What was to be improved

I am not really comfortable acting in positions of authority.  It doesn't seem to fit my temperament.  However, these positions must exist for the stable and efficient caretaking of any social or physical structure, and as we gain experience and stewardships in this life it is incumbent upon us to graciously accept new responsibilities and challenges.   So it is that on some Saturday mornings, I don the ceremonial denim and cotton and make the pilgrimage to the temples of home improvement to perform the rituals of home ownership.

The priests who officiate in these temples are friendly and helpful enough, but as any expert in their field they would much rather speak at length with skilled and experienced practitioners.  It becomes apparent that they quickly tire of repeating the simple liturgies to the neophytes and our puzzled expressions annoy them when they have finished communicating the most basic of principles.

I miss the days when I would follow my dad into these massive structures, where he would navigate the maze of relics; select the exact items, their quantity and measurements, and all that was expected of me was to do some lifting and eat the ice cream purchased on the way home.  Don't get me wrong, the ice cream is still purchased, it is just no longer consumed with the same ignorant peacefulness enjoyed by those who are not thinking about how to replace small parts of a spigot.  Or if that person at the Home Depot had just made up the word 'spigot' in hopes of getting other people to think I was using some racially insensitive term.   

What was to be abstract

I understand that painting is a difficult art form to master, and can take years of training and practice before one can produce a significant piece; however, that is no excuse for taking shortcuts and cheating. I am, of course, speaking of abstract art.  Abstract art is cheating. 

Instead of the artist owning the responsibility to decide on an image and then painting the image so everyone can recognize it, they just put any old mixture of paint on the canvas, throw it out to the public and say, "Here you go, figure it out, feel however you want about it, just give me a million dollars." 

From time to time though, I cannot help but fall into a feelings trap with certain pieces.  For example, I had never heard of Zao Wou-ki until I read his obituary a few weeks ago. There was a link to some of his work and the piece below trapped me.  I've spent what adds up to hours staring at it over the last few weeks and just when I think I'm done, there is a perspective shift and there is a whole new painting pulling me in.  It is calming, haunting, hopeful, and sad (like an old Disney movie).

But, it is still cheating. And Zao should be ashamed of himself for not painting horses or old boats or something. 


25.06.86

What was to be Thatched

Something in me has always identified very strongly with England.  Whether it is the spelling of my name ("Geoffrey"), or rooting for a power that seeks to wield an influence disproportionate with its size and weight.  I also wonder if it is because, as a country, we are a people without a past.  We have some pretty clear lines to the goings on here in the 17th and 18th centuries, but we have no medieval stories for ourselves, so I have to borrow from my European ancestors. 

Personally, I stick with England back through about the 11th century, about then I switch my allegiance over to the Norse side of things, mostly because I have a greater affinity for their gods.  I try to honor the old ways in as far as it is convenient and doesn't anger my newer Christian God, so I will schedule things for Odin's day, Thor's day, and Freya's, day; keep a hammer in my car in case of Ragnarok; and I make it a point to cheat and abuse giants whenever possible (for me this is anyone over 6'2".

But I don't see the current Nordic countries as the continuation of my people.  I follow Rollo to Robert I to William the Conqueror and then I stick with England through the revolution.  But getting back to my first point, part of my heart is still with the old country especially when it comes to heroic figures and achievements.  And so today I mourn the death and celebrate the achievements of Margaret Thatcher. 

Wast was to be a time to share

Today a cold chill covered my body as I realized the horrible truth; our celebrities are powerless to stop the violence between Israel and Palestine. Somehow the Israeli and Palestinian leaders are able to ignore the heartfelt pleas of the world’s most beautiful and melodic people. What they have done to impervious themselves from their siren song of peace we may never know. What we do know is that we must now look around and find a new hero to bring tranquility to the mid-east. The movie stars and music artists have done all they can and now we must look to an older, more powerful pantheon: the principles of the free market.

A brief history of the Middle East will be helpful in understanding what needs to happen next. I paraphrase the eminent historian David Barry who described the history of the Middle East, “A long time ago dinosaurs lived in the middle east. They died and were covered by sand and people who hated each other.” The principle problem is that there is a finite amount of land (including Jerusalem, the West Bank, and one of the few remaining Hardees) and two peoples who can’t agree on how, or whether, it should be divided between them.

The free market solved this sort of problem years ago. When thousands of the members of the American middle class were warring with the resort conglomerates for control of condos and duplexes, the market stretched forth its invisible hand introduced the Time Share. Time Share technology utilizes a flux capacitor to allow many different individuals to use the exact same piece of property during THE SAME YEAR!

This technology would be perfect for solving this land dispute in Jerusalem. For 15 days a year for the first 3 years and 20 days a year for each subsequent year, the Israelis will have Jerusalem during which time the Palestinians will have access to the West Bank. The rest of the year their time can be divided between Boca Raton, Las Vegas, and Vermont. Or they can use their points for cruises, flights, or pilgrimages to Mecca.

The plan will no doubt be complex and a hard sell, but the agents who sell these things are the toughest negotiators on the planet. These are people who have secured 50 year commitments from 80 year-old grandmothers on fixed incomes. This will not come without sacrifice. For months, American phones will stay silent during dinner time as every available telemarketer will be drafted into service with their auto-dialers concentrated on the holy land. But peace always comes with a price; a price that will probably be around 9,599 to get in and reasonable membership fees afterwards.

What was to be half the battle

Even before I started school, Saturday mornings were something to look forward to, because that is when the best shows premiered.  I still remember the shows from preschool through early elementary (many of which were watched long before the rest of the family was up) that shaped my understanding of courage, loyalty, and the importance of energy weapons in the fight between good and evil.  My shows were the well-known Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Transformers, GI Joe, He-Man, and Thundercats.  Also a few that are rarely recognized when I discuss them now: Dinosaucers, C.O.P.S. and BraveStar.  And one that I must have been the only one to have ever seen: Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future. But I know I didn’t make that one up because I had the sandals!

Over the years, reboots and live action versions of some of these have been attempted with results ranging from awesome (Ninja Turtles 1 & 2) to sad (GI Joe: Rise of Cobra) all the way down to the lowest possible ranking of ‘Directed by Michael Bay’ (I walked out of the first Transformers and never even tried to watch any of the sequels). 

In college, my roommates and I had the brilliant idea to institute Saturday Morning Cartoons, and we downloaded some of those programs mentioned above and got our cereal and blankets together one morning to watch a few.  This turned out to be a mistake, in our memories the animation was graphic and intense, but now all we saw when re-watching the Hannah Barbara creations were static pictures with moving mouths.  We remembered intricate plots and gripping suspense, but were met with cheesy dialogue unwatchable looping of the same pictures.    We made it through 15 minutes before switching over to Arrested Development. 

All that said, hope springs eternal in the heart of man, and this weekend I will go see the new GI Joe movie, hoping that their recasting will result in a more watchable product and let me relive the thrill of those Saturday mornings. But now I know to keep my expectations low, and knowing is half the battle.   

What was to be united

I am aware that there is a large and growing contingent of Americans keen on fiscal responsibility and espousing polices of limited foreign intervention so far as to want our participation in the UN curtailed or eliminated.

To date, I have not considered myself one of their number, but recent events have caused me to look more favorably on the dissolution of this international organization which I will show here to be guilty of the corruption of our youth. 

As I walked into my hotel in New York (the hotel where I had a reservation, not the hotel that I own (in fact, there is no hotel anywhere that I own with the exception of plastic ones in my monopoly box that equate to 5 houses)), I was taken aback by how crowded it was with young people in professional attire.  As I checked in, I asked the Sheraton employee whether some event had drawn them all here, or if a school bus had crashed into a Brooks Brothers.  He replied that the hotel was hosting a Model UN, and these college students had come from around the world to participate.

He handed me my keycard to a room on the 38^th floor and wished me a pleasant stay.  But as so many have learned before me, New York is no place for wishes to come true.  I dropped my things in my room and came down for breakfast before going to my meetings in our offices three blocks away.  I returned to the elevator which had previously taken me to my floor so quickly so I could reclaim the equipment and documents necessary for my first meeting, one minute, three minutes, five, now ten.  Fifteen minutes go by and no elevators in any of the 6 banks arrives to help me to my destination.  Though I have not yet received the security footage to verify this theory, the thoughts shared by my fellow waiting friends, was that these kids had their meetings on the different floors and this was monopolizing the use of the elevators. 

I like to think of myself as a patient person, but I was going to be seriously late, I gave it five more minutes, which was a mistake.  I should have just taken the stairs then and I could have moved at a more leisurely pace, but now it was necessary to assault the stair bank with some haste.  Here’s the thing though, there are a lot of stairs between the first and the 38^th floor, and I sweat more than I did as a younger man.  So by the 22^nd floor my legs could not be more furious with me than if I jumped from the height of that many floors, my shirt is beginning to show spots of damp, and I am as winded as a clock (huzzah for jokes that work in text, but not speech).  But don’t worry, there are only 16 more flights to go.  I make it to the top, an impossible task achieved, and move to my room where I pass the elevator bank on this 38^th floor and see it has its own crowd of waiting users.  So I grab my stuff, and a clean shirt that I stuff in my coat, and then proceed down those same stairs. 

I make it to our offices in time to change shirts and set up with a minute to spare and sit through a day of meetings set to the tune of my screaming legs.  I return to the hotel that night, and cannot wait to fall asleep.  But no, the UN has placed an injunction against this, and is enforcing it by having these kids go in and out of the rooms allowing the doors to slam as loudly as possible every time, while others hang out in the hallway to noisily discuss the issues of their august body.  After a time I poke my head out into the hall and ask if there is any limit to the number of times their doors are going to slam tonight.  One girl is polite and apologetic, a boy down the hall replies that this is New York City.  He is nearly told that “No, this is a hotel, New York City is outside of it and he is welcome to go out there and make as much noise as he wants.”  This goes unsaid and instead a call is made to the front desk who dramatically forwards me to security, where the disturbance is reported and the sounds were eliminated shortly after that long enough for me to sleep.

I awake the next day and nearly collapse when my legs refuse to carry the weight they are contractually obliged to support.  I move like a broken man for the rest of the day for the first 50 steps every time I get up, until my legs have said their piece. 

Later on that night, the previous night’s nonsense is reoccurring in my hall, but this time it takes 4 calls to the front desk over the course of an hour and an half, before any reduction in noise is achieved.  It is 3 am, my legs ache, my eyes are red, and my body pleads for sleep.  The UN has broken me, a man who has done nothing but pay his taxes to a country that funds it.  It has requisitioned resources that should have been available to me.  It has drafted a child army to destroy my peace. 

 Socrates was sentenced to death for corrupting the youth of Athens.  I expect the same sentence for the UN. 

 

What were to be the salad days

We stand in line at the salad counter, eschewing the tastier more appealing options available in this café(teria) to chew the leafy greens and assorted vegetables meant to add flavor and variety to plants that should never have been removed from the ground.  But something seems off when you compare those in the 'healthy choice' line to those in the other lines here.  Surely most or at the very least one of us should possess the lean figure and trim physique you would associate with a healthy lifestyle.  But we do not seem to fit that model.  The fronts of our shirts hang a little too far past our belt buckles, and our back pockets, though empty, appear to be pushed out to their limits. 

These salads are not the 'healthy choices' of life long fitness aficionados, those body types seem to be enjoying the Indian food, skipping lunch to get in an early afternoon run, or are in their offices satisfying what hunger they may have with a protein bar in preparation for their nightly triathlon. 

No, we are clearly the remedial students, forced to choose between purchasing a new wardrobe of more generous proportions or sacrificing our beloved burritos and pizza.  A sacrifice we are promised will be rewarded sometime down the waistline. 

This line moves incredibly slowly.  Though our bulk evidences that we are no strangers to the choosing and consuming of food, this particular process seems agonizing.  The choice between the tastier of many bland plants seems an impossible one.  Finally you grip the tongs and fill your plate with the odorless foliage.  At the register, you place your salad on the scales, and the meter does you the courtesy of displaying the weight of your meal as opposed to your own.  The others in line with burgers, fries, and desserts offer you sympathetic glances and you can almost hear their silent prayers that they never find themselves among your number.