Ringing it out

In White Plains, typical scenes. Great sibling togetherness after Michigan goes down to Texas Christian in a hard-fought national semi-final game at the Fiesta Bowl. Then the forks come out. First Rob insists that the leftovers be put in the fridge though Mary likes them left out in anticipation of her late night snack. Then Rob says something about how foolish Mary was to have washed Graham's backpack because the cats had peed on it ("I couldn't smell anything.") and Mary goes off on him. Ah family.

Outside it is blustery but mild for this time of year. There was zero visibility out the window when we landed at LaGuardia till our wheels touched down. Gotta love that modern technology.

All in all, a decent way to ring out 2022. It was a dramatic year in some ways, in others it was just nature taking its course. Mary Lee left us, but she had had a good long life and had for some time been having a range of pain and discomfort, so at least that's done. And in the end it seems like her passing could have been much worse. 

The markets went down, but we knew they had to so that's no big shock. People traveled around and saw loved ones and the world. 2023 will be the year China works though its own exit pains.

Certainly we could have done without the war in Ukraine. Putin is an ass of world-historical proportions, and it's not clear who might come after him who would be better. Navalny could be, but that ain't happening.

What will be next, we'll see starting tomorrow.

Attacks on civilians tend to backfire

As Putin attempts to bomb Ukrainians into frozen submission by destroying their utilities during winter, I am reminded of an important and unexpected point from Humankind, a book by Rutger Bregman that Natalie suggested for me and which turns out to have been recommended to her by Rob. Turns out that attempts to bomb civilians into submission never work, they only serve to bring people together and make them more resilient. Indeed, Putin himself might think back to Russia's own greatest moments of triumph, Napoleon's 1812 retreat, the 900-day siege of Leningrad, etc. That is in fact how the steel is tempered.

In the west, we need to be careful we don't do something similar with our economic sanctions. Thus far we haven't crippled Russia economically. Instead, we seem to have hardened the interdependence of Russia and China, or rather Russia's dependence on China. Geostrategically the most dangerous thing to have happened recently may well have been Xi Jinping's visit to Saudi Arabia a few weeks back. If the Saudis start falling more within China's sphere of influence and shipping oil to China settled in yuan rather than dollars, that erodes the dollar's primacy as global reserve currency, one of the key components of our economic standing. 

If we end up isolating ourselves on the world stage with only the EU -- the world's largest theme park and luxury manufacturer -- as an ally, things get tougher. The Global South has already showed us it doesn't care that much about one set of white people invading another, largely because we don't get worked up when people of color who don't own oil invade one another. The world is complex and we need to keep that in mind.

The Problem of McPhee's Poetics

In his 1929 book The Problem of Dostoevsky's Poetics Mikhail Bakhtin focuses on Dostoevsky's practice of hiding his voice behind those of his characters. In Dostoevsky for the first time in Western Art, he tells us, the author builds full and robust points of view for characters who disagree with one another and even the author. After all, it is the vignette of the grand inquisitor which is the most famous and remembered part of The Brothers Karamazov -- but that's Ivan speaking there, the antipode of Dostoevsky's favorites (Alyosha and Zosima). And so on in other books.

Making my way towards the end of John McPhee's 1977 book about Alaska, Coming Into the Country, I am struck by how much the same thing could be said of McPhee. He spends tons of time in the wilds with hardcore libertarian gold miners and other back country survivalists who are very keen to share their opinions of matters various and sundry, first and foremost the American government and its lack of business in the wilds of Alaska. He is a faithful transcriber of long monologues of their disquisitions, without ever tipping his hand as to his opinion of what they say. In some sense I suppose one might say his is just a good journalist if the transition from dialogue (or monologue, as the case may be) to description and anecdote were not so sculpted.

In fact, one facet of McPhee's character's speeches is how implausibly verbatim they are. It's possible he might have taped people speaking, but highly unlikely, given that it was the 70s when he wrote this and often he is in a canoe or a loud truck or plane when the conversation is said to take place. At times the characters' rambling are so long and verbose as to be as implausible as the dialogues of Knausgaard. So that the characters in fact are voices in McPhee's chorus of types, but the author is as if away on vacation.

Christmas update

We had a lovely holiday. As my main present to Mary, I planned, shopped for and cooked both Christmas Eve dinner (nian gao with pork) and Christmas dinner proper (seared duck break with a blackberry sauce, rosti, and roast vegetables). Natalie made an awesome carrot cake. I made and maintained a fire, no mean feat itself given that my main fuel is limbs that have come down in the backyard and the park, many of which aren't perfectly cured just yet and which are just smaller than cut wood. I could of course order up some cut wood, and it would be nice to see Scott Jens when he delivers it, but there's less sport in that.

This year I got fewer presents than ever: only a Patagonia fleece vest to supplement my Eddie Bauer one which is my current winter omnigarment, but which has had a whole worn in its inner pocket over years (a decade?) of wear. I had ordered the new one weeks before Christmas but didn't open it so that Mary could give it to me as a present. The anticipation was killing me. Natalie correctly noted that wearing it made me even more of a finance bro, but if a professional uniform clan is soft, comfortable and affordable, what's not to like?

I also ordered a new desk lamp from Walmart (at Wirecutter's recommendation) that hasn't gotten here yet. The wait is making it so much sweeter. Natalie also brought us a nice chocolate bar and a lovely Christmas ornament from Alaska. But I got no books, which is totally fine because I already have so many.

My final present to Mary is to get Marvin over here to do some painting, a task which requires some attention.

Anyhoo, all in all it was a fine day. Mom came over and seemed to appreciate the whole thing, including the fire. Also the fact that Graham and Natalie have each gone over to spend an afternoon with her this week, when she is stuck around her apartment getting over a fractured patella and a broken wrist. 

Shark Smile

 Last night Natalie had some friends over and they stayed kinda late. They were loud and just downstairs from our bedroom, so I needed to kill time in my study before heading to bed. Soccer has only half started back since the World Cup, so there was none of that to watch, except some old highlights from back in the day (France-Brazil 2006, with Ronaldo, Ronaldinho, Zidane, Kaka, Roberto Carlos, Thierry Henry, Patrick Viera, Frank Rivery and a few others. I did watch that and -- in the end -- I remembered watching the goal live all those years ago, a perfect pass from a free kick from Zidane to Henry that he volleyed into the roof of the net in an historic moment of perfection [Indeed, a few minutes of research shows that I blogged about that game in this post]).

But once the soccer was done, I had to move on to music, and I saw a Josh Turner video of him on the beach with one of the women he collaborates with often, doing a Big Thief song I hadn't heard before: "Shark Smile." I listened and liked it, so I decided to check out Big Thief doing it and, perhaps not shockingly, I was quite taken with it. Big Thief is a special band. Adrienne Linker, the lead singer, is a genius songwriter and a rare anomaly, someone who to hear her speak one would think was amongst the more fragile on the planet, but nonetheless able to front a rock band. She can both roar and squeak.

"Shark Smile" captivates in a rare way. It fits well into the tradition of car wreck songs going back to Dorsey Dixon's "Wreck on the Highway." I'd be very interested to hear Springsteen's take on it. 

After listening to a few versions I felt like I owed them some money, so I went to their merch store. I remembered that I needed long-sleeve T-shirts, as my current quiver is worn out from pandemic work from home overuse. So I bought one.

Home for the holidays

After a pretty arduous day which involved getting up at 3:45 to be on a 5amish flight from Juneau to Seattle but also being at Denver International late in the day (Denver was one of the airports with the most cancelled flights) Natalie made it home, albeit at around 1am. All good.

The press has made a big deal out of how many flights have been cancelled. The Journal for instance this morning trumpeted the fact that 6,000 flights had been cancelled since Wednesday.

But how many flights are there each day in the United States. Google tells me that there are about 100,000 of them, so 6,000 over three days is about 2%. The fact that a lot of these flights were out of specific airports (Denver and O'Hare, so probably also Midway) makes for some good photo ops. But it doesn't mean that the actual scale of disruption has been so awful. As always, if it bleeds it leads, and the business of American media is corralling eyeballs, attracting attention above all else. 

Skill vs luck in parenting

Graham went out to Linda's Bar for trivia night and got his traditional pink lemonade, which gave Mary and me a good chuckle, as it always does. At the age of 19 we were most certainly not getting pink lemonade at bars. To top it off, afterwards -- as I could tell by looking at his bank account transactions today -- he went to Insomnia Cookies, presumably for a warm chocolate chip one.

Mary and I often reflect on our good fortune as reflected in the children we have raised. Each of them has done well in school and, much more importantly, turned out to be a really fine young person.

Others are more likely to credit us with having done a good job to raise such nice kids. It is harder for the two of us to climb onto that wagon, though I must admit that we have both tried hard to do the footwork of being good parents: being home a lot, going on on family vacations, making the visiting of grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins integral to our way of life, etc. We've also striven to keep our tempers in check for the most part. Mary thinks I get bent out of shape when I am stuck in traffic and, while she is not altogether wrong, she doesn't understand how much better my temper is than my dad's, so I am a huge improvement on my baseline.

Of course, if I had truly done a better job raising Graham, he would have thought to buy his dad one of those delicious chocolate chip cookies last night at Insomnia. So there is clearly room for improvement.

On prayer

My cousin's husband has been fighting off some form of cancer, I'm pretty sure it's a leukemia because he's had a couple of bone marrow transplants (my inability to keep track of people's specific cancers is another topic altogether -- generally I figure I am not an oncologist so my staying up on the details means nothing so why bother sweating that). My cousin has done a remarkable job keeping everyone up to date with what's going on with him via CaringBridge and has even kept us up daily on uneventful days ("today he took a nap and then had delicious fried chicken for dinner.") Undoubtedly she has used the process of daily journaling on CaringBridge as part of her discipline to stay positive and forward-looking.

Even more important than the journaling, unquestionably, has been their Christian faith. It is clear that they use the concept of "God's plan" for them to say centered and not be overwhelmed by the very real challenges that face them. I find it hard to imagine a reason to criticize this.

But I hesitate to offer prayers, which are continually solicited by CaringBridge, as someone who doesn't share that specific faith. Similarly, when people are offering sympathy on Facebook etc. on the frequent occasion of the passing of someone's parent, there's often a tacit pressure to offer prayers. Indeed, "I will hold you in my thoughts and prayers" seems like the best and most appropriate thing to say. But I don't really pray so it just doesn't feel right. It feels in some sense like a debasing of the term prayer.

Or is it? Is it necessary to believe in a specific deity or belong to a specific faith community to pray? Is the simple fact of directing energy and consciousness towards someone else's situation sufficient? Maybe what I don't want to do is intimate to others that I am part of their community so as not to offend them. Or am I in fact misleading myself?

Mbappe the whiny little bitch

Mbappe had an opportunity to show some class at the end of the World Cup. He did not.

I understand that he wanted to win, of course he did. He scored a hat trick, four goals if you count the PK in the shoot out. But France lost. And it lost to Mbappe's teammate from PSG, Messi. There was an opportunity for Mbappe to shake it off and go congratulate Messi. Had he done so, it would have reflected well on him.

Instead he looked pissed off on camera, kept President Macron waiting. Then today he Tweets "We'll be back." Frankly, I hope he won't. I hope he caves to the pressure like his punk-assed teammate Neymar and never makes it back. 

Frittering away

Just finished Viet Thanh Nguyen's The Sympathizer, which was quite good. Which should surprise no one, as it did win a Pulitzer, so basically I agree with the canon-making powers that be.

It occurred to me that I had not gone and updated my Amazon list. I have strict instructions on it that people should sort it by priority and buy me the books ranked highest, but some people don't see that note and breeze right past it. In general I probably am too quick to add books to the list, so that there are a lot of half-baked choices on it. I am impressionable and easily swayed by a positive review, forgetting of course that reviews are just modest emanations of the book-industrial complex, coming to sucker readers like me into purchasing their beguiling wares.

Thankfully, I have instructed Mary not to buy me any books this year, since I have a rather substantial backlist of unread books on the shelf behind me, to say nothing of ones elsewhere in the house. What I really need is a new reading lamp for the reading chair up here in my study. The Journal had an add for one that is said to be killer, but then Mary said she wanted to pick it out. Then she just burst in here saying she didn't know what I wanted and I needed to help her figure that out. So I better get on that.

Off to the races

Much of the time I would normally be blogging has been eaten up recently by reading. Reading the Bible has become a rather fascinating endeavor, certainly not because every episode in it is enthralling. Still in the middle of the Old Testament now, in one of the two Kings books. For now it is generally quite repetitive, as we go from one king and/or tribe that strays from the true path, most often by worshipping some God other than Yahweh by erecting altars or pillars, and whom the Lord then smites in turn, sometimes hundreds of thousands of them. My mind goes back to Ernst Gombrich's Little History of the World which portrays the Hebrews as this uniquely peace-loving folk, revolutionary monotheists who possess a religion that focuses on ethics. Admittedly, he is trying to compress an awful lot into 120 or so pages, and I do love that book. But he elides an awful lot.

But then in the middle of this serial straying and punishing of kings and their subjects there are moments of interest, you just have to wait for them.

Today my phone started blowing up early, which disrupted my morning routine a little. Working on logistics around a get-together and also some back and forth with mom about some land in Roxboro we hope to dispose of one of these decades. All of which is distracting.

Got Marvin by the house yesterday to look at some painting we want to get done (Mary's Xmas present is knocking this out). Of course that took two hours, but honestly that's why we have Marvin do our painting. So I can get some private hanging out time with my boy.  

Fast- and slow-twitch mindset

Ran into my neighbor Russ up at the end of the driveway when I was picking up my paper (which had been delivered as always by Monica Romweber). Russ was training for a 40-mile race in the Uwharries sometime in the not too distant future, his first race at that length. The conversation quickly descended into the fast- (sprinter) vs. slow- (endurance) twitch distinction, I always see myself as more of a fast-twitch person. Then Russ reminded me that he too used to be a fast-twitch person. He used to be a fixed wheel bike track sprinter back in his youth, national if not world-class. "It's a mindset thing" he said.

I am loth to let go of my fast-twitch mindset. I still love being able to jump, over the tennis net for instance, and I love the thrill of running flat out after a ball. But I also appreciate some of the joys of the things that slow-twitch activities (long bike rides, hikes or runs) allow me to do. They let me go places I wouldn't otherwise go, and at a very different pace and in a very different physiological state than one has in a car, so I see the world differently, which has its own advantages.

But ultimately I think it is hard for me to go all the way over to a slow-twitch athletic gestalt because so much of the rest of my life is ultra long view. Financial planning, raising children, being in the community, etc. Shit, this here blog fits into the long view box. Even my diet is of necessity trending in that direction, as I dial back more and more short-term food thrills (meat, fried food, sugar, salt). I need to preserve a few treats/escapes, which right now for me is pretty much tennis and TV, particularly sitcoms. At least I think I do.

Leaving the house

In a very rare move, I will be leaving the house this morning for a number of things: first to meet my cousin Neva in Durham to pick up some gadget she has for my mom. Frankly, it all feels rather exciting and adventurous after this long period of working from home, if vaguely superfluous and somewhat frivolous. Admittedly, I will be doing things which involve actual atoms and not just bits: dropping off some old computer stuff at Triangle Ecycling, where if I'm lucky I'll get to see Larry Herst, the owner. I may also snatch up a spare laptop there, the same model I have here on my lap if a little newer. They seem to have a nice reconditioned one and mine is aging and right now Graham's computer is in the shop. I'll also pick up some cat food. Occasionally one needs to leave the house for something other than tennis, parties, or takeout.

BTW I apologize for dragging you through the mire of my quotidian realia. Sometimes it just happens and a man has to post and roll.

More nocturnal ramblings

Somewhere overnight last night, I suppose it must have been a dream, I realized there was something so important that I really needed to write it on my weekend task list. It must have coincided with needing to pee so I actually got it there. When I looked this morning it just said "Teeth." Go figure.

I mentioned this to Mary and she said that not long ago I had been talking in my sleep during the night and she heard me say something like "that sounds like an excellent networking opportunity." Which is just sad.

Dreams of Ukraine and plagiarism

This morning, just before waking, I dreamt that many of my peers (Jonathan Drake stands out) had been drafted to join in the conflict in Ukraine. Part of me was thinking of course that it was ridiculous that men of our age should be subject to a draft at all (though of course the Ukrainians aren't thinking like this at all right about now. They just ask themselves what they can do to get through their current hellish situation). Another part was glad that I, unlike my friends, hadn't been called up.

I must say that I had been thinking more and more in recent days about what people in Ukraine are going through now. We mustn't forget, though it is a reasonable critique that we do often forget what is going on in Yeman, in Tigray, in Baltimore, etc., and that managing down our fears and anxieties about the suffering of others is an essential precondition of functioning in the world. Being is complex.

My dream also had a plagiarism fear in it. I was shaking in my boots that the powers-that-be would figure out that my master's thesis had been 100% lifted from someone else, which was plain as the face of day on the thing if you just bothered to read it.

Kicking the girl off the plan

For the second time this year, I went through the whole Obamacare enrollment process, only this time I left Natalie off of our plan so that she can sign up for her own plan in Alaska. I had very mixed feelings about doing this. On the one hand, it's the right thing to do. Ain't nobody taking her insurance up there in Alaska. On the other... she's my little girl. I hate the feeling of excluding her from our household, although when I look at the IRS definition of what a dependent is for tax purposes, she just won't qualify starting next year. 

We had a brief conversation about some tax matters this afternoon, which was some good adulting for her. Aren't taxes paid in April? What is FICA? Are they withholding from my current paycheck? What is a deduction? How is that different from an exemption? My eyes quickly glazed over, but the sooner she learns the stuff, the better, in some very narrow sense. In another, I'd just as soon she remain ignorant of if a little while longer.

Court history, proximity to the divine, the real and the ideal

As I make my way through the Old Testament it's hard not to note its preference for court history (as opposed to stories and allegories of the doings of normal folk). Certainly since this was the central if not sole book in its people's religion back then, it's understandable that they'd want to keep straight who succeeded who and why.

But much more than that is going on, of course, which is why the study of Torah and the rest of the Old Testament is endless. The stories of the successive kings, their actions, their foibles, and the same of those around them is all about being close to God, or currying divine favor, as a guide to right and wrong. And i gets complicated. There are betrayals and pledges and reversals of all shapes and sizes. The great step forward comes when Solomon has a dream early in his reign and asks for the power to listen and discern so as to govern wisely, at which point in time the Lord says: "You got it." 

Shakespeare's work (which I now have a newly kindled desire to dig deeply and systematically into) seems to carry this theme forward, the doings of kings, queens and their consorts serving as models for everyone else, imbued with special significance because of their nominal divine sanction.

It's not like we've grown past this. One of the reasons for the great success of The Crown on Netflix is the richness and depth with which it meditates on the question of the royal family -- and in particular the Queen -- as mediator between real and divine. The last episode I watched, the first to focus on Mohammed Fayed, father of Dodi, soon to be Diana's lover. Early in the episode the young Mohammed -- living in Alexandria -- expresses his admiration of the British, I think even saying they are gods. Later, in the evening the queen discusses something with Phillip before bed and points skywards and indicates that she's thinking about God and his judgment on whatever they're talking about. Then she twice disdains to be in the presence of Mohammed, sending emissaries instead, the second time Diana. This, of course, will have consequences down the line...

Custom vs written law

For a history book group I'm in we've been "reading" (I've been listening in the car) to Linda Coffey's The Gun, The Ship and The Pen: Warfare, Constitutions and the Making of the Modern World. Once more, a rather wooden reading of a book is dragging the book down, though I suspect it would have been hard even for Meryl Streep or Sarah Silverman to make this one fun.

Which is not to say that the book lacks merits. I would scarcely want to do that, as it was I who recommended the book to the group. Coffey looks at the history of constitutions around the world from the mid-18th century forward and how their institution is intimately bound up with getting subject peoples to accept conscription.

As she catalogs the effusion of constitutions everywhere and the enthusiasm with which scribblers of all sorts jotted them on napkins the world around, one thing that becomes clear, as if it ever weren't, is that having a constitution don't mean shit. The American constitution has been a relative success -- in that it hasn't been thrown out and replaced for a long time or wantonly trampled upon -- because people take it seriously and because it has reasonable mechanisms for change. More important than the law itself is people's attitude towards it, again, in some sense, being infused with the spirit of the law, a desire to do the right thing. Hence the eternal theme in westerns and cop shows that the guy with the gun who really wants the right thing to happen ends up being more right in the deepest sense than the pencil pushers back in city hall or the capital city who are cramping his style.

But in reality it's always a complex dance and fraught with tension.  

Full day

As expected, a full day. A bruch party at the Shanzer-Losos's where I ate a lot of bagels, lox and whitefish salad but shied away from the salad and fruit, because I am just like that. Then tennis with Adam.

Really not much to report. Am watching the news of rising COVID numbers in Europe etc. with a sense of resignation but also continual thankfulness that I live in the South so it's never really too cold to do a lot of stuff outdoors, and also that I am pretty well stocked up on books. By contrast, I just looked at the weather for Juneau and it looks less auspicious up there for Natalie. Later in the week one day has a high of 18 and a low of 13. I was gonna call Natalie today but it's sunny with a high of 32 so I am going to assume she is out adventuring somewhere, making use of the Sunday.

I have been very carefully husbanding video content, not blowing through serieses just because I like them. Instead, I am kind of treating my portfolio of TV shows as if it were the good old days when they showed shows once a week, so I'm watching one episode or so a week of the various things that I'm watching (The Crown, Derry Girls, Ozark, Counterpart, Call My Agent, I think that's it). So they each last for a while. Last night Graham was home for dinner and then we watched a couple of episodes of Bob's Burgers. Rascal lay on the couch behind my head and for a while I was resting my head on her as if she was literally a pillow. That's a good cat.

Discipline

After a vigorous week of money-wrangling and talking to people about their various issues (amongst them cancer, autistic children, divorce, retirement/moving into an assisted living community) I was really quite ready to sink into my office couch and read this here book at around 4:30. Then I looked at the weather and saw it was planning to rain tomorrow, which translates to a very bad day for raking. So I hauled my ass off the couch and went out into the yard and raked well past dark.

There are an awful lot of leaves, but I took care of a reasonable chunk of them, including the pesky ones on the patio that blow into the mud room unbidden. Then I lay in our epic multiyear leaf pile and checked out the moon while listening to some kids play with an illuminated frisbee over in the park. That looks like a pretty cool toy.