Very, Very, Urgent

I don't know a lot about these TED talks; I have seen one or two before. In this relatively short speech, Al Gore delivers a warning and a challenge to us, and he looks pretty intense about it all. I would encourage you to set aside a few minutes (about 27!) to watch this. If you have a pretty fast computer, press the full-screen button (to the right of the speaker icon) to enlarge the picture:



I have shown the Inconvenient Truth DVD to my freshmen Earth Science classes because I believe it's good science, not just a political issue. Many students have already been shown the video by their history teacher, or maybe the substitute teacher, but I wanted them to see it from a science point of view.

This talk is short, and to the point:

1. we don't have much more time to act
2. we can change things if we do act
3. this will be the defining challenge of our time.

Please consider what he's saying, and if you do agree, spread around the knowledge of this talk. You can access the original at http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/243 or at a stand-alone page I created (which strangely works better at full-screen mode than the original) here: http://ggould.com/blogstuff/Urgent_Al.html

Thank you for your time, and I hope you'll share with the rest of us your thoughts below.

Timelessness of MLK's speeches

In the Name of Love

Last Friday, we observed the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination. It's a somber occasion to remind us of a great loss, but also an opportunity to look at what King was doing in his last days. I want to mainly give credit to another blogger, digby, and ask you to read his blog from Friday, which deals with MLK's speeches near the end of his life. My thanks to Mike Groh who turned me on to this excellent piece. In closing, I would simply like to print an excerpt from a speech against the war in Vietnam, delivered exactly a year earlier, which closes digby's blog post. Jeez, you think they might be relevant today?

These are revolutionary times. All over the globe men are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression and out of the wombs of a frail world new systems of justice and equality are being born. The shirtless and barefoot people of the land are rising up as never before. "The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light." We in the West must support these revolutions. It is a sad fact that, because of comfort, complacency, a morbid fear of communism, and our proneness to adjust to injustice, the Western nations that initiated so much of the revolutionary spirit of the modern world have now become the arch anti-revolutionaries. This has driven many to feel that only Marxism has the revolutionary spirit. Therefore, communism is a judgment against our failure to make democracy real and follow through on the revolutions we initiated. Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo and unjust mores and thereby speed the day when "every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight and the rough places plain."

My First Friday Night

Foraging in the Food Court

This last Friday night, we went out for dinner and then on to an opening at the Museum of Modern Art.

Returning to Westfield Centre (Sonja just got a job at Bloomies!), we went back to the food court for dinner. This gave me a chance to retake the picture of the dome, without the lights. It's still quite beautiful, just different.

Before my recent awareness of my blood pressure, there were too many choices, but now I was nervously trying to minimize my fat and sodium intake! What a surprise, no low-fat, low-sodium outlets in the food court! I settled for some salmon and veggie chunks on a skewer!

On to the Museum!

Martha is a member of the SFMOMA, and she gets invited to these openings where crowds of trendy people gather to view cool things. This time it was the opening of an exhibition of Lee Friedlander's photographs. We also went up to the 5th floor to see Olafur Eliasson's trippy exhibit, which in many ways was like some of the perceptual exhibits at the Exploratorium, done up large and art museum sized! When we stepped out of the elevator on the 5th floor, we were flooded with a pure yellow light. It was pretty strange, and made you look like some zombie out of a cheezy B-movie. Hard to believe the color of light could have such a strong effect on how you feel.

All in all, after all the time in the hospital, and self-focus, it was nice to get out for a few hours. Thanks to all of you who have been so supportive. I go back to work tomorrow!

Second Chances

Quick, close your eyes and touch your nose!

You know how a friend greets you with "How are ya?" and you reply "Just fine?" In many respects, I am 'just fine.' As a matter of fact I feel quite lucky in a way I never did before. It feels kind of odd to answer with "I just had a stroke, but otherwise, I'm fine!"

Now, philosophically, I already believed that one should be thankful for the life one's already had to live, and live each day like it's our last. But I just gotta tell ya that it feels a little different when the right half of your body seems out of whack, and you find out you have sky-high blood pressure when you do go to the doctor's.

So, to cut to the chase for those of you that may not know, and to shorten my typing since it's not too easy for my right hand to type accurately, I had a small stroke this week, and I'm basically fine, should recover completely, and must change my health lifestyle, and take blood pressure medicine conceivably forever.

Earlier, on Wednesday, I felt real ill, weak, and went to the clinic, where I found out about my blood pressure. She gave me some cognitive tests, which included closing my eyes and touching my nose with my fingertip. I did fine, and was sent home with some blood pressure medicine. I noticed later that night that it was hard to type with my right hand (which is still true!) but thought it might be the medication. I woke up wide awake around 3 AM, and for some reason started touching my nose, and was shocked when my right finger missed my nose very significantly. My right leg didn't function as well, and I really thought I had a stroke. I had to convince Kaiser of this the next day, and then found myself in the emergency room on Valentine's Day night (boy, did I blow my Valentine's Day!) watching my blood pressure every 30 minutes. Thoughts of guilt and selfishness about how I was now hurting my family flooded my mind. So many of my friends checked in with their concerns, I definitely felt unworthy. Eventually I said to myself, "Quit whining, and just be thankful!"

There's an old saying that goes something like this:

Nothing clears the mind like an execution in the morning

It's no secret that excess weight and a sedentary lifestyle pose health risks, but boy howdy, it sure seems real now. For the foreseeable future (should I be so blessed to have one) my life will change. I share with you a picture of the first meal I've made since getting out of the hospital, and I presume I'll be learning a lot more about low-salt and low-fat diets, to keep me from going insane. I just need to realize my old life is over, and I've been blessed to have a second go at it. Not being able to pig out on desserts and unhealthy 'comfort food' all the time is a no brainer of a trade for my second chance.

[cliché ending alert!]

So, count your blessings, tell the people you care about that you love them, and do what you need to do to stay around this dance a little longer!

Destination Shopping

Shopping as Entertainment
[picture at left is straight up view of rotunda dome, with lots of strings of holiday lights hanging down.]
I have generally escaped contact with the mass consumerist culture this Christmas Shopping season (last minute shopping for chocolates for Martha's xmas stocking are hopefully forgiven!) but as we headed out today to do some errands, and a little grocery shopping, we somehow ended up downtown at the Westfield Mall, home of San Francisco's Bloomingdale's, which is housed in the ghost of the old Emporium.

In many ways, a mall is a mall is a mall, but this one has some dramatic uses of space. The rotunda itself towers over a third floor rest area with chairs and couches, and the string of lights are positively mesmerizing. Some of the views from above down at the lower levels certainly evoke a sort of vertigo I don't usually feel. The food court on the bottom floor had way too many choices, and it took forever to settle on a 'safe' choice of fish and chips (pretty decent). We even got our grocery shopping done there; there's this real upscale grocery store, Bristol Farms, on the same level as the food court, which is an entertainment in itself. It out-Andronico's Andronico's! I even found a little wedge of goat's milk Bleu Cheese for Jeff and Karen's NYE party!

We ended up staying too late, and got locked out of the rear exit where we came in, and had to truck our groceries around the block, but survived. It gave us an opportunity to look closer at the clever xmas windows of Fox Hardware, at their chandelier made from colanders, wire whisk wheels, and other hardware parts!

Walking through the building brings up old memories: My sister Rickie and I shopping with our Grandma; taking my own kids (many years later) to Legoland during the Christmas season. My dad was an architect, now and then, and sometimes I feel a certain shared appreciation for buildings. I don't really know, as we never waxed philosophically about such things.

I feel kind of guilty, as I generally feel people who like to go to malls are like people on sitcoms, but to paraphrase Pogo,

I have met the shopper, and he is me!

I'm Not There [review]

Will the Real Dylan Please Stand Up?

Now, before I get into too much of a spoiler mode, let me take a shortcut to a recommendation. If you're really familiar with Bob Dylan's songs and lyrics, and you also enjoy surrealistic art in your movies (the second half of Apocalypse Now for example), I have a recommendation for you. Just go to the movie (quickly now, it's in limited release) with some friends, then go out to dinner or a coffee shop afterwards to discuss the movie. You can come back here later to read the rest!

---

Welcome Back
You've either gone out and seen the movie by now, or like me, you like to read spoilers! Spoilers? It's not like a whodunit, Dylan is still alive, and his story is not a secret, in fact it's deeply woven into our own culture and identity. This film's main shtick is that Dylan is played by 6 different actors, from an 11-year old black boy to Cate Blanchett. None of them is named Bob Dylan, and everything seems to be from some sort of parallel universe. We see scenes that happened in real life, sort of, but the names have been changed. We see the Newport Folk Festival of 1965, but it's not called Newport. Pete Seeger, who is not Pete Seeger grabs for the historic axe to try and cut the power cables to stop the awful noise Dylan/Jude/Cate is hurling at the audience. The scene in fact opens with the band opening fire with machine guns instead of guitars! (See? You shouldn't have read this far. It would've been a cool surprise if you could have seen it without warning!)
Chronologies are mangled, and you need to just let it happen. You may not like this movie if linear narrative is how you like things. I found it to be a reflection of our whole lives, not just Dylan's. The emotions of tragedy, of stress, triumph, loss, and heartache resonate deeply. Dylan was a one-man Beatles for a while in terms of how much pressure he was under as the 'spokesman for a generation,' a title he never wanted. I was fortunate to not know too much about the film before seeing it tonight, outside of the multiple-Dylan shtick, so it was a thoroughly enjoyable experience. We then hung out with our friends Bill and Lucy afterwards, discussing it. Even though we all had different levels of Dylan knowledge, we all liked it, and would recommend it. Please leave some comments below if you get to see this.

Trailer

I came to talk about the draft

Do you feel a draft?
Today I was sitting around, watching football on TV, while I was listening to the traditional noontime playing of Alice's Restaurant, by Arlo Guthrie. For those of you who have never heard it, I'm not going to explain it, other than to say it has a circuitous connection to the draft. It originally came out in 1967, so it certainly needs to be understood in that context.

During the Vietnam War (never actually called a war) resistance to the draft was a major anti-war strategy, sort of a way to stop the machinery of the war. I really enjoyed listening to David Harris talk about the draft when I was in college, and I remember him talk honestly about the problems of not having a draft. He said once (I can't prove this, this is from my memory) that without a draft, people would care less about the policies of our government, since their own children were not at risk.

5 years ago
On September 11, 2001, thousands of innocent people were killed in terrorist attacks, which were planned by cancerous elements in Afghanistan, a country under the control of religious fundamentalists. Notice, I didn't say Muslim fundamentalists. When the causes of the 9/11 attacks were identified, I was totally in support of a military response to what I felt were the human/cultural equivalent of tumors, tumors that could spread. This is an interesting point in time. I've always thought of myself as pretty much a commie-pinko-leftist kind of guy, but here I found some of my anti-war friends opposing the US entry into Afghanistan on some sort of absolute pacifist grounds.

Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iraq (sung to the tune of "Barbara Ann")
But I'm not comfortable being in the position of agreeing with anything George W. Bush says. While I now feel comfortable with the idea of having a military, and that the service these men and women provide to our country should be honored, I think having insanity call the tune at the top of our government is no way to operate. When we entered the Iraq war so blithely, and without any plan for peace, it all fell apart.

Return of the draft
So, in the last few years, there have been calls from some minority congressmen for a return to the draft. Today's 'volunteer' Army consists of an inordinate proportion of low-income young people, who have few other options. At this point there is no real support for this idea, but it brings back that old idea of how a draft might affect our foreign policy. If we had a universal service system, with no deferments for the privileged, you can bet your booties that before we send Brett and Ashley Prepster off to war, we'll make sure it's worth doing.

Modern ending
Just like the ending of the Sopranos, I don't have a nice well-wrapped solution here. Do I want my children to be put in harm's way? Not particularly. What if it's something truly noble? Please, no hypotheticals! I guess I'd just like to know how you feel about the draft.

In The Valley of Elah (review)

Elegiac Indeed

el·e·gi·ac
adj.
1. Of, relating to, or involving elegy or mourning or expressing sorrow for that which is irrecoverably past: an elegiac lament for youthful ideals.

For some reason, as I was watching this movie, this word 'elegiac' stuck in my mind. Actually, I was misspelling it in my mind as 'elegaic' but so much for my lost glory as the winner of the 3rd grade spelling bee.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie, but kept wondering how many people would be bored to death, looking at the heavy lines in Tommy Lee Jones' face, and not having any exciting action scenes (well there was one cops-chasing-AWOL-suspect interlude) involving Mini Coopers or martial arts. I even imagine it could be booed in certain parts of the country just for having Susan Sarandon play a soldier's mother. It's bad enough that Tommy Lee Jones used to be Al Gore's roommate!

But here we are, reaping what George W. hath wrought, with Saddam Hussein's blustery words echoing in my mind. Before the invasion, Saddam said something like 'the Americans will drown in sand' or words to that effect. Perhaps he was right. As we pressed on towards Bagdad, the Republican Guard melted away, and we were moving too quickly to even secure a huge warehouse of ammo and explosives we found. Later on, we returned to find the warehouse empty. I often wonder how many IED's and car bombs have been powered by what we callously left unguarded. While Saddam himself may be gone, I think one could make a good case for the analogy that the US has become stuck to the tar baby in the briar patch.

If you liked Paul Haggis' Crash, you'll probably like this film. I have a soft spot for anyone involved in the production of my favorite TV series, Due South, of which Haggis was a frequent writer, director and/or executive producer.

I'm not really in the mood to list all the spoilers that illustrate the damage the war in Iraq had wreaked on the US. Some of the scenes in the film make this point in an obvious, maybe even clichéd manner, but many resonated with me hours after the film was over.

I think I've warned off those that may not like it, but I still recommend it to the rest of you. If you see it, let's discuss some of the details in the comments area below, OK?

Fear No Weevil

Yes Virginia, there is a silver lining!

Down South, in the town of Enterprise, Alabama, a statue was dedicated in 1919 to the the Boll Weevil, the scourge of the cotton farmer. Back in the beginning of the 20th century, many areas relied solely on the cultivation of cotton. When the Boll Weevil came up from Mexico via Texas, it destroyed much of those cotton crops. It forced farmers away from the monoculture of King Cotton, and they diversified and prospered. The city fathers of Enterprise honored the Boll Weevil, and the statue itself has a long, bizarre history. But I'm not here to talk about the Boll Weevil.

For the last 15 years, I have played bass in a small intimate worship community, we've referred to as "The Early Service." Early, because we started at the ungodly hour of 8:30 AM! During that time I have been fortunate enough to evolve and improve my skills, and have shared music making with a long revolving list of wonderful, talented people. But, one doesn't have to walk very far down the road of old clichés to find "All good things must end someday."

For a variety of reasons (we won't go into it, remember the 'silver lining' focus here?) we've been on hiatus the last three summers, and I don't think I'll be rejoining whatever it is that's scheduled in the Early Service's place later this month. Certainly there's lots of pain, sadness, and sometimes anger, but let's get back to that silver lining, OK?

With some time on our hands during the last few summers, we have played in other churches on Sundays, and also at Laguna Honda Hospital in San Francisco. Laguna Honda is the hospital of last resort for many people, and we have been honored to play there. Sometimes there are 50 or more residents, most in wheelchairs, and they really appreciate what we do. It really puts things in perspective for us. Sometimes when we play John Lennon's "Imagine," it really hits me when we do the last verse:

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

Usually when you hear the first line of that verse, it resonates in some sort of intellectual way, but here we are, playing for the residents, many of whom literally have nothing. It's been an honor to play there.

Another thing we didn't used to do 'in the good old days' was play with Martha. Martha has always been an excellent piano player and musician, who can actually read those funny little black dots and staff lines, as well as work off the 'cheat sheets,' and helps me figure out the 'idiot chords' for songs, but hasn't been asked to help out in the past at church. Now we get to rehearse and play together, and that's what I call a silver lining.

So, what do I usually do in a case like this? What else; quote some T. S. Eliot that seems appropriate to the occasion:

Fare forward, travellers! not escaping from the past
Into different lives, or into any future;
You are not the same people who left that station
Or who will arrive at any terminus,
While the narrowing rails slide together behind you;
And on the deck of the drumming liner
Watching the furrow that widens behind you,
You shall not think 'the past is finished'
Or 'the future is before us'.

Tragic Echo

Coyote Pup Killed by Car

In an article today in the online Chronicle, we find that a coyote pup was killed by a car, near the site where two adult coyotes were recently killed. The article goes on to say that they also know that the coyotes that were killed were also fed by humans. It sounds like there is at least one other pup still out there. I don't know enough about coyotes, but worry for their safety without their parents around.

As independent as the coyotes seem in our imagination, just like any other animal, the babies need help to make it.