Letter From New York 12 19 15 On the countdown to Christmas…

December 20, 2015

Christmas Cards. Pandora. Christ Church. Hudson. Red Dot. Nick Dier. Christmas Quiche.  Democratic Debate.  Syrian Refugees.

It is Saturday night and I am at home.  Christmas carols are playing on Pandora and I am at the end of day in which I have been amazingly, perhaps disgustingly productive.

It is the pressure of the season.  Waking early, I did some weeding of my email inbox while sipping morning coffee.  I went to the gym then headed down to Christ Church to help serve coffee for the indoor Winter Market but there were enough people so I wasn’t needed.

Going to the Red Dot I had brunch, a wickedly delicious Eggs Benedict on potato latkes with a side of crisp American bacon.  I felt like a depraved man but it was so good.

Coming home, I went over to Lionel and Pierre’s because Nick was there.  I wanted to bawl him out.  He had surgery two days ago and was working, which he shouldn’t have been doing.  I was relieved to find his father with him, helping him.

Going home, I organized the making of quiches.  It’s my tradition to give neighbors and close friends a “Christmas Quiche.”  Today was the day to make them.   After leaving Lionel’s, Nick arrived and helped within the limits of a young man in a sling.

We made fourteen quiches.  I have wrapped my Christmas presents.  I have done my Christmas cards.

Though has anyone noticed how few Christmas cards we actually get these days?  I send back to everyone I get one from and this year that has been only seven cards.  Last year it was thirty some.  Paper cards are going out of fashion.

I remember the days of my youth in which my mother would spend what seemed like weeks getting out Christmas cards.  She had a basket in which she kept every Christmas card that came in and held it until the following year when she answered them all.

Must have been hundreds every year.

I bagged my presents this year.  Admit it, we all use bags now rather than the elaborate wrapping sessions of our youth.  I remember them well.  Intricate hours spent wrapping packages.  After enough of us had left home, my mother had a room devoted to wrapping.

Now I bag!  Don’t we all?

While I am writing this the Democrats are having a debate and I’m not watching.

I haven’t watched the Republican debates either.  They have been train wrecks from what I can assess.

And the Democratic ones have been on Saturday nights which, as I recall from my media days, may be the lowest ones for households using television.   Why are they doing them on Saturday nights?

I simply can’t believe all this is happening a year out from the election.  Have we turned politics into a reality TV show?

I am sitting in my lovely little cottage, listening to jazz Christmas music and am wondering about the world in which I am living.

And I am recognizing how lucky I am not to be a Syrian refugee or a refugee from anywhere.  There are sixty-million of them right now.  I think it is about to be worse than the refugee problem at the end of WWII.  And that is tragic.

I am wrapped in the coziness of my cottage.  It is where I want to be tonight, separated from the trials of the world though I will probably always be cognizant of them, wondering what I can do.

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Letter From New York 12 17 15 Naughty Hedge Fund Managers to a return of The Force, may it be with you

December 17, 2015

Red Dot.  Alana Hauptman.  Jerimiah Rusconi.  James Ivory.  “A Room with a View”  “Howard’s End”  “Maurice” Putin The Donald Martin Shkreli Enrique Marquez Farook  Malik  US and Cuba flights  Star Wars  May the Force be with you!

Early this morning I came down to the city and will return on the 7:15.  There is a Holiday Party I should attend but will not.  I want to return to the cottage and continue cleaning up from the dinner party I had last night.

Alana, who owns the Red Dot, and her partner, Patrick, were there as well as Jeremiah Rusconi, the premiere consultant for restoring homes in the Hudson Valley, and James Ivory, the directing partner of the Merchant Ivory team that brought us such films as “A Room With a View,” “Maurice” and “Howard’s End.”  He lives at the end of my street and has become by way of a friend.

It was a lovely evening.  Roast duck, scalloped potatoes, creamed pearl onions and peas, carrots and a salted caramel chocolate ganache for dessert.

We talked of movies and politics and local events in the warmth and coziness of the cottage.  Floodlights lit up the creek and holiday lights festooned the front of the house.

Jim and I started the evening with martinis and went on to a chill white Cotes du Rhone.  It was a softly warm evening of good chatter and comradeship, all united by the place where we live.  I treasure nights like that at the cottage.

While we dined and sipped wine, the world was moving on…

Putin has said that The Donald is the absolute leader in the race for the Presidency.  They have formed a mutual admiration society.  Trump wants to get closer to Putin and Putin sees nothing wrong with that. 

While I was waking up this morning to make my way into the city, Federal agents were preparing to arrest Martin Shkreli, the bad boy of pharmaceuticals.  He is famous, or infamous, for upping the price of drug that had sold for $13.50 a pill to $750.00 a pill.  Used to treat people with toxoplasmosis, including those with AIDS, it was a critical component of many folks drug regimen.

Apparently, according to the Feds, he was not a very good boy before that and is charged with fraud and wire transfer conspiracy.  He’d been doing, according to the Feds, a number of naughty things with companies he’s been involved with and lying consistently about the financials of those companies.

I hope it’s all true.

Enrique Marquez, a friend of the San Bernardino shooters, Farook and Malik, was arrested.  He legally obtained the assault weapons used and gave them to the shooters, without going, apparently, through he legal process to transfer firearms.

He converted some years ago to Islam but quite going to his mosque because some members found him “goofy.”  Depending on what charges are filed, he faces some years in prison up to life imprisonment.

The US and Cuba are working out an agreement to allow up to thirty flights a day between the country.  Hello, tourism!

And hello “Star Wars,” which is released tomorrow.  Generally the reviews are really good and say the film harkens back to the first films, which were actually Episodes 4, 5 and 6.

1, 2 and 3 came out much later and while box office successful, were not critically acclaimed and didn’t capture the love of the audience the way the others did.  The magic seems to have returned with this episode, number 7.

I am sure I will see it but not for a bit.  I don’t like crowds and the crowds this weekend with be formidable.  May the Force be with you!

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Letter From New York 12 15 15 From Vegas Debates to Plumber’s Strife

December 16, 2015

Penn Station. Acela Lounge.  Republican Debate. CNN.  Pataki. Santorum. Graham. Huckabee. Las Vegas Review-Journal. Arctic Warming.  Walruses. Los Angeles Threat. Saudi Arabian Coalition.  Yemen. Sunni.  Shia. Houthis. Plumbing truck with jihadists.

I’m sitting in the Acela Lounge at Penn Station, waiting for the 7:15 train up to Hudson.  The television monitor in the Lounge is on CNN and the final debate of this year for the Republicans.  It is the “B” team, Pataki, Santorum, Graham and Huckabee.  When Rick Santorum was announced, I actually was surprised.  I thought he was gone.  He’s not.

I am debate weary and there is almost another year until the election. 

The debate is being held in Las Vegas, which somehow seems appropriate. 

One of the things Las Vegans are working to find out is who owns their most important paper, The Las Vegas Review-Journal.  It was sold at a premium to a recently formed group that no one can find out anything about.  The reporters at the paper are stumped.  Seems like a Las Vegas kind of story.

It was sunny and balmy here in New York, the temp was up to 64 degrees.  On some of the last few days, New York has been warmer than Los Angeles.  It is the subject of many watercooler conversations in the city.

The Washington Post reported this afternoon that the Arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest of the planet, thinning ice and endangering the walrus population.

There was a bomb hoax against the Los Angeles school system today.  It disrupted the city and gave students a day off, while wondering what was going on.

Now on the train, we are sliding out of Penn Station and I’m away from the debate.  I will be catching up in the morning about what happened, particularly in the major round.

It is doubtful to me that any of the gentlemen that were in the first round will be the nominee.  Santorum and Graham made it clear they would support Trump if he were the nominee.

Saudi Arabia has announced a coalition of 34 nations to fight IS.  Reading the details causes the mind to hurt.  Not included in this coalition are Iran and Iraq, who are primarily Shia while IS and Saudi Arabia are Sunni.  The Sunni Saudi Arabians are working to put fellow Sunnis back in control of Yemen, which has been overrun by the Houthis, who I think are Shia-centric.  Following the players in this drama is always confusing.

The Sunnis and Shia consider each other apostates but they are still Muslims.  Saudi Arabia is attempting to overcome complaints that it hasn’t been doing enough to stop IS, which actually seems to have much of its ideological roots in the Arabian Peninsula.  There are certainly strong similarities between the Islam followed by IS and Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia had elections in which women could vote for the first time.  A few have been elected to office though they can’t drive cars to get to their work.  A Saudi Princess who runs a department store in Riddyah said Uber is becoming very popular with her “sales girls.”

Someone said to me: something is always better than nothing.

A hotel guest in Alva, OK, went to the front desk and said he had been charged twice.  The hotel reversed the charges but he didn’t believe them so he drove his truck through the lobby.  When arrested, he told the police he did it because they hadn’t believed his threat that he would do it.

Another truck in the news is one that was owned by a plumber in Texas.  He traded it in for a new one and asked that the decals of his plumbing company be removed before sale.  They weren’t.  It ended up in Turkey and a photo of it filled with jihadists ended up going viral.  The plumber, Mark Oberholtzer, had to clear out of town for a while because of all the threats he was receiving. 

The dealership, he said, in the lawsuit he just filed, hung up on him when he called to complain.

It is dark outside the train.  When I get home, I need to wrap Christmas presents and get them to UPS in the morning while also cooking for a dinner party tomorrow night.  Thursday takes me back to the city.

Good night, all.

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Letter From New York 12 12 15 Climate Change

December 13, 2015

It’s hard to believe that Christmas is in thirteen days.  The temperature today scratched 60 degrees.  I wore only a fleece pullover all day; it was too warm for anything more.

Now, a little after 7, the temperature is beginning to drop and I am thinking of perhaps lighting a fire.  When I finish writing this, I am going to watch some video and “wrap” presents, which means I put them in those oh so convenient bags, wrapped in tissue paper.

In the late afternoon, I went grocery shopping as I am having people over for dinner on Wednesday evening.  Since I am getting up in the morning and going to the city until Tuesday evening, I needed to do the shopping now.  Wednesday I will cook.

Young Nick was here today and we got the table all set so I don’t have to be concerned about that.  I love having dinner parties; it feels like a vacation to me putting them together.

My mind rests from all the everyday noise and I am lost in the cooking and prepping.

Because it is so warm, there have been lots of climate change jokes going around.

Today, an accord about climate change was reached by 196 nations in Paris.  It is monumental and there is still a great deal of work to be done.

Beijing has been on red alert for several days this month, pollution having reached a level that caused schools to close, factories to shutter, cars to get off the road and for people to stay at home. 

Delhi has worse air than Beijing and is doing less about it though starting January 1st, cars will be on an even/odd system for being on the road.  But the police say they will cancel it, if it becomes too inconvenient.  Which it probably will…

My friend Raja lives in Delhi and has a young daughter who spends this part of the year with nebulizers and in great discomfort because of the pollution.

Yes, we need to be tackling these problems.

Oh, so many problems…

This morning I had an impossibly difficult time waking up but when I did I began to charge into action.  It’s that time of year for all of us when there is absolutely more to do than we can but somehow it all comes together.

I’m getting up early tomorrow and heading down to the city.  My friend, Rev. Peter Panagore, is giving a talk at Trinity Wall Street about his death experiences.  He’s been dead twice.  Once as a result of a hiking accident when he was young and, most recently, when he had a massive heart attack and they kept losing him in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.

He has seen heaven.

I hope I do.

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Letter From New York 12 10 15 River ramblings…

December 10, 2015

Global warming. Todd Broder. Broderville. Uber. Trump. Goldwater. Lyndon Johnson.  West Point.  Penn Station. Moynihan Station. Grand Central. Union Station. “Newtown.” Odyssey Networks.

It’s Thursday afternoon and I’m riding north, leaving the city for the weekend.  It’s the 10th of December and the sky is bright and the temperature is hovering near 60 degrees.

Gallows humor jokes about global warming proliferate.  Burdened with things I am returning to the cottage, I got an Uber to take me to Todd’s office for a call. Chiek, my driver, and I discussed it most of the time between the apartment and office.

He just became an American citizen and so we talked about the election scene.  He said in the six years he has been in America, he’s never seen anything like it.  I must be twice as old as he and I’ve never seen anything like it either.

Trump barrels on, his foot firmly inserted in his mouth, a condition which does not seem to prevent him from topping the Republican polls.  As far as I can tell from newspaper accounts, Republicans are terrified of him and too terrified to do anything about him.

Some are saying that if he is nominated it will be the harbinger of a defeat of the magnitude of 1964, when Goldwater ran against Lyndon Johnson and was overwhelmingly defeated, taking down much of the party with him.

If that happens, there is a part of me that says they deserve it if they give the nomination to him.

The Republican circus is dismaying me.  And probably most other thinking adults…

We are gliding past West Point, the redoubt looking splendid in the afternoon sun as we move north.

When I got on the train today, I remarked to myself what a depressing place Penn Station is, especially when compared with Grand Central or Union Station in Washington DC.  Those places put a bit of pep in your feet while Penn grinds down the soul.

If I live long enough, they may eventually move train traffic from Penn across the street to what is now being called “Moynihan Station.”  Named after the late New York Senator, Daniel Moynihan, the new station will be forged from the old Post Office, designed by the same architect who built the original Penn, torn down in one of New York’s greatest moments of folly.

I woke up grumpy this morning and made a conscious choice to be happy, to enjoy the day – and I am.  Yesterday, a project I have been working on died with a whimper.

Yesterday, I was surrounded by friends and a dinner held by Odyssey for its Board and friends at which were shown clips from the films they are working on.  “Newtown” has been accepted into Sundance and The White House has asked to see their film on mass incarceration.  Much to celebrate.

But when I got home and the laughter passed, I took a little time to mourn my project, falling asleep wanting my teddy bear.

When I woke, the sadness was still hanging on me so I got a grip on myself and reminded myself that the sun had still risen, it was a remarkable weather day for the 10th of December, that other opportunities will come and there are other project joys to be found in the future.

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Letter From New York 12 08 15 Parsing The Donald and other things…

December 8, 2015

Big Daddy’s Diner. Manhattan. White Wine Problems. Tibor Rubin. Medal of Honor. George W Bush. Jan Hummel. Donald Trump.  The Donald. Michelle Fiore. Nevada Assemblywoman. Venezuela. Maduro. Chavez. U2. Angels of Death. Paris. Bataclan. Stephen Ambrose. New History of World War II.  Kindle.

As I am sitting down to write tonight, I am in a booth at Big Daddy’s Diner on 91st and Broadway in Manhattan.  Why?  Remy, who cleans the apartment in New York, is cleaning and I made an escape.  I went to Starbucks where, not surprisingly, there wasn’t a single seat so I came to Big Daddy’s thinking I could use their WiFi.  It’s not working so I am perusing the Internet with my phone connection and I am running out of juice on that.

Ah well, these are very much first world problems.  One of my friends calls them “white wine problems.”

It’s been a funny day, here in the city.  It was grey this morning and while chill, it was above normal in temperature.  As it has been for the last six weeks or something.

It seems the human race is experiencing a new neurosis:  fear of climate change.  There was something about it in the New York Times.  If there is something to worry about the human race will turn it into a neurosis.

It is something to be concerned about but I’m not sure that being neurotic is going to help.

In the LA Times there was a heart warming story of Tibor Rubin, who passed away recently.  A Hungarian Jewish survivor of the Holocaust he swore that he would join the US Army if he ever made it to America.  In 1948, he did.  He joined the Army and was sent to Korea where he served with distinction, no, more than distinction.  He held off the Chinese for 24 hours by himself and did more.

Three times his fellow soldiers pushed for him to receive the Medal of Honor.  Three times an anti-Semitic officer prevented it from moving forward.  His fellow soldiers testified that their commanding officer sent Tibor on the most dangerous assignments because he wanted to kill the Jewish soldier.

He finally received the Medal of Honor in 2005, from President George W. Bush.  He never spoke badly of the Army or of that officer who tried to get him killed.  He remained grateful until the day he died.

My favorite Conservative, Jan Hummel, wrote an email to me that said: He’s an idiot.  If there was more it didn’t get through so I emailed back: who’s the idiot?

Donald Trump.  Yes, The Donald IS an idiot but he is a popular idiot and that’s  frightening.

He has proposed banning the entry of ALL Muslims to the US.  Everyone is outraged.  Except, perhaps, Nevada Assemblywoman Michele Fiore, who takes an even more aggressive stance.  She announced she was about to get on a plane to Paris and shoot them herself. 

Then she qualified.  She would only get on a plane to shoot Syrian terrorists.  I’m not sure how she would tell which was which.

Yes, she is Republican.

In Venezuela, President Maduro has been roundly defeated in legislative elections.  The opposition has swept to power in the legislature though it is still stuck with Maduro as President, which might limit their effectiveness BUT it is a huge sea change in that country. It is a repudiation of Chavez and his socialist movement.

Interestingly, Maduro has had the television stations playing old Chavez speeches and sports events rather than covering the elections but the people know and have been celebrating in the streets.

Paris, battered on many levels since the November 13th attacks, has seen Angels of Death return with U2 for a concert.  Angels of Death were performing at the Bataclan Theater where most of the deaths occurred.  U2 had a concert scheduled for the following night, which it postponed.

It is dark here in New York and soon I will return to the apartment and read a book.  Last night I finished Stephen Ambrose’s “New History of World War II.”  I have many books on my Kindle.  I will choose from one of them.

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Letter From New York 12 07 15 Pearl Harbor Day…

December 7, 2015

Pearl Harbor Day.  December 7th.  Japanese Empire. Second World War. Russia. England. United States. “The New History of World War II.”  CL Sulzberger.  Stephen E. Ambrose. Axis Powers. Hitler. Italy. Germany. Gestapo. SS. General Winter.  John D. McCormick.

The heavy fog that blanketed the world this morning is dissipating in the afternoon.  Sun has replaced the grey.  When I drove to the gym this morning, it was hard to see far down the road.

It is December 7th and today is the anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese, resulting in the US entering the Second World War.

As it happens, I am reading “The New History of World War II” by Stephen E. Ambrose and CL Sulzberger.  The book does an excellent job of following the course of the war, point by point.

One of the things about the War that I had never really thought about was that Russia, England and the US coordinated their efforts through communications and meetings, bound by a single goal:  to win the war and, particularly, to gain the unconditional surrender of the Axis powers.

The Axis powers, Germany, Italy and Japan had no coordination between them.  Japan didn’t inform their allies they were going to attack at Pearl Harbor and there was no wartime coordination between them.

The book also clearly points out the number of disastrous military decisions made by Hitler, who, after his early successes, began to think of himself as the greatest general to have ever lived.

He listened to no one and no one stood up to him.  Terror is effective in silencing critics.  You don’t need the Gestapo knocking on your door in the middle of the night.

That happened often enough without disagreeing with Hitler.

Germany and Japan were brutal to the citizens of the countries they conquered.  Had Hitler not been such a monster to the Russians, they might well have rallied behind him.  When the Nazis first rolled into Russian towns, they were hailed as liberators.  Then the soldiers were followed by the SS and things got ugly.

The Japanese were equally brutal.

What I am also getting out of reading this history is what life was like for the ordinary soldier on both sides of the war.  It was a horrific business that required enduring, in the deepest sense of that word, horrific situations and surviving if one could, conditions that are almost unimaginable but for that fact they were endured.

And that was true for both sides, particularly in the Asian jungles and in the bitter Russian winters.  “General Winter” is what defeated Napoleon and went a long way to breaking Hitler.

Knowing that this anniversary was coming, I have thought about World War II and the sacrifices it demanded of everyone.  Since Korea, we’ve been fighting without asking sacrifices on the home front.  In World War II, everyone was contributing.

John D. McCormick, patriarch of the McCormick clan of which I am an “honorary” member stood on the deck of the battleship upon which the Japanese surrendered.  I didn’t know that until his Memorial Service.

And it connects me to that war in a way I didn’t feel connected before knowing that.  This wonderful man who gave me piggyback rides and twirled me through his legs along with his own children fought in the Pacific and was there to watch the final surrender of the Japanese Empire.

It is with his two oldest daughters and their families I will spend the Holidays.

The ancient Egyptians used to say that to speak the name of the dead is to make them live again.

Today I speak John’s name and thank him for the sacrifices he endured so that I didn’t grow up speaking German or Japanese.  I think of Eileen McCormick’s brother who was an airman and did not return from the war, shot down on a mission.

Perhaps today we should all take the time to think, for a moment, of the people of which we know, who participated in that struggle, while the fate of the world hung in the balance.  Speak their names to yourself so that they live again, for a moment.

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Letter From New York 12 05 15 Winter Walk in Hudson…

December 6, 2015

Hudson, New York.  Winter Walk. The Red Dot. James Linkin.  Mat Tombers. Mathew Tombers. Nutcracker. Columbia County, New York.  Warren Street, Hudson.  Old Chatham Kettle Corn.  Alana Hauptman. Brooklyn North. Hamptons.

It is the first Saturday in December and that means that tonight was Winter Walk in Hudson, an event I have attended faithfully for fourteen years. 

Hudson has one of the most magnificent collections of late 19th Century buildings in the country and each year on the first Saturday in December decks itself out for a winter party. 

Carolers line the streets and sing traditional carols while people in costume meander the street.  Shops decorate themselves for the day and there are probably 30,000 people who show up for the party.

It is Hudson’s kick-off for the Holiday Season.

For me, it reached its culmination when I returned from wandering the streets to go to The Red Dot to meet my friend James Linkin.  You couldn’t move in the place and it was the most festive of the places I had visited.

Alana, proprietress of The Red Dot, goes full tilt every year to transform her establishment to some Christmas theme.  This year may well be the most spectacular she has created.  It was all about The Nutcracker. 

She did an amazing job and it, alone, put me in a festive mood.

It was a local night.  The conversations were about decorative windows and great themes and neighborly conversations.  It was a celebration of local joy.  Tonight was about hometown.  Hudson is the county seat and the heart of Columbia County.

While I don’t live in Hudson it is the center of my life in Columbia County.  It is for almost everyone who lives in the county.  Hudson has a life of its own.

It is the last suburb of New York and the first suburb of Albany.  It has attracted a number of people who are economic refugees from New York, people who are connected to the city and who can no longer afford to live there.

It is a haven for those who are artistic, many are the artists who once made SoHo, SoHo.    

The creative energy that has found itself here that is amazing. 

With humor, people have called this Brooklyn North or SoHo Redux.  And it is true, there is a creative energy that flows through the county that is quite amazing.

The weekenders are people who cannot afford nor want to be in the Hamptons; looking for something that is more tangible and real.  We are also inhabited with those who could afford the Hamptons but don’t want it.

I have been to fourteen successive Winter Walks and each year find something new to wonder at.

Tonight I wandered through almost all of Warren Street while eating some of the best popcorn in the world:  Old Chatham Kettle Corn.  In a kind of popcorn ecstasy I walked the streets, not buying but looking for gifts for the folks on my list for which I have not found the perfect item.

Tonight the trials and the tribulations of the world were far way.  I was in my own place, my own world and allowed myself to be drenched by it.

  It was so good to celebrate my time and my place.

Since parking was impossible I hitched a ride in with young Nick after we had finished our weekend chores.  And I called Riverview Taxi to bring me home. 

Andy, the driver, came into the Red Dot to find me.  He was early and he wanted to be sure he found me and got me into his cab. 

It is the kind of personal touch of small town America that is seeping away in the world of Uber but one that I appreciate as I appreciate my place in this special place.

I’ve witnessed the growth of Hudson, seen it change a bit and know it will change more.  But it is a special place as is this whole county which is my home now.

I am lucky and am lucky enough to know I am lucky.

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Letter From New York 12 03 15 Avoiding past mistakes….

December 3, 2015

Claverack Cottage.  San Bernardino shootings. Domestic terrorism. Nick Stuart.  Newtown. Milwaukee.  Milwaukee 53208. Stephen Ambrose. IS. Radical Islam. World War II.

It is six o’clock.  The world beyond the cottage is dark after a day of grey and drizzle.  I went out only to do a few errands and spent most of the day at home, working on paperwork, prepping some things for my class in January, following up on some things.  It felt positive, moving through the endless amount of “paperwork” a life in the 21st century demands, even when most of it is digital.

The world has ticked on since I last wrote two days ago.  There was another shooting, in San Bernardino.  I thought about writing something on the train coming up from the city but I felt a bit punched in the gut by it all.

They are now working to determine if this was an act of domestic terrorism.  It might well have been.

My friend, Nick Stuart, and I met for a martini last night before my train.  He arrived ebullient. Just before he came to meet me, it was announced “Newtown,” a film he is Executive Producer of ,was accepted into Sundance.   Today he found out he is about to be a grandfather; his oldest daughter Rihannon is going to be having a baby in June.  We’ll celebrate more on Tuesday and Wednesday, both days I will be seeing him.

Some had told him that “Newtown” was an old subject and its time had past but given what has been happening it is more relevant than ever.  Today I read that there is a mass shooting of some kind on an average of once a day.

So “good on you” Nick, as my Aussie friends would say for having preserved with this project. 

Another one, on mass incarceration, which is nearing completion has been requested by the White House for a screening.  Who knew that Milwaukee had the highest number of prisoners per capita than any other city in America?  It is titled “Milwaukee 53208.”

The room is filled with the sounds of the ticking of a small grandfather’s clock.  It has been part of the background sound of my life since I was born.  It was on a shelf in the hall just beneath the stairs that went up to my bedroom.  Lately, I have been calling it the “heart of the house.”

It makes me feel like I am living in a soft womb of a house, comforted by the sound of a heartbeat.  It is part of what makes the cottage special.

I’m also doing laundry, a grounding task if ever there was one. 

I’m reading Stephen Ambrose’s history of World War II.  It’s a bit drier than I expected but gives a look into the horrors of that war.  As awful as it was, it reminded me that America and Canada were probably the only combatant countries that were not ravaged on the home front by the war.

It also has taught me how much the world and our country were changed by that conflict.

I am wondering how our world will be changed by the current conflict in which we find ourselves? 

Perhaps I am being a historical romantic but it feels as if we are living through another tipping point in history as we struggle with IS and radical Islam.

If the couple in San Bernardino were, indeed, domestic terrorists we face ongoing “Paris style” attacks and it will be a struggle to avoid mistakes of the past such as the encampment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

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Posted in Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Mideast, Political Commentary, Social Commentary, Uncategorized, World War II | Leave a Comment »

Letter From New York 11 30 15 Stepping up to hope…

November 30, 2015

Brian Gallagher.  Joe Boardman.  Amtrak. Hudson River. West Point. X-tra Mart murder.  IS.  COP21. Climate Change Conference. Producer’s Guild of America.“Tut” SpikeTV. Christ Church.  Hope.

It’s a grey day, chill and gloomy.  The train is crawling south toward the city.  In front of me is Brian Gallagher, who is the sidekick of Joe Boardman, President of Amtrak, who is sitting across from him.  Brian is by way of being a friend and  I went up to say hello to Brian when I saw him, realized that Boardman was across from him and said hello to him too.  He seems a very shy man, something Brian is not.  Perhaps that’s why they seem to make a good team.

The Hudson River is smooth as a mirror, reflecting the muted colors on the banks above it.

With me I am carrying twenty pounds of textbooks from which I must choose the one I will use in the class I will be teaching at our local community college near the cottage.  It’s challenging and I have to make the plunge by Friday.

That said, I’m excited about teaching the class. 

Waking up around seven, I almost immediately plunged into emails and got lost in them.  Before I drove to the train station, I organized all the Christmas presents I’ve purchased during the year in piles for the person for which they are intended.  With Christmas carols playing, I found myself in a festive mood.

Which is the mood in which I intend to stay.

It was, as you know, a harsh weekend out there.  Our local tragedy was that a woman, working at the X-tra Mart not far from my local grocery store, allegedly went into the restroom, gave birth to a baby boy, strangled him and disposed of his body in a trash bin outside the store and then returned to work.

She is currently in the hospital receiving a mental evaluation.

As is the man who shot dead three in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

We’re all a little crazy.  I think it is part of the human condition but these folks are really crazy, in tragic ways.

Crazy zealous are the members of IS, who, I think, honestly believe they are doing what God wants of them.  How you believe in such a crazy God is another question, but they do.

On a brighter note, COP21, the Climate Change Conference, has begun meetings in Paris.  Out of this might come good news, of nations agreeing to work together to cool the planet, which was warmer last year than any other year in recorded history.

That’s important to remember that we’re talking about “recorded history.”  The planet has gone through much colder and warmer times. 

As I am a member of the Producer’s Guild of America, I get screening copies of movies and television shows to watch for judging purposes.  One of them I got was “Tut,” the massive SpikeTV mini-series.  As I was watching, it occurred to me that it is amazing how humans seemed to make a leap toward civilization about 10,000 years ago and haven’t looked back.

The time we have wandered the planet as beings you and I would recognize, has been an incredibly short amount of time.

As I am choosing to be joyous, nature has chosen to support me with a burst of sunshine.  We have just sped past West Point and the sun is glittering off the river water.

Every Sunday that I go to Christ Church, I light a candle for myself, for a friend who is struggling with brain cancer and one for all the things I should be lighting a candle for, like world peace and the eradication of poverty.

I’m older now than I have ever been and will only continue down that path and as age piles upon me [with attendant wisdom, one hopes] I will continue to seek to be grateful for all the wonders of the world, those which I have experienced and the ones which lie ahead of me.

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Posted in Claverack, Columbia County, Hudson New York, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Mideast, Political Commentary, Social Commentary, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

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