Denny's America

Hello to all! I hope you all are finding your way well through this strange and disturbing time in America and the World. The alarming and dangerous, deadly virus that is wreaking havoc throughout the world in 2020 seems to be threatening every aspect of human life, upending and, in some cases, destroying the very foundations of our collective sanity and peace of mind.

Like everyone else, I too seek a return to the time of being able to rely on the social fabric of life to sustain and maintain my general sense of well-being and optimism. There is no question that we all live through difficult events and circumstances throughout our lives, however this current world status is particularly difficult, since we are all living through it simultaneously. And it clearly can be, and has been, devastating.

As often happens, I inadvertently stumble across moments of assurance and affirmation, despite being in the middle of circumstances that really do threaten chaos and despair. These moments often arise from a connective thread to my past, triggered by a moment or a memory resurrected by a random event. It seems random to me, at least. So it may not surprise you to learn that I recently did stumble into such a state of mind.

I have noticed in the last several years that I am quite susceptible to my personal memories and interpretations of past events from a different emotional point of view than I originally experienced at the time. It is something akin to re-watching a favorite movie or re-reading a beloved book for the second or third time, or more. You begin to realize and more fully understand why a particular experience in your past holds such critical importance and relevance for you now.

My very recent stumble involved dealing with a moment of boredom. That feeling is not exclusively sourced from current virus-related circumstances, however I found myself flipping through TV channels on a Sunday evening. Frankly,  due to the virus-related impacts we are suffering through, even TV is often bereft of interesting choices. It just so happens that I came across a broadcast of the Johnny Cash show. You can read more about Mr. Cash from the link, but suffice it to say that his show was on during my teenage years and my parents liked to watch his mixture of Country music, popular guest stars, and his talking narratives of American life. As a family in the growing-up years, we often watched certain TV shows together, all of us, at the same time. In our American culture, that kind of gathering has truly been relegated to the past for a long time. However, given the virus impact in the present day, families are discovering the value of doing so once again.

Watching this particular episode of The Johnny Cash Show, I was reminded of those days when our family did watch together. I didn’t appreciate it at the time, what it meant to me, what it would mean to me in my adult life with my own children, how I would lean on those days, not just of watching TV together, but growing up in a loving household, hearing the words and seeing the actions of my parents and learning how to truly be a man and a human being.

During this edition of the Cash show, one of the guests was an actor named Lorne Green who was a popular TV actor and who had a wonderful baritone speaking voice. His appearance on the show involved reading aloud a wonderful poem from the 1920s called Desiderata, written by American author Max Ehrmann. The word Desiderata is the Latin phrase for ‘Things Desired’. I have included the poem here since I feel it is not only tied to my past, but is a very assuring and affirming thought for how we could strive to be in the upside down world we find ourselves today in 2020.

DESIDERATA

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.

Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons,
they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.

Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs;
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment
it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.

By Max Ehrmann © 1927

 

 

 

In the America of today, it may be difficult to remember to do this, but I still celebrate the arrival of Spring and the month of April. It has always been that intensely anticipated pivotal turning point in the seasons where Winter is finally vanquished, and the green shoots of the tulips and early petals of the forsythia plants alert our souls to the renewal of creation.

There is no question that, this time around, the arrival of April comes with some bitter medicine to swallow. Our nation and our world have been turned upside down with fear and dread at the outbreak of a vicious viral crisis. As April arrives, every human being on Earth is affected in one way or another. Yet, the lure of warm weather and the sweet scent of flowers and new-mown grass has, at the very least, reminded us that all things, both pleasant and disturbing, continue on their relentless path of the cycles and rhythms of life.

I was reminded of a song from Paul Simon, of Simon and Garfunkel, called April Come She Will. It is based on an old English nursery rhyme called The Cuckoo. For those of a certain age, myself included, you may remember this song from their collection: The Sounds of Silence, released in 1966. I have included the lyrics of the song as well as a video from YouTube of the duo performing the song live in Central Park in New York City. In the USA, this city has been the most seriously attacked by this virus, and perhaps needs, more than most places, to stay strong and look ahead with the fundamental hope and resilience of the American spirit. We have all been forced to step back, think twice, take care of one another, remember our shared heritage and embrace the effort required to reclaim our lives from day to day.

April, come she will

When streams are ripe and swelled with rain.

May, she will stay

Resting in my arms again.

June she’ll change her tune

In restless walks she’ll prowl the night.

July, she will fly

And give no warning to her flight.

August, die she must

The autumn winds blow chilly and cold.

September, I remember

A love once new has now grown old.

This is strange. How is it that, just as the delicious sweetness of Spring is descending on us, our nation and the world are withdrawing and retreating into hibernation, curling into a protective cocoon against a viral ‘winter’ of sickness and disease?

Just as most of you wonder and worry about the uncertainty of the future, I too am dismayed by recent events, and the worldwide reaction to how an invisible and determined force can so rapidly rewrite the paths of our lives. It is not what you might think of as a traditional foe that we face, but rather an intangible mixture of fear and concern that we cannot control our lives in the manner in which we are so accustomed.

Part of me feels strongly that the human pendulum has swung far too much into the negative to properly and judiciously maintain a wise life-balance. Perhaps it is not really so surprising given the nature of the human condition, but I cannot help wondering if we have given in too easily to the mania of the moment. On the other hand, I am none to eager to sit amongst a crowded movie theater audience in the darkness, secretly worrying if the fellow moviegoer a few seats away has just sneezed or coughed a few droplets of danger my way. Those constant admonitions from the medical experts seem to make a lot of sense from that perspective. So in honesty, I also feel strongly that much of the caution is warranted but it really is kind of depressing.

As usual, when jarring events like this happen, it triggers a wide variety of thoughts in my mind about what such events or crises say about all of us, our nation, our world and the way in which we live. And it occurred to me how so much of the human condition on this planet has transformed it into a 24×7 world. This has typically been a gradual transformation, but now it has been greatly accelerated in the last 75 years or so by a number of cataclysmic changes. When World War II finally came to an end, we ended up in a world where technology and science produced a frighteningly lethal device that could literally destroy the entire planet, and every living thing on it, in essentially a matter of minutes.

Eventually, the human race was able to leverage the scientific knowledge that came from the efforts to produce such a device into, among other things,  a much more positive and life-saving series of inventions and tools and abilities. New ways of doing things, new labor-saving machines, new vistas of medicine and technology began to transform our human society and bring large scale efficiencies to bear against manufacturing, medical procedures, agriculture and communication. Space flight became possible and we actually, for the first time in human history, were able to ‘see’ ourselves and our entire planet from afar, inspiring  Joni Mitchell in one of her songs to call the Earth ‘that marbled bowling ball’. It was a magnificent sight.

A bit more recently, the phenomenon of the interconnected communication network, or Internet, was the proverbial ‘pouring’ of gasoline onto a fire. This sealed our fate in a manner of speaking. Initially intended to serve as a tool for sharing knowledge among scientists and information system professionals, it has obviously migrated into far more than anyone ever really envisioned. Its’ commercialization and mass marketing to basically every human being on Earth has brought many wonderful developments to our front door, but like so many other new wonders, it has also brought things like a hyperventilating mass hysteria to the front door as well.

You may be familiar with the author Henning Mankell, who has written several novels about a character named Kurt Wallander who is a police detective in Ystad, Sweden. The novels became extremely popular in Europe and eventually America, and there have been some television shows adapted from those novels. I particularly recommend the Wallander series in which actor Kenneth Branagh performed in the lead role. It is great entertainment (and you can watch it at home!).  Wallander is very adept at solving murders, mainly via his intense and relentless personality. So relentless in fact that he ignores food and sleep and the effects on his health.  In one episode he pushes himself so blindly that he ends up in the hospital from a diabetic collapse. Afterwards, he is forced into rethinking and reassessing his life and his life style.

I bring all of this for your consideration to potentially equate what happened to the fictional Wallander character to where the world is now, forced into rethinking and reassessing how we live. This virus and the fear and sickness it has brought has caused the literal  shutdown of so many things that we normally take for granted. All over the world a dangerous element has arisen that has caused the world to confront its’ own societal collapse. Over time, we have pushed ourselves and our world so blindly that we are now in the midst of being forced to severely slow down and stop and rethink our own lives. It may be a great opportunity to take advantage of reverting back, at least a little, to a simpler, less frenetic, more human approach to life and begin to remember what truly is important: Each other!

 

For most of us, life is full of unexpected and sometimes surreal twists and turns. In the same way, these changes in path and experiences are both large and small, both pleasing and disturbing, and also both trivial and dramatically significant.  We are never quite sure of what to expect next.

I experienced this phenomenon once again very recently. I was at home, browsing the newspaper while listening to some of my favorite music from Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays, specifically from the collection: As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls. Incredibly, I came across a small article reporting the death of Lyle Mays on 2/10/20. I must say that my heart was immediately and involuntarily filled with instant sadness and shock. I have been a listener and follower of Metheny and Mays for many, many years. Their music has been a constant theme and a reassuring thread for most of my adult life.

Fortunately, I have had the opportunity on multiple occasions to hear their music performed live, although only once did I have the opportunity to see and hear the Pat Metheny Group with Lyle Mays as the keyboardist, along with Steve Rodby, and I believe Antonio Sanchez. The music that was created and performed while these musicians were together, particularly the recordings with Paul Wertico and Pedro Aznar is, to me, the very best that was produced within the broad Pat Metheny repertoire. I will never forget that first live concert, which was in 2002 at the Tower Theater in Upper Darby, Pa. I had listened to so much of their music that I was certain that I would know a LOT of their songs, many of which I hoped to hear them perform that night. The collection: Speaking of Now, was the most recent LP they had produced, which I hadn’t listened to yet.

Again, incredibly, I didn’t recognize any of the music they played since they decided to perform Speaking of Now in it’s entirety. It didn’t matter. It was absolutely fantastic!! I jumped for joy at the end, as they came out for an encore and did First Circle which was really my absolute favorite at the time and the one song I REALLY wanted to hear.

The surreal twist I referred to came just a few days after reading about Lyle’s passing. I received in the mail the new Pat Metheny CD: From This Place. I forgot that I had purchased it in a pre-sale several weeks ago. As any Metheny fan knows, Pat has performed and recorded with dozens of fellow musicians, formed new bands and taken his music down a wide variety of paths. The same is true for Lyle Mays, by the way.

I was struck by the strange dichotomy, the odd juxtaposition of these two events. Here I experienced two wildly different moments: An eager anticipation of new, fresh music from my absolute favorite artist, Pat Metheny, and then a terrible dashing of my fervent hope that Metheny and Mays would collaborate, and more importantly, tour together again someday.

I am not sure if you would agree with me on this thought but I feel it is absolutely true: To me, the beauty and mystery of the music created by Metheny/Mays is the exact same tour de force of the quality and necessary collaborations of Lennon/McCartney, the dominant creative force of The Beatles. I say this because I really believe that the best music created by both sets of collaborators came into existence precisely BECAUSE they wrote the music together. I do not imply that the individual music created by Lennon or McCartney is not also beautiful and well worth listening to, nor do I feel that the music created individually by Metheny or Mays is less beautiful. In fact, I would say that the solo productions of both Metheny and Mays demonstrate and confirm the incredible talent of both. To me though, the best of each was brought out and created when they shared the creative process.

Whether or not you are familiar with Lyle Mays or Pat Metheny, I added here some links to give you an idea of the beauty and mystery of the music from both an individual and a collaborative perspective. The first is a song called: September Fifteenth from the collection: As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls. Here is where you can hear the subtle beauty of how these two incredible musicians complemented one another.

 

Another example of this same idea is the song: Too Soon Tomorrow from the collection: Imaginary Day

 

Finally, to acknowledge the wonderful talent and happy soul of Lyle Mays, I add this link to a YouTube selection from a live performance that embraces all the variety and musical intrigue contained within a musical genius. Fortunately for us, there are so many wonderful musical pieces to hold on to and enjoy that make Lyle’s passing just a little less painful. He truly spoke the language of the beauty and mystery of music.

 

 

A fellow author and blogger I follow has written and posted numerous insightful essays regarding the purpose, the function, and the interaction and intersection of the mysterious processes of the human brain, the ‘mind’ if you will.

I have found that these essays often evoke a frenzy of emotions, thoughts, decision-making and  re-evaluations of decision-making moments and times in my life. Another very revealing reaction to his writings is the deluge of memories that flood my own mind, cascading and flowing in a furious river of thought. These memories often have literally nothing to do with the focus of the particular essay I am reading, but rather are the offspring of a broader, more fundamental realization triggered by the words in the essay itself.

To a lesser degree, I have experienced floating down this same river of memories when I re-read my own writings and view the photographs and contemplate the thoughts expressed in what I have tried to convey in my words.

I am no psychologist or expert on the workings of the human mind, but I do share the ability in all of us to ‘remember’. What puzzles me is the extremely fragile nature of the memories that are evoked. At times, the memory is exact and has a clarity that does not diminish, even when the moments remembered occurred half a century ago or more. Far more often though, the memory is fuzzy, incomplete, and sometimes even contains parts that I must conclude are imagined, since they cannot be corroborated to my satisfaction. I tend to consider those particular memories as  ‘threads’, a tenuous fiber of connection to something that happened, someone I knew, something I did, or perhaps should have done. Despite their fragility and almost ephemeral nature, I KNOW that they are just as real as any unclouded memory or thought.

The fragility of memory also intrigues me since, in many instances the SAME memory, or sequence of memories I experience, are triggered by DIFFERENT sources, different events, different people, and even different moments in time.  For me personally, there has been a fair amount of time of life thus far, so my trove of memories spans multiple decades. This is one of the more satisfying aspects of aging.

I find that I enjoy remembering.

I have found a great deal of happiness looking at photographs, re-reading books, listening to a wide variety of music and even making some of my own. Music has its’ own fantastical and mysterious ability to generate a torrent of memories. Such memories are often sweetening and tainted simultaneously. They evoke their own level of fragility and transience.

There have been, of course, certain events in my life that simply cannot be labeled as having provided ‘happy’  memories. This is true for all of us. Over the course of time however, I have uncovered a latent ability to take advantage of the fragility of the threads of memory and, without discarding the sadness, to strengthen and clarify the invaluable shards of memories shared with those we love in the here and now, and even more so with those we have known and loved in our own fragile lives. These human threads of memory will always be ‘remembered’.

 

Not long after the November 2016 national election, in which Donald Trump won the Presidency of the United States over former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, my 13-year old granddaughter asked me how I cast my vote for President. Before I could answer her, she somewhat sarcastically added: Probably Trump, right? She was old enough, and had seen and heard enough during the long campaign season, to have come to the conclusion that, well, I MUST have voted for Mr. Trump since I was an older man and therefore I was probably not going to vote for a woman for President.

She was surprised to learn that in fact I had voted for Secretary Clinton. I explained that I had my concerns about Secretary Clinton, but those concerns had zero to do with her gender. I further explained that, although she was highly qualified and capable, my concerns were influenced by her policy stands, and with my retirement days growing near, I really preferred a different philosophy, one more in line with improving my economic situation that I felt would be more successfully addressed by a conservative President. 

So, my inquisitive granddaughter then asked me: So why did you vote for Sec. Clinton? I told her that, quite simply, I really did not care for how Mr. Trump treated people. Whatever my political and economic views, it was wrong for someone who aspires to lead our nation and our citizenry to approach that crucial role with a cavalier belligerence and arrogance toward well-meaning people. It is not possible to truly succeed as the leader of the free world by building up our nation by tearing down our people and our institutions. 

After nearly two years of the Trump Presidency, my perceptions in 2016 have modulated and evolved in some ways, and been disappointingly confirmed in others. Some very good things have happened in our economy. I do think that there has been a re-evaluation of the United States of America throughout the world, and that other nations realize that it is no longer business as usual. There is no doubt that we are regaining our footing in many ways. 

There has, however, been a price to pay. 

That is where the national reaction to the passing of President George H.W. Bush becomes understandable. We all, of course, mourn the loss, and pay respect to any person who has been our President, our leader, and who has sacrificed so much to bear the stress, the difficulty, the demands and the sometimes virulent criticism that is integral to serving as the President of the Unites States. President Trump is no exception

But you must be literally thunderstruck by the deluge of gratitude, homage, respect, admiration, wistfulness and love shown by not just the broad political class, but even more so by our fellow, everyday citizens, towards our 41st President. Those emotions, the spontaneous outpouring of grief and gratefulness, the tens of thousands of people at the nation’s Capital who want to spend a moment or two to say Thank You, the mothers and fathers who bring their children to pay respect to President Bush, and quietly and somberly explain to their own children and granddaughters and grandsons who this man was and why it’s so important to honor him in this way.

This kind of reaction is no accident. I think that most people in this country have been so inundated by the tone and tenor of our elected leaders, by the viciousness of many in ALL segments of the press, that we have forgotten how to recognize the signs of class, of concern for our fellow Americans, of the benefits of bipartisanship, of forgiveness, and of the willingness to listen.

I mourn the loss of President Bush, particularly for his family and friends. But it has unleashed something in our nation, and in all of us, that I almost believed was totally gone and unrecoverable. It is the newly resurrected realization that one truly kinder, gentler man or woman has the power and the impact to bring all of the great citizens of the United States of America together again, as one, in saying Thank You and God Bless You Mr. President. I pray that our leaders honestly and truly recognize the signs President Bush has left behind, and embrace them fully to preserve our precious nation. 

Hello everyone! I really wanted to check in with you all on this sad, happy, mournful as well as celebratory day when we honor the lives of thousands of our fellow Americans who perished on September 11, 2001. We celebrate their lives as well as re-affirm our grief at their loss. 

It truly is a day, among the remembrances and commemorations, to reflect upon our lives today as well. In this time of reflection, I also include the life of our nation and where we stand as a people.

It is gratifying to witness the true and sincere acts of courage and determination and homage to our heroes of this day, and to all of our friends and family members whose lives were lost. It has been estimated that one in four citizens in our country knew someone who was either killed or wounded on 9/11/01. I personally knew two men who were killed. Both were co-workers in Manhattan and, in honesty, were acquaintances with whom I occasionally interacted at business meetings. It does not lesson the impact of their loss on me. I also had the opportunity on July 4, 2000 to stand outside at the top of one of the twin towers (the one without the radio tower) and witness the Independence Day celebration in New York Harbor. This included seeing F-15 and F-18 fighter jets flying BELOW us, as well as seeing the Stealth Bomber, the secret black winged aircraft, scream over our heads at hundreds of miles per hour. 

So, in today’s reflections, I was drawn back to a story I read a short while ago about two American citizens who were deliberately murdered by the same evil, cold-blooded people and twisted beliefs that wreaked such horror on our friends and families on this day in 2001. 

I have included a link to the full story in the New York Times August 7, 2018. It is well worth reading, as are some of the links in the article to a blog maintained by one of the Americans that more fully describes these intriguing people.

The Americans who were killed were Jay Austin and Lauren Geoghegan, both 29 years old. They were close friends who shared a passion for cycling, meeting people and exploring the world up close. They reached the point in their lives and in their shared interests where they decided to give up, at least for a time, what they considered the mundane, humdrum, partially scripted lives as office dwellers, cubicle inhabitants who attended meetings and gave Powerpoint demonstrations, tracking working hours, spreadsheets, participating in teleconferences, attending to all of the day-to-day tedium that can creep into any job.

In July of 2017, they embarked on a cycling journey which involved, among many other places, part of the country of Tajikistan, which is a central Asian country close to China and Afghanistan. During their journey, they had encountered many, many happy moments that re-affirmed in their minds the essential goodness and kindness in people throughout the world. They also, of course, ran into those who did not display these same values, as well as an occasionally uncooperative Mother Nature and other unavoidable unpleasantries.

Most terribly for both Mr. Austin and Ms. Geoghegan, on July 29, 2018, as they cycled with a group of like-minded cyclists in a particularly scenic part of Tajikistan, a car passed by the group on the road, stopped and turned around. The driver of the car then sped up and deliberately ran into the cyclists and drove the car over them, killing Mr. Austin, Ms. Geoghegan, and two other cyclists from Switzerland and the Netherlands. The driver and passengers in the car were later identified in a video released by the Islamic State as members of that organization who were carrying out their ‘mission’ against disbelievers. 

On this day, September 11, 2018, I find myself thinking of the unrecoverable loss our nation and the world suffered in 2001 at the hands of people who perpetrated the same kind of pointless, useless and mindless violence against these two Americans.

I recently have eased into retirement from my own career as an office dweller and cubicle inhabitant, who labored through some of the same mundane and tedious moments as those experienced, and rejected, by Ms. Geoghegan and Mr. Austin. In fairness, I enjoyed a very satisfying career in the information technology business, however, there was far too much of what these two Americans jettisoned from their lives. 

I was particularly struck by a highly impactful insight Mr. Austin posted in his blog, accessible via the link to the NY Times article. As I adjust to new life routines, and have far more time to contemplate my life and the lives of those closest to me, I found Mr. Austin’s perspective quite profound, and particularly appropriate today, when we mourn the huge loss of lives, vow to make positive changes in our lives, and pledge to take the time to appreciate the sweet and beautiful moments of life, including not allowing too many gentle breezes to go unnoticed….

This is Mr. Austin’s blog reply to the questions he was asked concerning WHY he decided to give up a good job in a steady, predictable life, WHY he decided not to follow the traditional path of his peers, and WHY he so strongly felt that he had to change his life’s path to what his heart told him to do. May Mr. Austin and Ms. Geoghegan rest in peace, along with all our friends and families who lost their own lives on September 11, 2001. 

I’m grateful for the opportunity, and I’m anxious to turn my back on what was really a good thing. But getting too cozy is dangerous. Inertia is a stealthy predator. I’ve learned a lot from these seven years, and I enjoyed plenty, but with each passing year I feel I learned a little less.  The days have blended into weeks, the weeks into months, the months into years. I’ve grown tired of meetings, of teleconferences, of timesheets and password changes and Monday morning elevator commiseration. I’ve grown tired of spending the best hours of my day in front of a glowing rectangle, of coloring the best years of my life in swaths of grey and beige. I’ve missed too many sunsets while my back was turned. Too many thunderstorms went unwatched, too many gentle breezes unnoticed. There’s magic out there, in this great big beautiful world, and I’ve long since scooped up the last of the scraps to be found in my cubicle.