The Respectful Empiricist

My West Coast Trip

2011-12-22T14:08:00.000-08:00

On an early Sunday in December I wove my way from my home through several variations of public transportation and landed at the Green Tortoise Hostel some 2500 miles away in Seattle. The purpose was to visit my daughter who moved there some 15 months ago and landed a job at the http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifvery same Hostel that I would stay at. Seattle is not like home, sure it’s about the same size but that is nearly all that is comparable.

As I disembarked from the Light Rail that took me from SeaTac airport to downtown Seattle I was immediately met by a street waif beggar and as I completed the steps up to civilization I encountered a large number of ne’er do wells. At home this would have been a problem. A gray hair like me who also dragged rolling luggage behind would be easy prey. In Seattle the street toughs stopped to look at me and said nothing. I did my best to look like a hard guy but carrying luggage diminishes any feint of power. No one bothered me. As I walked and rolled to the Hostel some three blocks away I encountered numerous other street beggars and was in no position to aide them. At home there would have minimally been threats and possible violence attempting to walk those three blocks at 11:00pm. In Seattle the begging occasionally turns to pleading but never a threat. When I described the situation to my daughter, she said that in Seattle these folks had lots of bark and no bite. When I was home I did an internet search on violent crimes between the two cities-mine and hers and found that mine has a murder rate that is about ten times that of Seattle. The social scientist that lingers in me wonders why there is such a difference. Certainly Seattle is no more bourgeois than home. I have no answer so onto the next story of my trip.

Being on East Coast time I had trouble sleeping the first night and awoke at a profoundly early time for Seattle. A Hostel room is pretty barren so there is no television to watch or radio to listen to so I went for a pre-dawn walk. It was cold and damp though not raining. Almost everything was closed but I found a coffee shop (in Seattle there is a coffee shop about every thirty feet and it amazes me that so many can stay in business) that was open and so I entered, bought my drink and ventured to a table. On my table was a paperback book that was on my short list of soon to read books. I asked the barista or whatever exotic name proffered to this profession in this café, if this were laid there for customer browsing and he told me that in fact it was there for the taking. A marketing agent had left several different books there for anyone who wanted to read them. I was one of those and was pleased to encounter a free gift only five hours or so after having arrived in Seattle.

Since my daughter was working I made due with the daylight hours first by a walk to Chinatown about two miles away from the Hostel. It was worth the few hours spent in that I found a new neighborhood, watched the bustle of activity that accompanies food production and the colorful arch that represents Chinatowns all over the country. Of course sampling food is essential to such a trip but mine was a few finger foods which were fine but not sensational. One egg roll and one Crab Rangoon sated my already mostly sated stomach and it was back to the Hostel for a brief retreat. That morning also included a long slow walk through Pikes Market and an even longer bird watching walk along the water through the bizarre sculptor garden-one highlighted by a statue of a naked man with arms outreached to a naked little boy. Go figure…

As would be expected bird watching on the opposite coast will show birds not seen on the Atlantic side of things. There were Northwest Crows, Barrow’s Golden Eyes, American Widgeons, Glaucous Gulls and a Pigeon Guillemot.

Once my daughter was off work we hiked through Capitol Hill for some sightseeing, dinner and a brief pub crawl. It is a section of town designed for young people to network and while I am not of that demographic, it was a fine evening. Since it had been a day of walking and adjustment to a new time zone, I cut back to the Hostel for an early evening to the sack.

The next day was an off day for my girl so we went north a few miles to Discovery Park. We used a bus to get there and then went on an extensive walk through prairies of dried grass, through deciduous wooded areas and to the cliffs that overlooked the bay. Seattle is a city of hills and all walks away from the water are up and sometimes steeply so. One is pretty high in Discovery Park unless they wend their way from cliff to seaside which we did not do. From our vantage point we could see Bald Eagles.

Then it was off to find food. We took an extensive walk along Salmon Bay until we found a bus stop and then rode to the Ballard neighborhood where we ate at small bistro specializing in pies. Then back to the Hostel for some card playing, local brew drinking and tacos. Once sated and the beer gone it was a short jaunt to a local bar with live music. The venue was nearly comical in that the Latin solo act was a man with a guitar singing the loneliest, saddest songs in his native tongue. His cheeriest song was the Spanish language version of Orbison’s “Crying”. We left after about 6 songs-me to my room and daughter off to further evening ventures with peers.

The next day included a bus ride up to the University of Washington district for food (fish and chips) which was disappointing but probably satisfactory for students whose taste tends towards the substantial more than the gourmand. A short walk later I found myself at the Natural History Museum.

The Burke Natural History Museum is a research facility and probably is the home of some very interesting work but as a museum it was quite a disappointment. A thorough walk through the entire collection takes about half an hour. What is on display is fine and informative but there was not much of it. At the time I was reading McPhee’s Annals of a Former World. That inspired an interest in Geology and the museum did represent a considerable amount on the earth of Washington. In that regard it was good.

From there it was on northward toward my daughter’s house on 65th about a mile and a half from the Museum and through Cowan and Ravenna Parks where I was side tracked with about two hours to kill. I still had too much time so a traipsed around the Ravenna business district then back to 50th for a library to read my book for awhile. I needed to rest my feet and warm up. It was cold and damp during my stay in Seattle. At last it was time to head back up to 65th and over from 11th to 14th. On the way I stopped for a beer and finally my daughter was ready for me to visit.

She lives in a large upstairs room, temporarily sharing it with another Baltimore émigré and with several other young people in a neighborhood full of young people. It is the affordable part of town. From there it was off to a Mexican restaurant and some enchiladas. Having walked about 15 miles largely uphill, I was pretty beat by 6:30 and left for the Green Tortoise for an early to bed. I had to leave early the next morning anyway. Fortunately my daughter works at the Hostel so I could make my goodbyes shortly after she arrived. The flight home was seamless-everything was on time so 10 hours later I was in my home. The best part of the flight home was looking out the window at the Tetons and Cascades which was perfect given that I was reading a book about American geology.

So there you have it. Since we are about 2500 miles apart my daughter and I cannot visit very often. It was great to see her. Hostels I was reminded are great and efficient places to stay. West Coast seabirds are rarely or never found on the East Coast-plenty of life birds for me during my short stay. It is always good to see a city that one is not a common visitor. During this visit I was able to see many neighborhoods that I had never been to so local color became closer to reality.

I walked a lot of miles during my stay. I found a great book in a used book store (got that free one too). I found a map store that pretty much had a map of every place imaginable. I left with a topographical map of the Chesapeake Bay and of course I left with the memories that I just described.

A few autumn days in Ithaca

2011-10-19T16:11:00.000-07:00

Several years ago I chose the long weekend encompassing Columbus Day for a trip up to Ithaca NY to see some old friends. It was a beautiful trip with a chance to drive for miles along the Shenandoah into the foothills inspired by fall colors. My continued rise into mountains and then New York was a splash of colors and I was unimpeded by any significant traffic problems. I entered the rolling hills of upstate New York and into the Finger Lakes where Lake Cayuga bordered my left. The weather was autumnal-cool evenings and warmish sunny days.

It took about six hours which was just about right so that fatigue was just beginning but not yet setting its talons in. Upon arrival I was greeted by hosts who knew no bounds in extending their hospitality. Why do I tell you about then? Well, those factors have occurred every year that I have extended my ritualistic early October trip. The ride is a dream, my friends great and the weather exquisitely early autumn…and it occurs this way every year.

I had to miss my 2008 trip for personal reasons that I no longer remember and in 2009 my trip varied a bit and I wanted to get there by 11:00 in the morning and so I left before 5:00am. This was not a good time to travel as the deer are in mating season, US I83 in southern Pennsylvania is unlit and with the rain, darkness and amorous deer all over the highway (that excludes the carcasses that litter the sidelines during this season) I met the fate of many others. I crashed my car attempting to avoid a buck standing stupidly in the center of the Interstate.

This last month, was a successful drive though. I returned home on my own and in my own car. It was not until another very satisfying weekend with good friends. We do it (most) every year and we do a lot of the same things. Those who know me well recognize that I shun repetition much of the time. I’ve shed most of the few traditional activities that I relished or endured in days of yore. Even though we always hit the Ithaca Farmer’s Market, the local beer store and often one or more of the wineries that hug Lake Cayuga or visit Sapsucker Woods, and even though there is always splendid weather every year there is a twist that makes each trip unique.

This year on the night I arrived, five other people were there or arrived shortly afterwards. I came there because I went to grad school with one of my hosts. He married many years later but I came to be good friends with his spouse and their marriage proved to be a bit of a reunion amongst a few of us who matriculated from Bowling Green State many years ago. Her brother and his wife came as well as her son from a union long ago. Later her niece arrived from Harrisburg along with her paramour and we enjoyed a splendid evening talking, laughing and learning. The brother and his wife left later into the evening as did her son. The two younger women stayed the night but my old friend and I retired to the den for some post season baseball TV watching as the night progressed.

Saturday during the daytime, my pal and I did our ritual routines which remain essentially outdoors-a trip to the market and plenty of outdoor hiking around. We went to Buttermilk Falls and lost our fear to intrepidity and conquered the hike. Then it was off to dinner (each of us claiming that a nap was required first but it did not happen). We were joined by his wife and the two young women and we had a delightful time dining in the coolish evening outdoors spiced by stories and laughter. It is easy to enjoy young adults who are not intimidated to join us old folks as equal in conversations.

Sunday included my school mate’s parents both of whom are 92. They live in a retirement village (or whatever it is called) a few miles away. A nice early afternoon barbeque of Farmer’s Market sausage and homemade sauerkraut sated us nicely. Upon returning the parents to their habitué the three remaining adults (the young women departed that morning) visited a vineyard and enjoyed the wine tasting (Finger Lakes wine is really on a surge and seems to improve every year that I am there) and music listening. I bought their Dry Riesling and a Gewurztraminer (try pronouncing that…and a brief aside-MS Word did not take issue with the spelling I just applied to that wine variety) to take home with me. We finished off the night with some pre-dusk hiking around another waterfall with a name that eludes me now.

All pleasantries make way for the realities that beset us and so on Monday morning I was again saying goodbye and heading south. It was not after my friend of 33 years and I had a breakfast and personalized our conversation with talk of our private lives and health (we both are in pretty good shape but have not entirely eluded the ravages of time and age). There is always some bittersweet in saying goodbye to such good and old friends. There will be more visits of course but neither of us is a phone call away if the other has a flat tire in the snow. We will have to ask for assistance from newer friends who might someday become old friends too.

Family Reunion 2011

2011-08-07T12:39:00.000-07:00

The Family Reunion of 2011

July 31 was to be a hot day in a hot summer enveloping the largest part of the mainland USA. I arose and left Ann Arbor for the 180 mile trip to Niles, Michigan in the predawn hours. My intention was to grab a leisurely route, avoid as much traffic as possible and to mosey into Niles before the reunion started. That would give me a chance to take a walk around this old town. If I had ever been there before, I did not remember it.

I got my wish and rolled over the few hills of southern Michigan as calmly as could be. I got breakfast at 9:30 at a road side diner. As is generally the case, the meal was more than humans should eat so I had to leave much of it on the plate. They had fresh squeezed orange juice which was fine but it came in a 16 ounce glass. I drank it but wish I hadn’t had all of it.

I arrived at Niles about an hour early and chose to stroll around town. It was a bleak walk in a bleak town. The heat had arrived and the town had the air of a Tennessee Williams play. Everyone on the streets had the water logged armpits and beaded brows indicative of the days before air conditioning was common. The largest difference between 2011 and when Williams last wrote a sultry play was the number of mullet haircuts I saw on the young men. I had traveled back in time but not so far back as Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

The reunion is held at Pepper Martin Park which drew my attention to the Gas House Gang member of 80 years ago. While have a blast of weekend baseball fever, I imagined the St. Louis player, Johnny Martin must have been from Niles. Apparently though, two different Martin’s carried the same nickname.

All of my siblings save one in Colorado and one in Arkansas (I think) came for the day which doubled as a birthday for my dad. Here is the cake to serve as evidence that I am not making this up. So the two Tennessee sisters arrived and in good health. Jeanne came from the eastern edge and Betsy from the western side. Betsy’s husband Lonnie drove up with them and their daughter Angela, husband Jeremy and their kids came from the Chicago area. Julia Hernandez came from Chicago as well along with George and their three kids. Mary and Tony came from the Detroit suburbs and of course I represented Baltimore. Katie came down with Mary and Tony from Brighton.

Then there were about 40 other relatives and families from all over the place. I did not meet too many of them as I wanted to reconnoiter with siblings and parents more. I did some mingling and met Earl Koch from California and Fred from not too far away. I met others but while I remember their faces and our conversations, their names left me during the week. The whole event was filled with a lot of loud talk and laughter. We ate plenty and wrapped up plenty of leftovers.

Most everyone there was from my generation or the one before me but there were very few people in their 20s. There were kids who could be my grand kids by age but in fact are not. Lonnie is great with the little ones and he took to entertaining the young ones.

It was good to revive some memories and contacts with siblings and parents. We all moved away so long ago that our lives are established far from where we grew up. Even the folks moved away from the stomping grounds of our youth 30 plus years ago so a visit to their house revives no nostalgia though it is always a good visit.
Well for the most part we all have our health (though Katie needed some help based on arthritic knees) and humor. The health that we do not have doesn’t need this forum to describe). We are all getting old now. The youngest sibling is nearing 50 now. My parents are in their 80s and a few of us in our 60s.

All the time I hear stories of people who had hard childhoods and dysfunctional families. I don’t know what all that means. As a kid I did not get everything I wanted and got everything I needed. When I had the wherewithal to get what I wanted I did. A year ago I talked to several people that I went to elementary school with and many felt scarred by that experience.

Maybe I too am scarred by elementary school and upbringing and am just too dumb to notice. My own memory is that the holes I have found myself in were generally my own doing by bad decisions or not seeing the writing on the walls. My parents and siblings are far more a comfort to me than anything else. It was good to see most of them.

A summer trip to my home state of Michigan

2011-08-05T11:59:00.000-07:00

The main purpose of my trip was for a celebration of my dad’s 85th birthday. It was presented amidst a family reunion for the descendents of Phillip Stahl who migrated to Dowagiac Michigan from Chicago about 135 years ago. A large cake was bought for this purpose and though shared amongst about 65 people, plenty of cake remained. However the details of the reunion will find themselves in a separate blog.

I arrived in Detroit and rented a car to get to my sister’s house at about 12:30 am on Thursday after a day of work. That was pretty uneventful as I pretty much went right to bed…where I could not sleep. It seems when I travel I always get little sleep the first night.

On Friday morning after a few hours of catching up with my sister, I headed out to visit an old friend, one that I have known for the longest time. T and I have been friends for about 43 years and if we met each other today we probably would not be friends. We have approximately nothing in common but…the great thing about long friendships is the common experience. Over that span T and I have traveled together or met up in a different place about 30 times. He accompanied me on a 14 hour failed trip to Chicago on my 21st birthday. Fueled by the gas that drove us there and the beer that inspired us, we got to Chicago and discovered that motel rooms were far too expensive for our combined cash and headed back to the Ann Arbor that I lived in at the time. T and I have misspent many hours and days together and despite our differences have some fun memories.

He had just returned home from about 30 days in the hospital having major surgery that was successful and then the poisoning of Sepsis that nearly killed him. It did not but he was in a pretty debilitated state. He sat in some sort of barcalounger and with a quiet raspy voice answered questions and offered insight to his ex-wife and myself. It reminded me of a gangster movie where by the minions paid their homage to the iconic Don. I do not say that negatively either. It just was reminiscent of the film scenes just like it.

I stayed with T for a few hours but he fell into a nap and I slipped out.
Later that evening I met up with an old college flame for dinner. K and I get together about every three years or so and it always good to meet up with her. We do not really discuss old times as they are very old. We talk about what we are doing now. K has had a very successful life financially and was able to retire with her husband at around age 53. More power to her I say.

We met for dinner at a refurbished train station in Plymouth, Michigan. I had Walleye since it is never on a menu in my adopted state of Maryland (I have live there far longer than I lived anywhere else and in several months it will be more than half of my life so “adopted” may not really be the right word). We laughed and groused and in general had a good time. We then paced Plymouth for about an hour and continued talking but alas it was time to say goodbye once again.

While in Michigan my old delights in the home town team resurface exponentially. I have become a very passive baseball fan as time goes by. I still read box scores every morning and am familiar with the biggest of names in the sport but once in Michigan during the summer I am as big a fan as all of the people I left behind. When I left K and returned to my sister’s home the Tigers were in mid game and the young Porcello on the mound spinning a masterful game simultaneous to the home team hitting up a storm. We watched the remainder of the blow out and agreed that Porcello at least tonight, looked like Verlander. That is how Friday evening ended and I slept much better that night.

On Saturday I headed to Ann Arbor where I had lived most of the early 70s. I was off to visit with my friend B who I went to grad school with 30 plus years ago. We have occasionally caught up over the years since we left Bowling Green where we matriculated. We obviously have not been catching up enough. I enjoyed myself immensely for about 12 hours before falling asleep on his couch; a sleep that would last me through the night.

I arrived earlier than I expected but B was hanging around lolling so I was accepted at about 11:00 am. We spent the first bit of time reminiscing then headed to a lunch enclave replete with diner carts and bought vegetarian barbeque served by P who as it happens has been married to B for the last few decades. And…their son R along with his buddy provided some guitar jazz for the lunch crowd this hot Saturday afternoon.

Back to the house for a few hours to eat salads and banana bread, continuing to do some reminiscing and watching a really badly played baseball game. Once refreshed we headed over to a house where a porch jam session was going on. Three guitars (two rhythm and one lead) along with a mandolin, bass and banjo, bluegrass was performed for anyone who was in earshot. We did not stay for more than about 4 songs but it was a delightfully pleasant way to spend the early evening. Then B and I headed off to a blues performance which included a voluminous female diva and a band of 6 or so including three horn players. They started off with “Killer Joe” which is a great way to introduce the horns. After a few numbers the grand dame came on board. I should have remembered her name but I did not. She sang her sultry Chicago styled blues songs for a set and we left. I had within about 8 hours been regaled with about 3 full hours of live music. I have sort of faded out of going to see live music and forgot how entertaining it could be.

Back at the home of B and P I relaxed in their company for an hour or so before falling asleep. I crept out silently at about 5:30 in order to head to the family reunion. The ride out was a delight all by itself as well.

I drove south to M-12 or Michigan Avenue as we all know it. It was one of those early highways built for the budding auto industry and the buyers of those cars. It was designed for early travel and I preferred early travel to the hell bent expressway. It was a good decision. On Sunday morning and early morning at that, a highway like this is nearly devoid of traffic so I ambled through the Irish Hills which served as a memory lane trip as my dad would take us kids to the Hills every so often. I saw the signs for Walker Tavern, the historic visiting spot in which there was a purported murder some 150 years ago. I reveled in the stains on the floor which were to be proof that a man mortally wounded, laid there as his breath expired. I continued on mostly enjoying the bliss of a pressure free drive through historical towns and on my way to Niles, MI the hometown of Ring Lardner. He was sited more than once in my Master’s Thesis.

Since I was early for the reunion I traipsed along the St. Joseph River on one of the bike/hike paths that are becoming standard for towns. That is a good thing. Niles on the other hand appears as so many other rust belt cities during the last 25 years. It is bleak and rife with obese people driving pickup trucks. Upon walking around the downtown I could see all the remnants of a thriving small city of about 100 years ago and waxed a little nostalgic. Perhaps if I had a time machine I could have encountered Ring and did some joking. I did not have such a device and headed towards the Pepper Martin Park to see my close family and to meet several distant cousins etc. ou already know hat story will be a separate entry.

I headed back to visit T several hours later and while I used Route 60-another two laner for about 60 miles, I climbed onto US #94 for the remaining 120 miles in order to save time. I did not regret saving time but #94 requires full attentiveness and higher speeds. It was not pleasant. I got there after awhile.

T seemed to be a bit lighter but he is in pretty weakened condition now so we had low key chats interrupted by periods of silence and television. G, another friend from my distant past came by for an hour and we three visited. I tried to keep things light with silly joking and recalling events of so long ago-the ones we could laugh at. It was mildly effective and we retired early I on the couch watching some television show of which I had forgotten about in the morning.

The trip was to end on Monday but not before Monday had nearly ended. As always I was awake at about 5:00am so I took the opportunity to walk to the corner for a newspaper and coffee. I have tired of the print media over the years and typically only buy newspapers when I am out of town. Newspapers have crossword puzzles though so I had something to do. Later I bought a too sumptuous breakfast being a cheese omelet with chili and about a bathtub full of potatoes. I used to eat like that several times a week but not so anymore. Well as it would happen I ate all of it and felt like a whale the rest of the day.

Eventually T woke up and we chatted for awhile but I had to get my rented car back to the airport before 12:00pm so I took care of that. Unfortunately my flight was not until 4:30pm so I had a long time in the Detroit airport to read books and complete my collected crosswords. I did that and the plane arrived (20 minutes late) and the flight took another 15 minute delay on the tarmac and the light rail in Maryland upon landing took another 20 minutes to arrive and the normally 50 minute trip to my stop was delayed by another 15 minutes or so at one stop along the way and the taxi driver that I called for upon arrival took nearly half an hour to get there to drive me home. That long sentence was intended to leave the reader as breathless as I was when I got home to a torrential rain at about 10:00pm. At least I did not have to wake up and prepare-then go to work until 4:30am.

Well I had to whine about the long trip home as that is my mien. My quick trip to Detroit was very good. I am glad I did it.

My first salt marsh road trip

2011-07-20T15:37:00.000-07:00

I arrived at Point Lookout after an arduous three and a half hours of fighting a torrent that lasted with little respite for about 100 miles. A ranger helped me set up my tent as the rains raged. I could do little exploring on Friday night but at least my tent kept me dry.

So upon waking Saturday morning I got up to take my dawn walk. It was about 5:30 am and the rain had stopped and the heat was rising. Since I had arrived in the dark and rain I had no idea of what was available to me. My campsite itself was in the canopy of a mixed forest only yards apart from the actual salt marsh that is Point Lookout, Maryland. This is the southernmost point of what is referred to as Southern Maryland. This is to distinguish this location from the Eastern Shore which extends further south. What unraveled for me during my exploration was that Point Lookout was a picture perfect example of what a salt marsh is. I had read several scientific papers, DNR white papers and a few books all dealing with the contingencies that are salt marshes. It has been preserved and the park rangers were intent on informing us campers of the fragility of the area and encouraging us to be mindful of that regarding our camping activities.

On the dawn of July 9 I found a trail that lead away from the forest where I had camped and towards a briny inlet. The path led past the tall grasses, Spartina I imagine while comparing it to the photos I have of this salt grass. I dipped my finger to one of the many drops of water that the plant sweated. I found it very salty to taste matching descriptions of the salt filtering process that the roots of these plants provide.

Meeting a dock built for crabbers, I quickly discovered a nest filled with at least two Osprey chicks and their mother. The fledglings were large and very active so they were probably late spring births and they were near ready to hit the road. I say this based on my watching the maturation of Yellow Crowned Night Herons as they fledged. It also is based on the large number of empty Osprey nests that were available for easy viewing. The Osprey Chicks are very attractive. They are multicolored with lots of dots of bluish and clay colored hues. The mother Osprey is regal like a Bald Eagle but not as colorful as her chicks.House Sparrows built nests inside of the massive osprey nests.

There were many sea predators swooping around the waters but I am unclear as to whether they were Common Terns or Least Terns. They splashed inelegantly into the surf routinely. The Osprey which were rife, often surfaced from their swoops into the water successfully grabbing a large fish of whose species I am not clear.

There were two curiosities that I suppose I should have expected. I saw birds that resembled the Mockingbirds that I am so familiar with in Baltimore but they had far more of the light brown clay color that originally led me to wonder if they were a separate species. I saw many sparrows that also had the bright brown coloring that we usually call clay colored. I took photos of each and examined them closely and could only determine that I was watching Mockingbirds and House Sparrows. I do not know why each species had a more vibrant coloring than the ones I am familiar with. I might suggest it is the proximity to brackish waters and the food chain that results from that environment but really, I do not know.

In the forest where I was camped, the woods were replete with Fish Crows and their reverse “Caws”. The only way I can determine the difference between the Common Crow and the Fish Crow as they zoom by is the call of the Fish Crow sounds to my dulled ears, as if they are saying “Wac” instead of “Caw”. That might be just me.

The mosquitoes were thick and “Off” has a limited life span as regards to being a protective agent. There also was a very beautiful fly that bites quickly and often. I have yet to take the time to identify it. Amidst the flora that I had expected to see during my first hand visit was not Trumpet Vine. I had not seen it mentioned in my readings but it is more than prevalent in this environ. They have the very pretty and short lived orange blossoms that attract Ruby Throated Hummingbirds and there were plenty of them at the Point.

I headed back to eat some breakfast and then off for a long day’s walk that would provide me with a plethora of new discoveries. First I saw tiny crabs. I have to cross reference them with my research material but have not done that yet. I saw grass similar to the briny Spartina but they were more in the forest and lined the ditches that were fueled by rains rather than tides for sustenance.

I ran across a pie of Blackbirds and in this case they were Rusty Blackbirds. I also saw several Brown Thrashers for the first time. They were very active and vocal and I saw those gathering twigs making me imagine that they were making nests and were late maters though I have not researched that yet.

Everything about my six plus hour walk was interesting and informative but it was watching the Brown Pelican feeding that was perhaps the most interesting way that I spent half an hour of that walk. They are spectacular if awkward feeders in that as they raid the seas, they approach their prey by flying upward some 15-20 feet then corkscrewing their way into the waters where they crashed and gulped a mouthful of water and the food that might exist within that mouthful. The gullet sags as it is filled with the watery prey and it looks approximately like my own sagging gullet (despite my dearth of food). Watching the Pelicans made my day and though I saw other interesting things, it won the best images of the day award.

There were the noted periwinkles in abundance in the evening. They clung to the spartina only inches above the briny marsh. I did not notice them in the morning perhaps because I did not look or perhaps because they were not there. I’ll solve this query in my next trip.

In addition to the natural history I witnessed there was some Civil War history. Point Lookout served as a prison encampment for the Union. They housed some 3500 prisoners there in very horrid conditions. It was so hot in the summer that it was a nursery for mosquitoes carrying disease which was rampant. The spread of disease of course knows no Cause and the confiners suffered as much as the prisoners. There is nothing left of that camp save the relics collected for the small Civil War Museum.

After Gettysburg, the North worried of Southern invasion into this neutral state from below. It would be a strategic location for such and so Fort Lincoln was constructed as a defense but no invasion ever occurred. Point Lookout was also a station for escaped slaves who lived in tunnels that sounded horrific as they awaited passage beyond.

During the 19th century and especially during the Civil War, the fragility of the salt marsh and its ecological filtering capabilities was not a consideration. Fort Lincoln was largely built by destroying valuable salt marsh areas.

Recently I read portions of a slave owner’s diary in which he describes the slave task of carrying buckets of brackish mud from the shores of a South Carolina salt marsh to be used as fertilizer for his cotton and corn. I feel certain that as a growth agent it was spectacular but the debilitation of the salt marsh ecology was second only to the horrid job conditions endured by the slaves doing his bidding.

My first field trip to a salt marsh was very good for me. Perhaps it was unrealistic as Point Lookout really proved to be a textbook example of a salt marsh. Studying them is in my blood now, maybe a result of the many mosquitoes that fed on me. I plan on visiting many of them, often and in different seasons.

A new story...finally

2011-05-26T15:56:00.000-07:00

Graduation

Except for the high school graduation forty some years ago that I was forced to attend because it was my own and I had parents obligating me to its attendance, I had never been to a graduation. Never once did it dawn on me to attend one. I would read about them as celebrities came to speak to the matriculation as if their notoriety provided them with some sagacity that should be uttered to these young adults eager to throw their hats and begin the beer drinking that is part of the ritual.

It all seemed so fatuous to me and the notion of sitting with a few thousand others in some field waiting for hours of pomp to drain me of all spirit was enough to convince me to forego that rite. So I had never been to anyone’s graduation including my own. For the record I do not count the mandatory and noxious events of elementary school graduations that were thrust on my daughters and me. I did attend those only so as not to appear as grumpy about them as I truly was.

So my hiatus was disrupted in May of 2011 as my daughter completed her undergraduate degree at the very erstwhile St. John’s in Annapolis. This is not just college. It is a rigorous exploitation of traditional classics that render the graduate only capable of two things: graduate school or the lonely desolate life of a thinking artist. I am kidding of course because it is my notion that the sort of intellectual demands that this college places on the students surpasses virtually and academic experience that can be found in this nation.

It was in collegiate academics that I found my own real genuine, personalized and gut level success. There were things that I had done well in previously. I was a modestly good baseball player and knew my way around an automobile engine with a wrench but neither of these or other skills made me feel successful. I had always read a lot and wondered a lot but with no plan, all of my readings and queries only made me good at the game that came later…Trivial Pursuit.

There were achievements accrued throughout a pre-adult life that others thought I should build on but those did not occur to me and had no resonance while I aimlessly drifted through ideas. My high school career was fun but uneventful. I stood out at nothing good or evil and was undoubtedly quickly forgotten.

Entering college (with the exception of semester one where I continued my high school ennui) it became apparent that I could succeed and excel and that drove me into a new direction. The love of learning, of discovery provided me with two lifelong mottoes. There is an absolute joy in coming to a realization and all realization is humbling as it opens a new door for discovery.

A second great success in my life is fostering that bliss of uncovering new ideas and reshaping one’s thinking based on new information in my daughters.
Hannah completed her studies at St. John’s the other day but that is miniscule in terms of the studies she will complete during the rest of her life. Maybe it is simple genetics and maybe it is learned behavior-who cares? Hannah has the thirst for knowledge and the empirical skepticism that is so deep in her personality that she will be learning and changing for the rest of her life. I am glad that I had a role in that.

Attending the graduation (for the record it was short since the number of graduates was small) was more than tolerable. The speeches were better than awful but it was the great pride I felt knowing that I was a part of setting sail such a complex thinking daughter.

Year end reflections on 2010

2010-12-31T03:39:00.000-08:00

Our winter started in the last ravages of 2009 as everyone knows but they play a part in the story of 2010. The week prior to Christmas we received an early snow of over 20 inches. It was our greeting to winter.

Under normal circumstances those of us in Baltimore expect that every four or five years we will get a lumbering storm that will dump large amounts of snow on us. While my youth spent in Michigan provided me with far colder temperatures that started earlier and lasted longer, they rarely gave us a 20 inch snowfall.
Christmas Eve and the day itself provided us with warmish and torrential rains that obliterated all vestiges of the snow that had fallen only a few days before. New Years Day also was a day of rain so we had no indication that a rather remarkable snowfall ever occurred.

January came and I have little to remember it by. We did have an unusual (at least it was unusual in the not so distant past) warm spell in mid month which was exactly when I had a meeting in West Virginia some 100 miles to the west. It was a good time for it as it made the pleasant drive all the more nice.

While trying to refinance my house I had some serious basement improvements to make and so my spare time was doing lousy construction work on my basement. Most every dreary evening and weekend was spent tearing out old drywall and replacing it with cheap paneling. My effort was not at improvement but at the appearance of improvement. I knew it, the inspector knew it and most of all the finance company knew it. At any rate the sham worked and I refinanced late in the month.
Then February came and with it devastating snows. I have chronicled this back then on these pages. It was devastating and cost me a lot of money in property damages and it was beautiful. The awesome ravages of nature have a dual edge. While they so often ruin what we have worked hard for, they remind us of their power and glory and they regurgitate the earth and its many semblances in too often beautiful ways. We cannot complain about Mother Nature though we would like to. We cannot complain because there is no one listening. The wrath of nature is what we endure but not something we control.

February was not brutal in its temperature but it was in its precipitation and so I took a lot of house damage including my (beloved) porch roof; the one that shaded me for afternoon grilling or morning reading. I wanted to replace it with a vine canopy and that is slower growing than I assumed. I think it will take off in 2011 as I have added a lot of new Swedish Ivy to the mix late this summer.
In one mid February week we received something like 42 inches of snow. This meant time off of work and being home with the heat on all day. It meant over consumption borne of an ennui that is known as cabin fever. It means shoveling snow several different hours of the day. I imagine myself to be pretty hale but in reality age reminded my back and my knees that these tasks need to be done in moderation. I held a motto during that week and that was “Don’t make shoveling of snow the last thing you ever do”.

I took a brief vacation in very late February going up to New Hampshire to see my friend whose wife traveled to British Columbia either to ensure she would not see me or to go to the winter Olympics. So often when I go visit them the precipitation flows and this time was no different. Since it is enough north of here there was plenty of winter left. It rained or snowed pretty much every minute I was there. The electricity failed and we ended up spending a night in a Manchester motel. It was a nice visit but a fairly lousy “vacation”.

March was uneventful for me. The typical weather (which is truly awful) was not there. Rather than the 38 degree rain that seems to last forever we pretty much segued into spring pretty decently. In mid February I quit cable television and found myself devoting more time to reading and garden preparing. I had big plans for a garden this year and its relative failure will be explained soon. I think March and April were the calmest times of 2010 for me. I revel in early spring as it brings with it the mud and birdsong and smell of last fall’s leaves in early decay. During that time I make a birthday gift to myself every year by recording a pre-dawn hour of the newly arrived birds in my yard. During that time the birds are heading north and so many short timers alight in my yard.

This year in early April we hit 90 degrees for a few days; it is less unusual all the time. I finalized the garden prep and at the end of the month planted the tomatoes and peppers. It was also warm enough to clean up the mess that left from my collapsed porch roof and the collateral damage that occurred with that fall. At the very end of the month I was brevetted to Chief Information Officer for four months. This role was on top of my normal role so I was filling in two jobs. There is nothing so thankless as that since so many more people can be displeased with the jobs that have to be tweaked to make any semblance efficiency. As one might imagine, this means many less personal hours and many more devoted to work. It also included routinely working in Washington DC making my daily travel go from about 2 hours to 5 hours.

Then came May and the onset of the most brutal summer (in so many ways) that I’ve ever experienced. It was hot when I left the house at 5:15 am to go to work and it was hot when I arrived home at 8:00 that night. Not only was I too tired to go to the garden for maintenance, it was too hot as well. My central air conditioning broke and I had no resources to fix it. It was in May that my youngest daughter moved out and got her first apartment. It was in May that I was alerted to an urban rookery of Yellow Crowned Night Herons which became my passion for the early summer. Even that had some tragedy however as in June, only a week after the newest chicks had hatched, the nest disappeared and its place was only the white paint dung on the branches that had held it.

It was in May when my oldest daughter took her sister’s room for the summer. I had company for much of the season and that provided a relief and a release. I could let go of much of the pressure I was under, with the intellectual exchange that always goes with a conversation with her.

When her sister got her own apartment I was able to provide her with materials and enjoy my truly guilty pleasure of haunting yard sales and buying things that I do not need. Her first apartment bombed due to the lifestyles of her roommates but she got a second one that worked out much better.

For the next several months I awoke to the oppressive heat in order to work 10 or 12 hours and come home with the knowledge that the job I have held for over 9 years was coming to a close. As an employee of Veterans Affairs I am under the Federal Government. I have been a “term” employee for all of those years and that means that at various intervals I have to re-apply for my job. Military veterans (of which I am not) get priority points in the hiring process and it was determined that based on the point system, I was not qualified to do my job. This is a job that posted my work record as “Outstanding” and one that gave me a raise shortly before my final day. There ultimately was a happy ending and I am not selling apples. The whole ordeal was long and torturous and very ironic. The ironies I may describe in some other posting.

Just to make the summer more challenging my daughter borrowed my car and totaled it on the 4th of July. Since I still had payments on it and it was an old car, the premium I got from the insurance company was not enough to try to buy another car especially in the rather dire employment situation I was in. That story too had a happy ending but believe me when I say that it was difficult to see a happy ending to anything at about July 30.

There are friends and family to come to the rescue and be the safety net one needs in stressful times. There was my friend from Severna Park who provided a vehicle with no strings (and I returned it with little gas because I was so self absorbed with my own worries that I forgot to load it up upon return) attached but more importantly some sagacity and moral support. There was my friend from New Hampshire who also lent the moral support but also sent me a check for enough money to tide me over for months (fortunately for both of us it sits in a drawer only saved as a memento of the value of friends). There was my friend from Redford Michigan checking up on me and my status with routine. There was my sister who stopped her work day to pick me up from the airport and drive me for a few hours to my parent’s house. The reason for that trip was because my mother was giving me her car with no other reason than to help when I needed it. There was my boss who twisted, tweaked, strangled and wrenched the system to assure me that my job status would be restored after only a week of unemployment. It was not actually restored as my status changed so that I became a permanent employee without the dark cloud of reapplying ever to enter the picture again.

All of those folksy witticisms that are meant to calm worrying people in dire straits do not work. We are not thankful that others are worse off than us nor do we care about it being the darkest before the dawn. We all know that. All the well meaning adages do not mean as much as heartfelt concern and practical solutions and I am reminded that those things come from friends and family.

When I am despairing I fluctuate between moods of hopelessness and planfulness. I think the very worst things for a while then position them against some option that is pretty future oriented even if it includes drastic lifestyle changes. I spent about 90 days in that yo-yo ride of emotions and in the end I am where I was before the 90 days. I am working my job with the security an old man like me needs and with the complaints that an old man like me has merited but here is the difference. I figured on so many different future options I now realize that if things go south for me I have a bagful of opportunities to explore.
Thanks everyone for your help.

I did get some odd comfort during the summer and that was the arrival of a ground hog, first found in the next door neighbor’s garage but feasting on my overgrown yard in full view of my kitchen window. The animal was mostly unfamiliar to me when I saw it for the first time. I correctly guessed the species but that was close to dumb luck and I researched it to assure myself as to what it was. Well a groundhog is about as cute as it gets. It is like a mouse to the 12th power. It is an avid eater discriminating towards softer green shoots and since I was not a good gardener or landscaper this year there was plenty of good vittles for this creature. They were good enough for it to move to a dwelling beneath my deck. Around 4 or so every afternoon (well at least weekends when I was more apt to be home to see it), it came out to dine. When I imagined that it was sated or nearly so I would make my presence know only to see it flee. A running groundhog is sort of like a cartoon. The enormous amount of fat would bounce heavily as it leapt away and to its supposed safety. So there you have it; some cheap entertainment.

Then it was mid September and during my week of unemployment I spent some time in Pittsburgh visiting a friend. One might wonder why Pittsburgh and the answer is that it is about halfway from my home of the last 30 years and the home in Detroit where I spent most of the previous 30. So lifelong friends and I can meet there with minimal inconvenience and if one does it right, Pittsburgh can be wonderful; for instance mid to late September when the weather seems to be annually divine. The second is to stay right downtown so that the rivers are there and in this last case, the city fireworks going off nearly straight overhead on a warm fall evening.
Fall is the right time to be in Maryland. The temperatures are soothing, the colors great (towards the end of the season). It is fairly dry so birding hikes are not cumbersome. Really though, a trip to Ithaca, NY really should be in the works and for me it was. I visited my friends there in early October and the drive and weather were as sublime as they have been in the past. Driving along the Susquehanna for a long while and entering the mountains in northern PA then into NY for the last 40 or so miles to Ithaca are spectacular that time of year. Visiting my friends there is always a much needed respite and this year it was spent visiting the cheese open houses and vineyard open houses that dotted Lake Cayuga that particular weekend. When I rule the world I will never be thwarted from another early October visit for friends, weather and the other things that come with it. I nearly forgot. I love the Ithaca Farmers Market and that is always part of the itinerary.

My youngest moved to Olympia, WA on November 2nd. I encouraged her to do this all the while knowing that I will miss her dearly. She and I have been through a lot together. She is pretty far away. Thanksgiving has for many years been my favorite day. Not so much the last few but I still get the aroma of the day permeating the house. This year my oldest daughter and I went to some friend’s house for the feast and that worked well. On the home front I bought a small turkey and cut it in half. I made a small traditional meal on Wednesday night. I chopped the rest of the parts up and cooked them in a mole sauce. I gave my daughter much of that for future dining and froze some (after one meal of course) for my own future.

Her being out west reminded me of how precious our relationship has been. We went through a divorce, tumultuous teen years and her enlightened moments. She has a pragmatic and utilitarian perspective. As an analytical and empirical thinker she has been able to see through the nonsense clutter thrown at us continually. She growing up and making life plans as she ought to. All the same I will miss seeing her but she is not my “child” any longer.

Then as always, December arrived. The first 10 days much colder than normal but at least we had strong winds on many of those days. Our first hint of snow was on December 5th and the first that coated the ground even for a few hours was on December 10. It did not last long but the cold did with the exception of a dark and dank Sunday that actually returned for 15 or so hours to the 50s. It was an example of damning with faint praise in that while the day was warmer, it was an uglier day than those that preceded it and succeeded it. What has marked December has been the severe winds and the unusual early cold. We are having late January weather before winter has actually come to be.

I write this on New Year’s Eve and realize that the year was a difficult one but I got all I really need from it as I approach dotage. I want to stay fresh and never go stale.

I always enjoy the holidays and likewise glad when they are over. I ask little of them and my return is simple. This year the extent of decoration was decorative stockings taped to doors and chemically reproachable scented candles. It included a dinner of stuffed duck with Teutonicaly prepared sides. The duck failed but everything else was good. The remaining duck became “Grandmother’s Duck Noodle Soup” and that did work.

That was Christmas Eve and on the day itself my local daughter and I went to a dinner with friends at an Indian Restaurant. That is a good way to end the Christmas Holiday.

I’m very leery about associating people’s names to events and particulars on the web. If I were everybody it wouldn’t matter but alas I am not. Every one of you who is reading this know yourself as you read. Thanks to everyone and you folks in particular.

My first adventure with Great Courses

2010-12-27T14:26:00.000-08:00

For several years I have been inundated with advertisements for the Great Courses. The company even sends out a sampler CD every few years. The two that I remember were on Gnosticism which holds no interest to me but I enjoyed the lecture. It was cogent and the instructor easy to listen to. The other was on some phenomena of physics which appeals to me far more. In this case the instructor spoke at such a rapid pace I could hardly hear him let alone take notes. I was left undecided as to the efficacy of these “courses”.
They are not exactly courses. They are lectures of approximately 30 minutes each and include a .pdf that is an overview of each lecture. They come on DVD and I suppose you could view the instructor though for the life of me I do not understand the value of that. Audio is fine for me.

An allure to the Great Courses that has stuck with me was in its advertisement that suggested that some of the best times of our lives was when we were in an educational environment and were learning new and intriguing things. That rendered a fairly romantic image in my mind of someone from centuries ago living in a student’s barrack without enough heat and reading by candlelight. Well I am not Liebniz or Dostoyevsky but I did really enjoy being a student and sitting at a desk with a coffee (and…well yes cigarettes) and poring over material that was inspirational in its newness.

I did not buy their product for many years and finally did recently. I chose the cheapest route which was a download of 12 lectures. The subject was the Making of the Constitution. This is a subject in which I am more than moderately acquainted with and have an abiding interest in. The lecturer was professor emeritus (I have a suspicion that most of their lecturers are emeritus) Daniel Robinson. His style was easy to work with. Never hyperkinetic and often restating his case using different word in order to emphasize his takes on the situation or person. Robinson was clearly a traditional conservative (to the extent that one lecture juxtaposed Paine and Burke with Burke coming out the favorite). His presentation of the events and heroes of the events leading to the ultimate Constitution was well made.

Another suspicion of mine is that Great Courses is intent on presenting a pretty conservative bent on its wide array of classes. I have only taken one but I read the catalogues routinely. I liked it well enough to take another after the holidays. The next one will be in the hard sciences-probably biological in nature so I am not in over my head. It is harder to put an ideological spin on a hard science. Should an attempt be made to put any ideology on a science course I would end my efforts to make use of Great Courses.

I enjoyed and learned from Robinson’s lectures but was put off by two aspects of the formula. The first is that each lecture was introduced by pompous classical music of the Thomas Arne ilk. It may have even been an Arne piece but I don’t remember as I write this. Everyone has heard it. The second problem was the applause that accompanied every lecture. I was an undergraduate once and a graduate student twice.

In general we had about four emotions towards our instructor. They were mentors; they were decent profs; we did not care one way or another and finally we thought they failed as instructors. I never once heard a clap or a boo. Perhaps Leibniz or Dostoyevsky were obligated in their day and place to so honor a professor, I never was.

Anyway my first venture into Great Courses was worth my while so I will give it two more tries. Should the next one be unsatisfactory I’ll make my ongoing decision based on the third. I never buy anything with two straight bad experiences.

Reflections on learning something new everyday

2010-10-31T13:21:00.000-07:00

They say that you learn something new every day and I suppose that merits some respect. Maybe we do and I also suppose that we rarely stop and reflect on what new thing we learned. I don’t, to be certain. Every time we learn something new we risk having it replace something that has been believed for a long time. That is scary business and most of us want no part in that.

Well, I may do that. I try not to but it is easy to have some trust in the reams of psychological studies coming out now, that indicate that we all stick to our guns. It has nothing to do with ideology or belief of the scientific method. Overwhelmingly we do not want our perceptual understandings stirred by data that will nudge us out of our intellectual complacency. Almost every single one of us wants the comforts of our belief. We are wired that way.

But…! Enough editorializing since it has nothing to do with my story except in the broadest way.In August I visited my parents in E. Lansing, Michigan. It was a wonderful visit but that also has nothing to do with the story. What occurred (amongst other things) was that their garden was lush and in fact there were only the two of them to make use of the bounty. So…as all backyard tomato gardeners do, they foisted more tomatoes than I could reasonably eat on me. In fact I took them home and essentially became unreasonable and did consume them. I also consumed the acorn squash they provided (I made an ideal soup too but that is another story).

Well there were two green tomatoes that I intended to ripen in the age old brown paper bag method. Here is where things get a bit weird. I think I was in Michigan at about the 10th of August. That was two and a half months ago. I have checked my brown paper sack nearly daily and the tomatoes stayed firm and changed to a yellow color but just would not ripen. They also would not rot. You could have played racquetball with them (OK maybe only play catch).

Tonight, October 26, 2010 I decided I would fry them as green tomatoes with some onions as a side to the dinner. What I found when I started the process is probably well known to tomato experts. That would be the Luther Burbank types who actually study tomatoes. I on the other hand am essentially an expert at eating tomatoes and we are legion.
What I found was that (you know by now that I loathe digression but I am listening to Verdi preludes, overtures and such and it makes me type faster)the tomatoes once sliced produced nearly no juice, no liquid and were not fryable (as opposed to the real word which is friable and means being able to be pulverized). They were not acceptable as fried green tomatoes (btw…despite the movie of that same name being a “chick flick” I enjoyed immensely). Here is why and it actually will inform you of what I learned today.

You have waited this long and deserve to know. The seeds had all gone to sprout while still encased in the tomato itself. This was news to me. Here is a photo of what I found. I was amazed. I have had plenty of tomatoes rot because I could not get to them fast enough. I may have more since I currently am doing the brown paper bag thing with the 20 or so remainders from this year’s garden. Never have I experienced tomatoes that go to seed (or sprout) internally. The bodies of the tomatoes were robust as I described earlier but in their bellies they were sowing. They were growing new tomato plants. I was stunned but that may be more out of naiveté than anything else but now I know.

I had my first adult garden in 1975 and have had at least 20 summers of backyard gardening so it is not as if I do not know anything about plants (maybe it is). This is a new phenomenon to me. Now my dad is not (I think) averse to garden stimulation such as “MiracleGro” and I am. I may well be wrong here, he may stick to the same principles of “organic like” gardening that I use. I only use mulch to tweak a garden of vegetables (and the weeds that piggyback on my largesse)and have never experienced the story I have just told. I also do not do things like soil history or air quality testing so I do not have an “organic” garden. I only approximate it by not adding fertilizers.

I am going to tell my dad this story and gain a bit of insight but I have never seen a tomato that goes to seed internally. All of mine are eaten when it is right or they rot. I am enamored of finding out what happened here and probably will only have ideas to think about rather than an answer.
My Verdi music just finished and so will I.

One Hot Summer

2010-07-05T10:26:00.000-07:00

July 4th, 2010

This is a season for the young. Heat affects our juniors differently than it does us…at least from my experience. In those salad days it seemed that sweating was a chevron, a badge that told others we were up to the task of heat. We did not withstand it, we reveled in it.

That is not so for me at this age. I stand it because I cannot change it. I escape it when that is an avenue to pursue. Heat is with us in the mid Atlantic this year.
It is the 234th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, some two weeks into summer. I have not counted but we are in about our 20th day with 90 plus temperatures. We still have about 75 days of summer left. We need rain which has not significantly presented itself for about a month. My rain barrel has been dry for weeks forcing me to fill it with tap water. My garden lapping up every ounce I can provide of that tap water.

As I age I reflect more and more on the insightful generosity of our courageous if sometimes flawed forefathers. I spend some time imagining how they may have thought given the exigencies of the time. Today I re-read that Declaration and have some thoughts about that to present in another venue.

Knowing that today would reach temperatures near 100 I chose to do my outdoor activities early and so I was off to Cromwell Park for some 6:00am birding. It started slowly but in time the warblers came out from behind the leaves as did the towies. The goldfinch, robins and kingbirds did the same. I did not see the indigos or the bluebirds that I expected to see; nor did I see the Baltimore Orioles that are routine there; nor did I see the Orchard Orioles that everyone else claimed to have spotted.

It was a good day though and I’ll have to venture back next week mostly to find the Orchard Orioles. It was probably 85 degrees by 9:00am when I left. At home I watered the tepid garden and by 2:30pm was forced to turn the AC on as it showed 96 on my thermometer located outside my kitchen window. I cleaned my kitchen and nearly cleaned my room. It was a close call.

I’m reading a book about Andrew Jackson whom I have never appreciated yet I continue to see his name mentioned as one of the greatest presidents. I am reading it because I only know things about Jackson presented from very ideological perspectives. Rather than assume they are accurate I thought to get some resource material to better understand.

Then I reread the Declaration of Independence and now it is dark and I am going to go shoot off two bottle rockets that someone gave me a few years ago. I have always been a sucker for tiny explosives and I am on my way to the deck to satisfy that suckerdom.

234 Years ago...

2010-07-05T10:23:00.000-07:00

Thoughts on the Declaration Of Independence

The Declaration is really a list of grievances against King George. They were real and we would have them today…I dare say there are those that think we do. Everything has evolved in those 234 years though and for almost all of us in the US, things are significantly better than they were way back when.

In re-reading the Declaration I could see how this document was a brazen affront to the King; fighting words so to speak. There were two things that I thought worth commenting on. The first is the phrase “…endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights…”. It raises a question about many statements made by fundamentalists about the Christian motivation of the establishment of this new nation. It would seem that if the founders imagined this to be a singularly Christian nation they would have written “…THE Creator…”. There would have been only one choice rather than a personal choice which would include scientific naturalism.

The second curiosity that struck me during this reading was the grievance regarding the King’s obstructing the Laws of Naturalization of Foreigners. This was considered to be a point of rebellion. The founders considered the importance of building their stock through an open door policy. Immigration was important to them.

I would not try to make an argument that the same conditions that insulted the revolutionaries are the same as today. I would argue that a policy of immigration rights was critical to the thinking of those who penned the document and that still exists today.

Show me the unconstitutionality...

2010-05-14T15:59:00.000-07:00

don't just talk about it.

Well I am no Constitutional scholar. I have read it several times and I have a copy at my bedstead and one at work. I have these handy because I continually hear how various politicos are suggesting anti constitutional measures. It is refrain used routinely now that we have a black president. There are those who will object to everything he or his cabinet or a lawmaking democrat has to say and often it includes their unconstitutionality.

I’m baffled. I keep hearing this “unconstitutional” mantra; sometimes it even cites a particular amendment. Then there is nothing. There is no explanation as to how this or that proposal is unconstitutional.

I use my references to try to locate the problem. I try to understand the unconstitutionality that is so often (and so vaguely) resorted to. I also have read much of the Federalist Papers that played a major role in constructing the constitution and continue to access them for a clearer understanding. Most of the time I fail to ascertain the problem. I am not saying that is not there, only that I am too dense to see it.

Lest one imagine that I am merely an apologist for the current administration or the democrats in lawmaking branches let me say that I am profoundly disappointed. I am disappointed in the “change” that has not occurred. (On the other hand I also recognize that history began long before Obama took office which is averse to Tea Baggers notions). I have felt revulsion to lawmakers of all stripes for a very long time. Maybe they are all unconstitutional and I merely need edification.

I suspect though, that folks are merely echoing the braying of all the Father Coughlin wannabes that saturate our hottest media. I suspect that if Rush Limbaugh says something is unconstitutional than understanding need go no further. I suspect that the word of authority is all that is requisite to make statements and cling to them. Methinks the ire is ad hominem but I am willing to be corrected with any articulate discussion.

Unconstitutionality is the new “Nazism”. It is becoming the standard bearer word to voice a vague dissatisfaction of the current administration. Over the last several years ideological voices from all political perspectives have over used Godwin's law whereby all things that we do not like are linked to Nazism. That grew into “fascism”, “socialism” and of course “communism” and all of those terms have very anti-historically been conflated to mean the same thing. Well that became passé for the neo conservatives in the media (unless you are Jonah Goldberg who apparently has not read anything that was not published by Regnery Press and are unable to actually articulate a thought without opinion).

So the advancement of rhetorical framing has led us to over use the constitution without an explanation. Merely citing the constitution as being abraded seems to be enough for those squawking heads and in my estimation, all the fuel necessary for those joining the Tea Baggers or writing those letters to the editor.

Maybe I am all wrong but I need to be enlightened. Maybe the abrogation of the constitution should lead me to umbrage, fear and defense. Tell me where it exists or find a new punching bag.

I Quit Broadcast Television and My Life is Fine

2010-03-26T17:23:00.000-07:00

Well it seems that I have made a big change in my style. I quit television. I disposed of all my cable TV and have not figured out how to get the standard stations to work. I even have a nice hi-def flat screen television and it largely sits idly in the living room.

I thought the transition would be difficult as I often lull myself to sleep watching a movie that I have no interest in. I often wake to the syncopation of the “Law and Order” beat since it is on some station nearly every minute of the day.
No longer though. I can now spend my cable TV money on beer or something else more fulfilling (should such a thing exist). This all occurred about 6 weeks ago and I thought there would be a withdrawal period and there is none. There is a backup to all of this.

I have found that the internet provides me with all of the televised stimulation (or ennui) that cable TV can. I also get to follow my addictions for it seems that I glom on to a show and want to watch it in its entirety. I go on the internet to any show (the presentation does not require merit…only my prurient interest). So I saw all of the “Weed” programs available on the net. It is not a very good show and I would have a hard time liking the heroine in real life but she is easy on the eyes and there are a lot of moral dilemmas and ironies to contend with.

I did the same with a really tacky show called “Leverage” which is preposterous in its tales and exploits but it reminded me of the “Mission Impossible” shows that I loved as a 15 year old. Now I am finalizing all of the “Peter Gunn” shows. There is now theatrical merit to these either but they offer noir (one of my predilections) and great jazz music that existed in the late 50s.

I also have found that NOVA is available on line though one has to watch the shows in doses meaning that after about 10 minutes you have to connect to the next 10 minutes. That requires more attention than bedtime succor allows but it is good Saturday afternoon browsing.

I get all of this without commercials. There is no one to tell me that I would be happier with a larger penis (or larger with a happier penis for that matter) and no one to tell me what to tell my doctor next time. I suppose I could watch Chris Matthews or Bill O’Reilly if I wanted to but with my internet TV the suggestion does not even exist.

Jeez, I get to watch what I want and not have to pay cable bills. There must be a Go….well probably not.

Mid winter and howling...

2010-02-10T08:17:00.000-08:00

I could keep the title of the last post because another season and a half whizzed by again. Today, snowed in, I have time to write.

It is February 10, 2010 and most everyone in the US is aware of the monstrous dumping of snow that we in the Mid Atlantic have received beginning last Friday night. Our total since then is not complete as I write this. We are in the midst of a “white out” blizzard. This is the third consecutive snow day and tomorrow is not likely to be a work day either. A snow day here and there is fine-it is fun in fact. Three and four in a row gives us cabin fever.

Shoveling helps because it gives us some outdoor time. We joke with neighbors and help nudge the recalcitrant auto out of its embedded spot just to be helpful. More often than not the days following a heavy east coast storm are mild and sunny. It is not rare to be digging out while rivulets of thawed snow trickle past or that our feet get cold from the slosh conditions that we stand in.

Today it is not the case. It is more than a bluster and shoveling is pointless for the time being. No drivers even attempt to get their vehicles out of there cozy nests. No drivers even attempt to get themselves out of their own cozy nests…accept the intrepid dog walkers and the cross country skiers. There are a handful of shovelers in view of this seat and it looks soo pointless as the gusts are soo ferocious that their efforts are Sisyphusian (if that is a word).

Well I too am pointlessly intrepid and chose to take a long walk this morning. Originally I thought I could take some more photos of the local conditions and did take a few. The blowing snow, melting on my lens made photography futile. I continued the hike regardless. I did not really have a goal but did have a few bucks in my pocket and decided to see if the grocery store was open which it was.
The trip to the store is about one mile, all uphill and today was in the face of the shrill chill of the winter wind. There had been no plowing yet this morning and I trod atop about 25 inches of snow. It was good exercise, the kind that warms one up for the eventual digging that will be needed.

I bought hamburger and buns, neither of which was necessary but it created a destination and soon I was headed back to the homestead. Obviously it was still about a mile but this time downhill and with the wind at my back. Despite the arctic sort of conditions we are not having the arctic temperatures. It is cold to be sure but not bitterly so. When I got back into the house and peeled off my coat and boots, I discovered that I was drenched in sweat. I look like my own version of Nick Nolte’s image that raced around the internet after his drunk driving arrest.

Shortly before I got home I faced a minor moral dilemma. At the bottom of the first big hill west of my house there was a crew of about five young people and a four wheel drive vehicle that could not make it up the hill. Under almost any circumstance there would be no question about what I should do. I would help extricate the car so that it could get on its way. Today it was different. Even if I joined four others and a driver and got the truck rolling it had about 1200 feet of only uphill to travel before briefly leveling out. Had the vehicle got to that point what would have happened? There was no emergency here and I chose to save my strength and time and wish them luck as I walked past.

Well I still am chronicling the weather event with photos but for the time being they will be under the protection of a roof. They can be found at this link and will be updated up until dark on February 10 and perhaps a few more on the morning of the 11th.

I am so glad that there is a beer store in walking distance.

Thoughts on our scientific pedogogy

2010-01-17T05:57:00.000-08:00

Every day in my inbox I find a couple of newsletters that report interesting scientific events. They are sometimes daily and some have other intervals. In most cases they read a bit like a Newsweek Magazine but focus only on scientific findings. Most of the articles are written so that an avid hobbyist such as me can understand the basics. They provide urls for more specific information that would be of more value to a researcher than to me.

The Scientist Magazine is one such publication, offering daily blogs with news such as described above. I especially like this periodical because it is not afraid to scold its own industry. Within any given week it cites evidence of scientific fraud. It also routinely chastises the US for its increasingly weakened status in the international science seen.

That is not to say that this country is not a world leader; it is to say that the gap between our nation and several others is fading. On January 15, 2010, Edyta Zielinska reports about the noticeable narrowing and provides many links to support her blog.

One of those links points to the November 14, 2006 blog by Kerry Grens that cites the lessening of publications by scientists in America.

I have wondered over the last few years about the number and percentage of our scientific student community is native born. I am sure there are statistics to resort to. I also wonder what the percentage of PhD graduates in the sciences continue to work in this country when their education is complete. Lastly I wonder how that percentage has been changing during the last 10 years.

With concerted efforts by American school boards to dilute science in public education and a recent 8 year presidential administration that eschewed scientific evidence for gut level reactions (thus responses) certainly suggests that young people would increasingly take a fools skepticism with them regarding science.
Alas I am only musing but I think it is worth some time researching.

Some further thoughts on aging

2009-10-31T10:52:00.000-07:00

When this topic was visited several months ago I was feeling pretty optimistic about aging and basically still do. Yet a several events have occurred since then that make me quake. I am unsure if they are mere coincidences or are symbolic of the aging process.

The first was the result of a conversation with a friend twenty years my junior. She asked if I had a sense of authority based on the ways younger people deferred to me. Did I sense that my age suggested that others assumed some sort of experiential knowledge that they would not challenge? I had never considered this at all…until she asked. Now I see it (in reality or in my imagination) regularly.

I really never spent any time thinking that my age gave me any office or that it required any undue respect. Yet now I see why she asked the question and find myself on occasion having to coax stronger opinions out of younger friends; I have to encourage people to challenge what I estimate in a discussion.

About a month ago while taking my exercise walk from my Light Rail stop for the mile it takes to get to work, I tripped and made a pratfall in the middle of Charles Street. What transpired was that several people ran to my aid (a good thing) and my painful collision with the blacktop included some pretty severe scrapes. It really was not the pain that bothered me; it was the blow to my pride. Not only is being the center of attention during these moments unsettling but the fact that I did not recover from the stumble before kissing pavement made me shudder. I have stumbled and tripped many times over the years. The streets of downtown Baltimore are like frozen waves. They sink and swell unevenly. I had to wonder if that fall would have happened to the 25 year old me or the 40 year old me. I wondered if it was a sign of slower reflexes.

It was a little dreamlike too. When I landed I had two odd notions in my mind. I wanted to cry. It was like I wished my mother was there to comfort me. I also didn’t want to get up. I wanted to just lie there. Being in the middle of a busy intersection though, did not offer that option.

Then as I reported a few weeks ago was my first car accident. I already mentioned the thought processes that went on. What has occurred since though again haunts me with the notion that were I younger I could have avoided the accident. There may be nothing to that notion yet it continues to crop up in my mind.

It is true that I was about as carefree as possible that pre-morning. Despite the fact that I was driving 70ish on an unlit road during deer mating season, I was oblivious. That has nothing to do with age but my inability to control the car sticks with me.

Anyway those are some further thoughts on aging.

Another season and a half whizzed by

2009-10-31T09:41:00.000-07:00

Here is a mid fall update. I see I missed summer all together. The garden updates took its place. Briefly, summer was pretty uneventful. The temperatures were milder than average and we got decent amount of rain. I didn't go anywhere except many birding day trips.

I think I enjoy fall the most of all the seasons. There is the transitional weather that soars and swoops one day bluster the next one summer like. There is the changing colors and the bird migration. My back yard fills with eccentrics stopping by for a bite as they prep for the warmer climes of the south. I like the smells of wet leaves and mud.

This fall has provided an added feature that is a mixed blessing so to speak. It seems that every Saturday is a rainy day. It prevents me from getting some of my yard manicure done. I still have wilting tomato vines in the garden to pull and exterior painting to do. Today (Halloween), is also the end of daylight savings time. For the next 75 or so days, I will be coming home from work in the dark.

I also had to work on Saturday and Sunday which limited time on the yard and house; there was also a Saturday of car shopping; that normally onerous task is one that I try to only experience once every 10 years or so. This most recent event was not so bad though. I bought an older Toyota and am content with that.

I try to arrange for about a two hour walk on the weekend in addition to birding saunters. The rain has interfered with that a lot too. It really doesn't matter too much as I get as much exercise as I need (though I have to research good neck exercises because it seems I always have a creaky neck). Anyway life is as good as it ought to be.

During the fall I can make good use of my home office which is in the attic. I especially like it because it is large, and removed from the world. There is not much head space so I sit and read mostly. Right now I write this nearly in the dark as the windows here are few; it is another rainy Saturday too. It is pretty relaxing. I'm listening to an album by Airto Moreira (Homeless) and enjoying his South American mix of urban music and jungle sounds.

Another reason to like the fall and my attic solitude is that the microscopes are all here and the collection of insects found over the summer can be looked at intently and I can research their habits. E.O. Wilson suggested that all of us are inherently Natural Historians in our youth. Time, peers, assumed urgency, children, house payments are only a few of the things that redirect our curiosity. I am so glad to have re-discovered that curiosity during the last few years. I will never be more than an avid amateur at this but with the help of joy of discovery, writers like Fortey, Wilson or Heinrich (and many others); so many wonderful and informative web sites; and personally spending time in the midst of the natural world, I am satisfied.

Today's walk will be urban however. I am delivering goods to my daughter Hannah in Annapolis. I am spending the night there and delivering the borrowed truck back to its owner tomorrow morning. That reminds me of something else that I have rediscovered during the last few years. That is the importance of relying on friends. I spent 20 or more years trying to be as independent as possible; relying on friends only for fairly superficial things; far too often eschewing offers of assistance. It was as if availing myself on their largesse I would be somehow beholden to them. In fact I became beholden more to an empty sense of pride.

I've also come to realize the value of conversation. Simply sharing ideas with peers who may disagree with me but want to hear what I have to say as much as I want to listen to them. Good conversations way lay ideology and can get to the heart of ideas and beliefs. Years ago I stopped watching those news stations shoutfests that occur every Sunday. I have eschewed all of those Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly etc. screamers (after giving many of them several hours of my attention in order to get a feel for their ideas and styles) because they are not driven by anything but ideological propaganda. I rarely try to engage their adherents in any meaningful ways.

So there you have it, my thoughts this last day of October.

Addendum:

Here is the final story of that accident that I wrote about in early October. The saga lasted so long because well, it just did. So October 10 the accident occurred and I wrote about it. It created an outpouring of kind offers some of which I could accept and others while kind were redundant. One friend came to Pennsylvania to pick me up and deliver me to my home. Another loaned her truck for my transportation needs.

The use of the truck allowed me to travel back up to clean out the remains of my car. It also got me back and forth to the Light Rail and to go search for another car. Searching for that car was something I did not look forward to at all. It also was stalled by my having to work several late days and both days of one of those weekends that would have been devoted to finding that car.

Well, buying the car turned out to be less a horror story than it usually is for me. It took a long morning and fortunately I had a book with me to while away the dead time. So at the end of the second week of this tale, I had a car. I was anxious to return the truck but I had no time off of work to conveniently return it but my benefactor was in no hurry to have it back and so it finally was returned 3 weeks after the accident; that would be today.

Well my daughter’s mom became aware of my having this truck and that I was going to visit her daughter the same weekend that I was returning the vehicle. So she begged me to take these three 8-9 foot potted plants with me for our girl to decorate her apartment with. That seemed like a good idea until I actually did it. Plants that tall do not travel well in a pickup truck; they do less well in a 45 mile trip spent largely on the expressway; they do less well in a pounding rain. Same with me. Twice I had to get out and rearrange their spot in the truck, while it poured and I pouted.

Well the trees and I got their fine and wet and we got them to their locations with only moderate hassle and my daughter and I could go out for dinner. We enjoyed an evening of conversation along with one of her local friends. Then I went to bed at about 11pm and slept til 7am (more or less). This would be pretty close to a record for me. It continued to pour all night.

It continued to pour in the morning too but we needed coffee and we needed to walk her new Norwegian Elkhound. The dog is a fine mesh of polite and good house dog-eager to please, and youthful skittishness. The walk was wet and fine and the dog learned a bit about Annapolis. That being complete it was time to return the truck. In the pouring rain I drove the 15 miles to get it back.

We had planned to take a walk in a local park and despite the rain (it was less than “pouring” at that time). We went ahead and did that walk and returned damp but (as I was reminded, “We aren’t sugar and we will not melt”) and it was true. Once that was complete I was given a ride to the Light Rail where I waited with about one million Baltimore Ravens fans ready for their ride to the stadium. I got to my destination much quicker than I imagined and was standing in the rain at the Baltimore stop one hour earlier than my scheduled pickup.

A few hours earlier while on my park walk, we discussed whether the distance from the Light Rail stop and my home was walkable. I said that it was 4 or so miles distance was not a reasonable walk and she concurred. While I stood at the stop knowing that I would be standing for an hour I elected to try the walk. It would be about an hour anyway so while getting wet, my options were passive (sit and wait) or active (walk home). I chose active and took off. It gave me the ability to walk on the periphery of my own favorite park where I was able to see the raging stream brought on by about 36 hours of rain.

I learned a few things in this trek; things I did not see while driving the same path every day for many years. I learned that the hills, valleys and swales of the route are much easier to do while sitting in a car than when hiking. It is considerably drier in the comfort of a car than exposed to nature on foot. I learned that there are not so many sidewalks and that cars are driven far faster than necessary and that you do not get splashed when inside of a vehicle. All that really doesn’t matter because I was not going to call a cab. I was there to experience the walk home and was sort of stoically enjoying it.

One hour and 8 minutes later I was home. It was good to be there for sure but I was glad that I did the experiment in fairly harsh conditions. It was a personal thing and certainly was not noble or heroic. I have walked much harder and longer paths sans problems. I was glad to have done it anyway.

Once home I realized that the last leg of the accident saga was over. My generous friend had her truck returned and I was home and warm (I did change my clothes first thing).

That same generous friend had suggested that the sun would come out today though at the time that was a questionable call. As I finish this tale the sun is beaming into my window and in a second I will be opening the blinds.