We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
23:23 Am I a God near by, says the LORD, and not a God far off?
23:24 Who can hide in secret places so that I cannot see them? says the LORD. Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the LORD.
23:25 I have heard what the prophets have said who prophesy lies in my name, saying, "I have dreamed, I have dreamed!"
23:26 How long? Will the hearts of the prophets ever turn back--those who prophesy lies, and who prophesy the deceit of their own heart?
23:27 They plan to make my people forget my name by their dreams that they tell one another, just as their ancestors forgot my name for Baal.
23:28 Let the prophet who has a dream tell the dream, but let the one who has my word speak my word faithfully. What has straw in common with wheat? says the LORD.
23:29 Is not my word like fire, says the LORD, and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?
The “Cadillac” health plan is a myth - A doctor explains that limiting the scope of
employer-based health care has long been a dream of the establishment
A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London
Never until the mankind making Bird beast and flower Fathering and all humbling darkness Tells with silence the last light breaking And the still hour Is come of the sea tumbling in harness
And I must enter again the round Zion of the water bead And the synagogue of the ear of corn Shall I let pray the shadow of a sound Or sow my salt seed In the least valley of sackcloth to mourn
The majesty and burning of the child's death. I shall not murder The mankind of her going with a grave truth Nor blaspheme down the stations of the breath With any further Elegy of innocence and youth.
Deep with the first dead lies London's daughter, Robed in the long friends, The grains beyond age, the dark veins of her mother, Secret by the unmourning water Of the riding Thames. After the first death, there is no other.
I've always felt that his singing voice - or rather voices, because he has tried a few over time - never was either pretty or beautiful. At this age, he mostly croaks like a frog. Many or most male folk singers and rock singers are the same. What his voice has is character, expression, remarkable phrasing. I've never heard anybody cover a Dylan song more effectively than he sang it - even songbirds like Joan Baez and Emmylou.
The Band got closest, but even then, not quite the real thing.
I don't think "beautiful" is the point. Expressiveness is the point. I can appreciate Sinatra's polish, Pavarotti's mastery, but it's not them. What's your opinion?
But I will keep the play barn that Grandpa built for me when I was 5. It was a rough copy of the barn at the Farm, where Mom had her horses. Someday, perhaps grandkids who will have had less contact with farm work and farm animals, will enjoy it. We have lots of little wooden animals. Maggie's Farm?
I repainted it once. The real one, with a pal. Large barn, with sliding barn doors back and front, wood-paneled tack room, etc White trim. Big job. Lousy pay. Good lead oil paint, of course.
Who remembers tar paper? It is still used sometimes, by those in the know. Good stuff. What is Tyvek?
There's some old advice about not drawing a gun unless you intend to use it. It's true for individuals and for nations. If you go to war, then you had better mean it. Wars are bloody and messy. They're not for the sort of people who think that putting "Smart" ahead of something automatically makes it better. And "meaning it" means being committed to crushing the enemy.
Flashback:
“Full audio of 1998 ‘redistribution’ speech: Obama saw welfare
recipients as ‘majority coalition’” - See more at:
http://proteinwisdom.com/?p=50494#sthash.2xiuODlQ.dpuf
Flashback:
“Full audio of 1998 ‘redistribution’ speech: Obama saw welfare
recipients as ‘majority coalition’” - See more at:
http://proteinwisdom.com/?p=50494#sthash.2xiuODlQ.dpuf
It is no wonder than none of our readers were able to identify this stuff from my parents' basement, which came via my Grandpa via his Mom, I think.
It turns out that it is so rare that the china and jewelry appraiser said she knew these existed, but had never seen them. It's gold-plated Lenox china. They did not make very much of it.
She suggested letting Sotheby's take a look at it all. I'd keep a couple of pieces for sentiment's sake, but would never use fully gold-plated dinner plated, coffee cups and saucers, and soup bowls. Now I'm greedily curious about market value. That little one in the middle is one of the 12 soup bowls, which looks more suited for an offering to a Greek god than for consomme.
12:32 "Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.
12:33 Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.
12:34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
12:35 "Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit;
12:36 be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks.
12:37 Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them.
12:38 If he comes during the middle of the night, or near dawn, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves.
12:39 "But know this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into.
12:40 You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour."
As of this afternoon, my parents' house is empty of everything. Even the dumpster has departed. The Steinway Baby Grand was happily delivered to our parlor today and sounds pretty good there. My Mom's Victorian cast iron bird bath with four herons is in the driveway, waiting for me to show it some love with a power-wash and some Rustoleum. My Dad's Danish-style double bureau is in my bedroom. I've needed one forever, never saw one I liked. The drawers are cedar, so it smells good. Plus it was my Dad's for many years. He liked Danish design.
Funny thing about my parents. They never owned many clothes, but they always looked perfectly appropriate, and modestly-elegantly-attired, whether for weddings, beach club parties, dinner parties, fancy cruises, country clubs, hiking in Europe, opera, funerals, yard work, etc. I don't know how they did that. Mrs. BD opined that they did it by owning a very few perfect and very fine things, and were careful to never over-dress. They were not shoppers but seemed to have excellent Yankee taste. They had very little clothing for Good Will to take away.
Their dining room table is now against a wall in our living room, for the moment, where the piano mover guys were kind enough to lug away our old upright that my kids learned on. We might want to keep that Danish slate-topped table and use it as our kitchen dining table, as the wonderful one we use is quite large. Huge. Or save it for a kid. Mom's jewels - the few which I obtained thus far - are stashed in my safe.
After I do some clean-up, I'll post some pictures of it all. Life in Yankeeland goes on. An empty family house is eery, and left me feeling troubled and disoriented. I was already away at boarding school when they built it, but it became home even though I never really lived there. Somebody prosperous will love it, paint it, and raise some fine batch of kids there (it has 6 bedrooms). It's a lovely dwelling. Or maybe they will decide to do a demolition and start fresh. We are gone now.
Clean and wax the floors, wash the walls, then an open house asap. It's a short walk to the Congo church on the hill. It's only worth around a million, for the land. The lovely, large, but 1960s-era home itself does not seem to factor in its value at all. Small bathrooms, lots of big windows with no thermopane. People expect more comforts, nowadays, even though it is entirely sufficient and functional, modestly elegant and comfortable.
My parents were not interested in modern conveniences. Instead of a/c, they just planted trees to shade the house. No sound systems. Radio with WQXR.
Dad, I believe, was proud to have designed and built it for his big family of five kids. A place to read and talk, entertain, eat, and sleep. Never a TV until all the kids left, and always dogs until they got too old to take good care of them. Springers.
I thank all who have loved me in their hearts, With thanks and love from mine. Deep thanks to all Who paused a little near the prison-wall To hear my music in its louder parts Ere they went onward, each one to the mart’s Or temple’s occupation, beyond call. But thou, who, in my voice’s sink and fall When the sob took it, thy divinest Art’s Own instrument didst drop down at thy foot To harken what I said between my tears, . . . Instruct me how to thank thee! Oh, to shoot My soul’s full meaning into future years, That they should lend it utterance, and salute Love that endures, from life that disappears!
Don Surber 
An 
Never until the mankind making
