monoceros blogsThe Republican pundits may say what they will about Obama, but the man knows what he's doing. And what he's doing is thoughtful, smart, effective, and incredibly inspiring.
November 4th can't come soon enough.
Hold On Hope, by Guided By Voices
"An ordinary day. At seven the chapel bells begin again to punctuate the passage of time, quarter hour by quarter hour. After their night's respite, my congested bronchial tubes once more begin their noisy rattle. My hands, lying curled on the yellow sheets, are hurting although I can't tell if they are burning hot or ice cold. To fight off stiffness, I instinctively stretch, my arms and legs moving only a fraction of an inch. It is often enough to bring relief to a painful limb.
My diving bell becomes less oppressive, and my mind takes flight like a butterfly. There is so much to do. You can wander off in space or in time, set out for Tierra del Fuego or for King Midas's court.
You can visit the woman you love, slide down beside her and stroke her still-sleeping face. You can build castles in Spain, steal the Golden Fleece, discover Atlantis, realize your childhood dreams and adults ambitions."
~ by Jean-Dominique Bauby, from The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Lately, on days with incidents I'd rather forget, I like listening to the haunting strains of the theme from "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly." Reading chapters from the memoir itself keeps me aloft too, because I imagine what it must have been like for Jean-Do Bauby to struggle with locked-in syndrome, and take heart that I have the ability to move and express myself.
It's a short book and I often listen to the score for the film as I read it, remembering the scenes in which the piano soared, became quiet, and soared again. One of my favorites: Bauby imagining Empress Josephine walking down the corridor, beckoning him to rise and kiss her as she waits behind his wheelchair, resplendent in her 19th century gown of spring green and white and elegant stripes and a hat settled at a jaunty angle.
The first time I read certain passages, somewhere inside me, I wept because I could almost feel what he felt. The sharp yearning, the despair, and then the thrill of the imagination taking flight. He was by turns funny, poetic, solemn. What an imagination he had. And he loved to travel. His words made me recall the places I've been. In the past few years, I haven't traveled as much as I used to, or wish to. So I recall the places I did get to see, the things I purchased, the friends and people I met on long-ago trips. A chatty lady on the Amtrak, a young Japanese man reading intently on the subway. Most of all, I remember the thrill and joy I had of being in a new place or an old one where even older memories flooded my mind as I retraced the routes I once walked. Sometimes, if my mind is quiet enough, I can even remember the emotions I felt years before as I stood in those same places.
Memory of travel
is the stuff of our fairest dreams.
Splendid cities, Plazas, Monuments.
And landscapes thus pass before our eyes.
And we enjoy the charming
and impressive spectacles
that we have formerly experienced.
If we could stop again at those places
where beauty never satiates,
we could bear many dreary hours
with a light heart
and pursue life’s long struggle
with new energies.
~ Camillo Sitte, 1889 (an Austrian art historian, city planning theoretician, and architect. He traveled around the towns of Europe and tried to identify aspects that made towns feel warm and welcoming – now why didn’t I think of getting that kind of job?)
Theme For The Diving Bell And The Butterfly, by Paul Cantelon.
Always, always, I want to see and learn so much. And I want to remember everything, even the things I sometimes say I wish to forget. For when I am old and gray and barely able to walk from one end of the beach to the other, I will have only memories to quicken my spirit. And I hope to have a mind as vivid and alive as Bauby's. He remains an inspiration.
While working on the Proust Questionnaire (more on this later), I surfed over to The Late Greats, whose latest post was about Jake Shimabukuro. It inspired me to answer the question "What is your idea of perfect happiness?" with this statement - to have Jake Shimabukuro play his ukulele for me in Central Park. I eventually wrote a different answer, but that's another story.
Still, the wild beauty in his playing is no small thing. The video below is a treasure. I watched it dozens of times when a friend first sent it to me. That was about three years ago; today, Jake and his weeping ukulele still leave me reeling.
Many may find fault with Colin Powell for his decision to appear before the UN in 2003 to convince the Security Council of the urgency to enter a war with Iraq. Yet he remains a very popular figure in the US, and in his seven-minute appearance on Meet The Press, he took pains to rebuke the ugly side of the Republican Party, to express doubt in John McCain's ability to handle pressing economic issues, and to question McCain's judgment because of his selection of Sarah Palin as a running mate, who, Powell says, is not ready to become the president.
Perhaps Powell was following his Commander in Chief's orders when he appeared before the UN Security Council, as a good soldier would, however ill a decision he knew it to be. Today though, retired and removed from the present Bush administration, Powell gave a crossover endorsement and spoke honestly and accurately about his own party and a man he calls a long-time friend and fellow Vietnam War veteran.
Powell also points out a certain religious remark that has often been used by the GOP:
I'm also troubled by, not what Sen. McCain says, but what members of the party say, and it is permitted to be said such things as: "Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim." Well, the correct answer is: he is not a Muslim. He's a Christian. He's always been a Christian.But the really right answer is: What if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer is: No, that's not America. Is there something wrong with some 7-year-old Muslim-American kid believing he or she can be President?
Yet I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion: he's a Muslim, and he might be associated with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.
Republicans have accused Obama of being a Muslim, and the Democrats have constantly corrected the misapprehension - Obama is a Christian. The sole focus - from both parties - on the factual error all but suggests that, in America today, being a Muslim warrants being demonized. That if Obama were Muslim, it would render him unfit to be president; it would be inappropriate, even wrong. Such mistrust of Islam, and Arabs in general (another accusation Obama has had to face), is something Americans should more actively seek to eradicate.
Powell used Sunday's much-anticipated platform to make vital points that the public has neglected or failed to sensibly acknowledge. The GOP is becoming narrower, he says, while Obama's campaign promotes inclusiveness. This means that even if you are Muslim or of Arab descent, you are just as American as Joe Six-pack.
The most moving part of Powell's very coherent and eloquent speech is the story of one American soldier. Powell cites a photo essay on U.S. troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan which included a photograph of a mother in Arlington National Cemetary with her head on the tombstone of her 20-year-old son, who was awarded a Purple Heart and Bronze Star and was killed in Iraq. The photograph showed the headstone adorned not with the Christian cross or the Star of David, but the "crescent and star of the Islamic faith," and the soldier's name was Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan. The American soldier was a Muslim.
I don't usually comment on politics but I will tonight, because former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell's endorsement of Barack Obama amazed me.
Here's why.
I can't wait for November 4.
J's comment in the previous post brings to mind another Dickinson poem -
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chilliest land
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
~ by Emily Dickinson
870 ~ by Emily Dickinson
Finding is the first Act
The second, loss,
Third, Expedition for
The "Golden Fleece"
Fourth, no Discovery—
Fifth, no Crew—
Finally, no Golden Fleece—
Jason—sham—too.
One day we will hear the oncologist say, "I'm afraid the prognosis is discouraging." - Donald Hall
NPR is my everyday treat. Music, stories, movie reviews, news, politics, social commentary, car talk...the list goes on. Some time ago, I found this blog and began reading about Leroy Sievers' fight with cancer, which he succumbed to this August. In a recent entry, his wife, Laurie Singer, writes about the layers of cancer, of strength you need to get through the illness as a cancer patient, and as a care-giver of a cancer patient.
Prostate cancer didn't sound too frightening, and they'd caught it at an early stage. But how did my father feel after he'd been told that the tumor was malignant? So far, his emotions have been shrouded from us. I suppose you could say that despite his corny jokes, his chattiness with friends and colleagues, despite his open affection with the resident white rascal, Snowy, there are times when my father remains "inscrutable," that favorite term used for quiet, Asian men. I've never seen him show an ounce of fear before and I take this to mean that he's got the many layers Laurie Singer speaks of. He must.
The surgery later this month should remove all traces of the mutated cells. I think of how lucky he is, and his patience with the countless checkups these past few weeks. Oncologists, cardiologists, urologists, pulmonologists. The scans, the long waits outside clinics. Yet he never appears weary. My mother, who's been a trooper, accompanying him for every one, is more fatigued.
Earlier this week, the cardiologist declared my dad's heart fine, and he was gleeful as a child, my mother reported. Today, though, the lung specialist said, "We found a small lump." They don't know yet if it's malignant, but they recommend removing it immediately, and if the tests prove the lump is so, they'll remove the upper left lung.
I've been pretty optimistic thus far, but this unknown lump makes me nervous. The uncertainty, the unknowingness of it all. Two lumps, two surgeries. I'm beginning to waver, just a little.
Cancer used to be a distant terror. Now it seems too close. Recently, I spoke on the phone with an old friend from junior college. His three-month-old nephew has brain cancer. No chemo for the little fellow; it has to be surgery. Three months old. How does a tumor develop in the brain that swiftly?
Still, I preserve a portion of hope that all will turn out well. For everyone. But our family's anticipated vacation in SF before my brother's church wedding won't take place now. My parents won't be able to make the trip. I'm not sure about my own yet. Selfishly, I've been longing for the four of us to make merry together one last time before my brother officially becomes a full-time husband. Everything I've done and been occupied with seems selfish now - infantile even - when I think about my father.
I hope I have his layers. I'd like to think that what is best of me comes from him.
DSD's been in the doldrums lately, and it's hard seeing her like this. The more we talked about it, the more convinced we were that the new job wasn't the right one for her. And then we narrowed it down to what would be. Most people can function well enough in a career that may not be particularly motivating (visualize Henry David Thoreau's observation - "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation") but there are a few who need to be inspired by what they do, who can pursue only what they believe in and feel great passion for. DSD's one of such people.
Last week, we had dinner with the old boss and got to meet a friend of his (who turned out to be a friend of Peiming’s husband too). He'd trained as a lawyer but later moved to Geneva, where he worked for several years in an NGO, toiling for causes he believed in. Now he's back in SG to pursue an ambitious project; it's a risky one, but he's got his heart in it. You don't often meet individuals like that, certainly not in this country. Most of the time, you'll find people who are disconnected from their truest selves, dissatisfied with plenty, unaware or all too aware of having lost their way or their dreams altogether. Among them, there will also be free spirits like DSD who continue to search for vocations that are meaningful, inspiring, and feed the soul instead of throttling it. Each time DSD related her troubles, I thought, she's dying a little every day. No job is worth that.
So I hope she returns to the very thing she once and still believes in. It won't pay as nicely as a bank job, but how she'll be paid is immeasurable anyway. And it may not be the most popular choice for a career, but then, DSD was never the average girl who seeks what is easy and familiar.
Thoreau's words are always a great comfort when life seems dismal, and happiness, very distant - "If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to that music which he hears, no matter how measured or how far away."
Letting Go, by Charlotte Kendrick
More Than Life, by Whitley
"Nobody grows old merely by living a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals. Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul." ~ Samuel Ullman
I love fall and winter for the excellent films that get released, and one that I'm especially looking forward to is "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button." It stars the exquisite Cate Blanchett who can carry adolescent innocence in a glance, and gravitas and grace with her voice alone. How wonderful that her character is named Daisy - after Gatsby's great love in F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby - and not the original Hildegarde. And then there's Brad Pitt as Benjamin Button, a character that will let him stretch his acting skills. Benjamin Button is born looking like an old man, and as he ages, his appearance grows more youthful. It will be fascinating to watch Benjamin Button - vertically challenged, bespectacled, gray-haired at seven years old - who grows into an impossibly young man, all of sixteen years with his unblemished face and corn-colored hair, and a far older soul. (You'll see the young - or old, depending on how you look at it - Mr. Button at the end of the second trailer.)
Fitzgerald's short story was largely inspired by Mark Twain, who remarked that "it was a pity that the best part of life came at the beginning and the worst part at the end." So he turned things round for one lucky individual, or unlucky, considering that Benjamin Button's aging process is unique among his family and friends. Since then, several authors have taken this concept on board. Andrew Sean Greer is one who did so. In The Confessions of Max Tivoli, Max Tivoli ages backwards. He also meets the girl he loves three times; on each occasion, she doesn't recognize him.
Director David Fincher and the film's writers appear to have been similarly inspired as they developed the brief story into a more epic film. Benjamin gets to meet Daisy when she is six, and again when she's in her 20s. However, she appears to know who he is and has accepted the strangeness of his condition. In the short story, the theme focuses on our attitudes toward aging, but there's plenty else in the story to mine, and Fincher appears to be thoroughly exploring a relationship where one person grows old while the other becomes increasingly young and potent. I'm excited to see how the film reflects our fixations on youth, beauty, mortality, and demonstrates how love endures - or doesn't - the vicissitudes of life, our appearances, our desires.
"The great thing about getting older is that you don't lose all the other ages you've been." ~ Madeleine L'Engle
The Writer's Almanac features a few familiar verses today, and Garrison Keillor reads them in his usual deep, sonorous voice. Something about their simple meter and rhyme caught my attention and awoke a memory or two, and I knew I had to save them somewhere. Years from today, I'll read them again and wonder at their longevity.
Health Food
An apple a day
Keeps the doctor away.
Proverbial Advice on Keeping Healthy
Early to bed and early to rise,
Makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.
After dinner sit a while;
After supper walk a mile.
If you wish to live for ever,
You must wash milk from your liver.
He that would live for aye
Must eat sage in May.
Button to chin
Till May be in;
Cast not a clout
Till May be out.
Our fathers, who were wondrous wise,
Did wash their throats before they washed their eyes.
The head and the feet keep warm;
The rest will take no harm
Use three physicians' skill: first, Dr Quiet,
Then Dr. Merriman and Doctor Diet.
Untitled
When black snails cross your path,
Black clouds much moisture hath.
Evening red and morning grey,
Are the sure signs of a fine day.
Red sky in the morning,
Shepherd's warning.
Red sky at night,
Shepherd's delight.
I before E
I before E,
Except after C
(Or when it's 'eigh',
As in 'neighbour' or 'weigh')
Stalagmites and Stalactites
The mites go up
And the tites come down.
My less poetic way of remembering which is which - the "g" in "stalagmites" stands for "(from the) ground" and the "c" in "stalactites" refers to "(from the) ceiling".
Recipe for a Pleasant Dinner-Party
A round table, holding eight;
A hearty welcome and little state;
One dish set on a time,
As plain as you please, but always prime;
Beer for asking for—and in pewter;
Servants who don't require a tutor;
Talking guests and dumb-waiters; Warm plates and hot potaters.
These verses reminded me of the NYT's review of Billy Collin's latest collection, Ballistics, in particular the poem, "Envoy" -
So off you go, infants of the brain
with a wave and some bits of fatherly advice:
stay out as late as you like,
don’t bother to call or write,
and talk to as many strangers as you can.