2/23/23

 Thursday, February 23, 2023

In bed around 10:30, awake at 5:20, up at 5:30, thinking of Jim Aquavia and life being hard past 80.  Winter Storm Watch still in effect?  There has been 10.05 inches of wintery mix in the last 24 hours, and another 1.05 inch is expected today.  30℉ outside, E wind blowing directly off the lake at 14 mph producing a wind chill of 19℉. Winds today will be up to 19 mph, gusts up to 30 mph, and wind chills between 7 and 27℉.  Sunrise at  6:37, sunset at 5:33,  10+55.

Storm aftermath.  57,000+ customers woke up without electric power this morning, 90,000 total.  MKE public schools and most other schools closed today along with many daycare centers.  We're under a "Winer Weather Advisory" with all roads, even freeways, in "poor" condition, but Ozaukee County, i.e., across the street is still under a "Winter Storm Warning."  Many trees are ice-covered with branches breaking off and impacting power lines in Racine and Kenosha counties. . . Parking garage collapse at Bayshore, next to Trader Joe's.

Chickens Coming Home to Roost.  The headline story in this morning's WaPo is "A global divide on the Ukraine war is deepening:  Russia capitalizes on disillusionment with the United States to win sympathy in the Global South."  The global "South" including India and African countries, notes American and European hypocrisy in condemning Russia's invasion of Ukraine despite their own history of colonialism, selective concern over human rights violations, and the West’s failure to devote as many resources to solving conflicts and human rights abuses in other parts of the world, such as the Palestinian territories, Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, .and notably invasions of other countries like Iraq and Libya.  I'm surprised the writer didn't include Vietnam and Afghanistan.  "This is not a battle between freedom and dictatorship, as Biden often suggests, said William Gumede, who founded and heads the Johannesburg-based Democracy Works Foundation, which promotes democracy in Africa. He pointed to the refusal of South Africa, India, and Brazil to join Biden’s global coalition. . . . “  Of course I support Putin,” [an Egyptian commentator] said in an interview in Cairo. “A long time ago, we lost faith in the West. All the Arabs on this side of the world support Putin, and we are happy to hear he is gaining lands in Ukraine.”  “There’s been a failure of the West in the past 15 years to see the anger building up around the world, and Russia has absolutely exploited this,” Gumede said. “Russia has been able to portray Ukraine as a war with NATO. It’s the West versus the rest.”

Much of Day Spent Watching Alex Murdaugh's Testimony  Not a likable witness.  The testimony seems scripted, not like a professional witness (cop, coroner, etc.), but like a PI lawyer who has prepped hundreds of witnesses on how to relate to jurors.  Drooling snot during emotional parts of his testimony.

2/22/23

 Wednesday, February 22, 2023

In bed around 10, awake at 3:50, up at 4:20, thoughts of upcoming VA urology appointment on 3/6, last catheterization & ambulance ride to CSMO ER in 10/10 pain, sleeping in the waiting room till I could call Andy for a ride back to Saukville in the morning, thoughts of 'double dip' with Dr. Stepke and CPP, stress, unable to sleep. Winter Storm Warning in effect until noon tomorrow.  29℉ now, wind ENE, right off the big lake, expected to be 12 to 25 mph today with gusts up to 41 mph, the current wind chill is17℉, ranging during the day from 13 to 18℉.  Today's total wintery mix is expected to be 10.05 inches, and 12 inches in the next 24 hours.  Considerable risk of power outages today from ice, snow, and wind.  Sunrise at 6:39, sunset at 5:31, 10+52.

Latest copycat project, not so hot, disappointing.

Secession obsession.  Peter Wehner has a piece in The Atlantic, "Marjorie Taylor Greene's Civil War."  Excerpts: "On Presidents’ Day, Greene tweeted: 'We need a national divorce. We need to separate by red states and blue states and shrink the federal government. Everyone I talk to says this. From the sick and disgusting woke culture issues shoved down our throats to the Democrat’s traitorous America Last policies, we are done.' . . . Greene is not alone in her views. She is giving voice to a widespread and growing sentiment in the Republican Party. Among Republicans in the South, for example, support for secession was 66 percent in June 2021, according to a Bright Line Watch/YouGov poll. (The poll found support for secession growing among every partisan group in the months following the January 6 riot at the Capitol.)    . . .Last summer, thousands of Texas Republicans approved a platform that called on the state legislature to authorize a referendum on secession from the United States. And shortly after Donald Trump lost the 2020 election, Rush Limbaugh, one of the most dominant figures on the American right, said, “I actually think that we’re trending toward secession. I see more and more people asking, ‘What in the world do we have in common with the people who live in, say, New York?’” . . . Civil War–like secession isn’t going to happen in the United States, at least not anytime soon. But all of the emotions that are attached to a desire for secession—seething resentment, existential fear, an unforgiving spirit, contempt and hatred for those who disagree with you—are stoked by the kind of rhetoric employed by Greene and those who see the world as she does. Such language will further destroy America’s political culture and could easily lead to extensive political violence. . . . What the rest of us learned during the Trump era is that a party led by craven men and women—some of them cynical, others true believers, almost all afraid to speak out—will end up normalizing the transgressive, unethical, and moronic. . . . Trump did horrifying things at the end of his presidency, including attempting a coup and inciting a violent mob to attack the Capitol. The majority of Republicans tolerated what he did, to a degree that simply wouldn’t have happened at the beginning of his presidency. It took time for the corruption to fully take hold, for the party—lawmakers and the right-wing media complex—to fall completely into line. But fall in line they did. Trump may be losing his grip on the Republican Party, and that is a good thing, but his nihilistic imprint remains all over it. MAGA Republicans like Marjorie Taylor Greene have added calls for secession to their corrosive lies about the 2020 presidential election. More incendiary and treacherous claims will follow. Greene and McCarthy—one crazed, the other cowardly—embody a large swath of the modern-day GOP. Any party that makes room for seditionists and secessionists is sick and dangerous."

Republican Evangelical Christianity is reflected in the federal budget cuts they are considering now that they have taken Social Security and Medicare cuts off the table, probably because of concern over the 2024 presidential and congressional elections.  From this morning's WaPo: "Post reporters identified former Trump administration budget official Russell Vought as playing a key role in figuring out where to cut. Here’s how they describe his areas of focus:“The plan includes $2 trillion in cuts to Medicaid, the health program for the poor; more than $600 billion in cuts to the Affordable Care Act; more than $400 billion in cuts to food stamps; hundreds of billions of dollars in cuts to educational subsidies; and a halving of the State Department and the Labor Department, among other federal agencies.”  Cuts to food stamps and medical programs for the poor? Not unexpected, but remarkable in contrast to the rush to defend programs for senior citizens. In years past, Republicans would have included both pools of funding among their prospective targets. Now, the seniors are safe — as people over the age of 65 make up about a third of the Republican Party." . . . But politically, such cuts land in a different place than cuts to Social Security (which most Republicans think should get more money). There’s a long-standing tradition on the right of casting certain programs that aid poor people as a violation of the idea that Americans should pull themselves up by their bootstraps. That these programs have often disproportionately aided Black and Hispanic Americans was itself not a coincidence, as former Republican strategist Lee Atwater might attest. To many people, these were programs that went to unworthy recipients.

Matthew 25:41-45:  “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.  For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink,  I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’  They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’   He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

Beating the Storm  I went up to Sendik's at 7:15 this morning to get 4 Sciortino long rolls for Geri's Italian beef sandwiches tonight.  No Sciortino rolls were available, had to get 4 Sendik's brat buns.  Also picked up some fireplace logs, some Bogle Zinfandel, and City Market French bread for toasting and Walnot Raisin breasd for comfort during the snow/sleet/freezing rain/ice storm.  I forgot to get some 'c' cell batteries in case of a power outage.  Our last poser outage lasted 27 or 28 hours, a very trying experience.  I tried to stop at Wild Birds' Unlimited for a resupply of higher and sunflower seeds, but it wasn't open yet.  I'm operating on 6 hours and 15 minutes of sleep according to my ResMed sleep tracker and I'm feeling it, hoping to nap this morning.

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LTMW I see the storm becoming more intense.  I bit the bullet earlier and took my bird seed bucket from the garage out to our feeder station to fill the two non-niger feeders with mostly millet seeds but also some black-oil sunflower seeds.  I wimped out however and didn't take the small amount of niger seed I had to supplement what was in the goldfinchs' long tube.  I rationalized that the finches would be able to fill up on the millet and sunflower seeds.  Now I'm feeling the predictable guilt as I see that hardly any birds are showing up on the feeders except for the goldfinches on the niger feeder.  There is still about 35% of the niger seed in the feeder so I suspect that it may not be emptied during this storm.  The bad news however is that the lower the supply of niger seed, the fewer finches can feed at the same time.  As I look out now, there is only one goldfinch chowing down on the feeder.  The wind has temporarily died down but it will pick up soon.  Goldfinches weigh between 11–20 g (0.39–0.71 oz).  How they can hold on and continue to eat with the wind blowing upwards of 30, 40 mph is amazing.  The only other birds I am seeing feeding are occasional snowfirds on the squirrel-proof feeder and on the ground.   I'm surprised I'm not spotting any chickadees or woodpeckers, even on the suet cake. . . .  At  3 p.m., I notice that the one sunlower feeder that is not squirel-proof has about 1/3 of its seeds consumed,  probably by the squirrel I saw draped on it earlier.  I still see snowbirds on the ground and a couple of goldfinches on the niger feeder.  The snow/sleet/whatever it is is blowing from the S or perhaps SSE , now NNE, at about a 245 degree angle. . . .  At 4:30, my guilt about the niger feeder is disappearing along with the goldfinches.  The snow is still coming down at a 45/245 degree angle and it looks like we are in for an early sunset.  The niger feeder is still 1/3  full, probably enough to keep the finches fed at breakfast time tomorrow.

Ruth Margalit, Itamar ben Gvir, Israel's Minister of Chaos.  New Yorker, February 27, 2023 edition.  A long biographical essay on 'the notorious IBG."  Chilling, frightening.  A vivid reminder of the similarities of Israel and the United States.  We have Marjorie Taylor Greene and Laurent Boebert, Israael has Itamar be Gvir and Bezalei Smotrich.  Our Republicans have worked - successfully - for years to take over the federal and state judiciaries, Netanyahu and his partners are doing the same right now.  Our nation is riven by racism, nationalism, anti-minoirity, antidemocractic fascism and so is Israel.  Fascism is steadily winning here, the same is happening in Israel in spades.  "The overhaul of the judiciary only sharpened the country’s divisions. It will, among other things, give the Knesset the ability to override Supreme Court decisions with a simple majority, and allow the government to control a committee that appoints judges. “The concern is unrestrained political majorities doing whatever they want,” Adam Shinar, a professor of constitutional law at Reichman University, told me. “And, of course, who’s going to be the victim? Probably Palestinians, women generally, asylum seekers, Israeli Palestinian citizens, L.G.B.T.Q., religious minorities, Reform, Conservative.” In other words, Shinar said, groups without much of a lobby in the Knesset, whose only redress is through the court system." We are in deep shit, Israel is in deeper shit.

2/21/23

 Tuesday, February 21. 2023

In bed at 11, up at 6:50, after 5 pss, CPP.  Winter Storm Watch was issued for tomorrow & Thursday.  Currently, 20℉, wind NNW at 20 mph, wind chill at 4℉, wind speeds up to 23 mph today and gusts near 40 mph. Today's wintery mix will e .3 inch, .45 expected in the next 24 hrs.  Sunrise at 6:39, the sun beat me up again, sunset at 5:30, 10+50.

Back to Ta-Nahisi Coates; The 1619 Project.  We watched Nicole Hannah-Jones in Hulu's The 1619 Project last week and I am still reading Between the World and Me.  My attention was caught by a sentence in Coates' book relating that when he was his son's age, 15, everyone he knew was Black and all of them were afraid. With one exception, the same was true for me, substituting White for Black.  After the War, the Englewood district in Chicago was White.  Many Irish, Germans, Italians, what have you, but all White. Correction: there was one Black family on May Street, between 73rd and 74th, with a girl who was a friend of my cousin Christine's.  The pastor of our Catholic parish, St. Leo the Great, was Monsignor Patrick J. Malloy, who each Sunday at Mass would urge his flock to "keep the undesirables out," referring as all knew to the ever-southward incursion of Blacks into  "our" neighborhoods.  Whites were afraid of Blacks.  They were thought of as lesser creatures, dangerous, and contaminating.  Real estate 'block busters' were active trying to get any White property owner to sell to a Black buyer, knowing that once some Blacks moved onto a block, mass evacuation by Whites would follow.  And it happened with my family too.  I don't remember the timing of our race-based retreat and perhaps I am fooling myself about being confused by the perceived need for it, but my recollection was that I was confused, though I surely knew, as Coates did, that Blacks and Whites don't mix and that each was afraid of the other.  "We are all tattooed in our cradles with the beliefs of our tribe; the record may seem superficial, but it is indelible. You cannot educate a man wholly out of the superstitious fears which were early implanted in his imagination; no matter how utterly his reason may reject them, he will still feel as the famous woman did about ghosts, Je n'y crois pas, mais je les crains,—"I don't believe in them, but I am afraid of them, nevertheless".  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.  The reason I suspect that my memory about being confused is accurate is that my beloved little sister and I did know one Black person when we were young.  His name was Moses and he was a security guard (I used the term loosely, night watchman' is probably more accurate) in a construction shack across from our basement apartment when our street was torn up for the installation of a new sewer line.  I have no recollection of how old Moses was, but he was a 'grown up' and Kitty and I were children, youngsters.  There was a 55-gallon drum in Moses' shack and coke was burned in it to provide some warmth, so it must have been during the cold months of the year that Kitty and I would visit with Moses in his shack each night after dinner and Moses would read the Bible to us and tell us Bible stories.  He was soft-spoken, gentle, and kind and Kitty and I liked him a lot, I daresay we loved him and knew that he liked us a lot, that he loved us.  We would visit with him until our mother would call us to come home for the night.  One night Kitty gave Moses a kiss on the forehead as we said 'good night' and one of the neighbor kids witnessed it.  The next day the kid taunted Kitty by chanting "Kitty kissed a nigger, Kitty kissed a nigger." I got into a fistfight, wrestling match, some kind of scuffle with the kid for mocking my sister, the only physical fight I ever had in my now-long life.  I can't remember now how it ended or how our relationship with Moses ended- probably with the completion of the construction project.  But I do remember Moses, that he was kind and gentle and loving and God-fearing (though I surely didn't think in those terms then.)  And he was Black.  A Black man.  To Monsignor Malloy "an undesirable."  To the neighbor kid "a nigger."  To Kitty and me a friend.  So when the time for White Flight came to 73rd and Emerald Avenue and my family moved with all the other Whites to 'safer,' still White neighborhoods, it was confusing to me I suppose because it could have been Moses and his family who were moving into the neighborhood.  Almost 3/4th of a century has gone by since those events but I still have a clear memory of Moses in his shack with the 55-gallon coke drum radiating heat and Moses radiating goodness, surrounded by the unwelcoming fear of him and 'his kind' in "our" White neighborhood.

Photo by Robert Frank from "The Americans" 1955-1957

Nicole Hannah-Jones; Caroline Randall Williams.  Both Hannah-Jones and Randall Williams are bi-racial.  Hannah-Jones's father is Black, her mother White.  Randall Williams'great-great-grandfather was Edmund Pettus, an Alabama senator, Confederate army officer, and Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan.  The infamous Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma is named after him, a reminder to all of White Supremacy and Black Subjugation.  The fact that Randall Williams has some "White blood" in her makeup doesn't keep her from being caste as Black, though the presence of any "Black blood" in her under classical American race laws would caste her as Black.  Wikepedia entry on her relates: "In 2020, amidst the national discussions around removing statues of Confederate generals and renaming of U.S. military bases, Williams wrote an opinion piece for the New York Times, titled "You Want a Confederate Monument? My Body Is A Confederate Monument." She argued for the removal of Confederate monuments, using her existence and family history to make her point. In that essay, she stated, "modern DNA testing has allowed me to confirm, I am the descendant of black women who were domestic servants and white men who raped their help." She opened the piece by writing: "I have rape-colored skin. My light-brown-blackness is a living testament to the rules, the practices, the causes of the Old South.""  I used the word 'caste' above as a verb though the dictionaries recognize the word only as a noun or an adjective.  In America, it seems perfectly appropriate to use the word as a verb, as in 'to situate someone in a caste.'  If there were any doubts about this, Isabel Wilkerson's book Caste should have resolved them.

Wisconsin youths: More mental illness, more intense behavior, more suicide attempts.  From this morning's JSOnline: (1)  A 13-year-old boy was shot and killed Sunday evening, the fourth child to die in a shooting so far this year, according to Milwaukee police.  The shooting was reported at 6:30 p.m. on the 4100 block of North 47th Street, on Milwaukee’s north side. Police did not release any details about the circumstances of the shooting and said unknown suspects are sought.The boy was identified Monday as Jamarri Paige by the Milwaukee County Medical Examiner’s Office.  The incident came after two adults died by homicide in separate incidents over the same weekend, and just two hours before another 15-year-old boy was injured in a shooting on the 3000 block of North Teutonia Avenue.  Police reported three other teenagers – ages 14, 15 and 17 – were killed in shootings in January. An 18-year-old was shot and killed in early February.  It continues a trend of more children being victimized by the city’s gun violence. From 2016 to 2019, no more than 10 children 17 and younger died by homicide in Milwaukee, but 20 or more have been killed in each of the three years since then, according to police and the city's Homicide Review Commission.  Police reported three other teenagers – ages 14, 15 and 17 – were killed in shootings in January. An 18-year-old was shot and killed in early February.  It continues a trend of more children being victimized by the city’s gun violence. From 2016 to 2019, no more than 10 children 17 and younger died by homicide in Milwaukee, but 20 or more have been killed in each of the three years since then, according to police and the city's Homicide Review Commission.  Twenty-seven child victims were reported in 2022, according to police.  (2)  In Milwaukee, Children's Wisconsin hospital saw a 60% increase from 2020 to 2021 in emergency department patients who had attempted suicide.  "It is more common than not for a provider during any given shift to have at least one patient who's coming in for suicidal ideation or suicide attempt," said Dr. Erin O'Donnell, emergency medicine physician at Children's Wisconsin.

Our children are the canaries in the coalmine we live in.

2/20/23

Monday, February 20, 2023

In bed at 10, after watching 2 episodes of C. B. Strike, up at 7, wondering how I slept so long.  26℉, cloudy, high of 37℉, and wind is currently at 3 mph from NNW, 2 to 18 mph today with gusts up to 31mph, wind chill at 25, 22 to 29℉ today.  Sunrose at 6:42, before I did, sunset at 5:29, 10+46.

First Reformed.  I  watched this Ethan Hawke, and Amanda Seyfried film written and directed by Paul Schrader yesterday.  My memory is so poor I do not recall whether I had seen it before, or perhaps had seen it before and turned it off before its conclusion.  In any event, I was struck, for obvious reasons, by Hawkes' (Rev. Ernst Toller) opening lines: "I have decided to keep a journal.  Not in a word program or a digital file but in longhand, writing every word out so that every inflection of penmanship, every word chosen, scratched out, revised, is recorded.  To set down all my thoughts and the simple events of my day factually and without hiding anything.  When writing about oneself, one should show no mercy.  I will keep this diary for one year, 12 months.  And at the end of that time, it will be destroyed.  Shredded, then burnt.  The experiment will be over.  These thoughts and recollections are not so different from those I confide to God every morning.  When it is possible.  When he is listening.  This journal is a form of speaking, of communication from one to the other.  A communication which can be achieved simply and in repose without prostration or abnegation.  It is a form of prayer. . . . 12 months.  Can I keep up an exercise that long?  When I read these words I see not truth but pride.  I wish I had not used the word pride but I cannot cross it out.  If only I could pray."

Some thoughts: (1) The only other Schrader film I have seen is Taxi Driver, for which he wrote the screenplay and Scorsese directed.  He was raised in a Calvinist Dutch Reformed household and attended Calvin College where he majored in philosophy and minored in theology.  Not exactly a light-hearted guy. (2) This is not an easy movie to watch or to grasp.  The theme of despair is easy enough to understand as is Toller's attraction to Mary, the widow of the suicide he counseled.  The way the plot unfolds just seems awfully strained, especially Mary's inviting Toller to play 'magical mystery tour' on the floor and the self-flagellation followed by passionate kissing.  I must be too conditioned, too constrained to get into 'resonance' with films like this.  (3) The opening lines about keeping a daily journal were written simply to provide a narrative vehicle or structure for the film, a way to let the viewer into the head of Ernst Toller via journal entries.  The lines did make me think however of my own journaling, why I do it, what's the point.  I have thought for some time that I seem to have a need to write, more of a need to write than to speak or converse.  Is that introversion or some form of it?  And I've known for some time that the journal is a substitute, a poor substitute for my morning text conversations with Kitty.  Even when she was unable to talk back with me, I kept sending her my morning thoughts.  I even kept doing it for days after she died.  Every now and then I post a fairly long entry on FaceBook, something that is more thought out than most entries.  Why?  I often wonder whether my FB 'friends think of me as an old crank, especially when I post entries about war, my Dad, PTSD and its effects on families, etc., as I did just yesterday.  Ditto my posts about racism, fascism, police brutality, etc.  Why bother?  What's the point? Am I just ranting, like Paul Belling or Sean Hannity?  Showing off my liberal bona fides?  Showing off an ability to write?  I have learned the truth of Flannery O'Connor's insight: “...I have to write to discover what I am doing. Like the old lady, I don't know so well what I think until I see what I say; then I have to say it again. . . "  I discovered this in 2 ways.  The first was dealing with law students who occasionally would tell me that they understood some concept but just couldn't get it down in words.  I would respond that if you can't express it, you don't understand it.  The second was in writing my memoir, during which I often experienced how hard it was to express a thought accurately, honestly, how to say enough and not too much.  I also learned how writing about 'stuff' stimulated so many memories, so many thoughts related to what is written but not included in the writing.  Maybe I keep the journal mainly to persuade myself that I still have some 'executive function' and cognitive ability left in my 80s, not what I used to have but some.  I don't know why I sit every day with my laptop and pound out journal entries that will never be read by anyone but me.  What's the point?  Maybe there is no point.  Some people need to talk, some people need to write.  For that matter, why in the world have I spent so much time throashing around with paints and brushes when I have so little skill at drawing, composition, color mixing, color theory, etc.  Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly.  

To stay healthy in old age, research finds building muscles is key  From this morning's papers: Independent living requires the ability to perform the activities of daily life — bathing or showering, dressing, getting in and out of bed or a chair, walking, using the toilet and eating.  Doing these things takes four physical attributes: cardiorespiratory fitness (how well the cardiovascular system and breathing apparatus supply oxygen during physical exertion); muscle strength and power; flexibility; and dynamic balance, meaning the ability to remain stable while moving. . . Biological aging takes a toll on each of these.  Cardiovascular fitness — the ability of heart and blood vessels to distribute and use oxygen during exertion — declines throughout adulthood as our circulatory capacity decreases. That decline speeds considerably late in life. Over 70, cardiovascular fitness falls by more than 21 percent per decade — and that’s for healthy people. Prolonged inactivity and common chronic conditions such as heart failure, diabetes and obesity make the situation worse. It is common for octogenarians to have cardiovascular function so low that it plays a part in preventing them from performing basic activities such as vacuuming and cooking.  Dynamic balance, essential for walking, stair-climbing and avoiding falls, declines also, thanks to deterioration of the musculoskeletal system and of neurologic function. And muscle mass decreases by about 3 to 8 percent per decade after 30, with decline accelerating after 60. That often reduces both muscular strength — the ability of muscles to exert force, allowing us to lift objects — and muscular power, the ability to do work quickly, which we need to climb stairs. The more immobile you are, the faster this wasting can proceed.  This muscle loss, known as sarcopenia, is why walking, one of the most popular forms of exercise, may not be enough to keep us operating independently.  

2/19/23

 Sunday, February 19, 2023

In bed at 10, awake at 4:30, up at 5, half-dreaming of monitoring a law school final exam with Madeleine Kelly of my students, the exam I drafted being a bad one, poorly drafted, grading exams at Beans Lake.  Also thinking of Kitty and Yahrzeit approaching,  Geri let Lilly out at 5:-05, and I let her in.  37℉ outside, high of 43 expected, wind SSW at 14 mph, range from 8 to 16 mph during the day, gusts up to 28 mph, wind chill is 28℉ now, 24 to 36 during the day. Sunrise at 6:43, sunset at 5:27, 10+55.

Unfinished entries from yesterday.   I never got back to my thoughts about my Dad 78 years ago on his troop ship the night before the amphibious assault, D-Day, on Iwo Jima.  I know he and the 70,000 other Marines and Navy hospital corpsmen were frightened, afraid they were about to die, thinking of their lives, their families and loved ones back in the States, thinking they might never see them again, or might see them again but missing an arm or a leg or terribly burned.  I wonder if they wondered whether they might survive but be emotionally and spiritually scarred, perhaps for the rest of their lives, as my father was.  They wrote what they knew might be their last letter home.  The Navy had massed 450 ships off of Iwo and bombarded the island with naval gunfire for 3 days before the landing. For 3 days, the assault troops heard intense gunfire from 5-inch guns on destroyers, 8-inch guns on cruisers, and 16-inch guns on battleships.  For days, the Marines cleaned their weapons and then cleaned them again.  They thought of the dangers inherent in climbing down heavy cargo nets, of safely releasing from the nets onto the deck of flat-bottomed LCVPs,  landing craft vehicle personnel, bobbing up and down as the ocean's waves hit the hull of the troop ship (a much more dangerous feat than anyone can appreciate if one hadn't experienced it.)  Standing in lines waiting their turn to mount the net, they checked their own and each other's 'gear', their backpacks, steel helmets, ammo belts, canteens, first aid kits, and of course rifles.  If any of their gear should become loose while descending the net and come crashing down on the LCVP below, Marines could be wounded before they even moved away from the ship and the Marine who lost the unsecured gear was in deep trouble already.  Once in the LCVP, packed "asshole to bellybutton," the Marines hoped they wouldn't throw up from the pitching and rolling and yawing of the boat in the never-ending waves, and if he did throw up, he hoped he would able to do it over the boat's gunnel or gunwale and not on the Marine packed in front of him.  He hoped he wouldn't shit or piss himself.  He hoped he wouldn't die; he hoped he wouldn't cry.  If he was to die or be wounded, he hoped it would be from a bullet and not from a mortar or artillery shell that would blow his body apart leaving him to be buried in pieces.  These are thoughts that I have every February 18th and 19th, remembering the battle of Iwo Jima and what it did to my father and many others.  I was 3 and 1/2 years old, my sister Kitty was almost 6 months old.  My mother was 2 months shy of her 23rd birthday; my Dad was 24.  We were all damaged by the battle.  We would all have very mixed emotions when seeing Joe Rosenthal's iconic photo of the Marines raising the flag on Mount Suribachi.  If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace / Behind the wagon that we flung him in,  / And watch the white eyes writhing in his face, / His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin; / If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood /  Come gurgling from the froth-corrupted lungs, / Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud / Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, - / My friend, you would not tell with such high zest / To children ardent for some desperate glory, / The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est / Pro patria mori.

Also, the anniversary of Kitty's death on March 3 approaches.  I will light a Yahrzeit candle and mourn the loss of her.

LTMW It looks like every goldfinch in Bayside and Mequon is trying to perch on our niger feeder.  The disappointed ones temporarily shift to the sunflower seed feeder, which is now temporarily filled mostly with millet seed.  Many exquisite charcoal-colored snowbirds with their beautiful white bellies are busy on the ground joined by some goldfinches who couldn't elbow their way onto the niger tube.  It looks like a beautiful morning.  I suspect good neighbor John McGregor has already been out and back from his early morning walk.

Polish paczkis: Milwaukee's Ash Wednesday Sacramental.  Yesterday I went up to Sendik's to pick up some decaf coffee and some wine and what do I see when I walk through the doors but hundreds of paczkis, what we called Bismarks in Chicago but Poles call paczkis.  Loading up on paczkis before Ash Wednesday is an old Milwaukee tradition gifted to the city years ago by its large Polish community. Last year at this time, our home remodeling contractor Chris, a Polish immigrant, brought us a supply of homemade paczkis, a real treat.  I call the paczki a 'Polish sacramental' because it is so associated with Ash Wednesday and Fat Tuesday.  In Catholic theology, sacramentals like Holy Water and Ash Wednesday ashes and rosary beads are not to be confused with the 7 sacraments.  The sacraments confer grace of their own spiritual power ordained by the Most High. Sacramentals are just signs that tend to stimulate thoughts of the Most High.  They operate not directly because God so ordained, but rather through some intercession by the Church, some blessing.  Geri and I look forward to paczki season all year, recognize it as an essential component of the commencement of the Lenten season, so I feel free to consider paczkis sacramentals, right up there with holy water, ashes, palm fronds, scapular, and Miraculous Medals.  In fact, prune paczkis are probably my favorite sacramental (except for candles, a traditional Catholic favorite😊).

   

You Can’t Save Democracy in a Jewish State is Peter Beinart's oped in today's NYT.  "The principle that Mr. Netanyahu’s liberal Zionist critics say he threatens — a Jewish and democratic state — is in reality a contradiction. Democracy means government by the people. Jewish statehood means government by Jews. In a country where Jews comprise only half of the people between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, the second imperative devours the first. . . In 2009, Palestinian Knesset member Ahmad Tibi quipped that Israel was indeed “Jewish and democratic: Democratic toward Jews, and Jewish toward Arabs.”  . . . Ultimately, a movement premised on ethnocracy cannot successfully defend the rule of law. Only a movement for equality can."

2/18/23

 Saturday, February 18, 2023

In bed at 10, up at 5:30, 5 pss, 1 glass of petite syrah.  Woke up thinking of Sinantra's September Song.  23℉, high of 37, wind WSW at 13 mph, ranging from 8 to 17 and gusts to 32 mph producing wind chills of 4℉ to 30℉, currently 11℉.  Sunrise at 6:45, sunset at 5:26, 10+41.

September Song by Kurt Weill

Oh, it's a long, long while from May to December
But the days grow short when you reach September
When the autumn weather turns the leaves to flame
One hasn't got time for the waiting game

Oh, the days dwindle down to a precious few
September, November
And these few precious days I'll spend with you
These precious days I'll spend with you

Wow, the things we learn from looking up an old Sinatra song.  September Song was written by Kurt Weill, famed collaborator with Bertolt Brecht on The Threepenny Opera.  He was born in Dessau in eastern Germany, son of a cantor, and fled in 1933 when the Nazis took over.  He was married to Lotte Lenya and was a serious classical composer as well as composer of songs for musical stage plays.  He composed another of my favorite songs, as sung by Nancy Wilson, My Ship.  He was decidedly a Leftist, like so many Jews of his era, but not Left enough for Brecht, who broke off their relationship for that reason.  He was another great talent who died way too young, just after his 50th birthday, of a heart attack.

I listened again to Sinatra's September Of My Years album, struck by how philosophical the songs are and how uniquely he delivers them.   Once Upon a Time, This Is All I Ask, How Old Am I, . . .  Then listened again to Nancy Wilson's Broadway My Way which I first bought on Okinawa in 1966.  Another treasure, including Kurt Weill's My Ship and so many others.  I'm reminded of driving to the Latin Casino in Cherry Hill, New Jersey in 1966 or 1967 with Major Frank Peterson to see and hear her perform in person.  Frank, a jet pilot, was the only Black officer I knew in the Marine Corps and became the first Black Marine to be appointed to General rank.  A great guy and fellow fan of Nancy Wilson.  Great way to start the day.

Police Brutality, Police Mendacity  This morning's WaPo contains an article by Ashley Parker and Justine McDaniel titled From Freddie Gray to Tyre Nichols, early police claims often misleading:  An examination of seven prominent deadly cases where initial statements by authorities turned out to be false or incomplete.  I need to give more thought to the issues they raise.  

Iwo Jima, the night before the landing.  78 years ago today my Dad was one of about 70,000 U.S. Marines crowded onto a  ship offshore of the small island of Iwo Jima.  The troops on those ships were insufferably jam-packed, 'sardined.'   You can't move without bumping into another Marine (or corpsman.)  The canvas 'racks' for sleeping or resting are piled high, one atop another, maybe 15 inches of separation, just enough to permit the occupant to turn over or to sleep on his side.  He may have been aboard a troop transport ship, one that carried its own small landing craft (LCVPs) or aboard a large landing ship, pershaps an LST or LSD.  I wish I had asked him on one of the rare occasions when we talked of his experiences on Iwo.  

Burning the Yahrzheit Candle for Kitty

2/17/23

 Friday, February 17, 2023

In bed at 11:30, awake at 5:30, up at 5:41.  Driveways plowed, walk shoveled, 5 or 6 inches of new snow on the ground.  Let Lilly out into 13℉ cold with NNW wind at 13 mph and wind chill of 2 below zero.  Cold day ahead with a high of 24, winds 7 to 18 mph, gusts to 31 mp, and wind chills of minus 2 to 15℉.  Sunrise at 6:46, sunsetat5:25, 10+38

“...I have to write to discover what I am doing. Like the old lady, I don't know so well what I think until I see what I say; then I have to say it again. . .  Flannery O'Connor, The Habit of Being: Letters of Flannery O'Connor

Cunk on Earth kept us up late last night.  Diane Morgan plays the profoundly ignorant and stupid Philomena Cunk, investigative reporter.  Very funny stuff: "Was Jesus the first celebrity who was canceled?" but Cunk can't fail to remind us of some real people who are profoundly ill-educated, profoundly ignorant of history, and profoundly stupid.  More often than not, they end up Republican.  (Whoops, sorry😂)

How Far We Have Fallen.  I read Heather Cox Richardson's newsletter from yesterday in which she refers to the 1975-1976 "Church Committee" chaired by Sen. Frank Church.  The committee investigated and exposed massive wrongdoing by our American government: "illegal wiretapping of U.S. citizens, CIA operations to assassinate foreign leaders, drug testing on government personnel, discrediting of civil rights and anti-war activists, and so on. "  What principally struck me was being reminded that in the 1970s, Idaho sent a Democratic senator to Washington.  It reminded me that storied liberals George McGovern and Tom Harkin were sent to the Senate voters in Nebraska and Iowa, respectively.  It reminded me that there was a time when the Red/Blue intense polarization did not exist.  That Indiana sent Birch Bayh to the Senate and Texas sent LBJ to the Senate and elected Ann Richards as governor.  Ancient history.  What happened?

Curious Insight. "I came to believe that to live in Hollywood--Los Angeles is, I believe, its proper name--is to engage in a particular form of astral projection. One's body, one's mind, one's home, one's automobile are all separate and divine from the corporeal entity formally known as Tennessee Williams. Your body is cared for, fed, buffed, improved, plucked so as to be as perfect as possible. One's mind is to be filled with nothing larger than an aphorism that will cleanse your heart and mind and keep you perky for close-ups at the studio or crudities with the ladies. One's automobile and one's home are attended to by staffs of servile and attractive men and women who do not make eye contact. Everything in place. Everything arrested. Everything temporary. It is the closest approximation one can find on earth to the preparation and presentation of the altar in the Catholic mass. Perfect placement, perfect presentation feverishly in search of meaning." Tennessee Williams on Hollywood/Interview with James Grissom/1982/

Biden and his Balloons.  Is it just me or do Joe Biden and his team look pretty foolish about their response to UWOs (unidentified wafting objects)?  They permitted the Chinese surveillance balloon traverse much of the continental United States, including over our ICBM sites, with 3 busloads worth of sophisticated electronic surveillance equipment before shooting it down off the South Carolina coast.  Then they launched F-22s with Sidewinder air-to-air missiles to intercept and shoot down ('Bingo . . . splash!') what appear to be harmless weather balloons.  Each F-22 costs $334,000,000; production of them was canceled by DOD because they cost so much.  Each hour of flight time costs approximately $70,000. Sidewinder missiles cost between $400,000 and $500,000.  They are heat-seeking missiles, designed to fly up the exhausts of attacking jet aircraft.  I spent years in the Marine Corps working with fighter pilots in F-4s and F-8s positioning them to come up behind enemy aircraft to launch their Sidewinders into those very hot exhaust pipes.  Balloons are not known to be particularly hot, especially at high altitudes, so it wasn't surprising that one of the Sidewinder attacks was a miss, i.e., the Sidewinder couldn't 'lock on' to its cold target.  In any event, isn't there something really ridiculous about sending these $334M aircraft with their half-million dollar bullets up against what are probably weather or research balloons?

To Do or Not to Do.  "Oue records indicate that you are due for a colonoscopy and an upper GI endoscopy with Dr. Chad Stepke.  Please call our office to schedule . . ."