Letter From New York February 27, 2011

February 27, 2011

Or, as it seems to me…

Two days ago my friend Beverly, who receives and reads this missive, sent me an email wondering what I was thinking about Libya. What is happening there is less covered than events in Tunisia and Egypt. The difference: there aren’t that many cameras in Libya and there aren’t that many correspondents reporting out of there.

Gaddafi invited foreign correspondents to Tripoli, the capital, to demonstrate that all was under his control. It apparently backfired as some squares and streets were filled with protestors, demonstrating that all was not well and under the dictator’s control. Correspondents were eager to see things up close, particularly after a telecast from Tripoli of a long, peculiar, rambling rant of Mr. Gaddafi informing his subjects that he was still in control, wasn’t going to leave Libya, wanted to die there as a “martyr” and that all the trouble was being caused because Mr. Obama, our President, was seeing to it that young Libyans were being provided hallucinogenic drugs. I saw some of it and it was mesmerizing in a terrifying way as it demonstrated his dangerously erratic behavior and probable madness.

He is a thug; yesterday I listened on NPR to a heartbreaking report from Tripoli from a man who described the relief he and friends felt when ambulances showed up at the scene of a melee between protesters and security forces and how relief became horror as Gaddafi’s security forces burst from the backs of those ambulances to shoot into the crowd. It is such actions that have resulted in the UN Security Council recommending that Gaddafi and his cronies be referred to the Tribunal for War Crimes while placing sanctions against them, which makes me believe that Gaddafi might feel he is going to have to really embrace that martyr role because there will be no place for him [or his sons] to run.

Reviewing online some of the African press this morning, it is clear there is concern that Libya will have a Ceausescu moment when Gaddafi falls, looking back at the execution of Romania’s dictator and his wife when their communist state collapsed beneath them.

There is a provisional government that has been formed in the east of the country under a former Justice Minister who defected to the rebels a few days ago and which is currently being recognized by the former Libyan Ambassador to the U.N. who also has renounced Gaddafi. The situation is confusing and complex and frightening. Some governments are quickly evacuating their citizens but migrant workers from poorer nations are adrift with their native governments unable or unwilling to assist them. Workers from African nations are gathering in compounds and are being guarded because Libyans are confusing them with African mercenaries brought in by Gaddafi and his boys to subdue them.

It appears that it’s only a matter of time before Libya is freed from the Gaddafi family; it is only a matter of how much blood will be lost in the process. And that is the terrifying reality. Unlike Tunisia and Egypt, the army is split and some of them are firing on the Libyan people though others are defecting and turning on their Colonel.

Much of the news is coming out via Twitter and Facebook because the correspondents are not there in the same force they were in Tunisia and Egypt. And the Tweets and Facebook postings are also showing that unrest remains in much of the Arab world. The Arabian King is offering significant financial assistance to his population to quell their unrest while Yemen’s dictator is under increasing pressure with old allies beginning to abandon him. Bahrain’s monarch is shuffling his cabinet as protests continue. Oman has begun to experience its first protests.

What began two months ago in Tunisia and then swept into Egypt and has now been blown into Libya and Yemen and Bahrain and Oman and Saudi Arabia. We will have to watch closely because the world is shifting before our eyes and the eventual outcomes will undoubtedly shape the geo-politic for years to come, for good or ill.

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Letter From New York, February 21, 2011

February 22, 2011

Future of TV, according to the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Foundation and Variety Magazine on February 15th in Los Angeles, CA…

As I tweeted that I was at this Future of TV Summit one wag of a friend, himself a former producer of many a series, tweeted back: TV has a future? Which I suppose was the question this Summit was called to answer. There were big names there, from legendary producer Gale Ann Hurd to the head of programming for HBO, Michael Lombardo. There were a dozen men and women from the cutting edge, those in charge of the technologies threatening the TV business. Interestingly, the regulars and the newcomers didn’t mix much on the panels. The new guys on the block were pretty much segregated from the old boys on the block, regardless of their ages.

And one would have expected, one would have thought, someone from the invasive new services like Netflix Streaming or Hulu. But they weren’t there. Though Hulu got banged around a bit by various network executives and producers, decrying that the service streamed their programs shortly after airing but they weren’t getting an appropriate amount of remuneration for that airing.

Blame that on Nielsen said some, who, as it always seems to have done, lags in measurement of the new technologies so that actual viewership is not adequately measured. And there is truth to that; Nielsen always seems to lag behind what’s actually happening. That’s one of the gripes of the folks who make their living off the network model, pretty unchanged for decades now, especially if you’re one of the broadcast networks. But it’s certainly not the only one.

The fact that technology is changing the business was voiced by all though may be just because they felt they had to make a nod to the future. Much at this particular summit seem to be about the STATE of the television business today as opposed to a clear attempt to parse the signs and see what the future might be really like. Much of that, I suspect, has to do with that most of the people on the panels are luminaries in traditional television and as luminaries in that business are earning a very good living and are not particularly eager to face a future which might not be quite so lucrative for them.

One thread through the day was the concern of network executives about how to maintain a brand in an online world. No one really had an answer but it was definitely a concern. HBO is a brand and how does it maintain the strength of the brand as the distribution streams multiply? And what is the brand meaning now of CBS and what will it be in the future? Does CBS really stand for anything? HBO does but does CBS? Brand strength is important and there is a trend happening in which producers themselves are getting brand identity in individuals such as Dick Wolf of the Law and Order franchise and Anthony Zuiker, behind the CSI franchise, which are in some ways almost larger than the brands of the networks that distribute them.

But again, this was not so much about the future of television but commentary on the current state of affairs. Was anyone talking about the future? Yes, there were. Some. Those who were out working in the fields of the future…

Two bright lights from that world were Eric Anderson, VP of Content and Product Solutions at Samsung and Brian David Johnson, Futurist and Director, Future Casting and Experience Research at Intel. Samsung is at the forefront of integrating internet connectivity into television sets. He pointed out that it used to be televisions got upgraded once a year. Samsung now has done it about ten times in the last twenty-four months. Not on a panel with anyone from the traditional side of the business, he did try to speak out to them. Did any of them realize how fast it was all happening? Unfortunately, the people who needed to hear the question asked were probably back in the green room mingling with their peers. The Futurist at Intel announced that he had announced to his peers at Intel that the future of computing was television. Which may be the reason that this year Intel has put a chunk of change into Kaltura, an open source video-serving platform [with whom Odyssey is in business at this moment].

Notable but not noticed by the traditionalists in the business is that 25% of the TV sets sold in 2010 were internet enabled and it probably will be 40+ % in 2011, which is pretty amazing and which is demonstrating where the business is going. And it is going fast, thank you Mr. Anderson. But the reality is that TV, old style TV, is still very powerful and deeply entrenched in the way we live and consume video. AOL is aware of that and is working to make traditional TV its friend, not “frenemy,” but friend, working to augment not challenge the current behemoth. The gadgets and the gizmo boys are working to challenge the behemoth, to provide alternative distribution methods that are disruptive to a traditional business. The traditional business needs to find ways to embrace the alternative distribution methods so as not to completely disrupt their business.

Because it does take real money to produce really good content; may be it doesn’t take as much as is currently spent for traditional television series but it does take money. Content is king; always has been and pretty much always will be. The AOL folks have a phrase they’re using internally these days: content is kinging, a riff on a line in The King’s Speech. Content is kinging. In the early days of any technology almost anything will sail. When television erupted, people even watched test patterns [for those who remember test patterns]. In the early days of the Internet, silly college boys putting Mentos in Coke was entertainment. But things have moved beyond that – content is king, or kinging.

And we have to figure out a way to pay for the kind of content we want whatever the technology is that brings it to us. That’s the conclusion that the Future of TV Summit seemed to come to but what it lacked was the real dialogue between the creators and the gadget and gizmo boys and girls about how to make it all work for both creators and consumers.

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Letter From New York February 12, 2011

February 13, 2011

Or, as it seems to me…

As I wait for my train, I am doing what I have done most of the day today and most days for the last 18 days – keeping up with the tumultuous events in Egypt. For days, everyone in the office has paused as they pass the two big screen televisions to see what was unfolding in Tahrir Square in Cairo, the heart of the revolution which has shaken Mubarak from his perch where has been sitting comfortably for the last thirty years. No one thought this would come but it has, a cascading of events started in Tunisia, a restlessness flooding the Mid-East, challenging the status quo. Two long reigning autocrats have been toppled; serious changes in other countries have also resulted, preemptive measures taken by those in power to enable them to sustain their positions, at least for now.

Like so many I have followed this revolution on television and on the net, wishing in some ways that I was there so that I could feel the beat of the streets, though I know that wouldn’t necessarily be safe. Reporters were roughed up and arrested; a Google executive was detained, one who had organized protests via Facebook. Some died but an amazingly small number it seemed, though there have been reports that the numbers have been minimized.

Like Tunisia, this was a revolution propelled along by Facebook, Twitter and the connectivity of the net and new technologies. In both Tunisia and in Egypt the Army did not turn upon the people, for the most part maintaining order but not firing upon the crowds.

All week I have found myself contemplative. Each and every one of the people in Tahrir Square has a father and a mother, may be brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, living individuals with families and friends swarming together to gain an end, following the siren song of tweets to a destiny they could not clearly determine though they were abundantly clear about what they wanted, and eventually got, Mubarak gone.

I thought of the nameless people who are part of the news, the hundreds of thousands in Tahrir Square, the dozens killed in Pakistan by a teenage boy suicide bomber and the dozen or so that were killed in a Baghdad incident. I woke up more than once this week to the radio announcing the deaths of people in bombings in this place or the other, people I would never know but individuals who had loves and hopes, were loved in return and are now gone in a blinding flash of light and pain. The dispassionate voices that announce the passing of the nameless victims help us not realize these were people like us, who got up in the morning but did not get to go home that night.

I am not sure why all these nameless people have been so much on my mind; is it that if there were an attack on the subway in New York and if that were the way I met my end, I would be one of those nameless victims in some announcer’s report? Or is it that in staring at the images of the massive crowds in Tahrir Square there were moments when the cameras did focus on the face of one person or another and I would find myself wondering what their life was like?

Whatever the reason, I have felt a singularity with my fellow man. I am concerned about what comes next in Egypt, the heart of the Mid-East and a very singular country. There are those who fear this revolution will open the door to radical Islam though that fear did not prevent Egyptian Christian Copts from taking themselves to Tahrir Square to stand with their Egyptian Muslim comrades. Time will tell whether this will evolve into an Islamic Revolution as opposed to an Egyptian Revolution.

But whatever happens, it will have reminded me that I share much with all the other human beings around the world if only that I, too, am a finite creature with hopes and loves caught in the sweep of history being made.

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Letter From New York, February 4, 2011

February 5, 2011

Or, as it seems to me…

Last week in DC, the 13th Annual Real Screen Conference, a gathering of non-fiction filmmakers from all over the world, was held. Approximately 1500 filmmakers and executives gathered in DC at the Renaissance Hotel to survey the state of non-fiction filmmaking, to learn what might be coming next, to postulate about the meaning of changing technology to both the art and the business of non-fiction. It was the biggest Real Screen to date.

The meeting took place against a turbulent landscape, both inside and outside the particular slice of an industry being examined. Out on the great stage of the world, the hotel monitors displayed the ongoing protests in Egypt that are re-shaping the geo-political landscape. In that country, the unthinkable is occurring: Mubarak is falling. Now. Perhaps today. What comes next is the biting question. Out of Tunisia has come a wind of unrest that is unsettling the entire Middle East and leaders are scrambling to hold back the deluge.

All of this has been facilitated by the new technologies, by Twitter and Facebook, the presences of networks like Al Jazeera, not to mention CNN and all the other windows on the world technology has provided over the last two decades.

And technology has provided an enormous number of new outlets for non-fiction films over those same last two decades. Cable networks have been growing up and have become powerhouses. Their ratings are beginning to reach parity with broadcast networks, their stars fill the covers of the celebrity rags, and their programs are water cooler worthy. A lot has changed since Real Screen first gathered thirteen years ago to discuss Fair Use in documentary films.

You know an entertainment sector has become important when Hollywood agents descend upon its event and they were here in force this year for the first time. CAA, WME, APA, and ICM – all the big initial agencies had their minions present in numbers. It was the most commented upon fact of this Real Screen. The clubby atmosphere of years ago is fading.

What’s hot? Let me share with you something I have run by a number of network executives, none of whom have disagreed: bring a network LARGER than life characters, in interesting, perhaps exotic, hopefully life threatening situations who will give you an embarrassing amount of access to their lives and you probably have a chance at a show. That’s the basic formula right now as far as I can tell.

To me, it’s a bit sad. I admit to missing the more straightforward docs of yesteryear. But there are those executives and filmmakers who feel that today is a Golden Age of documentary filmmaking. Regardless, right now it’s all about the characters.

There is soul searching going on, wondering what the newer new technologies mean for the older new technologies and their futures, their business models and what the value of their brands will be as the proliferation of distribution platforms continues to accelerate. How big a threat is Netflix? Is it additive? Or not? Netflix now has over twenty million subscribers, second only to the world’s largest cable company, Comcast, in the number of subscribers. How can content providers monetize their investment against this kind of landscape? And not just the providers but also the creators, who are feeling incredibly squeezed by their network buyers to produce more on less money with no rights maintained for future exploitation.

It’s a tough world out there for everyone even while the business has never done better. Ratings are up for most. History Channel has pummeled its competitors and is probably the leader of the pack these days among male oriented non-sports non-fiction networks. Ice Road Truckers is a monster hit. Larger than life characters, etc.

Real Screen is an industry event. Perhaps not seemingly important to Mr. and Mrs. America and all the ships at sea unless you think about the fact that much of what you will be seeing on non fiction cable networks in the coming year will have been pitched and perhaps purchased during the last week.

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Letter From New York January 18, 2011

January 18, 2011

Or, as it seems to me…

It has been the long Martin Luther King weekend; a wonderful holiday, coming shortly after Christmas, an opportunity to gather strength for the months ahead, while we are mired in the depths of winter. As I write this, I am curled up cozily in the cottage, classical music playing, laptop on my lap, having listened all afternoon to reports of another storm descending on the region. When I arrived home on Friday, two fresh feet of snow were on my deck and young Nick arrived on Saturday to dig me out. The cold was deeper than usual and it was good to be home, a small fire in the Franklin stove, the lights of the Christmas tree twinkling, reflected in the great sliding doors to the deck. Indulgently, I left the tree up feeling as if I was not yet finished with my joy in it.

Like many, my thoughts over the weekend went to Martin Luther King whose assassination when I was a teenager was another coda in the violent symphonies that were the 1960’s. The year he died, 1968, was the year both he and Robert F. Kennedy were killed by an assassin’s bullets. When he died, I was shocked and saddened, like many, most others. I do not remember how his death was noted at school. I do remember that I asked myself the same question then that I asked myself when John F. Kennedy had been shot five years earlier: what kind of country are we? It was the question I asked myself later that year when RFK was shot and killed in California.

And, of course, it is the question I have asked myself since the shootings in Tucson a week ago. What kind of country are we? I didn’t have an answer in my adolescence when the Kennedys and King were killed and I don’t have an answer now.

I know some things about what makes this country tick, observations gathered from now more years than once I could have imagined. We are a good people. We are violent people. We have our fair share of crackpots, quacks and just plain crazy folks – the man who shot Representative Gifford and eighteen other people, killing six, seems to be just plain crazy, a young man who demonstrated enough evidence of trouble that his school called in his parents to tell them he must have help or he could not attend school. He didn’t get help; he dropped out of school to avoid it and I don’t know what his parents did to respond but now they will live with his actions for the rest of their lives. The photos of him leave me feeling unhinged.

In the shocking aftermath of the killings and the woundings, there has been a quiet that has come across the land. Representative Gifford was the apparent target of the man and her near death has resulted in all sides of the political spectrum to ratchet down the volume of their voices while standing united behind one of their own, whether or not they shared her beliefs.

A billboard in Tucson that described Rush Limbaugh as a “straight shooter” has been taken down. And, once again, the gun laws are being debated while the gun used in the shootings, a Glock, seems to have become very popular, notoriety not a bad thing for sales. The number of requests for gun permits has bumped since then, a result of some fearing that gun laws would become tougher. [Unfortunately, I don’t think that’s going to happen.]

Sarah Palin made a speech; I didn’t listen. But some pundits think it may have done her in as a Presidential hopeful. Obama made a speech in Tucson that has caused his approval rating to spike – and for some to remember his glowing oratory of the 2008 campaign with Democrats hoping this is the moment he returns to focus.

Perhaps Tucson is another coda, a finishing of another symphony in our history. But like others, it must be filled with prayers for victims, living and dead.

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Letter From New York January 13, 2011

January 14, 2011

Are you still there?

You may have noticed that some time has gone by since there has been a letter from New York.

The great quiet started on my birthday, last November 18th. I had written a letter, all full of musings about birthdays, aging, the gift of life and all sorts of other things of grand import, I am sure. It still sits on my desktop, a reminder of the day the laptop began to die. A MacBook no less. I thought MacBooks were invulnerable, indestructible – an illusion created carefully by those folks at Apple, purveyors of fine electronics.

Alas, it was not true! On my birthday, no less, the faithful MacBook began to slide into eternity. I could not send out my letter, my mailing list was in a piece of frozen software.
A wonderful Mac technician, Manca, struggled mightily to save it. First there was one new hard drive. I rebuilt my mailing list but alas, alack and more to be pitied than censured, that hard drive died a premature death. The MacBook was rendered useless and I had fallen far down the queue for the tech team’s rescue response. They had grown deaf to my strident calls for HELP!

Eventually, with the MacBook gone, really gone, unable to even limp bravely forward, I found myself in the possession of a new MacBook PRO. But because there is a small debate going on within the office about what software should be installed upon the new machines we’re all getting [moving to an all Mac office are we] that a temporary software solution was installed which is – oh, I don’t have words to describe my feelings about what it does and doesn’t do. It’s virtual you see, software that really isn’t there and one of the things it doesn’t do is build email lists.
Tossed out into the wilderness on my own, I searched for a solution and quickly came to the one used by many a small email list – Constant Contact and once more I plunged in and rebuilt my list, with hope that with it now living in the cloud it would always be there for me, so long as I paid my bills.

So you are receiving this letter because in my memory you once upon a time received my letter. You’re getting this because I have made my best guess as to who was on the list and if you don’t want to be [oh, here I fear rejection but it must be so, say the rules of the game (be brave, Mathew)] let me know and I will remove you from my list and the Letter From New York will only be digital dust as far as you are concerned.

Seriously, thanks to those folks who did miss it and let me know. It will be back next week in its usual vein, tempered I am sure by my having been silent for a bit, freed to think and after having progressed through one of the finest holiday seasons of my life.

Hope yours was too.

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Letter From New York November 7, 2010

November 8, 2010

Or, as it seems to me…

As I am writing this, I am journeying back down to the city after a very brief sojourn at the cottage, going back to the city to attend a farewell party for James Green, formerly CEO of several high tech companies, including Sabela Media, the company for which I was working when I moved to New York. James has emerged as a good friend and we have stayed in touch since the Sabela days.

Today he is about to embark upon an adventure he has been dreaming about since he was twelve years old. He and his wife have sold everything, purchased a lovely catamaran now named Ondine and are heading south to spend the winter sailing through the Caribbean before a spring Atlantic crossing to the Mediterranean where they will spend the summer. After that, who knows? Back to the Caribbean, out to Australia, back to work? But they are sailing away, the whole family, James and his wife, Emma Kate and their two children, Paloma and Ronan, who will most likely learn more while traveling than they ever could in school. Off to an adventure that almost everyone has dreamt about at one time or another – and an adventure they are going to live out. They’ll be gone for a year or two, vagabonds of the sea…

The Ondine, in port in the British Virgin Islands.

It’s probably a good time to be away. The Midterms have come and gone with the general consensus among my Democratic friends that it was not as bad as it could have been. Harry Reid might be despised by nearly everyone but was not so unpredictable as the loose cannon Sharon Angle, who struck me as simply unbelievable but less unbelievable than the Republican/Tea Party candidate in Delaware, Christine O’Donnell, she who once said she had frolicked on a Satanic altar, a statement that haunted her enough that she felt a need to take out ads that stated categorically she was not a witch, a decision she later regretted.

New York was spared the embarrassment of Paladino as Governor, a candidate that seemed to have a boundless ability to insert his foot in his mouth and to alienate nearly everyone while also leaving behind the impression, if not the fact, that his business dealings were suspect if not downright sleazy. Both Senatorial seats from New York remained in Democratic hands with Cuomo defeating Paladino for the Governorship. Locally, Democrats fared less well. Scott Murphy, the freshman Congressman from my district was voted out. The Republican State Senator, Steve Saland, defeated his Democratic rival, a disturbing result as Saland potentially crossed ethical lines in sending letters to volunteer fire departments demanding they support him publicly by directing members to vote for him and to have signs supporting him on fire department buildings in exchange for all the “help” he has achieved for them in the Legislature. This late breaking development in the race was disturbing to me and ensures that I will work to unseat him next election; he has crossed a line as far as I am concerned.

The entire race seemed to generate excitement only among the far right. The left was seemingly exhausted and unable to become enthused and motivated to work hard to fight back against the assault of the right. While Republicans claim a mandate, voter polls indicate that might well be a mistake. For example, in exit polls 47% of voters were in favor of maintaining or expanding health care reform while 48% were against it. Only 40% want the Bush Era tax cuts extended for everyone. 53% of voters have an unfavorable view of the Democratic Party while 52% have an unfavorable view of Republicans.

At the end of the day, the voters seemed to be saying – as it seems to me – that what is happening now is not good enough and something better is needed. What I fear is that as we seek that something better we might yield to the loud voices of demagogues rather than those of reason, seeking answers from leaders who promise easy solutions born out of undirected anger and pointed divisiveness.

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Letter From New York October 30, 2010

October 30, 2010

Or, as it seems to me…

The last week has been more than a bit business mad; Odyssey Networks has been doing a whole series of productions. I fell into the role of point person for them. We sent a man to Nigeria to shoot footage of the Imam and the Pastor, a Christian pastor and a Muslim Imam who have emerged from the religious warfare in that country as spokesmen for peace and interfaith hope. Pastor Wuye lost his hand in the violence, chopped off by a Muslim. It became the moment he moved beyond his hatred to embrace a different way. He and the Imam have become a team, founded a mediation center in Kaduna in Nigeria and have become world famous for their efforts.

They were honored on the 26th at the We Are Family Foundation Gala with the Mattie J. Stepanek Award. Mattie, if you recall, was the extraordinary boy who spent his brief life besieged by a rare form of muscular dystrophy, which killed him weeks shy of his fourteenth birthday. He wrote books on peace, became a national personage because of his presence on the Oprah Winfrey Show and was eulogized at his funeral by President Jimmy Carter, with whom he co-wrote a book. The Imam and the Pastor describe Mattie as a prophet, as he might well have been. Certainly his words echo beyond the time encapsulated by his short life.

I met them briefly at the Gala, introduced by Jonathan Smith, the producer whom we had sent to Nigeria to get the footage. There was a sense about them of peace and joy, calm in the center of a tumultuous world, a presence that was tranquil and slightly transcendental. It was an honor; it was a moment I won’t forget, two men, once sworn enemies, standing together now against the ravages of the violence that racks their land. Six months ago Christians and Muslims were killing each other in the Jos Valley, the place both call home. When they left New York, they were headed for Sudan where they had been asked to lead a Peace Conference in that country, which is edging toward potential violence as it advances toward a referendum that might split the country in two. If it goes that way, there is a chance war will break out and the land that is home to infamous Darfur will once again be racked by violence, the victims of which will mostly be the poor, the desperate, the defenseless.

Nigeria, the Sudan, the Middle East, Columbia, India, Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan… The list of countries wracked by violence, war, revolution, counter-revolution, insurgency goes on and on. Do we think daily of lawless Somalia, home to modern pirates that regularly seize ships in the Gulf of Aden, holding them for ransom? No, probably not. But while we live our reasonably secure lives, vast parts of the globe are war zones or de facto war zones. Jonathan described the vast sea of tension and fear that swirls through the streets of Nigerian cities as no one knows when the next bout of sectarian violence will erupt, bringing more pain and death into their lives. It is not uncommon that Muslims and Christians will chop away fingers or hands [witness Pastor Wuye] to remind their victims of their hate. The streets are filled with the disfigured.

Against this tide of religious vitriol, individuals like the Pastor and the Imam work as best they can to bring sanity into the world in which they live, to bridge the hatred, roots of which are now forgotten but not relinquished.

Against this hatred are the words of a child, Mattie Stepanek, the actions of two men of God, who stand with other men of good that dot the world, seeking in some small way to change the world, to offer an alternative to the generations of killing. For if we do not find some alternative, we will never find a way out of the vortex, one that is now more dangerous than ever as religious divide, hatred and extremism fills men who have capacity to wreck global havoc.

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Letter From New York October 17, 2010

October 18, 2010

Or, as it seems to me…

Proceeding south on the train into the city, the Hudson River is framed by the fall foliage, slowly moving to a moment of colorful glory. The weather has changed; now constantly cool. Sweaters have come out of the closet and jackets are required. The northern hemisphere is moving languidly into winter.

Surrounded by this inspiring beauty, it is easy to think of the world as tranquil and peaceful. This makes for good reflecting time.

Last Thursday, the world focused on the rescue of the miners in Chile, pulled out through a narrow hole drilled through nearly half a mile of solid rock in a capsule that was designed with the help of NASA. I found myself going out to the television set in the common area every while or so to watch the progression of the rescue. It was difficult not to feel a rush of emotion, joy at their return to the surface from their particular version of Hades.

Their survival is an impressive and inspiring tale; people, companies, organizations, governments worked together to make this a reality while the world watched on television. All’s well that ends well, said the bard but between the beginning and the ending there were harrowing times for these men, trapped for over two weeks before being discovered – a swath of red paint they sprayed on the piercing drill the first indication that life remained below. Attached to the end of the drill bit were bits of notes to loved ones.

They had lived below in darkness and in fear, surviving on starvation rations of what little they had when originally trapped, terrified that they might descend to cannibalism. Out of this miasma of terror and fear, they organized themselves and became an example to the world of comradeship and fraternity. After contact, they asked for a statue of the Virgin Mary and other religious articles to organize a shrine in one part of their cave home. One man became the captain, another the spiritual leader, another became the medic, nicknamed Dr. House after the television character, popular in Chile as well as the United States.

Their entire adventure became very real to a global swath of people. A camera was lowered into their cavern and we saw glimpses of their world, met men in real time living a real drama. We saw them sweat, we saw them live and witnessed their conversations with their loved ones. We were not just on the surface watching passively, we were in the cave with them, getting to know them before we knew whether they would live or not. Rescue was not guaranteed.

Their story became a local story almost everywhere. Video provides a path to intimacy and with intimacy comes investment, caring and engagement. That’s what I felt when I watched the rescue, engaged in the lives of men faraway but close because I could see and hear and thus become part of their world.

Their story has been inspiring, their rescue a feat of technology and ingenuity. The whole tale reflects man at his best. Yet to be dealt with are the causes of the tale, the dangers in the mine that resulted in the cave-in. We will watch these men, now national celebrities in their homeland and will wonder about them as they move forward, back into life. One will have to deal with his wife and mistress both meeting each other in Camp Hope, the tent town that grew to contain the waiting and watching relatives. Another has been offered a contract on a Chilean television network. Senor Sepulveda captured the heart of a nation as he gave video tours of their underground world.

Video is becoming the lingua franca of the modern world. If a picture is worth a thousand words then a story told in video is more than a novel. Twenty years ago the story of the Chilean trapped miners would probably not have been an international sensation. Putting cameras into their dire circumstances changed all that. We got to know them before knowing the outcome. They were the real reality show.

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Letter From New York October 7, 2010

October 7, 2010

Or, as it seems to me…

All day rain spattered down on the cottage while I worked on some personal business that I have been neglecting, the last day of a five-day vacation I took from work.  It gave me time to ruminate about existence; nothing like a rainy day to get one’s mind soaring over the landscape of life, attempting to put the pieces of the puzzle together to tell the story.

I am fortunate to have people in my life that have chosen to linger it in it for a long time.  When I was in my first high school production, I met another classmate, Tom Fudali, as he was climbing up some scarily high scaffolding to adjust lights for the play.  He was wearing a tool belt and struck me as the kind of person who could do anything.  I was more than a bit intimidated.  But he became my best friend and I am fortunate that he is still my best friend; we’ve seen each other pass through many of the litmus tests life gives to people.  I am the godfather to his son from his first marriage; I was best man in his second wedding.  We can be together for a short time and it is as if no time has passed since we’ve seen each other.

He came this past weekend to visit and we went up to Lake George, a soul achingly beautiful 32-mile stretch of lake that anchored a significant piece of American history of which I was pretty much ignorant until I explored it this weekend.  At the southern end of Lake George is Fort William Henry, built to protect the northern edge of His Majesty’s American Empire from the French.  Thirty some miles to the north, the French build another fort, Carillon, to protect the southern edge of their North American Empire from the British.  And it was here that the French and Indian Wars were played out.  The French attack on Fort William Henry, its surrender and the subsequent slaughter of many of the British by the Indian allies of the French, became the inspiration for James Fennimore Cooper’s LAST OF THE MOHICANS, made into at least three films, the most recent being the lauded one starring Daniel Day Lewis.  Not a bad film though only loosely accurate as to facts in some cases.

Carillon, the French fort, was taken by the British not long after the fall of Fort William Henry and was renamed Fort Ticonderoga.  Later it played a part in the Revolutionary War.  Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold raced there after Lexington and Concord, taking the fort from the British garrison who had not yet heard that the Colonies were in rebellion.  The cannon from the fort were then dragged through the snow of the winter of 1776 to Boston, coming through my little town of Claverack on its way there.  Once the guns were set up outside of Boston, the British decided to retreat, sailing out of Boston harbor, threatening to burn the city if their retreat was molested.

I realized there was a great deal about American history that I didn’t know and certainly didn’t have a granular knowledge of it.  I didn’t know that Ticonderoga was once considered “the key to the continent” or that LAST OF THE MOHICANS was inspired by the events at Fort William Henry.

In the exhibitions, I realized how hard life was on the frontier and thought of the people who had carved this country out of a wilderness, of our strange history with Native Americans, allies, foes, oppressors, combatants, the uneasy relationship that happens when any Empire displaces another, which we did when we came here.  That is history.  We’re not unique.  It’s been happening since time began.

And since time began, history is formed and lived with relationships, friendships, loves, marriages, families, generations of folks who come and then are gone, moving into the slipstream of time while history continues to be made.  But our individual lives are punctuated by the friendships we make along the way, like the one I have with Tom.

 

 

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