On my recent trip to Texas, when I was making the five-hour drive from San Antonio to the Dallas area, I was appalled by how much development there now is along the I-35 corridor, the main connector between these two metropolitan areas. There is very little unadul-terated land to be seen anymore. San Antonio now bleeds into New Braunfels which bleeds into San Marcos which bleeds into Austin which is indiscernible from its bedroom communities of Round Rock and Georgetown to the north. Urban sprawl in spades. There was a tiny stretch around the tiny town of Jarrell where you could see open loping land, with the occasional tree, a scattering of cows, that is the basic landscape of central Texas; but then you hit Belton/Temple/ Waco. There used to be countryside between those three small cities, but not anymore. Land can again be seen around the small town of West, which boasts a large Czech community. As an aside, I stopped there once at the much-touted Czech Stop and Bakery, right off of I-35, to try some of the much-touted koloches, which are firm, chewy pastries with some kind of filling – poppy seed or prune paste, apricot jelly, sausage, cream cheese – in the middle. I had the cream cheese and found it "all right," but not really as satisfying as a good cheese danish.
So small town West, and surrounding farmland, are still the same, but so much else...
I realize this kind of development is everywhere, that land that was once fields/hills/woods has disappeared beneath giant shopping malls/discount outlets/chain motels/fast-food restaurants/cookie-cutter housing "estates," and Auto World (auto sales/gas stations/ parts houses/tire distributors, etc.) I'm not talking something new, something that lots of other people haven't already commented on. But here's my point: this god-awful consumer sprawl represents the very "growth" that they keep telling us we need to return to, from the retrenching of the current economic crisis. We need more of this? I don't think so. It made me think of the 1972 book, "The Limits of Growth," which talked about the exponential growth of five variables: world population, industrial production, food production, pollution, and resource depletion. In 2008 somebody named Graham Turner from Australia published a paper comparing the reality of the past 30+ years with the predictions made in the original book, and found that "changes in industrial production, food production and pollution are all in line with the book's predictions of economic collapse in the 21st century."*
So here we are, collapsing. We've been churning out too much stuff, too many unnecessary gadgets, too many absurdly large houses to be lived in by a couple with one or maybe two kids (and now they can't pay the mortgage), too many Office Depot/Home Depot/Wal-Mart/Best Buy clones. This growth, which is supposedly essential to our economy, to the world economy – and the rest of the world has recently been jumping on the consumer bandwagon with us – has been eating up the land, and other of the planet's resources, destroying the ozone layer, wiping out species, increasing commute time and aggravation, which increases stress, making everyplace look like everyplace else, and in short, not impressing me one bit. I'm thinking, there's gotta be a better way. We've already tried the drop-out, get-back-to-the-land hippie alternative – and some people are still living that way – but it really doesn't seem like the solution for a whole planet. So what is? Let's hear it from the Wise Men (and Women). I'm not a big fan of my native Texas, but one thing it always had going for it was land. I don't want it all to disappear beneath concrete and Target stores.
*Graham Turner (2008). "A Comparison of `The Limits to Growth` with Thirty Years of Reality". Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Monday, February 23, 2009
Gadgets
This "rant" may be seen as an extension of my previous one: from unnecessary and unnecessarily expensive computerized keys to all sorts of other unnecessary gadgets.
On my recent trip, whether waiting in terminals for flights or flying through the air, I was always surrounded by people immersed in their own electronic world. They were on their cell phones, or thumbing their BlackBerrys (BlackBerries?), or listening with glazed eyes to whatever was playing on their ipods. There were also plenty of people pecking away at their laptops.
Very few people reading books (I was – the most recent volume in the Forsyte Saga, see Note of January 18), or magazines or, God forbid, newspapers. How many of you out there remember when stewardesses (this was back in the day when they were called stewardesses, rather than flight attendants) would pass down the aisle of the plane with an armload of magazines and newspapers for people to read? Ha!
I felt a real dismay at all these people clicking and pecking and holding conversations with people they'd just left or would see in 10 minutes, and I've been trying to decide why. Because these activities made them seem oblivious to what was happening around them? But when I'm immersed in reading I can also be pretty oblivious. In fact, that's why I tend to put my book away as the time draws nearer for boarding – I don't want to miss hearing my "seating section" called. I mean, God forbid that I shouldn't get on the plane the minute I'm able to – someone might get my seat!
No, I think it has more to do with a feeling that all those people are dependent on these not-inexpensive gadgets (the cheapest ipod I see on Amazon.com is $150, discounted to $134; the cheapest BlackBerry seems to be $170 with a 2-year contract required) to keep them-selves entertained, engaged. Without them they'd be reduced to people-watching, napping, maybe talking to the people next to them, or the aforementioned reading. We really have become a gadget-dependent society.
Of course, it could be claimed that a book is just a simpler, less expensive "gadget." A simpler form of technology – for I suppose it is the technological aspect of the whole thing that I find most objec-tionable. We haven't just become a gadget-dependent society, but a society obsessed with technology, with the newest and latest forms of same. And it all seems just so damned unnecessary. Like the stupid computerized keys.
I will say this: sitting next to someone nodding his head to the music pouring into his ear – but his ear alone – from his ipod is certainly preferable to sitting even on the other side of the waiting area from someone listening to a boom box turned too loud. Have boom boxes gone the way of the dinosaur? What an excellent development if they have...
On my recent trip, whether waiting in terminals for flights or flying through the air, I was always surrounded by people immersed in their own electronic world. They were on their cell phones, or thumbing their BlackBerrys (BlackBerries?), or listening with glazed eyes to whatever was playing on their ipods. There were also plenty of people pecking away at their laptops.
Very few people reading books (I was – the most recent volume in the Forsyte Saga, see Note of January 18), or magazines or, God forbid, newspapers. How many of you out there remember when stewardesses (this was back in the day when they were called stewardesses, rather than flight attendants) would pass down the aisle of the plane with an armload of magazines and newspapers for people to read? Ha!
I felt a real dismay at all these people clicking and pecking and holding conversations with people they'd just left or would see in 10 minutes, and I've been trying to decide why. Because these activities made them seem oblivious to what was happening around them? But when I'm immersed in reading I can also be pretty oblivious. In fact, that's why I tend to put my book away as the time draws nearer for boarding – I don't want to miss hearing my "seating section" called. I mean, God forbid that I shouldn't get on the plane the minute I'm able to – someone might get my seat!
No, I think it has more to do with a feeling that all those people are dependent on these not-inexpensive gadgets (the cheapest ipod I see on Amazon.com is $150, discounted to $134; the cheapest BlackBerry seems to be $170 with a 2-year contract required) to keep them-selves entertained, engaged. Without them they'd be reduced to people-watching, napping, maybe talking to the people next to them, or the aforementioned reading. We really have become a gadget-dependent society.
Of course, it could be claimed that a book is just a simpler, less expensive "gadget." A simpler form of technology – for I suppose it is the technological aspect of the whole thing that I find most objec-tionable. We haven't just become a gadget-dependent society, but a society obsessed with technology, with the newest and latest forms of same. And it all seems just so damned unnecessary. Like the stupid computerized keys.
I will say this: sitting next to someone nodding his head to the music pouring into his ear – but his ear alone – from his ipod is certainly preferable to sitting even on the other side of the waiting area from someone listening to a boom box turned too loud. Have boom boxes gone the way of the dinosaur? What an excellent development if they have...
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Computerized keys...bah, humbug
I recently returned from a trip to Texas to visit my mother, my husband's and father's graves, a couple of old friends, and to take care of some business. The trip, alas, proved to be an almost non-stop series of problems, mishaps and out-and-out disasters, beginning with my drive to the airport in Portland (at 3:30 in the morning) in a fog that was so thick I frequently could not see the white lines on the road. The only way I ever managed to go above 40 miles an hour was by following the tail lights of the occasional 18-wheeler that would pass me, the driver going as fast as if he could see. Unfortunately, those guiding lights kept disappearing on me, which I could not understand, since I was doing my darnedest to keep up with them. "Don't disappear!" I would yell, when I would see those two red lights wavering, fading in and out up ahead. And the next moment they would be gone, and I would yell "Where the hell are you disappearing to?!" and would be forced to drop my speed at once, because I absolutely could not see but a few feet ahead.
You have to keep in mind that in most of Maine you don't have a lot of traffic on the highways in the middle of the night, the way you do in many states. No towns, no lights, no traffic, except for the very occasional mad trucker. It was a very tension-producing drive, especially since time was marching on; it was obviously going to take me much longer to get to the airport than it usually did. And that's how my trip began.
But that's not what I want to talk about. I rented a car when I arrived at the airport in San Antonio, visited with my mother that afternoon and evening of my arrival, then drove the next morning to Terrell, the small town 30 miles east of Dallas where my husband is buried, then the 90 miles to Ft. Worth, where I planned to spend that Friday night and the following night with a friend, returning to San Antonio Sunday morning. That was the plan.
But on Saturday tragedy struck. I managed to lose the keys (I had been given two) to my rental car. Keys have always been the bane of my existence. I long ago learned to have duplicate house/office/car keys all over the place, due to my penchant for losing same. If I had been smart, which is to say if I'd thought of it, I would have separated the two keys I was given at the car rental place, and put one into my purse, which I do not lose. But it never occurred to me that I might lose a key.
When I was finally forced to face the fact that I had, indeed, lost both keys – this was after looking every conceivable place in my friend's house at least three times, and paying $55 for a locksmith to come open my locked car, as I thought the keys might be on the back seat under some maps that were lying there (we won't go into why I thought this) – it was about four in the afternoon. I called Thrifty, hoping they would be able to supply me with duplicate keys. They explained that new keys would have to be made; they would call a locksmith for me ("Oh, great, I thought, I just sent one off). But when I talked to them again they said that the two locksmiths they had spoken with had said the keys would have to be made by the dealer, as they would have to be programmed. And getting the car to the dealer would obviously mean a towing fee.
Better and better, huh? And since it was almost five on a Saturday I ended up having to wait until Monday morning to have the work done, losing a day and a night that I had planned to spend back in San Antonio, with my mother.
But here's my question; here's my beef. Why computerized keys!? If my keys had not had to be programmed any locksmith could have made me a key, and I could have been on way Saturday evening. Instead of having to pay $240, plus the towing fee, it would have cost me, what, $5? That's how much it would have cost to replace the key for my '96 Toyota (I called my local Toyota dealer to find out). And here's the thing: presumably people who own these new cars with the computerized keys have to pay the same outrageous charge to have any lost keys reproduced. Why would we put up with that? Why is it necessary to have computerized keys? What was the matter with good old-fashioned, $5 keys? Why on earth does absolutely everything have to be computerized? Just because it can be? I eagerly await an answer.
You have to keep in mind that in most of Maine you don't have a lot of traffic on the highways in the middle of the night, the way you do in many states. No towns, no lights, no traffic, except for the very occasional mad trucker. It was a very tension-producing drive, especially since time was marching on; it was obviously going to take me much longer to get to the airport than it usually did. And that's how my trip began.
But that's not what I want to talk about. I rented a car when I arrived at the airport in San Antonio, visited with my mother that afternoon and evening of my arrival, then drove the next morning to Terrell, the small town 30 miles east of Dallas where my husband is buried, then the 90 miles to Ft. Worth, where I planned to spend that Friday night and the following night with a friend, returning to San Antonio Sunday morning. That was the plan.
But on Saturday tragedy struck. I managed to lose the keys (I had been given two) to my rental car. Keys have always been the bane of my existence. I long ago learned to have duplicate house/office/car keys all over the place, due to my penchant for losing same. If I had been smart, which is to say if I'd thought of it, I would have separated the two keys I was given at the car rental place, and put one into my purse, which I do not lose. But it never occurred to me that I might lose a key.
When I was finally forced to face the fact that I had, indeed, lost both keys – this was after looking every conceivable place in my friend's house at least three times, and paying $55 for a locksmith to come open my locked car, as I thought the keys might be on the back seat under some maps that were lying there (we won't go into why I thought this) – it was about four in the afternoon. I called Thrifty, hoping they would be able to supply me with duplicate keys. They explained that new keys would have to be made; they would call a locksmith for me ("Oh, great, I thought, I just sent one off). But when I talked to them again they said that the two locksmiths they had spoken with had said the keys would have to be made by the dealer, as they would have to be programmed. And getting the car to the dealer would obviously mean a towing fee.
Better and better, huh? And since it was almost five on a Saturday I ended up having to wait until Monday morning to have the work done, losing a day and a night that I had planned to spend back in San Antonio, with my mother.
But here's my question; here's my beef. Why computerized keys!? If my keys had not had to be programmed any locksmith could have made me a key, and I could have been on way Saturday evening. Instead of having to pay $240, plus the towing fee, it would have cost me, what, $5? That's how much it would have cost to replace the key for my '96 Toyota (I called my local Toyota dealer to find out). And here's the thing: presumably people who own these new cars with the computerized keys have to pay the same outrageous charge to have any lost keys reproduced. Why would we put up with that? Why is it necessary to have computerized keys? What was the matter with good old-fashioned, $5 keys? Why on earth does absolutely everything have to be computerized? Just because it can be? I eagerly await an answer.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Knowing when to fold 'em
Some time ago I watched a PBS program called Who Cares if Bangladesh Drowns, that discussed the fact that that country, presumably to a large extent because of global warming, is being reclaimed by the sea. So much of the land lies at sea level, and when the annual monsoon arrives the people are finding themselves more thoroughly inundated than ever, and for longer periods, with great loss of homes, life, safe drinking water. The number one cause of death for children 1-4 years of age is...not malnutrition, as in so many poverty-riddled countries...but drowning. The gentleman who made the film was making a plea for the countries of the world to come together and do something about global warning. Save Bangladesh.
While I certainly agree that doing something about global warming is an important goal, it isn't going to happen quickly, may not happen to a sufficient extent to save much of the coastal land throughout the world that is threatened, including Bangladesh. The only real solution, it seems to me, is for people to stop living in these places! New Orleans is another example. After Katrina/Rita, I was one of those who thought we should just forget about resurrecting what had, indeed, been a unique, fascinating city, but a city built, not on sand, but on even more untrustworthy water. A city whose time has probably passed. I questioned then, and still question, whether it is worth it to try to rebuild what could quite possibly be wiped out again, in the not-that-distant future...after expending great gobs of money and effort. Wouldn't it make more sense -- wouldn't it actually be cheaper -- to help the citizens and institutions relocate?
According to the doom and gloom fellows, many, many places that lie along continental coasts are going to find that their days are numbered. In the case of low-lying Bangladesh, it's a third of a whole country. And yes, yes, there's the question for all of them of what to do with all the displaced people. In the case of Bangladesh, the narrator informed us that neighboring India cannot take a huge influx of people. The majority of Bangladesh citizens share a religion with Pakistan -- indeed, Bangladesh was originally called East Pakistan, after the division of India -- but the topography and culture of arid, mountainous Pakistan is a long way from that of humid, water-oriented Bangladesh. And of course, people don't want to leave what has always been "home." (See my Note of June 9, 2008). But people have emigrated, throughout history and pre-history, when conditions at "home" proved sufficiently intolerable. I think we have to start thinking in those terms as regards factors other than economic. If you're living at the foot of a live volcano, get the hell out of there. If you're living on a major fault line, get the hell out of there. If you're living in a city or, alas, a country, that is fighting a losing battle with the sea, for heaven's sake go someplace else. Maybe with a little help from your friends, i.e., other countries, other cities.
I remember when I lived in Boston, and the occasional hurricane would come through, wreaking the natural havoc, especially to homes built right on the coast. I would always feel irritated with those people who expected government help in restoring their homes. What, I would think, help you rebuild so the same thing can happen in three or four years? Do humans never learn!!
What humans are slow in learning, I think – or perhaps accepting would be a better word – is that the planet is really in charge. We can influence the weather – witness global warming – but we can't control it. We can't control the inner workings of the planet, that express themselves through volcanoes and earthquakes and tsunamis. All we can do is stay out of the way.
While I certainly agree that doing something about global warming is an important goal, it isn't going to happen quickly, may not happen to a sufficient extent to save much of the coastal land throughout the world that is threatened, including Bangladesh. The only real solution, it seems to me, is for people to stop living in these places! New Orleans is another example. After Katrina/Rita, I was one of those who thought we should just forget about resurrecting what had, indeed, been a unique, fascinating city, but a city built, not on sand, but on even more untrustworthy water. A city whose time has probably passed. I questioned then, and still question, whether it is worth it to try to rebuild what could quite possibly be wiped out again, in the not-that-distant future...after expending great gobs of money and effort. Wouldn't it make more sense -- wouldn't it actually be cheaper -- to help the citizens and institutions relocate?
According to the doom and gloom fellows, many, many places that lie along continental coasts are going to find that their days are numbered. In the case of low-lying Bangladesh, it's a third of a whole country. And yes, yes, there's the question for all of them of what to do with all the displaced people. In the case of Bangladesh, the narrator informed us that neighboring India cannot take a huge influx of people. The majority of Bangladesh citizens share a religion with Pakistan -- indeed, Bangladesh was originally called East Pakistan, after the division of India -- but the topography and culture of arid, mountainous Pakistan is a long way from that of humid, water-oriented Bangladesh. And of course, people don't want to leave what has always been "home." (See my Note of June 9, 2008). But people have emigrated, throughout history and pre-history, when conditions at "home" proved sufficiently intolerable. I think we have to start thinking in those terms as regards factors other than economic. If you're living at the foot of a live volcano, get the hell out of there. If you're living on a major fault line, get the hell out of there. If you're living in a city or, alas, a country, that is fighting a losing battle with the sea, for heaven's sake go someplace else. Maybe with a little help from your friends, i.e., other countries, other cities.
I remember when I lived in Boston, and the occasional hurricane would come through, wreaking the natural havoc, especially to homes built right on the coast. I would always feel irritated with those people who expected government help in restoring their homes. What, I would think, help you rebuild so the same thing can happen in three or four years? Do humans never learn!!
What humans are slow in learning, I think – or perhaps accepting would be a better word – is that the planet is really in charge. We can influence the weather – witness global warming – but we can't control it. We can't control the inner workings of the planet, that express themselves through volcanoes and earthquakes and tsunamis. All we can do is stay out of the way.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Unsung heroes
Like many people I enjoy watching nature films on television. Like everyone else I am amazed and delighted, occasionally awed, by the spectacular shots of scenery, and animals doing everything animals do, sometimes up close and personal. This, in all kinds of weather, all kinds of terrain. And I have often thought, hey, somebody is taking that picture.
But so often we don't know who that somebody is. If there's somebody making some kind of trek – to the top of a mountain, or through a park or rain forest, or along a particular river – we may know who that person is, at least come to know who s/he is during the course of the program, as s/he talks to us about what is being seen and experienced, and the Significance of It All. Yes, this person is visiting these amazing, often dangerous places, proving himself or herself (most often himself) all kinds of intrepid, but hey, the photographer is right there with him! Sometimes ahead of him, so as to capture that moment the Intrepid Explorer takes the final steps up that impossibly steep stretch of mountain. Intrepid Photographer is right there, and lugging a bunch of heavy equipment in the bargain. And getting none of the glory.
And then there are the people-less programs like Arctic Bears, which I watched recently on PBS, or The Penguins of the Antarctic of a couple of years back. On these kinds of shows, you know you've got photographers working in extreme conditions. And what they give us are all these wonderful shots of mama polar bears sheltering baby polar bears, romping with them in the snow, teaching them how to scout for seals beneath the ice, then break through the ice to get at them. We get mind-boggling pictures of mama and papa Emperor penguins sheltering junior in the midst of blizzards, or making the very long march from the sea to the traditional breeding grounds.
And there are programs like this on lions, on gorillas; there are all those underwater programs about fish or seals or whales or reefs. In all of them our unsung heroes, the photographers, are producing spectacular work for our delight and edification.
Of course the photographers are listed in the credits at the end of each program, but how many of you out there in television land take note of who they are as the credits go by? (Indeed, how many of you pay any attention to the credits at all?) I know I never do, even if I've had one of my 'there's a photographer there, taking that incredible shot,' thoughts, at some point in the show. Even in movies, how many of us take note of who the photographer (called, in the movies, a cinematographer) was, even if the photography was sensational? I think of the fairly recent The Painted Veil, (cinematographer, Stuart Dryburgh) with so many absolutely gorgeous shots. We know actors, we know directors, we don't know the people who make it possible for us to see the whatever it is. The only photographer I can think of offhand is James Wong Howe – who died in 1976 for heaven's sake – and even him I had to look up on the Internet, to make sure I was remembering his name correctly (I wasn't).
I was pleased to see included in a recent "trailer" (and why are they called that? They come before the actual film, do not trail after) of the upcoming Ken Burns program on our national parks, shots of photographers as they were doing their thing. We could see them all bundled up against the cold, or peering out of open helicopters, or bending over their cameras on steep, rocky slopes. This is the kind of acknowledgement I'd like to see more of, to remind us all of the eye and steady hand behind the beauty and the wonder.
But so often we don't know who that somebody is. If there's somebody making some kind of trek – to the top of a mountain, or through a park or rain forest, or along a particular river – we may know who that person is, at least come to know who s/he is during the course of the program, as s/he talks to us about what is being seen and experienced, and the Significance of It All. Yes, this person is visiting these amazing, often dangerous places, proving himself or herself (most often himself) all kinds of intrepid, but hey, the photographer is right there with him! Sometimes ahead of him, so as to capture that moment the Intrepid Explorer takes the final steps up that impossibly steep stretch of mountain. Intrepid Photographer is right there, and lugging a bunch of heavy equipment in the bargain. And getting none of the glory.
And then there are the people-less programs like Arctic Bears, which I watched recently on PBS, or The Penguins of the Antarctic of a couple of years back. On these kinds of shows, you know you've got photographers working in extreme conditions. And what they give us are all these wonderful shots of mama polar bears sheltering baby polar bears, romping with them in the snow, teaching them how to scout for seals beneath the ice, then break through the ice to get at them. We get mind-boggling pictures of mama and papa Emperor penguins sheltering junior in the midst of blizzards, or making the very long march from the sea to the traditional breeding grounds.
And there are programs like this on lions, on gorillas; there are all those underwater programs about fish or seals or whales or reefs. In all of them our unsung heroes, the photographers, are producing spectacular work for our delight and edification.
Of course the photographers are listed in the credits at the end of each program, but how many of you out there in television land take note of who they are as the credits go by? (Indeed, how many of you pay any attention to the credits at all?) I know I never do, even if I've had one of my 'there's a photographer there, taking that incredible shot,' thoughts, at some point in the show. Even in movies, how many of us take note of who the photographer (called, in the movies, a cinematographer) was, even if the photography was sensational? I think of the fairly recent The Painted Veil, (cinematographer, Stuart Dryburgh) with so many absolutely gorgeous shots. We know actors, we know directors, we don't know the people who make it possible for us to see the whatever it is. The only photographer I can think of offhand is James Wong Howe – who died in 1976 for heaven's sake – and even him I had to look up on the Internet, to make sure I was remembering his name correctly (I wasn't).
I was pleased to see included in a recent "trailer" (and why are they called that? They come before the actual film, do not trail after) of the upcoming Ken Burns program on our national parks, shots of photographers as they were doing their thing. We could see them all bundled up against the cold, or peering out of open helicopters, or bending over their cameras on steep, rocky slopes. This is the kind of acknowledgement I'd like to see more of, to remind us all of the eye and steady hand behind the beauty and the wonder.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
A family affair
For several months I have been working on John Galsworthy's multi-volumed The Forsyte Saga. These books are not quick reads, like so many of today's best sellers. But I have gradually got caught up in the lives of this clan of upper middle-class English philistines, whose unifying code is that of possession. In the first book – A Man of Property – I got a bit tired of Galsworthy's constant use of the word 'property.' All right, already, I get the idea, I would think. The Forsytes – and all the other late-Victorian Englishmen like them – thought of everything in terms of property, from their own homes (in good, but un-showy neighborhoods), to fine furniture, paintings and brick-a-brack (how much these examples of property had cost and how much they would bring being what determined their value, rather than their intrinsic worth), to wives and offspring, to their good name. Life is all about acquiring these things, and keeping them, passing them on to the next generation.
It is the Forsytes' sense of family that ultimately pulls you in, in a way that I suspect is similar to the pull of The Sopranos. I suspect that what kept people tuning in to that show week after week had less to do with the criminal goings-on than the family melodrama. In The Forsyte Saga we get occasional glimpses at what's happening in the business world – except for the character "young" Jolyon, who is a painter, all the Forsyte men are of course businessmen -- as well as developments out in the wide world, such as the Boer War, waged in South Africa from 1899 to 1902, which impacted both business and the personal lives of people. For someone like me, who is totally uninterested in business, these practical, mundane matters, though they form the background for not only the lives of the Forsytes, but the England of the day, simply do not engage.
But the stiff, unlikable (although I consistently feel sorry for the man, because he just does not get it) Soames, turning his steps instinctively towards his elderly parents' home when his marriage falls apart, that grabs you. The way his sister, obsessed with fashion, and a fool about her ne're-do-well husband, turns to her brother when that loser of a husband runs off with a dancer; and later, during Soames' own time of trial, the way she offers genuine sympathy, even if it is only in taking Soames' outthrust hand in both of hers (the Forsytes are never demonstrative). These and so many more instances demonstrate the need people have for one another, and the essential role families play in providing people with a sense of rootedness, and identity, for better or for worse.
I think with the following little scene Galsworthy offers a telling explanation of the urge to perpetuate ourselves, beyond the perpetuation of the species instinct in us all. We are inside Soames' head: "That evening in Park Lane, watching his father dine, he was overwhelmed by his old longing for a son – a son, to watch him eat as he went down the years, to be taken on his knee, as James on a time had been wont to take him...To get old – like that thin, wiry-frail figure sitting there – and be quite alone with possessions heaping up around him; to take no interest in anything because it had no future, and must pass away from him to hands and mouths and eyes for whom he cared not a jot. No! He would force [his divorce] through now, and be free to marry, and have a son to care for him..."*
There is another insightful section that anyone with children must surely be able to identify with, representing as it does what is surely every parent's worst nightmare. It comes when "young" Jolyon – in some ways the least Forsyte-like of them, having been cut off years earlier for leaving his wife for the governess – learns of his son's death in the Boer War, not on the battlefield but of a fever:
"Gone out like a candle flame; far from home, from love, all by himself, in the dark. His boy! From a little chap always so good to him, -- so friendly. Twenty years old and cut down like grass – to have no life at all! ...
To die out there — lonely — wanting them – wanting home! This seemed to his Forsyte heart more painful, more pitiful than death itself. No shelter, no protection, no love at the last. And all the deeply rooted clanship in him, the family feeling and essential clinging to his own flesh and blood which had been so strong in [his own father] old Jolyon – was so strong in all the Forsytes – felt outraged, cut, and torn by his boy's lonely passing."**
I press on, from In Chancery to To Let, to see what happens next.
*Galsworthy, John, In Chancery, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1969, p.210
**Ibid, p.219
It is the Forsytes' sense of family that ultimately pulls you in, in a way that I suspect is similar to the pull of The Sopranos. I suspect that what kept people tuning in to that show week after week had less to do with the criminal goings-on than the family melodrama. In The Forsyte Saga we get occasional glimpses at what's happening in the business world – except for the character "young" Jolyon, who is a painter, all the Forsyte men are of course businessmen -- as well as developments out in the wide world, such as the Boer War, waged in South Africa from 1899 to 1902, which impacted both business and the personal lives of people. For someone like me, who is totally uninterested in business, these practical, mundane matters, though they form the background for not only the lives of the Forsytes, but the England of the day, simply do not engage.
But the stiff, unlikable (although I consistently feel sorry for the man, because he just does not get it) Soames, turning his steps instinctively towards his elderly parents' home when his marriage falls apart, that grabs you. The way his sister, obsessed with fashion, and a fool about her ne're-do-well husband, turns to her brother when that loser of a husband runs off with a dancer; and later, during Soames' own time of trial, the way she offers genuine sympathy, even if it is only in taking Soames' outthrust hand in both of hers (the Forsytes are never demonstrative). These and so many more instances demonstrate the need people have for one another, and the essential role families play in providing people with a sense of rootedness, and identity, for better or for worse.
I think with the following little scene Galsworthy offers a telling explanation of the urge to perpetuate ourselves, beyond the perpetuation of the species instinct in us all. We are inside Soames' head: "That evening in Park Lane, watching his father dine, he was overwhelmed by his old longing for a son – a son, to watch him eat as he went down the years, to be taken on his knee, as James on a time had been wont to take him...To get old – like that thin, wiry-frail figure sitting there – and be quite alone with possessions heaping up around him; to take no interest in anything because it had no future, and must pass away from him to hands and mouths and eyes for whom he cared not a jot. No! He would force [his divorce] through now, and be free to marry, and have a son to care for him..."*
There is another insightful section that anyone with children must surely be able to identify with, representing as it does what is surely every parent's worst nightmare. It comes when "young" Jolyon – in some ways the least Forsyte-like of them, having been cut off years earlier for leaving his wife for the governess – learns of his son's death in the Boer War, not on the battlefield but of a fever:
"Gone out like a candle flame; far from home, from love, all by himself, in the dark. His boy! From a little chap always so good to him, -- so friendly. Twenty years old and cut down like grass – to have no life at all! ...
To die out there — lonely — wanting them – wanting home! This seemed to his Forsyte heart more painful, more pitiful than death itself. No shelter, no protection, no love at the last. And all the deeply rooted clanship in him, the family feeling and essential clinging to his own flesh and blood which had been so strong in [his own father] old Jolyon – was so strong in all the Forsytes – felt outraged, cut, and torn by his boy's lonely passing."**
I press on, from In Chancery to To Let, to see what happens next.
*Galsworthy, John, In Chancery, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1969, p.210
**Ibid, p.219
Thursday, January 1, 2009
The New Year...
...begins with cold and wind, here in northern New England. When I got up this morning it was -1 degrees; with the wind chill factor, -20. This was according to the NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) Weather Service. I listen to their reports every morning on the little weather radio Micheal got when he was working offshore, and wanted to stay abreast of weather conditions on the Gulf.
It’s now 12:45 in the afternoon, the sun is shining brightly, and it’s all of 8 degrees. Earlier, when I was lying in bed having my post-breakfast rest (preparing, and eating, pancakes, sausage, an egg, hot tea, and half an orange takes it out of you) I was listening to the wind, trying to decide what it sounded like. A low, steady roar, maybe like the traffic sounds people who live close to a busy, major highway grow accustomed to. Or a huge machine that runs all the time in the next building. No whistling, no howling. And it didn’t sound like the wind on Mull, which I would often listen to in the same way. That wind came in waves, off the sea, in deep thrumms. Thrumm...thrumm...thrummm.
I was very glad to be snug and warm in my little house. Admittedly, keeping warm, even indoors, involves wearing several layers of clothing, beginning with long johns, top and bottom. After all, you don't want the furnace running constantly! Am very glad I don’t have to go out today, having stocked up on food yesterday morning, on my way to work. It was supposed to snow later in the day, and I preferred not to have to stop off at the grocery in the middle of a snow storm. (In Maine so often ones activities are determined by the weather forecast.)
I just read that thirty minutes of shoveling snow burns 238 calories, the same as thirty minutes of high impact aerobics. Two weekends ago when we had our first major snowstorm, I spent close to an hour shoveling snow, with a thirty minute break in the middle because I felt spent (but the fellows I called to come finish the job for me hadn’t shown up, at the end of that half hour, and I’d gotten my wind back, so I went out and finished the job myself). It’s back-breaking work, especially given my current parking situation. More cars park in the little parking area in front of my house than was the case last year – more people living in the house next door than there were last year – so I have no place to put the snow. I have to walk each shovel-load either back to dump it in my yard, or across the street, to dump it on the piled-up snow over there. And this lady, as we all now know, is no spring chicken.
But hey, it’s burning as many calories as ice skating!
It’s now 12:45 in the afternoon, the sun is shining brightly, and it’s all of 8 degrees. Earlier, when I was lying in bed having my post-breakfast rest (preparing, and eating, pancakes, sausage, an egg, hot tea, and half an orange takes it out of you) I was listening to the wind, trying to decide what it sounded like. A low, steady roar, maybe like the traffic sounds people who live close to a busy, major highway grow accustomed to. Or a huge machine that runs all the time in the next building. No whistling, no howling. And it didn’t sound like the wind on Mull, which I would often listen to in the same way. That wind came in waves, off the sea, in deep thrumms. Thrumm...thrumm...thrummm.
I was very glad to be snug and warm in my little house. Admittedly, keeping warm, even indoors, involves wearing several layers of clothing, beginning with long johns, top and bottom. After all, you don't want the furnace running constantly! Am very glad I don’t have to go out today, having stocked up on food yesterday morning, on my way to work. It was supposed to snow later in the day, and I preferred not to have to stop off at the grocery in the middle of a snow storm. (In Maine so often ones activities are determined by the weather forecast.)
I just read that thirty minutes of shoveling snow burns 238 calories, the same as thirty minutes of high impact aerobics. Two weekends ago when we had our first major snowstorm, I spent close to an hour shoveling snow, with a thirty minute break in the middle because I felt spent (but the fellows I called to come finish the job for me hadn’t shown up, at the end of that half hour, and I’d gotten my wind back, so I went out and finished the job myself). It’s back-breaking work, especially given my current parking situation. More cars park in the little parking area in front of my house than was the case last year – more people living in the house next door than there were last year – so I have no place to put the snow. I have to walk each shovel-load either back to dump it in my yard, or across the street, to dump it on the piled-up snow over there. And this lady, as we all now know, is no spring chicken.
But hey, it’s burning as many calories as ice skating!
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