Sometimes I Pretend...

Sometimes I pretend I am just going about my business like adults often do, not paying much attention to their kids. But I was just pretending, I didn't want her to feel self-conscious, nor did I want her to see the expression of complete incredulity on my face. I kept loading the trunk of the car while she exclaimed, "Mommy! A wishing flower!" She plucked out one of these wispy looking weeds from the lawn and spoke her wish out aloud, "I wish for magic so that we get so much money that Mommy and Daddy can stay home with me and play and never have to go to work again." Then she proceeded to blow the wispy petals away. It was certainly one of those moments that you can only experience with a five year old.

She is really enjoying being five too. She said, "Mommy you can't believe how incredible it is to be five. I can draw a starfish, a coconut tree, a shark, a dinosaur and I can jump down two steps at a time. I am loving it!"

Little does she know how much I am enjoying her five year old-ness!

Express Yourself

In Paul Auster’s novel, The Book of Illusions, a filmmaker, Hector Mann, makes films that he doesn’t want the world to see. The instructions in his will are clear, every remaining copy of all the films he has ever made need to be burnt within twenty-four hours of his death. He has made these movies for himself, simply for the sake of making them, for the pleasure he felt from making them.

But he falters in his resolve. He invites a writer, David Zimmer, to his ranch. He wants him to view the movies. David Zimmer knows that the Hector Mann is drawing his last few breaths and that he doesn’t have enough time to view each masterpiece in the vault. He panics at the thought of the world missing out on these works of genius.

And so it is with any form of expression. Is there such a thing as writing for oneself, painting for oneself, making films for our own viewing pleasure, blogging for catharsis alone, expressing oneself eloquently just for the pleasure of expressing oneself? I think such a thing would be about as satisfying as muttering or yelling to oneself within the confines of ones room or padded cell as the case may be. I believe we need an audience, an appreciative or, at the very least, a sympathetic one, at that. Even if we have little to say that may interest the world, even if we have nothing new to add to the collective evolution of thoughts and feelings, our perspective, we feel, is unique and we want to share it. It buys us an iota of minor immortality, a sense that we’ll be leaving a part of ourselves behind. Even if the value of this left behind part may be questionable to future generations; what our future generations will question or accept, after all, isn’t really our concern.

Some insist they write for themselves and are not interested in what others have to say about their work. That may be true but don’t they still want people reading what they have to say? They may not care about what others have to say about their work, but I am certain they want to be read.

And we don’t really have to worry on that front either because no matter what we want to say, there is an audience out there. People want to be unique but even as they try to distinguish themselves and stand apart, they still seek resonance in other thoughts, other actions. Why else would I have scoured about fifty blogs today, reading the latest posts, searching for kindred spirits? The search wasn’t entirely satisfactory today but the pleasures of going to the “next blog” are immense, if only to see what others are talking about, what they felt the need to immortalize in cyberspace this 14th day of September.

Random Conversation

“Excuse me…”

“Yes?”

“Are you waiting for the bus to New York?”

“Yes I am.”

“Does it show up at 7:45 and reach Port Authority by five of nine?”

“Well no, we’ll probably be there by 9:15.”

“I just want someone to be honest with me! The lady at the Lakeland Bus office said I’d be in the city by five of nine!”

“Well, they say that but there’s always rush hour traffic at this time, so it’s possible we could get a little delayed.”

“Ok, but they shouldn’t say what they don’t mean! Anyway, would you mind if I stayed with you?”

“Not at all.”

“I just had to do it today, I’ve been postponing this all along but they should be able to do something for me.”

“What’s the problem?”

“Well it’s my knees. They’ve operated upon it so many times…it doesn’t help. Nothing works. And the doctor here tells me he can’t do a thing. So I called up the surgeon who did the original surgery. You see… he was nice to me on the phone and asked me to come on over. He said he would take a look. I am going to show him my x-ray. I am sure my knee-cap is broken in a thousand places even though the doctor here says it looks fine.”

“So what time is your appointment with him?”

“10:15”

“Ok. You’ll get there in time.”

“Yes, I think so. May I sit with you on the bus? Will you tell me where to go once we get off?”

“Sure. No problem.”

“May I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“Are you from India?”

“Yes I am.”

“I thought so. There are these other Indian people I know. Nice man. He came to the Quik Chek with his daughter to get some coffee. He was Hindu, not that it matters. Are you Hindu too?”

“Yes I am.”

“I liked him. Even though it was a little hard for me to understand him. I do have a little trouble hearing. Then there was this other Indian girl - Aruna. She was my neighbor. I couldn’t understand her when she talked. I even told her – ‘I am slightly deaf, can you repeat yourself?’ But no, she had her nose in the air. She told me – “I don’t like to speak too loud!’ So she lost my friendship. But most Indians I meet I like.”

“Can I just stay with you until I leave the bus terminal?”

“Yes, sure. So who’s the doctor you’re going to see in the city?”

“Do you watch TV?

“Yes?”

“Did you watch the US Open?”

“No I didn’t.”

“You know what the US Open is, right?”

“Yes, of course!”

“Well, my doctor was on it! He is the surgeon who was on call for the players. They kept showing him on TV. He’s good. My rabbi recommended him to me. You do know what a rabbi is, right?”

“Yes I do know what a rabbi is. The doctor sounds good, I am sure he’ll be able to help you.”

“Pardon me, what did you say?”

“I said yes I do know what a rabbi is and that your doctor sounded good. I am sure he can help you.”

“Oh yes, he says he can. Someone has to. I have just had it. I can barely move. I can’t tell you how I am taking myself to NYC today. I’ve been up since 3 AM thinking about this. I kept watching TV all night even though I can’t hear. I just have the captions on.”

“How did it happen in the first place?”

“How did what happen?”

“Oh your knee injury.”

“My what?”

“YOUR KNEE INJURY.”

“Oh, wow, you’re loud. I am just a little deaf. Well, the first time it happened I was 26 and my hip popped. I can’t tell you how many times my hip has popped since then. I was swimming the other day and it popped again. I couldn’t move. I was just hanging by the side of the pool. Then this maintenance guy came along. I told him – my hip has popped – I can’t move. He wanted to call the ambulance but I said no. Can’t deal with ambulances. So he asked me what I planned to do. I thought he could help me get out of the pool but he didn’t want to. Don’t know what he thought would happen, I just kept hanging there, couldn’t move this way or that and the guy kept looking at his watch. But I can’t help it. My hip just pops. He just kept asking if he could get the ambulance for me. I finally let him get me the ambulance seeing how I wasn’t going to get out of the pool otherwise. I keep falling. I just topple over backwards. Are there too many escalators to take in Port Authority?”

“Yes, quite a few.”

“You’ll be with me, right?”

“Sure.”

“My daughter told me not to talk to anyone on my way to the city. But you look all right. I think I can talk to you. She said not to say a word. She told me not to get in an elevator full of people, especially one with another man. She also told me not to sit on the bus with another man. She said not to talk, not to tell anyone where I lived, where I was going or tell them how much money I have on me. Now why would I tell anyone that? Although I do want to talk to someone about pulling out all my investments from Smith Barney and putting it somewhere else. That place was my rabbi’s suggestion and they just don’t want to touch my money. It just sits there, they don’t invest it in anything!”

“Really? She said not to be in an elevator or a bus next to a man?”

“Yes. But you know, she’s young and pretty. Maybe this is what she has found works best for her. Can I sit with you?”

“Yes.”

“Let me show you the list of things she told me not to do…oops! I think I left the list at home. I’m telling you, it is about yay long…it has all kinds of instructions for me. Oh well, doesn’t look like I have it though!”

“What does you daughter do?”

“Oh she just got arrested for disorderly conduct. She was stopping the condo people from building on green acres. They said it was green acres. They lied. They started building there. She told them to stop and the mayor got her arrested. The old mayor was a friend of mine, this one doesn’t like me. I told my daughter to move to California. She lives there now. My son lives with me.”

“What does your son do?”

“He’s had a tough life. He’s 38. Things never really worked out for him. Now he is going to school to become a medical technician. I really think he needs to find someone to marry. I can’t sleep all night. I keep watching the Animal Planet. It was so sad what happened to my friend Steve Irwin. I loved him.”

“Yes it is quite sad.”

“The stingray got him, it didn’t even mean to. You know him right? You know what stingrays are?”

“Yes it was very sad. Yes I do know what stingrays are.”

“What did you say?”

“I said I do know what stingrays are.”

“I am sorry. I told you I was a little deaf. I am thinking of getting a CI.”

“Ah a cochlear implant!”

“Yes! I was going to ask if you knew what CI was! You seem very knowledgeable. You don’t even have much of an accent.”

“Thanks. Looks like the bus is on schedule. You’ll get there just in time.”

“Oh! Will you please help me down the stairs? I am sorry but you don’t know how many times I have fallen.”

“Sure. I’ll take you downstairs.”

“Indians are really nice people. Thank you so much.”

Harvest Moon

On Wednesday night
when it’s your turn
to take the garbage out
and you saunter to the curb
with your head hung low
and arms weighed down,
something whispers,
calls out your name,
and peeking through the lattice
of a maple
readying for fall,
from between two homes
silhouetted across
Winding Hill Drive,
it greets you.
It’s made an appearance
just for you,
tonight.

Descended
from the heavens,
for a tête-à-tête
with you!

Your bags
are suddenly weightless,
a glow travels down,
from your head
to your toes,
this harvest moon,
you’re blessed.

Movie Review: The Ice Storm

Mikey Carver (Elijah Wood) bundles himself up in his warmest jacket and saunters out in the ice storm, drawn irresistibly, compelled beyond reason or rationality into this seemingly pristine setting of frozen trees, frozen streets and shimmering icicles, nature’s glass palace in Connecticut. This is the kind of day he relishes, a day when the “smell molecules” cannot be inhaled they are frozen in space. He slides on the roads, slips on icy planks and stares mesmerized at the frozen, swaying branches in this ice storm. In his final moments he is entranced by the fireworks from a broken overhead power cable as it swishes through the air creating an amazing display of fireworks.

Mikey is just one of the six teenagers trying to imprint something on the empty pages of their minds, they are grasping for straws in a world that their parents have given up trying to understand a very long time ago. They emulate the falsely animated antics of their parents who have been rendered mere facsimiles of the people they once were. Parents who have failed to equip their kids with any means of understanding what their gradually awakening senses perceive. The hollow, termite ridden, interiors of their psyches are so terrifying and so chilling that the audience is as mesmerized as Mikey Carver’s character was with the terrifying ice storm.

All characters here are encased in several layers of ice, they are beautiful, prosperous people with friends, neighbors, kids, and beautiful Thanksgiving Day spreads on their dining tables but they have long since lost touch with their pre-cryonic states.

Benjamin Hood (Kevin Kline) is found in bed with his enchanting neighbor Janey Carver (Sigourney Weaver), who has lit the proverbial cigarette and wears a bored expression on her face as Ben gets conversational and tells her about his aversion to golf. She cuts him short saying he is boring her and that she already has a husband. So he cuts his monologue short pulls up his pants and heads home. The joylessness and the meaninglessness of the act prove to be no hindrance to the driving desire to repeat the same ordeal the next day and the next. “Key parties” where spouse swapping is the much-anticipated culmination of an evening are normal occurrences in the danse macabre of this prosperous neighborhood. To the characters in question there is something compelling about passionate mindlessness; a theme that runs through every scene of the movie. The children never talk to the parents; the parents don’t offer much more than four walls, a roof and sustenance to their kids. Jim Carver (Henry Czerny), for instance, arrives home one day and announces that he is home only to have Mikey ask if he was away. The disconnect, the cold, chills the viewer to the bone.

I do want to pick up the book since movies often gloss over the various layers of meaning that a book conveys, especially in the case of this directorial venture of Ang Lee. The director did a fine job, I felt, but critics have found the movie flat, monotonous and joyless.

Makes me wonder about the point of expecting the conveyance of joy in a subject that is essentially devoid of joy? If life is flat and monotonous in suburban Connecticut, or for that matter anywhere else in the world, where souls are encased in sheets of ice, then a director who is able to portray this as accurately as Ang Lee has, must receive accolades and not derision at his efforts to portray that which he set out to.

Saying more would give away the story, but I recommend seeing it or stopping the remote while channel surfing, if it happens to be playing. I have found some of my most absorbing and compelling movies this way.

Fudge

Today Fudge entered our lives! A bright spot if there ever was one all rolled up in a cuddly ball of black and white fur and a wet nose that goes sniffing around the house. He doesn’t think he’s a dog and neither do we.



He loves being carried around and his humans are more than happy to oblige, especially the little human:



When assaulted by meaninglessness let a dog enter your lives and watch a five year old face light up with joy!

Splitting Hairs

My blog announces to the world that I am introspective in the extreme. I traverse endless loops of thoughts that circle in on themselves endlessly until I absorb a nugget or two of learning and move on to the next big adventure of the mind. But introspection often requires a bird’s eye view of the mechanisms within, a need to hover over oneself and examine the causes and consequences of ones actions.

It is 1:40 AM in the morning and some near and dear, loved ones, who stop by this blog, may get mildly concerned about my propensity for extreme introspection at this early morning hour. The room is dark, the house is quiet except for the clickety-clack of my fingers on the keyboard; some much-needed quiet time. But I need to relive the events of the past few days, I need them captured and preserved.

So for the next few hours I’ll become a spectator in this arena of angst and acrimony being played out over several days. I must talk about the events that led to the final hellish destination, conduct “morbidity and mortality” (M & M) analyses of my role in these events.

Here’s my perspective:

1. Shakespeare & Co. announces a sestina writing theme.


2. A writer on the network announces his objection. He feels strongly about poetry and is fresh from an experience on another network where he has denounced what he calls “lazy poetry”.


3. In some ways he’s saying one must learn to walk before one runs.


4. His objections are noted. But the network is not about to change the weekly theme.


5. He continues with his objections.


6. A debate ensues. There are only two participants in this debate. A prolific writer and poet who often experiments with structure and form and is dedicated to the art of poetry and the person above, who doesn’t much care for such experimentation and is adamant about his point that sestina writing is not an appropriate exercise for our network.


7. The rest of us sit back and watch the progressive escalation of this debate. Calm descends over the network as nothing else gets posted while this important debate unfolds.


8. Then we sense a change in the winds, the debate turns personal and edgier. Here’s a quote from this debate, the readers can evaluate the astringency of the tone or the offense factor here for themselves:

“My reasons for objecting to the "sestina" as an exercise was that too much bad poetry appears on the board anyway and such an exercise appeared to encourage it. As someone who seems to have no literary device for distinguishing between good and bad poetry, this is clearly not a problem for you. Furthermore, as the great purveyor of, dohas, limericks, 55vers and god knows what else, it was always perfectly clear that an exercise involving "sestinas" would have you at least purring like a cat that's found the cream.Let us have one thing clear: your attitude to poetry and literature is the anomaly and not mine. You are not impressed by the tradition because (it seems) you haven't even read most of it! As I said before, from my point of view, you are like a musician who wants to be a composer, but has never actually bothered listening to the Western tradition. Anyway, you will forgive me for not always being filled with wonder every time you "google" something new. Some of us spent our time reading rather than googling.I might finish by saying that (in my opinion) most of your poems, slap dash as they tend to be, show profound structural weaknesses (now and then, there is a pleasant turn of phrase, which should encourage us not to totally give up on you). Indeed I would love to criticise your forthcoming "sestina" as I imagine such a critique might actually be of some help to you!”

The highlighted sentences here were showing definite signs of escalation but I wasn’t about to do anything yet.

1. The responses from our experimentally inclined poet here were mild and within acceptable standards of debate. But we weren’t done with the escalation yet. This followed:

It's also worth mentioning that on Ryze boards one needs to keep referring to these points frequently because so few people here seem to have really "read" the classics (nor their criticism!). When someone writes "this was wonderful" do they mean "wonderful" by the standards of this board, or "wonderful" by any standards? Very likely they have never even considered such questions and it is here that criticism can help to keep a balance. Most of what I'm saying would be merely standard stuff in the English Dept. of a Harvard, Yale or Oxford University: in any place that thinks seriously about literature.

At this point of the debate, as moderator I am concerned but not alarmed. I am merely wishing they would stop. I sense that the insults would keep growing and the next post might say something derogatory and insulting to every member of the board. Every moderator who monitors and observes a debate would watch for these signs, I believe.

1. Then the first of many private messages arrive in my mailbox, expressing concern:

“Have been following the exchange between A and B on the feedback for this week's theme. Am curious, are we allowed to get this personal on a public board? And do you think A's assessment of the general lack of talent may discourage members from posting? It’s one thing to provide constructive feedback for a particular post and another to be generally dismissive. Just curious.”
As I indicated, this was the first of many messages I received about the ongoing debate. It appeared to me that the situation was increasingly unstable and that I needed to do something about it.

1. I make a decision to close this discussion thread with the following announcement:

“This topic needs to be closed now, wouldn't you agree?This discussion has started getting personal and comments have been made in passing that could offend the members of this board in general.You are entitled to your opinions but in this public forum, you are not permitted to make sweeping remarks that show condescension and dismissiveness toward members of the board, nor do we need to witness personal attacks. This is not the place for it.”

The thread was closed. One of the parties to the debate politely inquired as to why I had taken such an action and I told him that I had to consider the wishes of all members of the board. He may or may not have agreed with my decision but he didn’t pursue the matter any further.

However the next thing that the original objector to the sestina did was post a piece on his blog that speculated that Shakespeare & Co. was a network run by two bankers one of whom was steeped in literature and the other (me) who hadn’t a clue about literature and that the network was a means to finance an operation where Indian students in America were transformed into Americans. He went on to express disdain about the network and its members and suggested that he would continue to use that particular corner of cyberspace as a means to receive free advertising for his own works of literature.

I was shocked and stunned by this post. Mostly stunned at its tone, its viciousness and its paranoid nature. It seemed to appear out of nowhere because I had always had cordial, if not friendly, interactions with this person. I had found him rude, arrogant and abrasive but respected the fact that he wrote well. I had even spent several tedious hours archiving all the stories he had ever posted on the board and giving him a special link and place of prominence on the web page of the network. He had even uttered something complimentary about the effort. He had on occasion praised some of my own writing as well. This person is a friend of a friend and I always heard that he was a quiet, unassuming sort of person. So considering that background I was stunned beyond belief to see what he had posted.

There have been other events in my moderating history, events which haven’t made sense to me because they have failed to fit any frames of reference I carry around in my head. This incident topped them all. So my immediate reactions were captured in the post you may or may not have seen below.
The post made by this writer and my own reactive post took on the status of a long drawn out war over the next few days. I was thankful to have many supporters and upset to see a steady stream of venom spewed on his blog from people who had called themselves my friends before.

Things have quieted down today after I made the decision to remove this writer from the network. I didn’t want someone who felt such animosity toward our group, who wanted nothing to do with our board except the use of free advertising space and was increasingly abusive to us, to continue to be associated with us.

That should be the end of this sordid story, shouldn’t it? Except in my mind there still are unresolved issues that have nothing to do with the boorish behavior of this individual.

1. Did I do the right thing in closing the increasingly volatile thread that threatened to upset the members of the board?


2. Did I do the right thing in removing this member from the network?

Those are the two immediate questions. The other questions I need to ponder, even if it means the attribution of some credibility to the rantings of this madman:

1. Is it better to say nothing at all if I am not sufficiently inspired by something that is posted on the board, than to offer words of encouragement and occasionally, gentle critique to the members of the board?


2. How far can I let matters escalate before it becomes important for me to step in and moderate?


3. How concerned must I be when facing a barrage of emails and private messages that recommend a certain course of action, should I act on them immediately or should I let things play out until the discussion in question loses steam or enters the territory of irretrievable damage or irreversible disaster?


4. How important is it to try and keep everyone happy?


5. Should disruptive members be kept on board indefinitely or should they be banished if the majority feels they should be?

I know the answers to many of these questions, intuitively, even as I write them out, yet they still fall in the “easier-said-than-done” territory when events are actually unfolding before me.