Saturday, February 19, 2005
GRANDMA'S VIEWPOINT Our grandmas - both yours and mine - would have said that "things have come to a pretty pass" when we arrive at a point at which we seem to accept violence as a type of good. Two events are said to have occurred in Iraq this past week which remind us of such a subtle warnings from the past voiced by people who have known them as the sort of thing they have seen happening before and who have often seen the results go far afield from being right. Over thirty Iranians died in a suicide bombing which took place in an area outside the walls of a Mosque in which a Shiite religious service was being held. The suicide bomber involved was prevented from getting inside the mosque area itself by barricades set up by Iraqi military-police-troops. I listened to one American TV account of the story and it centered the point that the Iraqi guard and their barricades had, probably, saved many Iraqi lives within the mosque itself than if the bomber had been able to advance to that point before detonation. One listener commented: "See there! What ever it is we are doing in Iraq is working ...training policemen-guards-troops ! They're catching on fast!" Thirty-some Iraqi citizens might disagree with that estimate were they still alive to do so . We at home "troops"' need to curb our natural tendencies to want to "read into" news report - ideas of a religious, social or political bent, which may or may not be there at all. It is not true that " a little bit is better than nothing at all." And, is especially true when the "little" portion is mis-labeled or willfully mis-used. The second incident concerns a man who was thought to be a bomber because someone noticed (we are not told how) that he was wearing a vest of the pocketed type used by many suicide bombers to transport their explosive charges. The crowd turned on him and beat him to death the and there. This may well be a fanciful piece of information. I heard it just that one time and my interest was in a comment made by another listener. "See there!", she cried out "You can't get a bunch of Americans to work together like that for the common good! Can you?" No. We can't We don't want to do so. It is called vigilantism we want no part of it - ever again. We've been burned before. A.L.M. February 19, 2005 [c428wds]
Friday, February 18, 2005
GOOD OMEN We are subject these days to so much severe criticism in the world of the theater, and with some justification, perhaps, because standards have, perhaps, wavered rather severely in the face of much material which is now, more or less commonly accepted as being normal in films and other forms of family entertainment. I was pleased to find that the citizens of a small town in the Valley of Virginia - a community known as Crimora, Virginia, has started its own community theater. The first production is set for tonight at the Community Center, which, is, I assume, the old, school house building which was "consolidated out" of existence some years ago. That's a good thing for towns to do with their discarded school structures, too. The first play is a comedy, which has a cast of over twenty, showing that someone in the group knows how to go about starting such a theater. Choosing a comedy means people won't worry so much about it all and take it too seriously at first. They will take mistakes in stride. Audiences will be more receptive, understanding and encouraging. Every on-stage personality needs offstage support and that's where a lot of individuals can really "star" in a Little Theater group. Twenty or so cast members - plus all the others needed - will pretty much "cover" the town's potential. I have seen a small town revitalized at first hand by this dramatic method. I was a member of the Little Theater of Radford, Virginia in the 1930's and I have often been amazed at all it has meant to me. We did three plays and one set of Three One-Act plays each year. The short plays became schools in which new acting talent was developed; new stage hands, painters, directors and generated wider, stronger town support because we touched the lives of more and more residents. I left home after several years to go to college and the writing I have doing since then in newspaper and magazine jobs, in radio and television has been very often been echoes of things I learned on-stage, back-stage and away from the actual stage doing PR work to help make it all move. Congratulations Crimora, Va on the Opening Night of your Community Players! It will take work and dedication, but it will be a joy in ways you cannot possibly know until the curtain comes down on a series of plays which as affected the lives of those who participated, and in doing so ,enriched the life of the community at large and possibly became a special blessing to some talented unknowns in your area. Break a leg. A.L.M. February 18, 2005 [c456wds]
Thursday, February 17, 2005
DO! To be required to sit absolutely still and purposely do nothing whatever, can be real punishment. It is good that most of us have learned that basic lesson in our younger years; good also, perhaps, that many of us learned it the hard way because there are, and there will continue to be, times when we, as adults, are required to do the same thing in real terms. To be made to "stand in the corner" of a classroom while the swirl of childhood activities was fanned to new levels of excitement with its accompanying blanket of joyous noises and laughter amid authority which encouraged rather than inhibited such group actions. Most of us, it appears, seem to thrive on activity in and around us and it seems true that we American,in particular, like to feel we are part of things in progress. Americans, young and old, seem to have certain concerns - "built-in and native- which we call upon from time-to-time to see us through disturbing moments of relative inactivity. We are in such a phase at the moment. We have experienced harsh times in Iraq. For a time there was far too much to do , but with the end of the major fighting, while plans were being formulated for something lasting and worthwhile to come about because of it all, we have been told to do far less. It has proved to be difficult for many to "wind down." - to make use of our common sense which says for us take it easy for a time to allow important decisions to be made and suitable actions taken by others striving to restore order and continuity to the nation. The pictures we are now seeing are those of people who have taken the needs of their nation very much to heart and who have risked their lives in a very real sense, to become a part of the making of a new ,stable government. It is all an experiment, in a sense, for we do not know how the tenets of democracy - however bent and restyled - will "take" in Arabic nation of this type. We have to be ready to face many situations in which hasty action might spell doom for the entire project in Iraq and inhibit its possible spread to other dictator controlled states on the continent of Asia. We are going to have to exhibit sincere patience and not always insist western world haste must give way to way to less vigorous Oriental concepts and ideals with which these people have been historically endowed. If you feel you must carry " a big stick", keep it out of sight.Much is going on while we seem to be doing nothing. Go for a walk these days in February of 2005 and reflect on the fact that springs daffodils are, at this snow-flurried moment, already growing upward along the edge of the narrow path you walk. A.L.M. February 17, 2005 [c501wds]
DO! To be required to sit absolutely still and purposely do nothing whatever, can be real punishment. It is good that most of us have learned that basic lesson in our younger years; good also, perhaps, that many of us learned it the hard way because there are, and there will continue to be, times when we, as adults, are required to do the same thing in real terms. To be made to "stand in the corner" of a classroom while the swirl of childhood activities was fanned to new levels of excitement with its accompanying blanket of joyous noises and laughter amid authority which encouraged rather than inhibited such group actions. Most of us, it appears, seem to thrive on activity in and around us and it seems true that we American,in particular, like to feel we are part of things in progress. Americans, young and old, seem to have certain concerns - "built-in and native- which we call upon from time-to-time to see us through disturbing moments of relative inactivity. We are in such a phase at the moment. We have experienced harsh times in Iraq. For a time there was far too much to do , but with the end of the major fighting, while plans were being formulated for something lasting and worthwhile to come about because of it all, we have been told to do far less. It has proved to be difficult for many to "wind down." - to make use of our common sense which says for us take it easy for a time to allow important decisions to be made and suitable actions taken by others striving to restore order and continuity to the nation. The pictures we are now seeing are those of people who have taken the needs of their nation very much to heart and who have risked their lives in a very real sense, to become a part of the making of a new ,stable government. It is all an experiment, in a sense, for we do not know how the tenets of democracy - however bent and restyled - will "take" in Arabic nation of this type. We have to be ready to face many situations in which hasty action might spell doom for the entire project in Iraq and inhibit its possible spread to other dictator controlled states on the continent of Asia. We are going to have to exhibit sincere patience and not always insist western world haste must give way to way to less vigorous Oriental concepts and ideals with which these people have been historically endowed. If you feel you must carry " a big stick", keep it out of sight.Much is going on while we seem to be doing nothing. Go for a walk these days in February of 2005 and reflect on the fact that springs daffodils are, at this snow-flurried moment, already growing upward along the edge of the narrow path you walk. A.L.M. February 17, 2005 [c501wds]
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
FOLK SONGS ALL?
Folk music, according to a definition set forth in amazing complexity by the International Folk Council in 1955, folk music is the "product of a musical tradition that has been evolved through the process of oral transmission." (etc) That would appear to be a definition which excludes much of what is, today considered to be "folk music" to audiences and, more importantly, to the musicians themselves, those persons who, with skill and training in much demand, compose and perform it. The crux of the entire matter of disagreement as to how folk music finds its insistent genesis. To wall-in a definition of the term by leaning too heavily on the concept of "oral" tradition has been a cumbersome point in modern times. It has been a long time - many decades - since oral transmission of musical lore has been the dominant means of making it musical variations known to others. It may well have been the main, even the sole means of evolvement for music of some forms, but that limitation was superseded many decades ago with the growth of scientific and more reliable ways of reproducing and saving sounds. I am, in no way, attempting to change the way we say we have come by our folk music heritage - which, in an international sense, is priceless and quite extensive. I am, however, of the opinion that we of the present era are shortchanging the musicians of the future if we do no attempt to document the derivation of various present-day musical items to show how many of them spring from the people or a special element of the population in a specific geographical area. I grew to adulthood during a time when the term "jazz", often an obscene reference in some dialects, came to be popularly applied to type of music -chiefly instrumental - which was a basic simplicity but subject to gross improvisations by the performer. Much of this type of music stemmed from the daily living who brought it forth with such enthusiasm and evident joy. The main criticism I remember of "jazz" in the 1920's was to mark it with the very term now being used to define what is considered to be a merit in true folk music. We were ridiculed, scorned and condemned for "not reading a written score" - for a-libbing, for improvisations, for embellishments on simple themes, and for, oddly enough, making improved instruments of our day do things which had previously, been considered to be improper, impossible or too innovative. Our "jazz", then, was "of the people" and , might well qualify, by the academic definition cited, as being "folk" music. But enough of that for now. We can talk about it some more, if you like, later on, but right now I'm urging you to try to think with me about possibilities of seeing potential merit in our current spate of "rock" and "rap". Music? A.L.M. February 16, 2005 [c495wds]
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
OUR NATIVE NATIVES How many full-blooded native American Indians do you know? Less than one, perhaps? That's about the average with most Virginians. Then, we have and advantage over people from other states because there come sweeping back over our memory screens all the stories about the beautiful Indian princess Pocahontas, her papa Powhatan who was chief-chief of all of the noble redskins in or around the troubled Jamestown colony. You have a special treasure if you actually recall those stories and the actual history which set such events before us. Today's knowledge is based almost exclusively on those wonderful, colorful, convenient, abridged, abbreviated eviscerated,condensed encapsulated and ruthlessly romanticized versions produced a la Disney. I am grateful for them, I hasten to insert this point, because, without them all may well have been totally lost. Our tribes were located mainly in the east end of the colony - east of the Blue Ridge mountains. The actual number varies on how one counts them. Even such familial units as they were, disagreed at times and broke into short-term fragments. Today the Chickahominy Tribe, for instance, for instant, is the largest tribe about a thousand members. They live in the Charles City County between Richmond and Williamsburg with several scattered "colonies" elsewhere in the estate. In nearby New Kent County, twenty-five miles east of Richmond, we find the "Eastern Chicahominy Tribe". Total population about 150. The Chicahominy Tribe was not a member of Powhatan's Confederation. They were the ones who captured John Smith and held him prisoner for Pocahontas, who "lived with the Flunkey's Tribe. The tribe today consists of about a hundred persons. In Powhatan's time it was the most powerful. His remarkable confederation consisted of from 32 to 34 "tribes" from the Carolina border to DC with about an estimated ten thousand persons under his leadership. We will be hearing more about the Virginia tribes in the next few months because they were approved for Federal Recognition and eligibility to many benefits because of this nationwide recognition. The Bureau of Indian Affairs has been dragging its moccasins in implementing the classification procedures for nearly three years and tribes are growing restless. A.L.M. February 15, 2005 [c376wds]
Monday, February 14, 2005
ON THE MOVE At times, we appear to be a people who are constantly "on the move"' always ready, even eager, it seems, to search elsewhere for the realization of dreams we have allowed to become goals in our life. Often ill-defined and romantic by nature, many such "'green pastures" ideas moved many men and women women around as if they were chess pieces being ineptly played in a serious game dealing with materials bordering upon life and death. At times, we are forced to ask ourselves if we have, perhaps, allowed our dreams to lead us astray. It is highly unlikely that a peasant might become King of the domain or, that a chronic spend-thrift become the richest man. Simply ,moving from one location to another does not work such miracles which some seem to expect it to do. Quite often we read of a famous writer or artist who was " a product of the slums" and we find it was only after when he or she had escaped from that imprisonment that their talents started to come to the forefront in their lives. The move may well have caused the change to become append apparent -first to them, perhaps, and, in time, to others but the roots were established long before that change of location. Far too often, I have seen young men and women leave their family environment seeking that which they have decided is to be their lifelong dream work. The success of failure of such a move depends almost entirely on what potions of that home atmosphere he or she took along with them when they left. Few leave empty-handed, even though what they may have taken long is a negative awareness of what is wrong with things them must not do in their new situation. No one leaves home empty-handed or empty-headed. Major changes in our lives seem to come to us unbidden and circumstances over which we have little or no control decide them. We, as a family many years ago, moved only five or six times in my first two decades, and looking back at it I find that over half of those "moves" where mild, cosmetic changes from house to apartment or the reverse of that or a larger house , whatever became available. Major changes were decided by economic factors - my Dad's job, for instance, moving from a coastal, urban community to a small rural one in the western, mountainous section of our state perhaps three hundred miles away. I was a six-year old at the time, and as I grew, I always had a feeling I had a special blessing of having grown up in two different worlds. I have always as a positive value in regard to my writing tendencies, never as a handicap or obstacle in any way. The pattern of my childhood years was decided by conditions of The Great Depression era and the direction of my adulthood was radically changed and refashioned by Pearl Harbor Day and events leading up to that moment in our national history. In one sense of the term, The Depression era may be seen as my "slum" and I have lived so many unusual facets of what is often called "the Good Life" including blessings I could not have anticipated, planned or enacted. I'm never really still, I now realize. I am ever on the move. A.L.M. February 14, 2005 [c578wds]
Sunday, February 13, 2005
CHECKERS AND X-ERS That was quite a ballot they handed out to voters in Iraq recently wasn't it? Imagine someone gutsy enough to try doing such a thing here at home. Can't you imagine the storm of opposition? How can anyone vote for a choice out of hundreds of "candidates"? Imagine voting for people associated such a host of political parties and factions! A photograph and a symbol of some sort designated each division. Any such attempt to do so this side of the Euphrates would have resulted is something even sillier than Florida's chad storm . I can understand what such printed forms disturb people. I've "filled out" my share of questionaires... also titled surveys, studies, evaluations, polls, informational in-gatherings and other such harmless as well as some harmful - printed forms. They are not all politically oriented as you well know from your allotement of junk mail. I tend to be old fashioned and remain, basically a "checker" on such forms I have avoided becoming adept at newer methods such a "X-ing, dotting, blacking-in, ticking, underlining, circleing, crossing-out, or a catch -all instruction which is very good to have handy. That line tells me to "mark" my ballot. Some people, oddly enough "check" to the left when they fill in the little boxes provided. I'm a right-sider, myself and have always been. I used to worry about commiting trade mark infringments when people told me that my marks resembled that of Nike. Others, when plainly told to "check" the items they like, immediately fill them with "X . To me an "x" or three of them "xxx", mean I made a mistake and want that entry cancelled. Someinstrzuction are next txoimpossible to compay withn: foxrinstence,xthe one which tellme Imust u,s a N o 2 penci.lwhenIonlyhavb e one; that which tells me to use black ink - not blue - after the first six squares are neatly filled in and blinking back at me in bright blue. The squares must be completely "filled in" or "blacked out" depending on the mood at the moment of the questionaire writer. No blanks. No shadows. And stay with the borders like a good kindergarten kid ought to be capable of doing, you will be creaeting what, in time, will be called "chads". We have been accused of being a civilization of button pushers. I don't think so. A good many of us are still stuck in the old century- filling in blanks, checking or x-ing little blocks -with black ink, mind you, never blue in any exotic shade. Occasionally you ghet to filln out which ends with the instruction: "Return completed questionaire promptly in the enclosed, self addressed, postage-paid envelope which is never there. That either completes your day or make your day complete, depending on how seriously you take such common, everyday things. A.L.M. February 13, 2005 [c485wds]
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