REFLECTIONS ON LIFE – NOVEMBER 2019

ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED
PS - My monthly-recorded “Reflections” episodes on Howard Community College’s Dragon radio program I record can be located at http://dragondigitalradio.podbean.com/category/reflections-on-life/

REFLECTIONS ON HOME IN COLUMBIA

The water in the two ponds behind and alongside our home has turned dark and remains a deep black. Earlier this month, poplar leaves fallen from their tall home, shone as bright patches of yellow on that sometimes still and sometimes shimmering black water.  A few now remain there, although presenting much less contrast in color.  Most of the leaves that have lived through this year on various trees have now fallen to the ground.  A few faded and crinkly orange and yellow ones still hang on to the maples.

Hummingbirds abandoned our feeders and headed south the beginning on November. A large woodpecker with the reddest head I have ever seen on that species feeds many times a day on the suet cakes hanging from the branches of our beloved long-limbed pine tree.    Cardinals feast on the sunflower seeds in the adjacent feeder.  Last winter I wrote about the several days’ vigil we held over those branches when they were so heavily laden with snow we feared they might not see spring.  They did.  Squirrels run back and forth seemingly endlessly on those branches - two accessible from different levels – one outside our bedroom window and the other from the kitchen window downstairs.  

 Throughout this year’s spring, summer, and fall we have felt such joy watching them scamper back and forth from both the windows by our bed and in our kitchen where we often eat our meals.  Now, with winter approaching, we wonder whether these same branches will make it through again.  

Only time will tell.

You may recall my writing in past Reflections about the deep sadness Lloyd and I experienced when The Tomato Palace restaurant on Columbia’s downtown lakefront closed.  We had such great memories of taking Zach and Julia there for summer lunches sitting outdoors by beautiful Lake Kittamaqundi.  As time passed, so did that nostalgia (or at least it lessened significantly).  Last year that building reopened as “The Soundry” a musical venue.   This year we had attended a couple events and found them entertaining.  Then last week Deanna Bogart whom we had heard outdoors many times over the years at the Lakefront during summer treated us to a magnificent performance.  We both loved her great piano concerts (including her sitting on the piano keys) and highly spirited singing.  The ambiance and acoustics inside the Soundry took both of us to a significantly higher level of pure enjoyment.  Deanna was great.  So Lloyd and I now consider ourselves living proof that “old” people can indeed adjust.  Hope to see you back there soon, Deanna.

“The New Yorker”                                                                 November 18, 2019

“The Final Frontier “Star Trek” guides a hospital vigil”   by Michael Chabon

Chabon, Columbia born and bred, the much beloved and Pulitzer prize-winning author of “The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay”, more recently wrote about his relationship with his father as well as his own experience as a parent in his new book “Pops:  Fatherhood in Pieces”.  In this article, Chabon writes “My father and I had already done all the talking we were ever going to do”.  It takes me back to my own dad, “Barney” to me, about whom I have written in prior “Reflections on Life”, If you can read this article without tears, I would like to know how.

REFLECTIONS ON ZACH

The annual Zaching Against Cancer Foundation Running Festival

took place this month at Turf Valley. It was quite a cold day.  One thousand plus people turned out to run or walk.  They had three choices:  10K, 5K, or one mile.  Lloyd and I walked the mile with approximately 100 other participants; all the rest ran 5K or 10K. I have attended more than a few outdoor events in my 75 years, and I can honestly (and objectively, I believe) say that I have never seen a more enthused and celebratory event.  The joy and reverence that Zach’s memory brings out in people of all ages and walks of life is nothing short of inspirational – just as our memory of Zach himself continues to be.  I realize that this could easily sound like a grandmother’s words.  They are, and the truth is that everyone present with whom I spoke made similar observations.

Zach’s sister, Julia, now works full time for the foundation, the main mission of which is to provide assistance in many forms to families of kids with brain cancer.  She does such a great job in carrying on the love her brother spread around. We recently received the very happy news that Julia and her boyfriend, Chad, are engaged to be married.   Her parents, Chris and John are brimming with happiness.  Lloyd and I are, too.  Zach’s presence at their engagement party was palpable.

REFLECTIONS ON BALTIMORE, MY HOME TOWN

I have written before about the time I spent as a kid at Edmondson Village shopping center, one of the first of that genre in the nation.  Along with many other kids, I was enamored of the monkeys in the shoe store, which was about half a mile’s walk from our home.  I was equally enamored of the scrumptious chocolate sundaes which I ate sitting with a girl friend at about age seven on a stool at the drug store counter. This shopping center was among the first in the country to include a movie theater, where I went on my first “date” at age 14.  Ever so often I randomly take a ride around my childhood neighborhood including my church and elementary school, St. Bernardine’s, and that shopping center. With these and many other fond memories, I was saddened to read of the serious fire and am hoping for quick repair.

Speaking of fires in Baltimore, my mom was born in that city in 1904, the year of the Great Baltimore Fire, which was the third worst in U.S. history, following those in San Francisco and Chicago.  Twelve hundred fire fighters, including many from surrounding counties, worked continuously for thirty-six hours to extinguish the flames.  Some 1,500 buildings were destroyed over an area of 140 acres.  Some of them came BY TRAIN from Philadelphia!  It’s important that those of us living in counties surrounding Baltimore understand the importance of helping that city succeed.

***

“The Baltimore Sun”                                                Sunday, November 17, 2019

“Forget luxury apartments.  We need affordable housing.”     Editorial

“Developers and city officials are all too eager to welcome in well-to-do residents while forgetting about the city’s poor.  We have enough buildings geared to empty nest baby boomers and young professionals.  Why not build where there is a need?”

With all due respect to baby boomers and young professionals, I agree with this editorial, and the same goes for the need in Columbia.

“The Baltimore Sun”                                             Sunday, November 2019

“You know you’re from Baltimore if…”               by Dan Rodricks

I realize I’m writing quite a few words about Baltimore, but there are two aspects of this regular column by Rodricks that I can’t resist.  First, The mention of Jimmy’s Restaurant in Fells Point, which had been one of my Mom’s favorites, and in later years, mine too.  Second, legendary journalist, H.L. Mencken about whom I wrote in a recent “Reflections,” Rodricks quotes him writing in the Baltimore Evening Sun in 1920;  “As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people.  On some great day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a down-right moron.”  As for our current president, I don’t believe he’s a moron.  He merely acts like one.

The Baltimore Sun                                                  Monday, November 4, 2019

“Pelosi warns Maryland Dems of ‘assault’”          by Lorraine Mirabella

I was in my thirty’s when Speaker Nancy Pelosi’ brother, Tommy D’Alesandro, served as mayor of Baltimore in the 60’s.  This month Lloyd and I went to hear Nancy speak at the gathering described in this Sun article.  We were not disappointed.

REFLECTIONS ON PUBLIC POLICY

Howard County

 “The Baltimore Sun”                                                          November 17, 2019

“Do what’s right to diversify schools in Howard County”  by Arne Duncan &

                                                                                                  John R. King Jr.

The two authors of this letter to the editor each served as Secretary of Education under President Obama.  That carries a fair amount of weight with me, re: their opinions on diversifying schools in our county.

State of Maryland

The Washington Post                                                              November 4, 2019

“Remembrance and reconciliation”                                  by DeNeen L. Brown

“Montgomery County will send soil from the site of an 1880 lynching to an Alabama museum”

With the ever-growing number of historical “lynching” reports, I am taken back to The Water Dancer”,Ta’Nehisi Coates’ magnificently worded novel

with a unique inescapably piercing perspective on slavery.

U.S.A.

The Baltimore Sun                                                            November 29, 2019

“Thank Lincoln, not the Pilgrims, for Thanksgiving” by William C. Kashatus

“Lincoln’s Thanksgiving proclamation”

A few days ago our nation recognized Thanksgiving Day. One way or the other I have managed to live to the age of 75 without reading these wise words in the proclamation of President Abraham Lincoln on this national day of recognition.  I strongly recommend that you read it, particularly these words near the end, regardless of your religious affiliation – if any.

“…with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers …”

When I read this on Thanksgiving Day, it hit me hard to realize that we as a nation continue to allow, if not cause, such pain and harm to many at home and abroad. I yearn for a Thanksgiving Day when this has ceased.

REFLECTIONS ON OUR PLANET BEYOND THE UNITED STATES

UKRAINE

A deep bow of gratitude and sincere admiration for former U.S. Ambassador to the Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, for the deep courage, dignity, respect, and solemnity she presented in testifying recently before the House Intelligence Committee of the U.S. Congress.

MEXICO

“Pilgrimage”                                                             by Jackie Bryant

Sierra (magazine)                                                    November/December 2019

Like me, during the past several years you have likely read various news, literary, financial and other publications about Central American migrants crossing our U.S. border.  They all conjure up images of the few and various such crossings Lloyd and I have made. Here in an environmental publication –“Sierra”- is one such article that may be the most poignant, humane, and spiritual I have read to date.  The image of “where one (nation) ends and the other begins” has come to me countless times since I first read, “Pilgrimage.”

A deep bow to poet, Jackie Bryant.

 ITALY

Lloyd and I love Venice.  When we visited this beautiful city 25 years ago during our European honeymoon, we danced one night in the magnificent Saint Mark’s square.  Last autumn, in celebration of our 25^th wedding anniversary, we repeated the same self-guided tour, starting in Paris then travelling south along the Mediterranean coast by train.  Although it was much too crowded to dance in that square this time, we loved sitting and people- watching while having a glass of wine.  We were heartbroken to see the recent photos in the Washington Post of Venice literally under water. 

Such a stark reminder that the magnificent city by the sea, with all of its precious art, is not immune to destruction.  Venice is a quintessential example of the value of tangible, material objects.

REFLECTIONS ON OUR UNIVERSE

“The Washington Post”                                                       November 5, 2019

“A Cosmic Mystery”                                                            by Joel Achenbach

“Scientists say the universe is expanding – but how fast?  The answer may be found in a “new physics.”

I feel deep gratitude toward Mr. Achenbach and the astronomer whom he quotes, Adam Riess, professor of physics and astronomy at Johns Hopkins University.  No longer do I feel quite so ignorant when reading articles about the universe.  “We are wired to use our intuition to understand things around us”, says Riess,  “Most of the universe is made out of stuff that’s completely different than us. This adherence to intuition is often wildly unsuccessful in the universe.”

Since reading this article a few weeks ago, on clear nights I have lingered longer than usual looking out of the window by my bedside at the stars in the sky.  I repeat to myself the final words of my October “Reflections.” 

“Good night, Elijah.”

     

Across the Universe

 “Pools of sorrow, waves of joy

Are drifting through my open mind

Possessing and caressing me

Across the Universe

~Lennon and McCartney

Be well and love life.

~ Liz

ps - My monthly “Reflections” episodes on Howard Community College’s Dragon radio program I record can be located at http://dragondigitalradio.podbean.com/category/reflections-on-life/.