Grief defies easy explanation.
Tears switch to laughter, sadness is soothed by memories, pain is eased by hugs. Life feels irrevocably altered; life continues.
"How are you doing?", well-meaning people ask.
"As well as can be expected", is the best I can offer now. Tomorrow? Grief defies easy explanation.
Reflections from the Bell Curve: Not Today
How routinely do you pay close attention to the amount of airtime you use when conversing with others?
Having an honest and caring partner gives me a clear advantage in the conversational sweepstakes. When I've taken up more than my share of airtime, I can rely on her to subtly redirect a conversation, sometimes by asking a question of the glass-eyed person who's been listening to me ramble, other times via some unmistakable signal she makes to indicate I've gone on way too long.
OK, so maybe her re-directing is not always all that subtle. No matter; the end result is the same, i.e., I stop talking as much and begin listening better. And even if I'm defensive in the moment I'm being conversationally tuned up, I'm usually grateful later when re-playing my jabbering in my head. When I'm listening to someone who appears clueless about the amount of airtime they're using? Glad you asked.
It was difficult to tune out a distinctly one-sided conversation going on directly behind me on a hike earlier today. After almost thirty minutes listening to what was essentially a monologue, a judgy, ungracious blog post began taking shape in the mind of judgy, ungracious Pat. Then, to my surprise, as the rest of my day unfolded, my clear advantage in the conversational sweepstakes kept returning to me. Some twelve hours later, a less judgy and marginally more gracious post formed as I reflected on a few things.
How fortunate am I having someone who loves me enough to assist me in improving this critically important skill? Isn't it unfortunate that some people have no such person in their life to assist them? Will I remember to ask myself these questions the next time I'm being tuned up or the next time I'm listening to someone using all the airtime? Stay tuned.
"It's strange, what desire will make foolish people do."
Can I hear an "Amen"? Despite its simplicity, that terse phrase from Chris Isaak's Wicked Game (1989) captures a universal truth. And it stands on its own; no rhyming couplet is required. These are words for the ages, no matter how straightforward.
In fact, I would argue Isaak could have easily left out the word "foolish". Certainly, the things that desire drive us to do can be foolish. And the consequences of those things often make us look foolish indeed. But wouldn't you agree that even reasonable people do foolish things under desire's influence? How many people have you known who've had their life upended by desire? For just a minute, put aside the things those people did. What percentage of those people would you have described as foolish before their desire took over?
Perhaps Isaak's timeless lyric is directing us to chicken and egg land. That is, was the person who succumbed already foolish enough that desire was more easily able to do its work? Or was the desire a force so intense that even a reasonable person would succumb?
Early today, while preparing for tonight's discussion, I was temporarily sidetracked thinking about the celebration planned to mark the 100th book my club has read since our maiden voyage in January 2017. Tonight's book - #99 - was Tar Baby (1981) by Toni Morrison. As usual, it was a stimulating, enriching discussion. Book #100 - A Marriage at Sea (2024) by Sophie Elmhurst - will be discussed at our September meeting. Then, that celebration.
Since realizing months ago that this milestone was approaching, I've been vibrating with excitement, thinking of ways to try to make the event memorable. But even if my planning goes awry, how bad can it be to commune for an evening with other bookworms about our shared adoration of literature? Five of the people who will be at the celebration - including my partner of 48+ years - have been in the club from its inception. (That book - in case you're keeping track - was Founding Brothers (2000) by Joseph Ellis.) The rest of the folks who may attend the event? Mostly hardcore bibliophiles. How cool will this be?
Though I haven't kept close track (honest!) for the nine + years the club has overlapped with my blog, I'd estimate I've published at least twenty-five posts about books the club has either read or is about to read. After all, I only publish about books that have moved me, the same criteria used for putting a book in the queue for the club. Most recently? The two posts directly below highlight the selections for September & December. If reading these posts whets your appetite enough to read either or both of these winners - or even if you're just thinking about reading one or both - consider yourself an ex-officio member of the club. And celebrate with us from wherever you are.
Reflections from the Bell Curve: Being Truly Tested
Reflections from the Bell Curve: The Bee Sting
I didn't fully appreciate how much my fourteen Rogue Scholar travelling companions had brought to my life until recently as my wife and I finished a Shutterfly project commemorating our adventures together. Though mentioned on this blog several times since we all met in Alaska in 2015, considering the riches this community has bestowed on me, I cannot overdo the tributes paid to them here.
Soon after our 2024 reunion in Rocky Mountain National Park, the group decided a celebration of our years together was in order. Two of us worked on crafting several questions for everyone to respond to in writing. The responses were then compiled into a final document and distributed to all. (Sample question: How did our time together add value to your life?) It was in the re-reading of the responses to those questions - and deciding which select few to include as text in the Shutterfly project - that my appreciation for my soulmates grew even deeper. One celebration response included a mention of every person in the group - by name - and how that person had enriched the author during our years together. The time put into that one response alone reminded me - again - of how grateful I am to have made these Act Three friendships. As another person said in a different celebratory response - What a gift!
How do you celebrate the people in your life who have given gifts comparable to those my Rogue Scholar tribe has given me?
Although I didn't thoroughly scour my archives to be 100% certain, I'm reasonably sure the time between my last post about a movie and today is the longest gap of its kind since I began reflecting from the bell curve fifteen + years ago. My recent ten+ weeks of movie silence here is not connected to the number of films I've sat through since late May when a re-watch of Fargo inspired a post. But not a single film since then spoke to this unrepentant movie geek like A Private Life did. Cinephiles: Put this one in your queue.
Aside from Jodie Foster's predictably excellent performance - speaking in French throughout - what sets this 2025 movie apart from some of mediocre fare I've endured these last few months is its incisive script. As the film opens, Foster is experiencing personal challenges as well as setbacks in her professional life as a slightly aloof psychiatrist. The director and screenwriters then imbue that straightforward premise with astute insights about the stories we often create in an attempt to make sense of the things that happen to us.
"Irony can be an effective way to avoid dealing with fear." I'm accustomed to capturing sharp phrases in my journal while reading. But I cannot readily recall the last time a line of movie dialogue that did not come from a book hit me with as much force as the one directly above. I felt compelled to write it down, much like when I'm reading. When did a line of movie dialogue recently do the same for you?
I recommend A Private Life without reservation.
p.s. How refreshing it is to see a sixty-three-year-old movie star who looks sixty-three. On a parallel plane, not long ago I read a NY Times article about Jodie Foster. In that article, I recall her comment that having a personal assistant struck her as "... like having someone else living your everyday life ..." or words to that effect. Is it possible she is carefully curating a down-to-earth public persona? The cynic in me would be inclined to believe that but those lines in her face tell a different story.
Thinking back on your life, what have you accomplished that continues to give you significant satisfaction? For the purposes of today's thought experiment, I'm requesting parents put aside - just this time - the most obvious answer, i.e., your children. What might be the next thing that comes most readily to mind?
Although the years spent teaching guitar to my youngest nephew is not the next thing that comes most readily to my mind, the sense of accomplishment I get listening to him play is up there. I suspect the fact that he's getting married this coming weekend contributed to this Act Three-ish reflection popping up recently. I mean, it's difficult imagining someone still in Act Two - that is, someone not likely to have a twenty-something youngest nephew - spending much time on a thought experiment like this. After all, while in Act Two, most of us on the bell curve are still working at the big stuff, aren't we? But when we're in Act Three - or like me, quite a bit along into Act Three and watching the youngest members of our extended families starting adult life - isn't it predictive for us to be looking back at accomplishments, at least occasionally?
So, when this reflection first began percolating weeks ago, the first thing I did was capture in my journal several things that came to mind, including that time spent teaching guitar to my nephew. Next, I did what I almost always do. I asked my ideal reader and partner of forty-eight + years to respond to today's thought experiment. Though unsurprised that her instinctive response was our daughter, I asked her to dig deeper, just as I'm asking you to do. Her "secondary" answers gratified her and reminded me of significant pieces of her legacy. I'm guessing the same could be true for some of you. I hope a few of you will share something here. To anyone who does, I pledge to respond by sharing a different accomplishment of mine, another from that same journal entry, the petri dish for this post.
Over my reading life, I've enjoyed a fair number of novels that exceeded 500 pages. But I can readily recall only a handful that held me end-to-end like The Bee Sting (2023). Weeks later, I remain astonished that Paul Murray was able to sustain enough narrative momentum over 643 pages that I was never once out of his spell. His tragi-comic tale of a family trying to find its way is a literary marvel.
"...and she feels a kind of worn happiness like they are normal."
Given her dire upbringing, Imelda Barnes has always yearned for a normal life. Her husband Dickie has spent his life struggling trying to land on what is normal, a struggle that intensified the day he and Imelda were married, her face marred by a mysterious bee sting. Their teenage daughter Cassandra envisions normal life as something to be found in Dublin, living with her friend Elaine, far from the small town where both of them have lived since childhood. And twelve-year-old PJ's vision of normal toggles from the virtual world of video games to a texting bond he's formed with someone who wants to show him around Dublin to the bunker he and his father - along with a cranky survivalist - are building in a clearing on the Barnes's property.
I offer that taste hoping it might tempt some reader(s) to try the full meal. If you do, please remember to check back in with me when you finish. I sincerely want to hear your thoughts about this book.
In the meanwhile, tell me this: What was the last novel of over 500 pages you finished that held you like The Bee Sting held me?
p.s. Thank you to Ann Patchett - via her weekly podcast - for directing me to this winner.
If you're the kind of viewer who enjoys following a mini-series from its outset, be on the lookout for the debut episode of Ride or Die - starring Octavia Spencer and Hannah Waddingham - streaming on Amazon beginning Wednesday July 15. If you don't mind jumping into a series after it begins or you're not much of a TV person, I urge you to mark Wednesday August 19 on your calendar. That's the night episode #6 of this new series will be shown, if you decide not to binge beforehand.
I'm drawing your attention to this in the hope you'll celebrate with me as the top name - of three - scrolls by in the opening writer's credit for this particular episode. Like most, my daughter's career has had its share of victories and defeats. And this series - her first experience working in a writer's room after her move to LA a few years back - was frustrating and satisfying in nearly equal measure.
But the sequel to this story is happy enough to make this crowing father even more obnoxiously proud. Today, my daughter and her writing/directing partner started work on season two of Ride or Die, already renewed before season one begins. Keep your fingers crossed for syndication, please. In the meanwhile, I'll keep you informed about which episodes in season two will have her name at the top of the writing credits. Count on it.
"LA's fine but it ain't home, New York's home but it ain't mine no more."
Early in my young adult years as an itinerant musician, I took up temporary residence in Los Angeles, the only extended period of my life when I've actually lived outside of New Jersey. For several reasons, LA and I were not a good fit, which made my return to my beloved home state quite welcome. My unease with LA life in the early 70s also helped to permanently cement Neil Diamond's clever phrase from I Am, I Said into my lyric-addled brain.
More than a half-century later - with visits to my new grandson in Los Angeles a regular occurrence - that lyric now fits me even more snugly. I like it OK out here - that tired and anodyne adjective "fine" is perfect, actually - but I still have trouble picturing myself feeling settled in LA. Great weather, nice vibe, ocean nearby, what's not to love? And if that hoary cliche is at all accurate and home is where the heart is, at present, LA holds many of the winning cards.
Still, hard to predict if the desirable elements and those winning cards will persuade us to re-locate. In the meanwhile, this week the little man and I are perfecting drum interludes from Wipeout, analyzing the cinematography of Citizen Kane, and translating The Odyssey from the ancient Greek. Stay tuned for regular updates.
The last time I reversed the digits of my age to use in a post was early in my blog's lifespan when I published 61? or ... 16? in July 2011. Months ago, a faithful reader stumbled across that relic in my archive, prompting me to re-visit this particular thought experiment, especially because it will be easier to recall specifics of my life from a distance of just nine years vs. forty-five. I hope you'll join me today and have some fun with this, regardless of the way your reversed digits fall.
(If you are someone who journals and you retain your old ones, why not take a peek and see what you were up to at that earlier point in your life? That is, provided the reversal sends you back in time. If the reversal instead sends you forward, why not conjecture what you'll be up to at the older age the reversal places you? For those in double digit territory - 33, 55, 77 - or those with a "0" as your second digit, use your imagination. You don't expect me to do all the work, do you?)
* At 67, I started my own book club. Next January, the club will celebrate its tenth anniversary. And in September of this year, the club will reach another milestone - our 100th book.
* Over the span of my 67th year, with a good friend's help, the first critical phase of a long-postponed project - my daughter recording eight of my original songs - was finished. The completed CD with overdubs, mixed and mastered, was held off for release to coincide with my 70th birthday. Directly below is a link to Bandcamp, a music site you can visit if you'd care to listen to one or more of the tunes. Lyrics are included.
Til There Were Two | Patrick Barton
* At 67, I met the young man who would become my son-in-law approximately five years later. He is a welcome addition to my family and now the father to my beloved grandson.
Please join me in this thought experiment. When I'm 78, I'll try to remember to repeat the experiment a third and final time; forces my hand to project forward to my 87th year. a more daunting prospect for sure.
Reflections from the Bell Curve: 61? or...16?
"The older I get, the less I need."
Since the 2017 inception of this series, I've been on the lookout for terse lyrical phrases like that, words that are able to stand on their own, i.e., they're not dependent on the rhymes accompanying them to complete the thought. The lyric above - from a 2025 Mary Chapin-Carpenter song entitled Girl and Her Dog - satisfies those simple requirements. I've never been overly concerned about selecting lyrics that might strike others as capital "P" profound. For me, the most critical element is how well a lyric succinctly captures an essential and timeless truth. That is, are these words for the ages?
The essential truth of those eight words struck me almost from the moment I first heard Carpenter sing them. Then as weeks went by, a question - one even simpler than the lyric that prompted it - would not let me go. What do any of us really need? I decided then that any lyric reminding me of Abraham Maslow's groundbreaking work on the hierarchy of needs is clearly worth memorializing here, profound or not.
And that brought me full circle back to a central motivation for starting my blog fifteen+ years ago. From the start, I've aimed these reflections at the 98% of us who do not reside on either far end of the bell curve. We are neither fabulously famous nor we will ever end up in jail. We have more in common than not. We want to love and be loved. We want to take care of our families. We want to make a small difference in the world. We enjoy many of the same things. Those are the things I try to write about here - most of the time - hoping to engage you in some fashion.
Maslow's hierarchy of needs - Wikipedia
In your view, which traits help make a person well suited to being a parent? How much does the person's gender factor into your thinking. i.e., how much do the traits shift in your mind, father vs. mother?
Had someone had asked me that same question in my younger years, I suspect my answer might have been tied to things my own solid parents had shown me, traits reflecting prevailing cultural norms of the time. My mother = a loving and devoted caretaker of her children and our home; my father = a hard-working, dependable provider.
Later in life, considering my own suitability as a potential father, my thinking evolved. Although I aspired to be a reliable provider like my father, I fully embraced my wife's wish to have a life outside our home. I knew also that I wanted any children we had to expect the same level of unconditional love and intense devotion to their care as my mother had shown me.
It's quite clear to me how well suited my son-in-law is as a parent. He already shows my young grandson all that my parents showed me and all that I hope I showed my daughter as she grew up. In addition, my son-in-law's gentle temperament - unlike my father's or my own more combative tendencies - models a kinder, more gracious way of living. Without question, this one trait alone - if he follows his father's lead - will help my grandson better weather the challenges life will hurl at him.
On this Father's Day, I'm grateful for the example my son-in-law is showing to my favorite little man in the world.
The more time I spend trimming my six-hour class on the Beatles down to ninety minutes, the more I wonder why I offered to do so in the first place. Much ado about nothing, you say? Oh, I beg to differ. Using just one incomparable Beatles song as a focal point, indulge me as I lay out a few of the unpleasant dilemmas facing me while constructing my final playlist for the presentation I'm doing about a month from now.
* If I choose not to use And Your Bird Can Sing how to best demonstrate how advanced the Beatles were with respect to guitar harmony?
* If I do use And Your Bird Can Sing as my selection from the British version of Revolver, which of the equally important songs from that breakthrough album do I scuttle? Eleanor Rigby? Taxman? Here There and Everywhere?
* Is a compromise in order with respect to And Your Bird Can Sing? That is, can I instead use that piece of musical magic and say it was from the vastly inferior American toss off LP called Yesterday and Today? If yes, how much time do I devote to making a distinction between the American and British versions of all the albums before Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band? And then, what other Beatles ephemera do I leave out while rhapsodizing on their endlessly influential oeuvre?
There's more where this came from, honest. If I began describing my turmoil about Abbey Road and what I'll play from that gem in this truncated class vs. what was included in my longer offering, you might begin to worry about my mental health. The White Album? If you still have any pity left for this unadulterated Beatles geek, please don't go there.
Though I have biases like everyone, for the most part, I consider myself reasonably open-minded. That said, I'm providing the Wikipedia link below to help you decide if what I'm about to confess makes me guilty of ethnocentrism.
With respect to restaurants specializing in ethnic cuisine, I'm less confident about what I'm about to eat when folks preparing my meal appear to have no trace of the ethnicity in question. Call me ethnocentric and read no further if you choose, but before anyone reports me to the PC police, hear me out.
I don't necessarily need to hear Italian spoken by cooks in an Italian restaurant, but for me, it is preferable to hearing Russian or German. Now because I speak only English - admittedly bolstering my ethnocentric bona fides - I struggle to differentiate some languages from others. However, if any Polish or Slavic speaker working as a cook in a Mexican, Thai, or Lebanese restaurant stumbles across this post, allow me to respectfully suggest you stay silent when encountering me - or some equally prickly individual - as a customer. Even we monolinguists can usually pick out blatant auditory clues and, in my case, it could start me wondering if my meal is going to pass muster. Sorry in advance if this offends you.
The ethnicity of cooks in a diner? A less cut and dry matter. Given the number of choices on a typical diner menu, a United Nations contingent would be necessary in those kitchens to fully satisfy my narrow requirements. However, to be painfully honest (what have I got to lose at this point?), I will almost always bypass a diner not featuring spanakopita. And I also pay attention to the name of the diner's proprietor when advertised, on the lookout for first names like Stavros or Eleni. Another technique? I listen when a diner's proprietor pronounces gyro. If I hear something like "jiro" (hard "J" and long "i") instead of something close to "yiddo" (rhymes with "kiddo"), that could signal my last trip to that particular diner. I love my spanakopita too much to take chances. Same goes for my pasta primavera and all those other yummy ethnic dishes that have been passed down through generations of folks who originated the dish in the first place.Over the span of your longest-lasting relationship, what has been the most serious test of the strength of your bond with that person?
Like most folks who have been together a long time, my wife and I have been tested more than a few times over our almost half-century together. But reading A Marriage at Sea (2024) brought into clear focus the difference between the tests most of us face and the kind of test that only the sturdiest of bonds can hope to endure.
Author Sophie Elmhirst's background as a journalist perfectly suits this tale of super-human resilience. In her debut, Elmhirst never raises her voice because it's unnecessary to do so. What Maurice and Maralyn Bailey faced during their 117 days adrift on a rubber raft in the middle of the Pacific Ocean needs no fanfare. I can't imagine an attentive reader being unmoved by this remarkable story.
Would you describe yourself - as I do - as introspective? If so, would you also say - as I would - that you frequently struggle to hold back tears? I've wondered most of my adult life about the link between these two temperamental traits of mine.
I've known people I would describe as introspective that don't appear to struggle as much as me with tears. How often do you encounter folks like this? Though not proud of it, I'm obliged to admit I'm a little jealous of people like this. And though I never have, more than once I've been tempted to ask these folks to share a strategy with me. This is especially the case following an episode when my tears just don't seem to want to stop.
Who knows? Maybe a few of those introspective folks will read this post and offer me some help. Even better, maybe the help offered to me will also assist one of you who sometimes fights the same battle as I do.
Perched near the midpoint between Memorial Day and the celebration of the nation's 250th anniversary that's poised to unfold on July 4th, it feels right to offer up four national treasures for this iteration of my most enduring series. I hope you'll join me by celebrating four uniquely American treasures you wouldn't want to do without. Regular readers will recognize my abiding passions reflected in the first three selections.
1.) The New York Times: A feast for readers and the gold standard for responsible journalism, the Times has enriched me as a thinker my entire adult life.
2.) Ken Burns: Without question, the greatest documentary filmmaker of my lifetime. My favorite film in his impressive oeuvre? See directly below.
3.) Jazz: Music has been the singular driving force of my existence. And jazz is the classical music of these United States as well as being the subject of my favorite Ken Burns film. Understanding this uniquely American art form is a never-ending quest.
4.) The National Park System: When Yellowstone National Park was created in 1872, the United States became the first country in the world to establish a national park. In 1916, with the birth of the National Park Service, another groundbreaking innovation was unveiled. At last count, I've visited thirty-five of the sixty-three national parks. Aside from those few bordering the Arctic circle and the one on American Samoa, my plan is to get to all the rest in my remaining years. Wish me luck.
How about you? Which four uniquely American treasures would you enshrine?
"Since death is certain, but the time of death is uncertain, what is the most important thing?" - Pema Chodron
That formulation and provocative question have been on my mind for some time now. Perhaps the word "most" is what continues to bedevil me. How to be that specific?
I recall when first stumbling across Chodron's words - used as the epigraph for a wise novel I was reading at the time - my reflexive answer to her question was family. I suspect many people would say the same, don't you? But over the ensuing months, as I carefully examined how I often choose to spend my time, my answer started feeling less authentic. The chasm separating reflex and reality steadily grew, accompanied by a lingering unease.
Today began uneventfully. Then, while still trying to find my rhythm, that question returned full bore and I wondered: Who am I if family is not the answer? The rest of today? Best not to dwell on that.
Reflections from the Bell Curve: #16: The Mt. Rushmore Series
When I published the post above in October 2013, I'd seen Fargo once - with my wife - not long after its 1996 release, eighteen years into our lifelong partnership. What follows is a brief tale of complete trust and faulty memory.
From 1996-2013 my wife had repeatedly quoted a line of dialogue from the Coen Brothers' modern-day masterpiece. She'd said this line over and over with such total certainty that as I finished constructing Mt. Rushmore #16 - without first verifying - I decided to use "Whatcha got in the chippa?" as the last entry of four in that post. Such was my confidence that sheriff Frances McDormand said those exact words to homicidal Peter Stormare that I used the verb "deadpan" in my post describing McDormand's delivery. I'd heard my wife say the words so often I could hear McDormand while composing that post thirteen years ago. (BTW, those of you who have seen Fargo will readily recall Stormare's nearly mute psychopath, perhaps the creepiest creep the Coen Brothers have ever conjured, and those two twisted minds have conjured a memorable slew of them over their long film career.)
Fast forward to several nights back, my first re-watch of Fargo. As the gruesome scene near the end of the movie unfolded, imagine my surprise as McDormand confronts Stormare, blood spewing from the woodchipper - Steve Buscemi's remains - and says nothing remotely similar to that line I'd used in my Mt. Rushmore. Before that re-watch I would have bet anyone McDormand asks Stormare "Whatcha got in the chippa?" Indeed, I would've gone to my grave swearing these were the exact words used. Over the years, I myself had repeated that line to others in different contexts, sure beyond any doubt that McDormand had said it. Such is what complete trust - and thirty years (1996-2026) of both hearing and repeating a line of non-existent dialogue - can do.
Call this our married version of "Play it again, Sam." Except, Ingrid Bergman says those four words - just not in that exact order - speaking to Dooley Wilson in Casablanca. McDormand does say woodchipper - in the penultimate scene in her police car - but none of the rest. She doesn't deadpan at all; that was my invention. But under oath, I would've sworn differently.
Though any "greatest" list is inherently subjective based on who is compiling it, to have even a scintilla of credibility, isn't it fair to ask that the compiler(s) has actually toiled in the field - just a little - especially when their list is likely to be widely read, like one published in say, the New York Times? In other words, doesn't any list of "greatest" authors or "greatest" filmmakers or "greatest" plumbers - no matter how subjective - carry more weight when created by someone who has actually written a book, made a film, fixed a toilet?
In early May, I was excited when a good friend brought to my attention a Times piece called The Thirty Greatest Living American Songwriters. If anyone cares to know how much this travesty incensed me, contact my wife, who suggested medication as my rant approached an hour in length. Is apoplectic an exaggeration? I think not. I have not included here a link for this absurd piece of music journalism lest you waste precious time reading it.
But I did research each of the six contributors to see which of their songs I'd heard. Guesses anyone? And then - to help calm myself down - I listened carefully to Lullaby (Goodnight My Angel) for perhaps the thousandth time. While reveling in the artistry of Billy Joel's modern-day masterpiece, I briefly considered writing a letter to the Times editor, a suggestion my wife made to me somewhere around the thirty-minute mark in my toot. After deciding not to waste my time, I calmed down some more by listening to These Days and By the Time I Get to Phoenix. I knew I'd get around to writing a blog post about the garbage I'd just read but wanted to wait for a clear head. Two + weeks listening to songs by the three most egregiously overlooked songwriters from this insulting list was the perfect recipe for soothing my raging beast. I also listened to some stuff by the songwriters unfamiliar to me from that same list. Before I write of that experience, more calming down is required. Stay tuned and caveat emptor.
Here's the thing: If you've never spent time carefully analyzing the songwriting craft of the two compositions mentioned above by Jackson Browne and Jim Webb respectively - putting aside the massive, consistent body of work both of them and Billy Joel have produced over the past fifty years - you can't call yourself a reputable music critic. Just try and create something as majestic as any of those three songs, Mr. or Ms. New York Times contributor. I'm waiting.
"Only connect." - E.M. Forster
Few things get me as reliably juiced as conversational ping-pong. When did this most recently happen to you?
You feel heard even though the back-and-forth between you and the other person is rapid and nonstop. You bounce from subject to subject, but the conversation somehow remains focused. Your energy and attention never flag. You don't want it to end.
Sometimes I walk away from these one-on-one encounters with books to read, movies to watch (or re-watch), or music to listen to. More often, I de-brief the experience via writing; I desperately want to retain the buzz these moments of intense connection deliver and writing about them seems to help with that.
But even if no books, films, music, or writing spring from an instance of conversational ping-pong, one thing is guaranteed. I look forward to the next time.
Which mother in your life are you celebrating today? It's hard to imagine anyone who has had better good fortune than me in this domain. Three home runs.
For almost the first twenty-eight years of my life, my mom was the person I knew would always be there for me, in every capacity. She was my coach, my confidant, and my biggest fan. Even when I let her down - which I did continually, especially as an adolescent - she didn't waver. Losing her in 1977 was the biggest loss of my life to that point.
From almost the day I met my life partner, one fantasy has consistently played out in my head. I wish I could have heard my mom and her laughing together. My mom had the greatest laugh I'd ever heard, until April of 1978. And after forty-eight years, it's difficult for me to single out one thing I most cherish about my life partner. But her laugh - the only clear rival I've ever had to mom's - is right up there. As is her unerring sense of how to be the best possible mother to our daughter.
My daughter is new to the role of mother. Is it too soon to say she'll be an equal to my mom or her own mother? I don't think it is. She had the best possible model, someone who unfailingly gave her unconditional love, the foundation to being a solid parent. From the day my grandson was born, I knew watching my daughter that she'd fully internalized that foundational message. I've seen nothing since - nor do I expect to - that would lead me to think that will ever change. My grandson's life is getting off to the same strong start as her own, and mine. Good mothers have that impact on their children's lives.
I hope you've been as fortunate as I've been. If you have, remember to acknowledge the mothers who have shaped you, or shaped your children, or are shaping future generations.
Although it took me almost eleven years to get around to it, there was never any doubt I'd return to Jill Lepore. And what a return it has been.
Lepore's This America: The Case for the Nation is the best book of its kind I've read since 2017 when I consumed Timothy Snyder's On Tyranny soon after its release. Both books are sobering but hopeful and both authors are first rate scholars, astute cultural critics, and compelling writers. And though you can finish either in under a few hours - each is an extended essay in book form - as soon as you finish, I suspect you'll want to reread immediately. I've returned to On Tyranny several times over the last nine years, have already reread This America once and plan to do so a second time before meeting a reading soulmate for a discussion about it next week. Over the coming years, I'm confident I'll return to Lepore's book just as frequently as I have Snyder's. What was the last book you finished that you couldn't wait to return to?
"Patriotism is animated by love, nationalism by hatred."
"The nation is often wrong. But so long as protest is possible, it can always be righted."
"Writing national history creates plenty of problems. But not writing national history creates more problems, and those problems are worse."
How do you know which books will have staying power for you? When a book compels me to write down sentence after sentence - as This America did - I know that book will be with me for a long time.
What is your first memory of music that made a lasting impression? What musical memories do you closely associate with certain family members? What place did music have in your home or neighborhood? Much of the research I've been exposed to says lasting musical memories begin building when we're between 12-15 years old. Based on my own life, this rings true. How about for you?
I was fortunate to have two parents who enjoyed music. My father played the ukulele and my mother had a nice singing voice and good ear for harmony. When Dad would play a popular song from the 1930's - the years he and Mom were in that 12–15-year-old range - and my Mother would sing, the songs were unfamiliar to me. But songs like "Embraceable You" or "I Get a Kick Out of You" - and others written years before I was born - occupied a space in my early musical landscape even if they didn't take up as much space as "Where Did Our Love Go", "Surfin USA", or other songs popular when I was an adolescent.Because I've been largely immobilized since returning from Spain in late March, day-to-day routines - by necessity - have since shifted. Included in that shift has been an insane competition with Rhodes Scholar and ex-President Bill Clinton. First, a little background.
Some time back, my wife heard or read somewhere that Clinton gets to genius every time he plays Spelling Bee. Soon after, she and I occasionally added Spelling Bee to our post-dinner ritual, i.e., the joint completion of Wordle, Strands, Connections and other games that can often be finished in a reasonable amount of time. On the nights we were foolish or ambitious enough to add Spelling Bee, I would joke that she was "gen" and I was "ius" whenever the two of us managed to get to Clinton's purported "every time" genius level. Fast forward now to late March and my lingering immobility.
With lots of time to myself - including a ten-day stretch when my wife was at her sister's - little out-of-the-house activity, an inability to sit for long stretches to play guitar, and interrupted sleep patterns, reading and writing dominated my waking hours for the first several days after our return from Spain. Then somewhere around the first week of April, my over-the-top competitive instinct combined with Clinton's reputation as a Spelling Bee genius kicked in. Word and/or game nerds who have spent frustrating hours with Spelling Bee might be able to predict how that time-sucking vortex - disguised as a harmless pastime - has since obsessed me. For those wise enough to have avoided ever being infuriated by Spelling Bee, skip the next paragraph, my open letter to Mr. Genius.
Dear Mr. President: Before uncovering both of today's pangrams - which you had to do to earn your everyday genius badge - did you even know "vincible" was a word? Did you use "hints" today? Do you ever use hints? Does Hillary ever assist you when playing Spelling Bee? How often? If she does, do you count those days when you reach genius with her help as your own or ... do you not count them at all or ... do you give her the gen or the ius? Last question Mr. Genius: On average, how many hours of serious torture does it take before you reach genius?
The last time I can recall being as seriously derailed by words as I've now been for a few weeks was in September 2011, soon after the notorious bagel store affair. Back then, following my first and only lifetime arrest, anagrams and palindromes tromped through my sleepless brain for weeks. See the link at the bottom for a blog post published soon after the impulsive act that ended up costing me over $4000.00 that year and helped thrust me into word misery for weeks. This current battle between obscure blogger and genius ex-President is thankfully unconnected to any rash act but has been no less consuming. This time it's my temporary homebound condition that has me endlessly shuffling seven letters in varying combinations for hours at a time until reaching that puerile but satisfying "I got genius" message. Alas, I suspect I'm spending more hours getting there than the genius who once occupied the White House.
Reflections from the Bell Curve: Back (Mostly) From Anagram Land
For more than forty years, my rationale for not re-watching movies - even those I loved the first time - was straightforward. I didn't want to spend hours in a redundant passive state. Such can be the curse of a goal-driven person. I don't claim to have never wasted precious hours re-watching an old favorite but it was rare and I was never tempted to purchase videocassettes just to have a standby on hand.
Having more hours to myself after leaving the full-time work world as well as having a daughter in the film industry were two factors that moved me toward abandoning my longstanding resistance to re-watching movies. But the single factor that most persuaded me that re-watching films could be a productive use of my time was a deepening appreciation for the art of screenwriting. As I re-watched more movies, I began to see the way that first-rate screenwriting could help me as an aspiring writer, perhaps as much as great literature can. And I saw a clear link between how the concision of a great script contributes to movie magic and how a similar concision could aid me in my blog. Of course, it's possible I've simply constructed a neat rationalization for spending more time in front of a screen. But I don't think so.
When I recently re-watched The Man in the Moon (1991) for the first time since its theatrical release, the words of the perfectly realized script landed for me in a profoundly different way than they did thirty-five years ago. As the closing credits rolled, one thought wouldn't let me go. There was not a single false note in this coming-of-age film. Was Director Robert Mulligan's artistry on display? Without question. Were the central performances - including Reese Witherspoon in her film debut - nearly flawless? They were.
But without the words of screenwriter Jenny Wingfield, all the other important elements that made this an extraordinary experience - twice - might have added up to a less satisfying whole. I may not improve as a writer having now been witness to Wingfield's words, twice. On the other hand, how can exposing myself more than once to her kind of artistry hurt me as a writer?
In grammar school I really enjoyed geography, which in my day was a subset of social studies. Remember that boomers? I don't recall ever telling peers that geography turned me on, probably because back then it wasn't considered a cool subject. Still, looking back it's easy for me to trace a clear line from my childhood enjoyment of geography to my adult interest in other cultures, my love of travel, and many of the quirky projects I've initiated throughout my life, like trying to sample the cuisine of as many countries in the world as possible.
Where my enduring interest in geography and my quirkiness intersect is in a post full-time work habit I've dubbed Atlas riffing. When this habit will take control of me is not predictable, though books and movies are inclined to set me off. If a book or a film takes place in some unfamiliar locale, off the shelf comes my Atlas. So far, so good, right? I'm curious where in the world a story is taking place. I suspect many of you bookworms and film buffs might do something similar, perhaps with your phones.
But once I step inside my Atlas, all bets are off. At that point, any casual observer watching you scrolling your phone vs. me Atlas riffing would clearly know which of us needs medication. I've lost count how many times over the past sixteen years I've riffed in that Atlas for several hours, bouncing from page to page like a deranged, happy pinball, all the while making fevered, frequently inscrutable annotations. On occasion, my Atlas riffing has gotten way out of hand in circumstances unconnected to books or films. For example, when mention is made of a less familiar country in casual conversation while I'm at home, it's difficult to suppress my immediate desire to grab the Atlas, which occupies a prominent place in the reference section of our over-stuffed bookshelves. If I do succumb, I try not to be rude via limiting my riffing time; sometimes I succeed. I also try not to appear obsessed while doing so. Another work in progress.
Which quirky habit will you confess here? What got you started down that particular quirky road? Can you trace a line - as I have - from your current quirkiness to an interest developed early in life?
