Staying in the Comfort Zone

Tags

critical thinking, philosophy, psychology, the human mind, worldviews

Time for confession time again. This one is a doozy, so sit down and be prepared. Oh, wait, don’t think it’s something awful, just dumb sounding.

When I was in my first year of law school, exams were terrorizing. This was a new realm and the usual rules didn’t apply. Law exams are unlike any other really, since absolutely different and opposed answers can both be correct. It’s all in the analysis. Critical thinking remember?

So, I’ve finished a brutal exam in property. I’m walking out, down the sidewalk, heading to car or whatever, when I hear behind me folks discussing question four. I start to hear an answer that has nothing to do with what I wrote.

I panic, and begin an ever growing nanananananananana, hoping to stamp out the voices behind me. My motto is and was, never discuss with another a test that is over. It can only upset you, and you can do nothing about it.

My point, is that we are all very guilty a lot of the time, in deliberately blocking out information if it conflicts with what we take for granted as true. The degree to which we succumb, is directly proportional to how dearly we need to believe what we have up to then believed. We stop investigating too soon, and turn to justifying our position.

In this we err badly it seems to me, and as I said, we are all guilty to one degree or another. Most of us have the good sense to stop when presented with fairly overwhelming evidence (read most of the world disagrees with us). Some of us do not. This suggests that the reality we have adopted is so important to us that we dare not even think it might be wrong. Bad things happen to those whose trust is wavering.

Yesterday, I was led by link to a disreputable site, but one that is in business as a far right rag. Even the crazier right has never quoted from it as far as I have seen, but it does represent a small fringe belief, and so I dutifully read such swill, if only to see what the other side is using to justify it’s position. And it is not outside the realm of possibility that I might learn something I need to know.

It basically said, that because “some locals” were of a mind to “to think” that the murdered census taker might have stumbled upon a drug lab,  he “might” have been murdered by drug dealers, who “might” be illegals. Illegals meaning people from countries who have come here without benefit of papers, i.e., bad people.

Now that’s a mightily lot of mights, and maybes and thinks, in there. To anyone who thinks at all critically, it is fraught with error, and laughable. I mean it’s not the greatest stretch to think that the man might have stumbled on a moonshine operation up in the mountains, but how likely it is it that Latinos are in charge? In Kentucky? I mean seriously.

What the story points up is not the ludicrousness of the “report” which is utter nonsense to any thinking person, but that someone posted it as “better look at this!”, thinking it evidence that we should have a  more stringent border policy. It is the result, I would argue of the person who is afraid to actually think past their worldview and investigate the truth of other ideas.

We move too quickly often from investigating that which threatens our comfort zone to searching for ANY report that will bolster what we want to be the truth.

It has been said of me, that my faith is weak, in some part because I don’t hold much of anything as written in stone. My faith is strong, but my beliefs are fluid. I try to be open to proofs that take me in new directions, even when it means I must seriously alter my theology. I try, which is why I read a lot of dissonant material,  to read stuff that I know going in won’t agree with what I think. I look for kernels of truth, but sometimes, I admit, I look more for holes I can exploit.

The trick is knowing when to do either. When can you safely set aside what the opposition says as bunk and when are you honor bound to actually pursue their line of thinking? I suspect there are no hard and fast rules here. But I have a few ideas.

1. Be sure to read what you don’t like from time to time. And read the more reputable of that genre. William F. Buckley and William Safire were surely more likely to have truth in some measure that a Michele Malkin will.
2. Pay serious attention to the words being used. Are there lots of “some people” “the folks” and such that it is clear that there are no actual people but a a vague “some.” The writer usually hasn’t researched and so has no idea if there are 3 people are 300. Thus the word “some.” Qualifiers that are wide open make for suspect conclusions.
3. Pay attention how many “ifs” have to be met before you can get from A to F. With each “if” a thing becomes more statistically implausible.
4. How much ad hominem do you find? One report I just read, said that the right wing religious tend to use the word “Darwinist” as if it meant worship of a man and his principles, rather than conscious logical adherence to a well-proven theory of science.
5. How important is it that you’re right? Will you belief system crumble and leave you adrift if it’s not true? It shouldn’t you know. Truth shouldn’t scare people. If it does, then something more psychological is at work than correct thinking.
6. How much of a minority are you in? If it’s great, and especially if you are picking and choosing within a area as to what fits your belief system or not, then beware. You may well be stuck in what you need to believe. Case in point the creationist who picks what science he can accept and what he can’t. Science is science and demonizing any subsection of it means something else is at work.
7. What are the credentials of the source you have chosen? Does the person have any training, education, or long term life experience in the field in question? Are the degrees from diploma mills? Is it difficult to learn of the credentials? Honest specialists usually want you to know these things.

What amused me and caused me to write this, is a little parody that I found on the census taker’s murder. It is every bit as irrational as the first one I told you about, but this one is done as parody and not put forth as explanation. Hopefully, you will see the point.

I’m Part of the Most Destructive Force in America!

Tags

feminism, health care reform, Michele Backmann, Mike Huckabee, Phyllis Schafly, racism, right wing nuttery, Steven King

I can report that there are no swat teams surrounding the meadow and no bull horns calling me to come out with my hands up. I woke up, you see, to find that I am part of the “most destructive force in America.” In a word, I am a feminist.

Indeed, I am the cause of most of societies ills, according to that bastion of rectitude, the ever busy body Phyllis Schafly. (Bet ya thought she had kicked the bucket by now eh?)

Ms. Schafly, who no doubt absolutely would hate the use of Ms., spoke at the “How to Take Back America” conference. Course, that kinda says a lot already, since I think it fair to say that that little phrase is fast becoming code for you know what in America. Plenty of the usual Republinuts, like our own Stephen King, and Michelle Backmann, are attending and offering ways and means as to how to get rid of THAT BLACK MAN.

Ms. Schafly, who regrettably has not stayed home and taken care of hubby and hearth, as she ardently urges other women to do, has determined that most all of America’s ills lay at the doorstep of women who actually want the same options as men in the world. Not to be says Ms. Schafly. According to her, women and their pesky desire for equality account for drugs, illicit sex, abortion, and on and on. All being tied ultimately to fatherless homes, which Ms. Nutcase associates with feminism. Don’t ask me how, I’m not venturing into that bat-heads brain case!

Not to be outdone,  Mikey Huckabee, and Joe (I’m soon to be a Rhodes Scholar) the Plumber were also in attendance. If you think this is just tame Rethuglican posturing, think again. One spokesperson, Kitty Werthmann told her audience that:

If we had our guns, we would have fought a bloody battle. So, keep your guns, and buy more guns, and buy ammunition. […] Take back America. Don’t let them take the country into Socialism. And I refer again, Hitler’s party was National Socialism. […] And that’s what we are having here right now, which is bordering on Marxism.

Yeah, you heard that right. And this is being attended by Mike Huck? Wow, it just goes to show you that the GOP will offer anybody to blame rather than themselves for being out of power, and will engender any kind of hate in order to get back on top.

To be fair, this stuff, along with Huck’s plea that we dump the UN, appeals to varying sorts within the right wing hodgepodge of wingnuttery. Some, as we clearly see are outright racists. Others are mislead and misinformed right wing religious types. They especially like the Schlafly rhetoric for it falls within their self-interpreted beliefs that women should bow to the better abilities of men to run things, both public and private. Equal but different they say. Yeah, and that’s surprisingly a lot like separate by equal if ya recall, and I know you do.

Speaking of which, I keep getting either comments or messages from folks who deny being racists but can’t abide by the President for all sorts of reasons. My answer is always the same: nobody called you one. If you feel you were attacked, then perhaps you better look closer to home, like who’s wearing your clothes. I have said, and I will continue to say that a segment of this anti-Obama stuff is clear racism. Some is just generated by the GOP who catch unawares some of their less stellar intellects in the core religious base. Some, a small number, have real and legitimate arguments to make, and ones we should hear and think about.

Mostly,  no racist wants to think of themselves as such. That’s why quirky ways of reading scripture that let you off the hook are scooped up by the religious right to justify their condemnation of all sorts of good things, like health care reform. I mean, excuse me if I can’t buy the argument that you won’t be for health care reform until somebody shows you where Jesus said government should take care of the poor. I’m not buying that as legit, I’m seeing that as just a nice mask you’ve developed to be greedy and selfish and not have to feel guilty about it.

But, on the other hand, being the source of  most of what’s wrong in America isn’t all bad either. At least I an help take the heat off an embattled president who now has to defend a tiny little grade school somewhere who sang a song about him and how we should all pitch in and help. Fox is up in arms at the “indoctrination” to say nothing of their certifiable maniac Glenn who screams that he has FILM. And of course no mention of the fact that another school did a song of a similar nature about Bush after Katrina. Can you see that there might be a conspiracy of wackos here folks?

By the way, just so you know where I’m coming from: I see Grassley and Huck as purely taking advantage of situations they hope will rebound to their political credit. Grassley for sure knows better but is being pushed mercilessly by his party, dangling the chairmanship of finance before his drooling lips. Huck is trying to position himself as the “moderate” right winger for Iowa in the 2012 primaries. Michelle Backmann and Steven King are true in the blue crazier than aunt Maggie on a good day, believers in the alternative universe they inhabit.

Just sayin’.

It’s America, What Can I Say?

Tags

Entertainment, social mores, TV

The Contrarian and I are TV watchers. Most of you, who read regularly, know that. From 7pm until 10:30 we are watching something.

I say that with a certain mixture of guilt and defiance. I neither condemn nor congratulate those who watch none. There are good reasons for rejecting it in part at least, and good reasons for embracing it, in part at least.

The devil is always in the “in part at least.”

I grew up in the era of when “TV was new.” The earliest shows I recall are Howdy Doody, and Milton Berle. People really did get together to watch these shows, marveling at the technology, although the TV owner spent an overwhelming time fiddling with the aerial, or twisting the dials to bring in the picture and get rid of the snow.

I remember fondly going to my uncles where we saw our first “color” TV, though that was stretching things a bit. Trying to get anything remotely resembling a good blend of red, green and yellow or blue or whatever,  proved interesting especially as to faces, and it seems that no two people were ever satisfied that the tuner had gotten it right.

At some point, concerns started to be heard about the “dangers” of TV. This probably came about about the time that children’s programing (cartoons and such) started to be the norm for Saturdays and then ad agencies realized that there was a dollar to be made in enticing young minds to Kix and Cocoa Puffs as well as toys galore. Then parents began to sit up and take notice a bit.

Still, TV grew into the great “babysitter” of the 60’s and beyond, allowing mom and pop a few extra minutes of sleep on the weekend, as the kids were glued to the sets of America.

Today, we worry about the influence of computers on young minds in much the same way, and in worse ways. Yet, adults feel no guilt by and large about spending vast hours surfing and blogging, Facebooking and twittering, downloading and uploading, photoshoping and of course shopping.

No, we adults are handling the entire thing quite well, thank you.

But this is not about computer time, but about TV. And I merely want to make the point, that while I appreciate and in many ways look up to my friends who don’t watch “it,” I find even the most entertaining of shows worthy of a certain applause from time to time.

I frankly am glad that we are past the days of inane shows about family life in the US. They in no way reflected real life, as we all now know. Bud and Betty and Princess had childish problems and their parents frankly never had a problem worth mentioning. Everybody worked hard, happily, for great bosses, and no body had catastrophic illness or accident to contend with. Nobody had alcohol or drug problems, nobody divorced. It was all happy, and we thought that was how it was supposed to be. But we need only look around the living room, our living rooms to see that we were dysfunctional by comparison. We of course would change all that when we “grew up” and set up our own lives.

So I like the more real lives of the characters around today. One of my favorites is Mad Men. Life in the 50’s in a bigger type ad agency in NYC. Men in charge, women mostly being what they are supposed to be, mothers and supporters of men. Everyone smokes, and a lot. A hint of a gay man, but closeted, still nearly to himself, trying frantically to be “normal.”

The sets and clothing and accoutrements are exquisitely done. I have not found a single error. But of more import are the ways of thinking, the assumptions about life that our characters speak and think out loud. These do provide us with moments of real reflection on where we have come from and what we have learned.

Case in point: last show the  British owners are visiting the agency. An afternoon party is in swing with plenty of champagne. This gives the usual license for secretaries and ad men to drink too much and flirt. A secretary climbs about a John Deere lawn tractor (signifying a new account landed) and begins running down the aisle when she loses control, somehow engages the blades, and runs over the feet of a Brit ad man.

Fast forward to the hospital, where a vigil is in place. The doctors have notified that the injured man will require amputation of one foot. He will live however. The ensuing conversation is insane:

“Well, he was the best ad mad in all of England. I don’t know as how we’ll replace him.”

“Too bad, the poor guy will never walk again.”

“He’ll never be able to play golf again.”

“Such a wonderful career now over.”

I begin to frown and then it erupts. “What????” They are acting like he’s going to be confined to a nursing home for life now. Why does this end his career? Ever heard of prosthetics? I mean they had those even in the 50’s for God’s sake!”

But you see the real idea behind this? In the 50’s we did indeed tie physical defect with mental defect. A broken body cannot do the mental work of a solid healthy body.  People in wheel chairs don’t contribute to society, they are it’s beneficiaries. We take care of those poor unfortunates.

How far we have come. How far must we still go? We would no more think that an accident would end a career of an ad man that think that the moon is really made of cheese today. Perhaps this bodes well for some of the social issues we contend with today. Will we look as silly to our grand kids as we think of those that thought that a physical disability meant the end of a productive life in the 50’s?  I don’t know but I hope it does.

Our National Shame

Tags

free clinics, health care reform, infant mortality rates, religious right, Republicans, tort reform

There is another of those free health care clinics being conducted in MeriKa today. This one in Houston. It is a one day affair, unlike the last one in Los Angeles which went over four days, and saw some four thousand people.

This one will hope to see two thousand. As is the norm, no questions are asked, if you appear you will be treated. Unless of course, you are too far back in the line. These clinics always turn away people, running in the end, out of that precious commodity, time.

This is our national shame. The same organized groups that used to go over seas to do this in third world countries, now stay home, because where health care is concerned, MeriKa is a third world country.

I’m not a big fan of anecdotal stories, since one can be found for virtually every point anyone would care to make, but I thought this was apropos. The first person in line for the Houston clinic is a woman. She is employed as a school teacher. She has seven children.  Her health insurance premiums rose from $800 per month to $900. That was her straw that broke the camel’s back. She had to drop her insurance, no longer able to afford it and still feed the kids and pay the bills. This is her option.

Imagine, a fully employed person, working in a white collar job, unable to afford health insurance?

The National Coalition on Health Care estimates:

• Nearly 18% of the population under65 is without health care insurance. That figure comes from the US Census bureau. Other indicators place the figure near 27%.
• It is expected that 7 million more will lose their insurance through job loss between now and 2010. If unemployment reaches 10%, that figure will more that double.
• 85% are natural or naturalized citizens.
• Eight in ten of the uninsured come from working families.
• While inflation raises at the rate of 2.5% health insurance premiums have risen at 12%.
• It is estimated that 22,000 people die as a direct result of lack of health insurance each year.

Half of all bankruptcies in America are due to health care costs, usually from catastrophic illness.

One of the reasons I mentioned the story of the women scheduled to be the first patient today in Houston is this: The ultra right tends to argue that all we really need to do to bring down costs in health care, is do tort reform. This of course, is always tied to that Republican truth that is really a lie, that benefits seen by the economic giants “trickle” down to the little guy in terms of lower costs.

Balderdash as they say. Texas did indeed pass massive tort reform, capping awards for pain and suffering at $250,000 and massively reducing lawsuits. But health care costs haven’t gone down, and in fact Texas is home to three of the most expensive cities in America to get health care.

Moreover, experts claim that reducing tort claims only affects health care costs to the tune of a mere 2.5%, not nearly enough to make a significant difference.

Of course, this and more about the abominable state of heath care in this country is known to most of us. That is why we are so passionate about changing the system and making health care a right, not a privilege. Every single human has a right to basic health care, period. No argument.

Yet the fringe right continues to bellyache. Some of it is misplaced hatred of all things Obama. Everyone admits that. The birther and deather arguments aren’t rational, and no self-respecting conservative will have anything to do with them. They decry their hidden racist agenda, as do we all.

Others are just looking and finding, (sometimes by misuse of the Bible) reasons why this section of the uninsured, or that section shouldn’t receive health care.  The “lazy,” usually distilled from corrupted passages in Paul and Timothy, are not to be treated for free.  Nor are immigrants. Nor are those who seek treatments that some portion of the citizenry find objectionable to their religious beliefs. All this finely masks, I would argue, at least some who really are just trying to keep what is theirs theirs. Just selfishness. “I worked for mine, and you should too.”

What I find ironic are those that argue that public health care will end up serving those women who seek abortions. Thus, public options must be fought against. I find it ironic, because in opposing health care for those without it, they fail to remember this ugly vile statistic: America is tied at the bottom of all industrialized countries in terms of infant mortality figures.

Yes, we are in the company of Hungary, Malta, Poland, and Slovakia. Canada, Britain, Australia, France, Sweden, and on and on, come out ahead of us. This is a national shame, this is absurd, it is immoral in the ultimate sense.

Yet the right wing religious continue to scream about abortion, an undoubtedly horrid outcome we all hate, while turning a deaf ear to universal health care which SAVES babies lives. It is illogic in full-blown glory. Is it any wonder that normal people question the motives of these people?

Meanwhile, as I am writing this I see a CBS poll that asked self-named Republicans what they thought about the Republican “Just say no” to health care reform. Forty-three percent claimed it was politics and nothing more ( Rethug politicians thus having no interest at all in the public well being). And forty-nine percent said that such opposition was not helpful and not right. So perhaps there is hope still.

New Beginnings

Tags

Babylonian exile, creation story, Genesis, Priestly tradition

As I’ve mentioned, the last couple of weeks have been filled with Genesis for me. A deep immersion in the first creation story, looked at through several different lens, produces a story that only adds to my awe and wonder at those who constructed this amazing text.

For at least two hundred years, it has been well known that Genesis, as part of the Pentateuch, is the product of many hands, but especially there are four traditions represented, the Yahwist which is oldest, the Elohist, the Deuteronomist, and the Priestly. The Priestly tradition was constructed after the exile, in other words between the 6th and 5th centuries BCE. It is believed that the P constructed the framework of the Pentateuch, i.e., worked out the placement of the various stories from oral traditions that had reached near final polishing in written form.

Thus, it is hard to assign a “writer” to any portion of the creation story of Genesis, other than the generic “P” appellation. Still, it is  nearly impossible not to be suitably impressed by the high level of theological development evidenced by the tradition as well as the high intelligence exhibited. It denotes, in utter fairness, something that can be rightly called “inspiration,” a imprimatur of sorts given by God, that indeed, there is something very basically true and right about what is said.

Of course, this cannot be taken too far. The stories were never meant, it is believed, to provide any kind of actual factual historical evidence of the how of creation. John Paul II very famously alluded to that some years ago when he said, “The bible is not meant to tell us how heaven was created, but how to get there.”  Of first importance was the why of creation, and more important yet, the who of creation. It is a story of Creator creating creature as Walter Brueggemann suggests.

I have heard others say that there is “proof” of the first creation account being factual, in that it agrees with present historical evidence produced by both astronomy and evolutionary theory about the stages of creation. A simple reading of the passages Gen 1-2:4a belies this conclusion. It also tends to disprove the oft pushed theory that God creates ex nihilo.

The beginning includes an initial something, not nothing. There is a darkness over the face of the waters. The waters are dangerous and chaotic. God brings light first. Recalling that the exiles at this time are in Babylon, faced with many local deities some of which are sun and moon, the Priestly source is quick to dispel that at least the sun is the source of light. No God is, and creates this first. Darkness existed and God pushes back the darkness and harnesses it, locating it apart from day. He creates a dome which serves as the firmament, (actually a metal domed or hammered bowl) to separate the waters into those below and those above the dome. This of course is something rather odd, and frankly is in opposition to the second creation story.

In the minds of the ancients, the earth was thought to be a flatten disk. So the waters are harnessed and located around the edges of the disk on the third day, and dry land appears. God then creates vegetation. And it is clear that there are no meat eaters, either animal or human considered at this point. All are to live in harmony. Only after this does God create the stars, and specifically the sun and moon, though they are deliberately left unnamed to further make it plain they have no power themselves.

Following this sea creatures (plants were not considered “life” as such by the ancients), birds and finally mammals. Then of course humankind is created. God speaks directly to humans in their creation, whereas he has not spoken to any other created thing.

Of great curiosity is the use of the plural. “Let us make,” “in our image.” Much is made of the word,  image. It seems that God meant more than to make us in his spiritual image, yet we accept today that God is not corporeal, but Spirit. Some scholars suggest that we are more akin to to a likeness of God in the sense of a statue in the realm when the king cannot be there. Man (generic human) is God’s representative on earth. Yet the us, our usage, denotes that while we are like God, we are also not like God, or the image at best is blurred.

The concept of God in a council of gods is not new, nor not uncommon in the Bible. There is reference in one of the psalms to the “council of gods.” While by the time of the Priestly tradition, monotheism seemed well formed, there was still a recognition of their being other gods, they were just subject at best to Yahweh-Elohim. The Hebrew Testament is replete with references to these gods, and to proving of course that Yahweh was vastly more powerful.

The redactor masterfully creates from the known writings and oral stories a perfect fit for those who were now coming out of exile, but who had been divorced from an Israelite state for generations. This powerful story explains that no matter their life experiences in Babylon, they can trust that God is the true source of everything that is, and commands all the forces of nature and life. God gives fertility, light, food, and all else. People are reminded that their God, the God of the Exodus, has from the beginning made an irrevocable covenant and that they are still his chosen. And most importantly they are reminded that all happens by God’s will, which cannot be overcome. Thus, their exile, was part of a greater plan, and signals no abandonment by God.

These lessons have and do resonate down to us today. It is essential that we not get bogged down in archaic and simplistic explanations of creation and miss the true import of the work. It establishes forevermore the creator-creating-creation format. It makes crystal clear the closeness of this relationship, and the appropriate location and response of God to creature and creature to God. Covenant is established and cannot be broken by human error, for God is gracious, and has given his “good” to his creation.

Humans are understood to stand in the stead for God as his representative. And since God’s response to creation is loving, gracious, forgiving, and so forth, so must ours be to that which we are responsible for–the earth and all it contains. In this short but hugely packed section, we see the entire import of how we relate to one another, to all life, and to our God. We obey in gracious acceptance, willingly as images of the Creator.

One cannot help,  no matter the difficulties in assigning authorship to a specific person, which we cannot, in concluding that the theological conclusions of the final redactor were indeed inspired by God. With huge intellectual powers, overlaid with a genuine radical openness to God, the writer manages to set down truths that are still revered and honored, and deeply believed some 2500 years later.

While, the creation story 2 will in some ways contradict or bring tension to this theological frame, it will provide it’s own inspired conclusions that are every bit as valid and rich today.

I have not even begun to do the text justice of course. One could write a hundred pages and in some sense one would still merely have touched the surface of the impact of this opening gambit. I mean only to convey some of the sense of wonder I am swirling in these days, as I revisit some old analysis, and gain new visions of God’s awesome relationship with us the created being.

It’s the Caffeination, Stupid!

Tags

60's, cabbage, caffeine, Casseroles, divorce, Entertainment, gay marriage, incest, Mackenzie Phillips, Mamas and Papas, Music, Recipes, sausage, slow cooker, Steven King

“Boy, you sure made the coffee strong this morning, dear.” This as I yawn and peer through lidded eyes at GMA. “I don’t know that it’s any different that usual,” the great one replies.

“Well it was falling out of the grinder when I lifted off the top, so I knew it was gonna be strong,” smiling weakly. I saw a look of “oops” fall across his face. “Ummm, perhaps that was mine.” Mine being the caffeinated stuff, which I have long since abandoned as making me too wired, and upsetting my delicate digestive mechanism.

An hour later, I have completed my walk in record time, and am deeply ensconced in Genesis, trying to see the myriad differences between creation story one and creation story two. My mind is flying, reeling really among the possibilities, and now, I’m really not sure at all what “made in the image of” means.

I have the urge to write, yet know, I’m not nearly ready to tackle THAT topic. I start in the Google reader, skimming the stories, vaguely aware that I am looking for a few in particular, stories I want to consider. I make the mistake to visit Randal’s L’ennui melodieux. Not knowing French, I still have no idea what that means, though the word l-ennui is vaguely familiar. In any case, I don’t recommend that site when in a full-blown caffeine mania. I actually understood his post “Naked in front of the Computer.”

You see, I almost never understand Randal’s posts, which takes nothing away from the fact that mostly they are brilliant. He is writing as art personified. Like Justice Black, I can’t define it, but I know it when I see it.

With that post, I realized that my mind, going off in several directions at the same time, could not focus on one issue long enough to write a post about. Thus you get the hodgepodge of trivial and snappy snapshots of reality. At least my reality. The human brain is exceptional in it’s ability to hold, simultaneously, several thoughts at once, some of them in direct and obvious logical opposition (witness the fundamentalist mind –if you can call it that–which is required to do that 24/7–but no we are NOT going there again. I’m looking for a treatment for THAT addiction as well.)

Moving right along, switching gears, about facing, and other metaphors that come to mind. I always obsess happily about our utterly infamous and undoubted resident wing nut Stephen King, R-IA, (may God forgive us our sins). He is always good for a profoundly stupid remark. Yesterday he was quoted as saying that the best vote he ever made in the House was his nearly singular opposition to Katrina aid. Imagine that. Today he is quoted as saying that gays marriage is a “purely socialist concept.” No even, I with my high-speed brain cells this morning, don’t care to get into the ugly morass of a mind that could concoct such bull-crap. Be my guest. Read more here.

***

Meanwhile, spinning on a dime, and managing quite well, thank you, not to fall. . . over, I present a recipe. This time of year one’s thoughts turn to slow cookers and comfort food, and this is definitely that.

One can imagine doing all sorts of outdoorsy things, like planting fall mums, raking leaves, (yeah right) and coming inside for cocoa (yeah right) and taking in the wafts of yummy meaty goodness slowly melding together in the crock pot.

If such thoughts are yours too, and no doubt they are, then let your fingers do the walking over to Baking Delights and pick up the recipe for Slow Cooker Red Cabbage and Sausage.

***

With all due and I do mean due, respect to our tinfoily friends on the extreeeemmmme right, one of their oft cited, but never explained objections to gay marriage is that it will “destroy the sanctity of marriage.”

Well, yes, but, exactly what do that mean Mable? Nothing much it seems, but dang it sounds good. Words can, it seems, be put together in nice sounding ways that appear to point to deep thought, when in fact they bespeak no sense at all.

In other words, ya can’t destroy what don’t exist! And according to recent statistics,Die vorce is alive and well and on the climb and not, repeat NOT in the states that allow same sexers to marry.

Of deeper concern, since I live here, is a recent poll, (saw it I swear but have dumped the site already) in Iowa, that showed that something like 92% of Iowans don’t feel,  so far, threatened in their marriage because of Iowa’s new marriage decree that allows same sex wedding bliss. I can testify as well, that so far, I’ve not been hounded by lesbians wanted to “hook up” nor has the Contrarian been solicited by hoards of men wanting to cuddle behind the tractor. Nope, hasn’t happened. Course this will do nothing to stem the gasps and horror among the “bible told me so” folk.

***

And the winner in the category “gag me with a spoon” is. . . . Mackenzie Phillips and her revelations that “Dad and me were lovers!”

Now, it’s hard to know who to blame for all this. I’m inclined to blame the druggin’, which I understand was beyond the pale, over and above, topped out, even the Stones can’t come close to these folks in over indulgence.

The Contrarian recalls reading where Cass showed up in the Caribbean somewhere with a quart jar of acid one vacation time. These are seriously f**ked up people.

One could of course simply blame dad for all this, but really, Mack admits she was nineteen, yes you heard that right, at the time of the first incestuous meeting, and AND it continued for a record ELEVEN years. I’d say she is somewhat complicit? This doesn’t make any of it other than sordid, wrong, abusive, and a host of other things, but lordly, it sure taints any desire to hear “California Dreamin’ ” any time soon don’t it?

***

Yeah, I know, you wish I would go on and never stop, but hey, I can’t feed your addiction all day long ya know. I hear one of the big pharmaceutical companies, Pfizer perhaps is working on a drug to wean ya off me. If I can get a cut of the that action, I’ll gladly add my opposition to the Democratic health care reform movement. Greed does trump the common good. I can be bought! But you knew that already. Blessings, and well, I’m off to rain caffeine craziness upon the rest of my household.

Autumnal Moments in Time

Tags

autumn, essay, Iowa, life in the meadow

If I haven’t mentioned it lately, life is hectic. Our library re-opening is Sunday, and there is a flurry of e-mails zipping back and forth as we get things together. Months of work are nearing fruition. Hundreds of books cataloged and stamped, filed and stacked.

We were blessed with a huge donation from a past rector who died, leaving us a significant portion of his home library. So many amazing books. I never knew him, but I’m told his teaching was awesome and filled with learning opportunities. His books, I know are beyond compare. I have a few of them myself, but saw literally dozens I can barely wait to read.

Speaking of which, I’m reading a ton of things. My EFM class is on Genesis and I’m steeped in various biblical scholars. The amazing talents of those ancient people continue to literally blow me away. Such beautifully constructed theological formulae. There is a pastoral richness that is breathtaking.

Add to that the now more common unsolicited books being sent to me by publishers to be read and reviewed, and the gift of a lifetime, a dear blogging friend has sent his manuscript to me for reading and comment. Lucky am I indeed, though more hours in the day would be appreciated.

As I walked the meadow today, I paid close attention to the changes. I’m not sure the average city or suburban dweller notices what is common to us. The subtleties are probably lost on them. They notice that the mornings are darker, the air a bit chillier, and a few leaves are across the lawn.

For us countrified folks the changes are big. The fields are drying out. Van Gogh would be proud to paint the bean fields. Swaths of yellow, bits of green, and sandy browns interweave in a mosaic of infinite complexity and impressionistic colors blending and swirling as they dance across the acres.

The corn fields are mostly a bit behind, the browning is confined mostly to the lower halves, while the green still holds command of the tops. Everything else? You would call them weeds, we just call them grass. Grass such as we have, not mown nor groomed, just wildly growing in dizzy and disjointed patches.

These grasses are of varying types and size, shape and color. They dance to their own tunes as it were. Some are seeding, many have already. They are black or near black, seeds long dispersed. Some have heads that are delicate feathery fingers with tiny seed swaying on the tips. Where only a couple of weeks ago, field yellow daisies danced in the breeze, today are browned, dried heads, awaiting the moment to be right when they can burst forth and send forth their collection of future hope.

Then there are the new daisies, tiny, floribundas of white with tiny yellow faces. Only a few inches high, they high light the fence. The clover is still bright green, their seeding duties long past. A single stalk of goldenrod stands stately in its loneliness here and there. Yellow is the theme of fall.

The birds are quiet or quieter. No more bright praises of the summer do they sing. Now it is all business. Either the business of preparing for a winter in the meadow or preparing for the trip south. They practice in formations, calling and directing, teaching and renewing flying pal acquaintances. The new must be readied for their first trip. They are not nearly as curious of humans as before.

Evidence of the usual movement of animals is always to be seen. The deer move up and down the lane nightly, leaving tracks that signify buck from doe and doe from little one. They too are preparing, the males starting to feel the stirring in loins long dormant from pleasure. The young are unsure, aware that change is coming, but what that entails they as yet have no idea. Nervous must define them, as they sometimes get caught unawares in the field and scurry for cover in the slues, sleeping the day away hopefully safe.

It’s been dry as a bone for a couple of weeks, and everything is covered with a fine film of granite sand, powdery dust. It covers the box that sits near the road, concession to delivery trucks. My books usually are left there. No fear of stealing, the car has sat there all summer, now covered in dust, with the keys laying on the floor. No one touches these things but the creatures that poke and prod from curiosity.

Raccoon paws abound on surfaces. Nosy little bandits, waddling. I name them all Ricky. A new generation inevitably takes its chances in the meadow, and the old guy, Bear, continues to kill off a fair share, not allowing the  female to come near for a day or two, then turning over possession. Archaeologists will wonder indeed at all the bones, wondering what these people did with hedgehogs, coons, possums and rabbits. We nary ate a one, and except for the rabbits neither did the dogs. Deer are another issue. We both gnaw on venison, raw in their case, cooked in ours.

At night the coyotes howl. Mostly the youngsters being kicked from the teet. Angry, frightened, nervous, excited, they sing in the meadow and cause the dogs to howl warnings in return. It is autumn. We are tightening down, winding down, tucking in.

 It will soon be cold, miserable, wet, unforgiving days of snow and sliding off roads. We will cry out in anger at it all, swear it’s never been so miserable, so cold, so snowy. We will claim we can’t take it any more. That is what is in store, but today, it is still autumn, taunting us of warmth still lingering, sun still brightening, breezes still southerly. Quietly let it sink within your bones, for it is fleeting. Peacefully let it seep deep to sustain in the months to come. The sabbath cometh.