working properly, perhaps due to the continued restoration of the St. Charles Streetcar line. Fortunately, New Orleans still has some of her old soul left, and thousands of cars were able to ford the four lanes of traffic on Napoleon and the two on St. Charles without any mishap, at least none that I could see. As I proceeded down the avenue, another light was out as well, but this was a less traversed intersesction.
As I approached Lee Cirlce, I was impressed to see that now only had the neighborhood managed to survive, it was thriving. Many new resturants and shops were open, all freshly painted and apparently doing well. Clearly, while only 60% (about 265,000 people) of the population has returned to the city, the tourists are back, since at no point could the city's population ever have supported its massive retail and dining infrastructure. Arriving in the Quarter I found the tourists, not in droves, but in sufficient numbers for August, traditionally one of the area's off-seasons. I drove in and out of the Qaurter's narrow streets noticing that, while the place still didn't have all its former verve, by large and far it had recovered.
One of the most notable differences in the city today is how the racial make up has changed. Current Mayor Nagin promised that it would be a chocolate city once more, but in fact it's more cafe au lait, much whiter than it was, less black, and certainky more Hispanic; indeed many of the new businesses near Lee Circle have an Hispanic theme, as do many along Magazine Street. My little auto-tour took a good two hours even so, and there's still more of the city to inspect between my own touristic endeavours.
dissabte, d’agost 18, 2007
The Penalty (English)
the dark night
the cold hibernal wind
the smell of frozen snow in my nostrils
the moments fall in icey flakes
the warm days of my youth curl as autmunal leaves
and yet I yearn
and long
that some justice might visit my lonely court
Rhiannon you have always been my guide
will you forsake me now
have I not carried enough visitors on my back
to lust
to others' arms
to self-fulfillment
to the grave
you toiled seven years in Arberth
now I enter my ninth in this place of servitude
and long and long so long have I waged war
do not warriors fight better when well-loved
with a fellow soldier at their sides
was this not the way of Southern Barbarians
would I not be richer still with a strong back to my own
however now the sun has set
and the dark half of my year clammers about my limbs
invading my entrails with wretched promises
somewhere in this darkness I shall meet Truth
yet I would still have a small coal alight in snowy moments
this quixotic desire envivifies me
and so I move zombie-like in blind hope
across deserted tundra
until the hammer falls
only once but decisively
and I greet Orpheus' muse
as I have nearly every bridge I have crossed
irreconcilibly on my own
the cold hibernal wind
the smell of frozen snow in my nostrils
the moments fall in icey flakes
the warm days of my youth curl as autmunal leaves
and yet I yearn
and long
that some justice might visit my lonely court
Rhiannon you have always been my guide
will you forsake me now
have I not carried enough visitors on my back
to lust
to others' arms
to self-fulfillment
to the grave
you toiled seven years in Arberth
now I enter my ninth in this place of servitude
and long and long so long have I waged war
do not warriors fight better when well-loved
with a fellow soldier at their sides
was this not the way of Southern Barbarians
would I not be richer still with a strong back to my own
however now the sun has set
and the dark half of my year clammers about my limbs
invading my entrails with wretched promises
somewhere in this darkness I shall meet Truth
yet I would still have a small coal alight in snowy moments
this quixotic desire envivifies me
and so I move zombie-like in blind hope
across deserted tundra
until the hammer falls
only once but decisively
and I greet Orpheus' muse
as I have nearly every bridge I have crossed
irreconcilibly on my own
diumenge, d’agost 12, 2007
Weight of the Past (English)
The weight of the past is heavy. It pulls me back to a world rich with stories and tall-tales, a childhood of privation and suffering, of illness and profound sadness, and still a tapestry far richer than the one I behold today.
Soon I will have no one to share my ancient world with. My mother will fade into the Ultimate Question, surely dragging what little pride any of us has left down with her, and I will scatter her ashes with full knowledge that I'm likely to be next, perhaps even the last.
And when I do, no love will be there to calm my heavy sobs, no kin to tell stories to. There will be no one to witness my keening as I beg to know who will bury me. My fortune: to bury my father and my mother and face the abyss with cold hands.
It should be so. I know death well. We have walked many miles together in the host of hearses and coffins, of hospital gowns and ashen remains. My brother is ill formed to live in a world of emptiness and sorrow. His world is small and poor, but it's nearly as big now as it ever was.
I could not bear to leave him here alone. For his sake, I will take on the mantle of Last Leaf.
He doesn't have my past, our family's past, with houses and icons and reputations. He wasn't there to hear all the old stories, to be wrapped up in the self-agrandized myth of small-town Pennsylvania German bourgeoisie.
Even so, most of those wily old sons-of-a-bitch laughed all the way to grave, forsaking those few dregs of us left like empty coffee cups at the train station. How ashamed I am that I loved most of them as well as I did.
My mother's fondest quote: "I swore I would never sacrifice anything for my children, and I never have."
My own fondest: "What ever I've done, I've done inspite of you and without you. The best things you ever did for me were not kill me and not get in my way."
So many graves to spit on, and not nearly enough gin in all the world...
Soon I will have no one to share my ancient world with. My mother will fade into the Ultimate Question, surely dragging what little pride any of us has left down with her, and I will scatter her ashes with full knowledge that I'm likely to be next, perhaps even the last.
And when I do, no love will be there to calm my heavy sobs, no kin to tell stories to. There will be no one to witness my keening as I beg to know who will bury me. My fortune: to bury my father and my mother and face the abyss with cold hands.
It should be so. I know death well. We have walked many miles together in the host of hearses and coffins, of hospital gowns and ashen remains. My brother is ill formed to live in a world of emptiness and sorrow. His world is small and poor, but it's nearly as big now as it ever was.
I could not bear to leave him here alone. For his sake, I will take on the mantle of Last Leaf.
He doesn't have my past, our family's past, with houses and icons and reputations. He wasn't there to hear all the old stories, to be wrapped up in the self-agrandized myth of small-town Pennsylvania German bourgeoisie.
Even so, most of those wily old sons-of-a-bitch laughed all the way to grave, forsaking those few dregs of us left like empty coffee cups at the train station. How ashamed I am that I loved most of them as well as I did.
My mother's fondest quote: "I swore I would never sacrifice anything for my children, and I never have."
My own fondest: "What ever I've done, I've done inspite of you and without you. The best things you ever did for me were not kill me and not get in my way."
So many graves to spit on, and not nearly enough gin in all the world...
Meddwl wrthyt (English)
my mind dwells too much on you
still unsure what to think
what to feel
I'm ashamed to say I think I'm beginning to love you
you are so flawed
so typical
and yet, tonight I can smell you on my shirt
and all I can do is dream on you
your lust, your eyes, your sadness
the ancient motherwit inside me
is longing to care for you
hold you tight and make you well
inspite of "superior" knowledge
I still believe in myths
somehow my love could cure you
and yet I know, in my heart of hearts
you will not come to love me
today, tomorrow or a thousand moons from now
yet you placate my weariness
and fill some days and nights with hope
in vain tho it may be, it's better than the long, empty night before the final dawn
still unsure what to think
what to feel
I'm ashamed to say I think I'm beginning to love you
you are so flawed
so typical
and yet, tonight I can smell you on my shirt
and all I can do is dream on you
your lust, your eyes, your sadness
the ancient motherwit inside me
is longing to care for you
hold you tight and make you well
inspite of "superior" knowledge
I still believe in myths
somehow my love could cure you
and yet I know, in my heart of hearts
you will not come to love me
today, tomorrow or a thousand moons from now
yet you placate my weariness
and fill some days and nights with hope
in vain tho it may be, it's better than the long, empty night before the final dawn
Peth Od (Welsh)
Mae cloc y stafell fwyta yn gweithio ac yn canu heddiw, a fi heb ei gychwyn ers meityn hir. Naeth o ddechrau p'nawn'ma, ac rwan, yn hwyr yn y nos, mae'r cloc yn canu o hyd!
Subscriure's a:
Missatges (Atom)
