Monday, July 27, 2009
Comment
Howlin Wolf has left a new comment on your post "Transfer #2 from terminal blog by GJ": I couldn't agree more with you here-- what the reader brings to the writing. You may recall my eldest son Mark was in your English class-- but what you may not know, was that his mother READ to him every night--AND, despite being dyslexic, he continued to read. When his younger brother bought Indian souvenirs during our camping trips, Mark bought BOOKS. All through elementary school, he tested 2-3 grades BELOW level-- yet by his sophomore year, he had reached grade 10. I firmly believe that his successes were a direct result of his mother's devotion to reading. Howlin'
Transfer #3, the dedication by GJ
Dedicated to Ellie Skees, 1998 - 2007
Engraved on numerous hearts,
Etched in numerous memories.
Abiding in our minds,
Dwelling in our thoughts.
Among uppermost who knew you,
Within closest who bonded,
There is Great Grandma Jean;
Your pal, your playmate,
Your partner in pretending,
Wherein you forever remain.
GGPAJ
Engraved on numerous hearts,
Etched in numerous memories.
Abiding in our minds,
Dwelling in our thoughts.
Among uppermost who knew you,
Within closest who bonded,
There is Great Grandma Jean;
Your pal, your playmate,
Your partner in pretending,
Wherein you forever remain.
GGPAJ
Transfer #2 from terminal blog by GJ
READING
I’ve been struggling, mightily, with the makings of a book. Found three “editors;” one local, one in Orlando, and one in NY. Based on those three, and aware that it’s a small sample, if I had to draw anything like a conclusion, I’d have to say, “I wonder if, maybe, editors are NOT READERS.”
Now I don’t claim to be an expert in the “science” of reading. I have to go on my efforts to “teach it.” I’m not even sure it can be taught! Daughter Donna says that she learned to love reading through me. Because she was our first-born, and I had a little more time in those years, and I was a new father, I did spend a lot with her on my lap and reading who-knows-what to her.
Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird reported that she also learned to read (the newspaper) on daddy’s lap. Donna is now a prodigious reader. She cranks out books like they were endangered species. When she’s desperate, she’ll re-read ‘em! I believe that reading is not even 75% of what the writer presents to us. I’ll be generous and give him half.
The other half is what WE BRING to his product. (Friend Bob calls it the emotional baggage.) Exhibit A: my mother died on Mother’s Day (and my 9th birthday, May 10th, 1936.) When I read something, anything, that sidles up alongside a tender story of motherhood, or of maternal instinct, or if there is a verbal image of a dark, smiling, plump woman of the 1930’s, don’t you think I bring a potential for tears?
Is it important whether those salty drops are in remembrance of her, or for my loss? Won’t those tears cause me to get involved in that printed page to a greater degree? Exhibit B: Donna and I love to exchange views on Gone With the Wind. Now, GWTW is sacred to that girl. Talk about tears, she can cry when Brett says, “Frankly, my dear…”
Our eldest identifies strongly with something in Scarlet O’Hara. I keep asking if Melanie isn’t a more sympathetic character? There is no way we will ever agree, and it sure doesn’t matter. Not one bit. I take a fondness for Melanie (is she an ‘underdog?’) (a victim?) to the book with me. I become a strong “fan” of hers for whatever reason. Donna takes a loyalty for Scarlet with her, and we become competitive, but loving rivals (just as they are?)
Exhibit C: About 20+ years ago, I discovered a little book that took on a life of its own. It is called, The Education of Little tree. It is NOT a very well-written book! It has a degree of profanity I could do without. There have been some clouds over the author’s name. But I’ll bet that I bought and gave as gifts over a dozen copies! (Maybe 20!) The foundation for the book is in some Cherokee beliefs and cultural lore.
Little Tree and his Grandpa communicate via the Dog Star! I can buy that., and it’s because I can accept that people can COMMUNE. I may not be able to, and I don’t know, personally, any who can, but my imagination (another tool I bring to the written word) tells me that commune, communicate, and prayer are not alien to each other. (And I have felt prayers.)
In conclusion, I assigned “Little Tree” to a university class in remedial English years ago. I could FEEL the resistance when I showed them the cover of the book: right off the “juvenile” shelf! I made them an offer. I told them, that if anyone felt cheated out of his two dollars, or whatever very reasonable cost, I would buy back their copy. Out of two classes of 25 each, two or three asked for the refund. I could cite many more exhibits.
Reading is, I firmly believe, an active process that requires the reader to bring something of his unique, personal experience to the printed word. Be it bias, or belief, reality or fantasy, it is his or her contribution to a form of communication. Written words can evoke tears, printed words can summon laughter, visual words can help us dream. But not unless we bring the willingness to receive, the hopefulness of a relationship.
Donna and Harper Lee had the distinct advantage (one we can ALL provide to our children) of hearing (inflection, pronunciation, and feeling) Those which are the priceless enhancements of the printed icon.
I’ve been struggling, mightily, with the makings of a book. Found three “editors;” one local, one in Orlando, and one in NY. Based on those three, and aware that it’s a small sample, if I had to draw anything like a conclusion, I’d have to say, “I wonder if, maybe, editors are NOT READERS.”
Now I don’t claim to be an expert in the “science” of reading. I have to go on my efforts to “teach it.” I’m not even sure it can be taught! Daughter Donna says that she learned to love reading through me. Because she was our first-born, and I had a little more time in those years, and I was a new father, I did spend a lot with her on my lap and reading who-knows-what to her.
Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird reported that she also learned to read (the newspaper) on daddy’s lap. Donna is now a prodigious reader. She cranks out books like they were endangered species. When she’s desperate, she’ll re-read ‘em! I believe that reading is not even 75% of what the writer presents to us. I’ll be generous and give him half.
The other half is what WE BRING to his product. (Friend Bob calls it the emotional baggage.) Exhibit A: my mother died on Mother’s Day (and my 9th birthday, May 10th, 1936.) When I read something, anything, that sidles up alongside a tender story of motherhood, or of maternal instinct, or if there is a verbal image of a dark, smiling, plump woman of the 1930’s, don’t you think I bring a potential for tears?
Is it important whether those salty drops are in remembrance of her, or for my loss? Won’t those tears cause me to get involved in that printed page to a greater degree? Exhibit B: Donna and I love to exchange views on Gone With the Wind. Now, GWTW is sacred to that girl. Talk about tears, she can cry when Brett says, “Frankly, my dear…”
Our eldest identifies strongly with something in Scarlet O’Hara. I keep asking if Melanie isn’t a more sympathetic character? There is no way we will ever agree, and it sure doesn’t matter. Not one bit. I take a fondness for Melanie (is she an ‘underdog?’) (a victim?) to the book with me. I become a strong “fan” of hers for whatever reason. Donna takes a loyalty for Scarlet with her, and we become competitive, but loving rivals (just as they are?)
Exhibit C: About 20+ years ago, I discovered a little book that took on a life of its own. It is called, The Education of Little tree. It is NOT a very well-written book! It has a degree of profanity I could do without. There have been some clouds over the author’s name. But I’ll bet that I bought and gave as gifts over a dozen copies! (Maybe 20!) The foundation for the book is in some Cherokee beliefs and cultural lore.
Little Tree and his Grandpa communicate via the Dog Star! I can buy that., and it’s because I can accept that people can COMMUNE. I may not be able to, and I don’t know, personally, any who can, but my imagination (another tool I bring to the written word) tells me that commune, communicate, and prayer are not alien to each other. (And I have felt prayers.)
In conclusion, I assigned “Little Tree” to a university class in remedial English years ago. I could FEEL the resistance when I showed them the cover of the book: right off the “juvenile” shelf! I made them an offer. I told them, that if anyone felt cheated out of his two dollars, or whatever very reasonable cost, I would buy back their copy. Out of two classes of 25 each, two or three asked for the refund. I could cite many more exhibits.
Reading is, I firmly believe, an active process that requires the reader to bring something of his unique, personal experience to the printed word. Be it bias, or belief, reality or fantasy, it is his or her contribution to a form of communication. Written words can evoke tears, printed words can summon laughter, visual words can help us dream. But not unless we bring the willingness to receive, the hopefulness of a relationship.
Donna and Harper Lee had the distinct advantage (one we can ALL provide to our children) of hearing (inflection, pronunciation, and feeling) Those which are the priceless enhancements of the printed icon.
Transfer #1 from new (terminal) post by GJ
Time is of the essence. No, time and tide wait for no man. No, time sure flies, doesn't it? We "run out of" time, we "take our" time, and we "waste "time. So, what is this demon we live with? I can only report that, here in my octogenarian era, I actually seem to lose a whole year, now and then.
A good example is when I quit driving and sold the car. I could swear that it was in early May, 2007. Two years ago. It seems at least two years that I have not driven. Has to be. At least two. Nope. My replacement ID card clearly states, May, 2008. That's one year. That means a year that I know I lived through, by "feel," just up and blasted off into orbit.
If you happen to spot a mysterious object glittering in the sky , up there, just to the right of Jupiter, that's merely my lost year, OK?
A good example is when I quit driving and sold the car. I could swear that it was in early May, 2007. Two years ago. It seems at least two years that I have not driven. Has to be. At least two. Nope. My replacement ID card clearly states, May, 2008. That's one year. That means a year that I know I lived through, by "feel," just up and blasted off into orbit.
If you happen to spot a mysterious object glittering in the sky , up there, just to the right of Jupiter, that's merely my lost year, OK?
Friday, July 24, 2009
Bicycle Story by GJ
I was 12 or 13 (1939 or 1940) and was required to travel clear across town to a junior high school for a class in mechanical drawing.
My route took me two blocks down a VERY STEEP pair of hills to a dead end at the bottom: a guard rail that protected people from the electric rail that trains used in a commute to Chicago. We often referred to the train, the railroad, and the tracks as “the third rail.”
It was my habit to make a 90-degree right turn at the bottom, first to avoid crashing into that guard rail, and second, to make my turn north to the next street.
On the afternoon in question, I was running behind a bit and in a hurry and that turn was everything I could muster! Still in a hurry, I decided to ride around a small building on the corner of where I needed to turn left. (I had done this before, but never so hastily.)
Imagine my shock when I encountered a car heading straight for me, with only myself and my bike between that automobile and the side of the building. I instinctively withdrew my left hand from the handlebar, and my left foot from that pedal, and probably said something in the way of a prayer.
Two senses jolted me. One, the FEEL of bicycle as it was squeezed between two immovable monsters, and two, the SOUND of now-bare steel handlebar and pedal against the steel of automobile body. When I survived and recovered and made a miraculous turn left onto a sidewalk, I felt the now-cold handlebar and, an absence of pedal! Some part of the car had taken the grip from my handlebar and the pedal from my bike. I had taken a pretty deep layer of paint from an automobile.
And so, I right-pedaled as furiously, and as fearfully as I could to my goal, and I did, believe me, LOOK BACK!
My route took me two blocks down a VERY STEEP pair of hills to a dead end at the bottom: a guard rail that protected people from the electric rail that trains used in a commute to Chicago. We often referred to the train, the railroad, and the tracks as “the third rail.”
It was my habit to make a 90-degree right turn at the bottom, first to avoid crashing into that guard rail, and second, to make my turn north to the next street.
On the afternoon in question, I was running behind a bit and in a hurry and that turn was everything I could muster! Still in a hurry, I decided to ride around a small building on the corner of where I needed to turn left. (I had done this before, but never so hastily.)
Imagine my shock when I encountered a car heading straight for me, with only myself and my bike between that automobile and the side of the building. I instinctively withdrew my left hand from the handlebar, and my left foot from that pedal, and probably said something in the way of a prayer.
Two senses jolted me. One, the FEEL of bicycle as it was squeezed between two immovable monsters, and two, the SOUND of now-bare steel handlebar and pedal against the steel of automobile body. When I survived and recovered and made a miraculous turn left onto a sidewalk, I felt the now-cold handlebar and, an absence of pedal! Some part of the car had taken the grip from my handlebar and the pedal from my bike. I had taken a pretty deep layer of paint from an automobile.
And so, I right-pedaled as furiously, and as fearfully as I could to my goal, and I did, believe me, LOOK BACK!
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Friday, July 17, 2009
Dream a Little Dream
When I was a boy I had this dream. I saw myself seated at one of those elegant, concert grand pianos. Just me and a piano.
I don’t recall the “house,” at all. That is a term used to describe the large room where the audience sits, and refers to the people, themselves, at times. (A full house means that all seats are occupied. A “good house” is one that applauded a lot.)
I recall that I imagined playing Chopin’s “Polonaise,” once called the unofficial “Polish National Anthem.” I thought it rousing and triumphant and stirring deep in my soul. But I was a boy, we had no piano at all, and one piano teacher told Dad that my hands were too small to reach more than an octave. It was also the final years of the depression, the late 1930s. It was truly a dream that had no hope. I just didn’t know that it had no hope, and so I clung to it for a while. I could “make” music, people would know the melody, and I would be admired for my talent.
I had another, shared dream when I was middle-aged. As a matter of fact there were two dreams during that period. In one, a colleague and I talked often, and fondly of our dream to set out in two cars, as I recall, because we both wanted to drive. We saw ourselves driving across the continent, but soon enlarged that to more continents, and wondering how we might make it around the world. We figured we could utilize the narrowest spaces across water, no matter how many thousands of miles it would be “around” the many waters on earth. Of course, at our age, we were well aware of the futility of this dream.
Another colleague and I also talked regularly about “our school.” We saw a warm, friendly, welcome venue where kids could learn to “fly” in the sense of soaring to places of their own design. No administrators would be there (or needed) and all kids would be willing to do our bidding, of course. Naturally, at our age, we knew the school would never be built. Our kids would never know the close, kindly, personal bond that is truly possible between teacher and pupil. We knew, even as our talks wore down and became harder to describe and details grew distant, that this dream, too, was not to be. It eventually became too sad to bring it up again.
Three men, three dreams, and three escapes from the ugly ‘what is’ to the euphoric ‘what ought to be.’ I always thought we should devise a “service” where we could say goodbye to dreams. Some words offered by the dreamers, themselves, would surely be in order.
I don’t recall the “house,” at all. That is a term used to describe the large room where the audience sits, and refers to the people, themselves, at times. (A full house means that all seats are occupied. A “good house” is one that applauded a lot.)
I recall that I imagined playing Chopin’s “Polonaise,” once called the unofficial “Polish National Anthem.” I thought it rousing and triumphant and stirring deep in my soul. But I was a boy, we had no piano at all, and one piano teacher told Dad that my hands were too small to reach more than an octave. It was also the final years of the depression, the late 1930s. It was truly a dream that had no hope. I just didn’t know that it had no hope, and so I clung to it for a while. I could “make” music, people would know the melody, and I would be admired for my talent.
I had another, shared dream when I was middle-aged. As a matter of fact there were two dreams during that period. In one, a colleague and I talked often, and fondly of our dream to set out in two cars, as I recall, because we both wanted to drive. We saw ourselves driving across the continent, but soon enlarged that to more continents, and wondering how we might make it around the world. We figured we could utilize the narrowest spaces across water, no matter how many thousands of miles it would be “around” the many waters on earth. Of course, at our age, we were well aware of the futility of this dream.
Another colleague and I also talked regularly about “our school.” We saw a warm, friendly, welcome venue where kids could learn to “fly” in the sense of soaring to places of their own design. No administrators would be there (or needed) and all kids would be willing to do our bidding, of course. Naturally, at our age, we knew the school would never be built. Our kids would never know the close, kindly, personal bond that is truly possible between teacher and pupil. We knew, even as our talks wore down and became harder to describe and details grew distant, that this dream, too, was not to be. It eventually became too sad to bring it up again.
Three men, three dreams, and three escapes from the ugly ‘what is’ to the euphoric ‘what ought to be.’ I always thought we should devise a “service” where we could say goodbye to dreams. Some words offered by the dreamers, themselves, would surely be in order.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
A remarkable tale
Sent message to small group of family and extended family about a doctor's visit. I still remember a story he told me for first time, although I have run across it a couple of times since.
As I recall, and don't hold me to details, our Army Air Force was told that we had broken the Japanese code in late WWII. They intercepted a message (or were given one by another branch), that famous Admiral Yamamoto was going to inspect troops on Wake Island, I believe it was. It was said that this highest-ranking officer who was in charge of the attack on Pearl Harbor, was obssessed with punctuality.
The decoded message was addressed to troops and informed them the admiral's plane would land at 1300 (1:00 P.M.) let's say. Our men met to see if the plane could be intercepted as it would be a mammoth P.R. coup to shoot him down. The nearest place for us to take off, I believe, was in the Mariana Islands, probably Guam or Saipan. The best plane we had for the job was the P-51 (Mustang) but it could not make the round trip, fuel-wise. They struggled and struggled with ways to remove any weight that wasn't essential, stripping down to the barest possible aircraft.
The diagnosis was that our pilot would have about one minute over the island and practically no room for error. Cutting to the chase, our plane shot down the target while it was at its most vulnerable, mid-way into its landing, and in front of thousands of troops all lined up to be inspected by their hero.
Is that a great war story, or not? Maybe some of you know more facts and could correct me? (For instance, I say Army Air Force only because I feel fairly sure that Navy did not use P-51s. Were they "too hot" for carriers, I wonder? Or not enough of them to go around?) I remember when they first came out. I was in high school, saw them in magazines, and drew them from memory in study halls and, ahem, maybe an occasional class??? (There are those who would say that that might explain my grades?) Beautifully designed. Matter of fact, my interest in latest planes helped me come in second on the Naval Officer's qualifying exam when I was 16. But that's another war story. (I was still getting USN recruiting stuff while a seaman in the South Pacific a year later.)
Whoops. If there's enough interest, I can tell about the time that Jean and I were up on the flight deck of the U.S.S. Saratoga, (aircraft carrier) in about 1995 +/-. There were 5,000 of us civilians up there, watching as planes did "touch-and-go's." THAT was a thrill.
As I recall, and don't hold me to details, our Army Air Force was told that we had broken the Japanese code in late WWII. They intercepted a message (or were given one by another branch), that famous Admiral Yamamoto was going to inspect troops on Wake Island, I believe it was. It was said that this highest-ranking officer who was in charge of the attack on Pearl Harbor, was obssessed with punctuality.
The decoded message was addressed to troops and informed them the admiral's plane would land at 1300 (1:00 P.M.) let's say. Our men met to see if the plane could be intercepted as it would be a mammoth P.R. coup to shoot him down. The nearest place for us to take off, I believe, was in the Mariana Islands, probably Guam or Saipan. The best plane we had for the job was the P-51 (Mustang) but it could not make the round trip, fuel-wise. They struggled and struggled with ways to remove any weight that wasn't essential, stripping down to the barest possible aircraft.
The diagnosis was that our pilot would have about one minute over the island and practically no room for error. Cutting to the chase, our plane shot down the target while it was at its most vulnerable, mid-way into its landing, and in front of thousands of troops all lined up to be inspected by their hero.
Is that a great war story, or not? Maybe some of you know more facts and could correct me? (For instance, I say Army Air Force only because I feel fairly sure that Navy did not use P-51s. Were they "too hot" for carriers, I wonder? Or not enough of them to go around?) I remember when they first came out. I was in high school, saw them in magazines, and drew them from memory in study halls and, ahem, maybe an occasional class??? (There are those who would say that that might explain my grades?) Beautifully designed. Matter of fact, my interest in latest planes helped me come in second on the Naval Officer's qualifying exam when I was 16. But that's another war story. (I was still getting USN recruiting stuff while a seaman in the South Pacific a year later.)
Whoops. If there's enough interest, I can tell about the time that Jean and I were up on the flight deck of the U.S.S. Saratoga, (aircraft carrier) in about 1995 +/-. There were 5,000 of us civilians up there, watching as planes did "touch-and-go's." THAT was a thrill.
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