Fifteen Books

This collection was inspired by a challenge that my brother David recently put up on FaceBook. This post is for those of you who might find this interesting but are not on FB...yet!

The idea is to put down, in just fifteen minutes, fifteen books that "will always stick with you". Here are mine:

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, by Robert Pirsig

This book changed my life. I read it at a very critical juncture in my personal and intellectual growth, when I was 23 and desperately searching for meaning. I loved the story but didn't 'get' the philosophy until the second or third reading. I was so taken by this book that I made Lynda read it and was most disappointed when she was not as impressed as I was. Still I find things to learn about 'reality' and myself every time I re-read it, which is about once a year.

The Bible

I went to an Episcopalian school for the first six grades, and not only was Chapel a mandatory 'class' on Wednesday mornings, we also had Bible study as part of the curriculum. I loved hearing the stories of the patriarchs in the old Testament and the Parables in the New. Later, studying Art History in college, I came to discover the Psalms and of course, Revelations. I have two Bibles on my dresser. One was Lynda's, given to her in 1925 and so inscribed; the other was Valery's grandmother, Dorothy's. This is an illustrated bible, and while I find the pictures in it interesting, my real fascination is with the use of words in the Bible.

In Flanders Field, by Leon Wolff

This book was the crucible in which my commitment to pacifism was formed. Though in the face of life's cruelty I have perhaps softened that commitment, recalling that 300,000 men died in a single day during World War I is still enough to rouse in me ferocious anger at those men who would so willingly and callously sacrifice the best and the brightest of their time for so very little. After reading this, I was convinced that all war dead were so taken in vain. It was also the time of the Vietnam war, and there was some question of whether or not I would be drafted, but my convictions were not formed of fear, but anger.

Beowulf

Wow, was there ever a better horror story? Has Alien or Psycho or Jaws ever really scared anyone more or, for that matter has any story scared more kids down through time? Lynda read this to me at some point, and I have not forgotten my initial mental picture of Grendel: teeth and claws, bright red eyes; a vicious fear that is re-awakened whenever I re-read this. I have a comic book version but it is the one that a professor read to a class in the original Old English that most sticks with me.

The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint Exupery

And, was there ever a better love story? Actually, I am still trying to understand the meaning of this wonderfully simple tale. I read it, think I understand and know that I still do not. I am not daunted by this, merely encouraged to read it again with the eyes of a child. I am still trying.

The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky

I feel as if I actually lived in 19th century Russia for a time in my early twenties. I read this for a class, then re-read it over the summer just because I felt it was too short. I've never encountered a denser, richer, more engaging piece of fiction, and God knows I love Dickens, who doesn't even appear on this list...yet.

The Gutenberg Galaxy, by Marshall McLuhan

I am still reading this. McDonald Smith gave me a copy when we were seniors in high school but I didn't 'read' it till I was in college the first time, in my early twenties. I thought I got it back then, and it was an important revelation, but as I re-read it now, I realize that I am just opening my eyes to the transformation that the electric field is currently (get it?) causing in our society.

Selected Poems, by W.B. Yeats

Yeats is my favorite poet of all time. Sailing to Byzantium is my favorite poem. I keep this book by my bedside.

The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway

Here's one I haven't re-read in a long time. I read it in Paris, while hanging out in the Cafe Select and Le Dome in Montparnasse. No, I never made it on a fishing trip to Spain, but in 1976, I experienced what may have been the very last vestige of the Paris that Hemingway lived, and his writing inspired me as it did a generation before. I'm afraid I didn't emulate him that well as, alas, my prose still suffers from 'too many words'.

In Bluebeard's Castle, by George Steiner

Dense engaging prose that led me to re-evaluate my cultural heritage (ie Jewish) and set a standard for the quality and clarity of thought that my own prose should emulate. That hasn't happened, yet, but one of the essays in the book, along with The Gutenberg Galaxy and Snow's Two Cultures form the axes of a theory of literary criticism that I am developing.

Charlotte's Web, by E.B. White

I was devastated when Charlotte died. Really. I have never mourned for a fictional character in quite the same way again.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, by Hunter S. Thompson

I'll admit, reading this book made me want to do drugs. Lots of drugs. More drugs. Different drugs. Seriously I cannot remember laughing longer and harder while reading a book. Just thinking about the over-pressurized tires on the 'White Whale' makes me chuckle. And does anyone know where I can get some adrenachrome (sp)?

Jaws, by Peter Benchley

Talk about a page turner! I was waiting for the bus to go to work while reading the scene where the scientist gets eaten by, well, the shark, and missed it--twice. I may have read the whole book that day. The movie, good as it was, was, of course, lame by comparison.

A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson

One of my most recent reads and among the most inspirational books I have ever read. Bryson's ability to make even the most difficult scientific theories and subjects readable and relevant instantly inspired me to read more about science. I came away from this book believing in the power of original thought and possessed of the notion that I too am capable of it.

The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, by Julian Jaynes

This book has an impossibly long title for a subject that is really pretty simple. Jaynes is not the most rigorous of scholars, but his argument is so compelling that I can overlook the similarities with many crackpot socio-linguistic theories. It seems a shame that the work is overshadowed by less adventurous empirical theories, and it may well be recovered as we learn more about the brain from magnetic imaging.

Dodging a Bullet

Confessing to being a thief, as I did in my previous post, has engendered more romantic thoughts of my rebellious, pirate side and prompts me to now admit that I am also guilty of committing an even worse--though equally innocent, if you will allow it to be so characterized after hearing my story--'crime' in my youth.

I shot my brother David in the navel with a sticker.

Many tragic stories have been told about the misuse of guns by foolish children, and as I contemplate this tale I am thankful yet again that it is a tale of foolishness and not anguish; a lesson learned without more serious consequences. I am the one who 'dodged a bullet' that sunny summer afternoon in the mid-sixties in Abilene.

All I remember of the actual day is that it was hot. The sunshine floods my memory of the moment, seared in my brain as one of those fading kodachrome snapshots, yellow and overexposed. This isn't surprising, as it was nearly always hot in Abilene. Most of my recollections of that place and time are of summertime, when I had a great deal of free time and a virtual absence of supervision.

These were two commodities of which I had an apparent abundance that fateful day, much to my brother's belly button's detriment. Oh, and I likely scarred him mentally for life that day as well, but this post is about my mental scarring, not his. Doubtless in response to this memoir I will hear more of his recollection, but for now, I press on to enter my long overdue mea culpa into the lublic record.

The weapon I had in my hand that day was a BB gun. It was a pistol, manufactured by Daisy, who still make BB guns today, though I very much doubt they have they model I got for my seventh birthday in 1963. The reason for my doubt has to do with the design and consequent killing power--or lack thereof--that this particular gun presented to me and my safety conscious parents.

While many BB guns are powered by compressed air that is 'pumped' into a chamber by repeated cocking of a lever or part of the barrel, my Daisy pistol was actually spring-powered. It resembled an old fashioned Colt 45 six-shooter, but the revolver was in fact, fake. The BB's were loaded into a holding chamber on the side of the gun, six at a time. Cocking the gun was a matter of sliding a bolt on the top of the barrel back until it locked. As the bolt slid back, the spring was compressed and one of the six BBs from the chamber was supposed to drop into the firing chamber at the back of the barrel, just in front of the spring, which had a small metal plate attached to the end to cradle the BB and push it forward when the spring was released via the trigger.

It was all very mechanical and remarkably low powered, which was no accident, and not necessarily ironically. The choice of this model was a compromise between my intense desire to have a gun, and my parents' intense desire to keep weapons of any kind out of my hands. As such it was a good compromise: it satisfied neither of us completely.

At first, however, I was more than satisfied. Thrilled is a good word for this feeling. I can recall my heart soaring as I opened the package at the table that day. I remember that it was my seventh birthday. I recall having the party at the kitchen table then going outside to play with my friends and my new treasure.

I also remember that my best friend at the time, Paul, was not impressed, and with good reason. He lived 'in the country' which, in Abilene, simply meant outside of town. Looking back, even living in town was a remarkably rural experience. Nonetheless, Paul was true country boy in a way I never was nor will be. He knew about guns. Of course, he had fired and even owned 'real' guns, so his opinion mattered a great deal. However, despite knowing the truth of its relative value, to me that Daisy was a 'true' gun. It was my first. In a way this is important because it was also a symbol of my parents' trust.

This story, then, is about how I dealt with that trust and what I've done with the lesson learned that day.

At first I had a hard time believing it it was real. So impossible did it seem that Lynda and Bill had both relented and spared the money for this birthday present that I can still remember placing it by my bedside before going to sleep, then waking up in the morning having convinced myself in my dreams that it was just a dream, only to be astonished anew when my eyes rested on it in the light of a new day. That was the first and last day for such joy.

One of the parts of the compromise that was most unappealing to me was the paucity of the ammunition. Tough I suppose it is a bit of an exaggeration, I recall being given something like a dozen BBs in a little clear plastic pouch. Since a full 'load' comprised just half a dozen of the little copper colored metal balls, I exhausted my arsenal in just two rounds and had to resort to retrieving them from the burnt straw colored grass in our front yard.

This was easier than it sounds for two reasons. First, the gun was so underpowered that I could literally see the BB arcing out of the barrel through the air toward the ground. 'Tests' conducted with the gun muzzle's proximity to pieces of wood and glass that the emerging projectile would neither embed in the former nor break the latter. Second, the bright copper color of the BBs was easy to spot in the withered grass and dark red dirt of West Texas.

Nonetheless, twenty four BBs do not last forever, and it may not even have been an hour before I was back in the house, asking Lynda when she would go buy me some more. Well, of course, when was a bit presumptuous. If was more like it. I was sent back out to play with my new weapon sans ammunition but not without imagination.

I soon discovered that other things besides BBs would fit into the loading chamber, hence into the firing chamber and barrel of my little pistol. Things like little rocks could be worked in, but I soon discovered that finding pebbles of exactly the right size and shape was hard to do, even in our gravel-filled driveway. Not so hard to find, and, as it turns out, easily manipulated into the 'right' shape without much effort were stickers.

If you live in Texas or have, you know what I am talking about. We called them stickers, but they are actually seeds. These are those big, old nasty, spiky, hard white, spine-covered balls of foot-pain inducing hell that hide in the grass, attach themselves to your socks and pant legs, then stab you and inject their horrible poison into your bloodstream.

Ok, I am really exaggerating about the last bit, but there's no doubt that after no more than simply being poked by one of these stickers, your skin will itch for far longer than the simple act of touching it deserves. Just plucking one out of your sock can mean several nasty pokes to your fingertips, so try and imagine, if you will, what it would be like to have one shoved, nay, rammed into your belley button with such forch that it literally disappears into that fleshy knot. Though it may not be an absolute center of your nervous system, it is certainly close enough to the solar plexus that the zing is not something you're likely to forget.

I doubt he's forgotten it. I certainly haven't.

I can only hope it is something one can forgive. I took one of those very nasty if not actually deadly stickers, loaded it into the firing chamber of my trusty little Daisy pistol and fired it, point blank, into my very trusting little brother David's navel.

Despite what I considered to be a demonstrable lack of firepower, the Daisy nonetheless managed to deliver the substitute ammo with enough force to drive the sticker into his tender, four-year-old flesh. In an instant, he was howling and all I saw in the moment before he went hurtling into the house was the spot of blood that appeared on his belly button. I was certain I'd killed him, but his screams and my mother's recriminating chords at soon convinced me that he would live, even as I feared that I would not.

Despite her desire to do so, it is to Lynda's credit that she did not shoot me with or even hit me over the head with my stupid little BB gun, much though I deserved it. Instead I had to endure several of the most horrible lectures about my lack of responsibility and the dangers of guns from both her and Bill. Bill solemnly placed the gun on the very highest shelf in the pantry as I watched, sorrowful less for my actions and more for my loss.

The physical damage to David's navel was, I am glad to say, minimal. I cannot speak to the emotional consequences of my act, if he even remembers the incident with the intensity that I do. Though deserving of a prominent place in my memory, it may not be the same for him.

Life went on, of course. Eventually, I was allowed to have the Daisy pistol again. I even went on to to get another gun--a powerful rifle--by convincing Bill and Lynda that I had learned a lesson. I had, indeed, but what I never told them was exactly why. You'd think the trauma of the actual event would be enough, but it was actually the dream that I had that night and for many months and even years afterward that affected me most.

In this dream, while caring for my brother, I picked up him around the waist to carry him from one room to another. As I picked him up, I squeezed him too hard, and his eyes popped right out of his head. The futility of trying to replace his dangling, useless eyes was overwhelming, flooding my heart with an irrepressible fear and anguish. Fortunately, the metaphor was just that.

Inauguration: The Video

Well, I had to do something with all those photos I took during our trip to D.C. to see David & David and attend the Inauguration that I did not include in the photo gallery, so here is a little video that I hope sums up what we saw and did!

He's Not the Change: We Are

From D.C. The Inauguration

It's been a while since I've written here, but not for lack of desire.  I've actually managed to curb my compulsion, mostly because I've simply been too busy to indulge myself as I have so often in the past weeks.  Both Gentle Readers will appreciate the silence, I am sure, knowing that a flood of words is to follow any extended--more than a day--absence from this journal.

I have been thinking a lot about the experience of being in Washington D.C., of being with my brother, and most of all, of the personal consequences of the changes we are seeing in the government on an almost daily basis, it seems.

Being in the Nation's Capital, with all the museums, monuments and memorials literally overflowing with unique and precious objects around us had a significant influence on me, though I didn't realize it at first.  Touring the Air & Space Museum, it hit me, though.  I came to regard this place and these things as part of my inheritance.  In the National Gallery, I was surprised to see someone take a photograph of a painting, so I asked if it was all right and sure enough, not only is the entrance to the museum--almost all D.C. museums, in fact--free, but we are also allowed to take as many photographs as we like.  Not that I have any desire to actually take pictures of the art itself, but it was interesting to photograph the people and the art together.  If you haven't already seen the photo gallery, here is the link.

Being with my brother, David, added another unexpected dimension to our experience.  I've already written about his performance in the play and how I saw therein another side to his personality, but what I haven't mentioned is how well he took care of us during our visit.  It's the unfortunate duty of people who live in big cities to act as tour guides to their guests.  This obligation is compounded by the fact that a free place to stay in a popular destination is an understandably big factor in the way those guests make their plans.  Consequently, those 'big-city' folks who can and do pull off being tour guides time and time again make it look easy, as if this was a natural part of their daily lives.  And, in a way, it is.  For some folks, anyway, and I am pleased and proud to count David and David among them.  They really, genuinely enjoyed touring us around, explaining the Metro, turning the map right side up (again) and giving us good advice on everything from where to eat, what to see and what to save till next time.  Ironically, they were such good hosts, there will definitely be a next time!

It was, however, the experience of being on the street as President Obama took his Oath, being with all the people from all over the country at the very moment when we were reborn, called out to commit again to the promises and ideals that made this country great and have for so long been suppressed in the name of 'National Security'.  Hey, we Americans are big kids now.  We can have both security and ideals.  Neither will be perfect, but please, let's promise each other not to let this choice be presented to us again.  Now that we have again acknowledged that we can be free and fair at the same time, let us here commit ourselves to keeping it this way.

One of the most frequent things I've heard said since the Inauguration is something like, "Well, I just hope he can do X% of what he's promising."  To a certain extent, I agree with this sentiment.  I too hope he can accomplish a lot, and I too hope it will happen sooner, rather than later.  However, even though it is simply common sense to acknowledge that he, Mr. Obama, cannot "do it alone", I think it here worth saying that we--as a collective people--have yet to understand what he is and has been saying to us all along.  

He is not the change.  We are.  It is up to each one of us, as individuals, to look around us, find something that needs doing, something that needs fixing, someone who needs help, and do it.  The burden is not only not exclusively on Mr. Obama, it is not even exclusively any single one of our burdens.  How easy it is to lift a heavy load when many hands are present is something we need to recall in a moment when a great deal of heavy lifting is called for.

To all readers of this journal, therefore, I issue the challenge personally.  In this new year, this year of change, find something you can help with, find someone who needs your help and do it.  In the restaurant business, when something happens that requires the staff to make a big change (see Dinner for Fifty, Please) this is eaxctly what we do. Each person looks around, see what needs doing, and if no one else is doing it, then that is what they do. In this way, everything gets done and no one has to do it all. In fact, we can't do it any other way.

So here what I propose: Commit a certain part of each week--perhaps the same day, perhaps just a certain number of hours per week, no matter--to a cause, hopefully one that benefits someone, somewhere as directly as possible.  If each one of us finds a place and time to volunteer even a small part of our time and energy in this year, and the next and every year after, we will see change.

Let's commit to each other, to a new year, a new life: You there!  Be the change.

He's Not Heavy...

Yes, indeed, he is my brother.  In spite of the close resemblance, it is David, not me, here on this poster.  Not coincidentally, either, as he has the lead in this delightful, if slightly bloody pre-Elizabethan tragedy, called appropriately enough, The Spanish Tragedy.  Without mincing words or delaying my review, I will say that David's performance was excellent to say the least, and if you are to believe a reviewer who also happens to be his brother, he was inspired.

Now, that may not be the hyperbole you think it to be, for it happens that the subject of the play is one that struck me deeply and for good reason: It is about a father who seek revenge for his son's death.  Thus it is that there is a scene where David's character, Heironimo, grieves over the body of his freshly deceased son.

Now, though the son has been murdered, the emotion that surged through me as David bent down to caress his 'son's' face was the selfsame grief I felt on seeing Pierre lifeless in the hospital bed.  In spite of myself, in spite of the knowledge that it was 'only a play', I cried.  Lest you think that this is simply 'normal' consider the fact that I have not yet really wept openly since Pierre's death.  It is, I believe, through artifices such as drama that I may eventually come to resolve this tangle of emotion and grief, and I have my brother David to thank for this 'revelation.'

Knowing that actors must find a personal emotion to draw upon if they are to make that emotion felt to the audience allows me some satisfaction because it means that there is some use to the grief so long harbored in my heart.  In short, if others can derive some meaning from his death, even if they are not conscious that it is he for whom the grief is spent, then there is meaning in my loss.  The pain, though still great, is dispersed by such actions as may be seen in a stage play, which is thus placed into the stream of emotion felt by the human as a whole.

In a way wholly unexpected, yet perfectly natural as I here contemplate it, I find that I am healed--in part--by David's creative strength and the power of his performance.  I say natural because it seems that way when you watch him perform, yet it was unexpected because I did not realize till I saw and felt it on the stage last night, that David's gift has allowed for a return of my own angst to the collective consciousness we all share.