Ah, Christmas!

Ghost of Christmas Past: "I am here for your welfare, Ebenezer."

 

Scrooge: "My welfare? To be awakened by a ghost at one o'clock in the morning is hardly conducive to my welfare!"

 

(From the 1970 musical "Scrooge," starring Albert Finney)

 

We actually celebrated Christmas with my in-laws on Sunday, two days early. This year the usual December 25 date didn't fit everyone's plan, so we just rescheduled it. I love the concept. Kind of like a giant TiVo.

 

There was a half-hour of caroling at the church before the service last night. Someone in the congregation would shout the name of a favorite carol and that's what would be played and sung. I wanted to hold a cigarette lighter over my head and yell, "Layla!" but I don't think they would have gotten it, or appreciated it if they did.

 

Cookies matter at Christmas, of course, and this year's gingerbread men seemed to work out. There were the classic gingerbread men:

 

 

From the "Great Artists" series (left to right: Van Gogh, Picasso, and Toulous Lautrec)

 

 

 

The "You've Got Mail" gingerbread man:

 

And the "CSI - North Pole" gingerbread man:

 

 

Overall it's been quite a year. Every year, for everyone, has its large events, pleasant and not, and this year herehasn't been so different except it's been more like three years worth of it all.

It was the year I lost my father, and my cat. It was the year I learned the course I've taught for 14 years is probably being phased out after this school year.

 

It was also the year my father finally got peace from a brave, difficult battle that went on for years. The year my cat's long, healthy life ended with a short illness and minimal suffering. And the year I'm getting the opportunity to take on new challenges after successfully handling the same one for 14 years. It's all in the interpretation, and how I end up remembering it is up to me. That's a valuable lesson I learned from one of my favorite people.

A big first yesterday morning. Sitting right here typing, for the first time the cats came up into my lap. Lily came up first and then Willie, seeing the attention Lily was getting and being a true petting gourmond, followed. It's their first holiday in an environment they're just now getting used to. At first they just kind of stared at the tree with cautious reverence, like the 2001 apes looking at the monolith except without the weird music. After that phase came the delighted recognition that a tree that blooms cat toys grew right there in the living room. Lily's the smaller of the two, and can climb nearly to the top of the Christmas tree effortlessly. I probably should tell her not to but it's just beautiful to watch. Willie has started to get up that high too, though not quite as gracefully. When he pushes off with his back legs to jump out, the tree almost looks like it's coming down. The tree started out nice but keeping it that way quickly became hopeless. I really don't mind. So far they've left the other decorations in the house alone. I take all of this to be a good sign for the coming year.

 

Best wishes to all for a great Christmas and a great New Year. As for me, I have to check the date of the Super Bowl. If I'm busy that day I want to make sure the NFL has enough time to reschedule it. 

Sermonized For Your Protection

"If one has morals, they can't be taken away by me or anyone else." (Lily St. Cyr, legendary 40's and 50's stripper)

This weekend, "The Golden Compass" opened (to mediocre reviews and box office) at a theater near you. It's a movie based on a book I never heard of that was written by an author I never heard of. Or hadn't heard of until I started getting mass-mailing e-mails a few weeks ago warning of the dire consequences sure to result if anyone sees this movie.

If the idea is to make sure no one sees a movie, a campaign to tell people about the movie is a curious approach. In any event, I understand the campaign's objections to be two-fold.

First, the writer, Philip Pullman, is an affirmed atheist whose writings generally portray major religions as groups of people engaged in widespread, organized efforts to tell the less-enlightened people what to do. To counter this portrayal, groups of  offended religious people have organized widespread campaigns to tell the rest of us not to see this movie.  (And on the eighth day, the Lord created irony...)

Second, some of those offended have expressed concerns not about this movie or the book on which it is based, but rather about the more openly critical second and third books in the trilogy. It's felt that after reading the first book, there's a chance there could turn out to be a possibility that maybe someone could conceivably read one of the other books at some time in the future and potentially be influenced by it to some degree. Sure sounds to me like something to spend today fretting about. And I'm sure these folks, in protecting their religious beliefs from any form of disagreement, must have a good reason for disregarding Jesus' own admonition from the Sermon on the Mount: "Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." (Matthew 6:34 NIV)  

Being fair, many of the concerns are understandable. Not long ago, these same folks were warning us about the rush of youth enrollmont into witchcraft-practicing cults after the Harry Potter books and movies were released and, sure enough, isn't that just what happened? It was the most shocking display of social deterioration I've seen since the epidemic of alcoholism that resulted from Lucy doing the still-shocking Vita-Meta-Vegimin episode.

If children ever started getting hold of Phillips' books there's no telling what could happen. Just ask any child who has already read one of the fifteen million copies of books in the trilogy sold since 1995.

Regular readers of this journal know God is an important part of my life, so I'm certainly not taking any kind of anti-religious stance. Regardless of whether I agree with someone's concerns about a movie or book, I can respectfully accept them if they've seen the movie, read the book, etc. We need to think a bit more than we sometimes do before preaching a sermon from the Book of Reefer Madness about how we know the sky is falling because we heard it from someone who saw it in an e-mail he got from a guy he knows who read a synopsis.

Now let's go out there and protect our children from the threat of wizards and golden compasses, and give them more wholesome concepts like talking lions.

 

Do Not Pass Go, Do Not Collect $200

Back from relaxing for a couple of days in Atlantic City. (The photo below isn't mine - in fact, I didn't take any this weekend - but it will do for now.)

 

 

I hadn't been there in quite some time, maybe four years, and for all the building and rebuilding the place remains a great constant. For international readers, Atlantic City is a small beach town in southern New Jersey that over the years has become the east coast's answer to Las Vegas, with better fudge and salt water taffy.

 

It's a curious place. A boardwalk lined with the gaudy lights of big-money casinos. There are some big-name chi-chi stores with high end jewelry, clothing and such for that day's lucky big winners, punctuated by junk shops and greasy food joints for the rest. Lots of storefronts featuring oriental foot and back massages. (These, as far as I know, are actual massages, as opposed to the "massages (nudge, nudge, wink, wink)" one can get in Las Vegas, where "massages (nudge, nudge, wink, wink)" are legal, a code word for taxable.) And, of course, souvenirs for everyone to remember the trip. What is life without a "someone I know went to Atlantic City and all I got was this t-shirt" t-shirt?

 

There's a Korean War Veterans memorial that's powerful even if the boardwalk does seem a curious location for it. It includes plaques for each of the native New Jersey recipients of the Medal of Honor, with a brief description of what each did to earn that distinction. The descriptions read like the heroic scenes from a big-budget action movie, and then you remember these guys did it for real and without knowing if the script would bring them out alive. In most cases, it didn't. If you visit Atlantic City and think looking out at the ocean leaves you feeling awestruck and humbled, turn the other way and read the plaques. I'll never call some guy who hits home runs or makes 3-point shots a hero again.

 

When first built-up years ago, the casinos were supposed to benefit the city, in particular the schools, but travel a couple of Monopoly-named streets past the boardwalk and the poverty tells a different story. Visiting high rollers, rooms and drinks provided free in return for dropping a couple of thousand dollars at the craps tables, walk past glitzy casinos alongside the busloads of regular folks who could probably be doing better things with their money than trying to double it at a slot machine or blackjack table. And together they pass local folks trying to get a few dollars by singing, playing plastic-bucket percussion or just by being there. It's very democratic, in a sad kind of way. Most sobering for me have always been the pawn shops, right across the street from the casinos, with big signs offering immediate cash for gold jewelry.

 

Still, the boardwalk has things to offer the non-gambler. Fresh air. Good shows too, though it's a bit off season for entertainment until it's closer to Christmas. The only big-name show this weekend was Jay Leno at Caesars (top ticket price: $175). We decided on a Beatles tribute band concert (top ticket price: $25). So realistic I almost yelled out, "Don't marry Heather!" Afterward we went back to our motel (about a twenty minute drive from the pricier hotels on the boardwalk) and watched a Letterman rerun.

 

Life Soup

Some moments to write, finally. It's just been that kind of couple of weeks. But enough chit-chat...on to the issues.

Issue 1: Barry, We Hardly Knew Ye

So now we find out Barry Bonds took steroids. Who would have thought it? It's a sad day for baseball, of course, but an even sadder day for the legions of young boys and girls who look up to sports figures like Bonds and believe in their young hearts that if you work hard and never lose sight of your dreams, it really is possible for anyone to grow large muscles and increase their head size in a matter of weeks.

In Tom Wolfe's great book about the American space program, The Right Stuff, he describes the mindset of a group of test pilots whenever one is killed in a testing accident. They're saddened, of course, but each man's mind also invariably finds all the reasons he wouldn't have crashed the way the doomed pilot did. I think a similar thing can happen when someone is too long on the pedestal of public adulation, thinking that the laws (of man as well as physics) only apply to regular people.

The charges against Barry Bonds aren't for taking steroids per se. Rather, they are for lying about it under oath. It's the same kind of thing that sent Martha Stewart to the big house when she decided to mislead investigators looking into those insider trading allegations. I've never agreed with those who said she was sent to prison because she's a celebrity. First, since when has that ever gotten anyone hard treatment in court? Second, taking it upon yourself to hamper a criminal investigation is a serious matter, sometimes more serious than whatever the original investigation was about. Where do these people think they are, FEMA?

Nixon lied about Watergate and became synonymous with political evil. (Considering our politics and politicians, that's really saying something.) Conversely, Reagan owned up to Iran Contra and ended up all but beatified. Clinton...well, he's Clinton.

With Bonds being a free agent I have to think no team will sign him with this indictment hanging over his head. We'll see how it all plays out, but it's starting to look like we won't have Barry Bonds to kick around any more.

Issue 2: This Will Sleigh You

A news item today reported that some Santa's (Santae?) in Australia have been directed not to say "ho ho ho" because it could be considered offensive by some women. Even if Santa were pointing at the perp walk from a brothel raid when he said it, I'm not sure the average three or four year old would get the inference. (Though I've known a few who probably would.) I think when someone created the expression, "You can't make this stuff up," this is the kind of thing they had in mind.

Issue 3: Residential Demolition, While You Wait

This is the latest photo of Willie (on the right) and Lily (on the left). (Yes, we decided to fix the spellings of their names.) Pulling clothes off hangers, throwing laundry around the bedroom and running around in a way that recreates the sound from every cowboy movie ever made wherein a herd of horses gallops in from the plains is hard work, and they need to rest sometime. Seeing them this way makes me think of a lot of things. Mostly about how witnessing life in its pure, innocent form underscores how very badly we've screwed up everything else. 

Coming Out of the Dark

I read something recently, I don't even remember where, pointing out that DaVinci, Michelangelo and Edison all had the same 24 hours in a day that each of us has. It was supposed to be encouraging. At least I think it was. It was actually kind of depressing.

On to what matters. Our new babies have decided it's no longer necessary to steal about cautiously and then run back under the chair. They now run around like double-parked bank-robbers on amphetamines, occasionally redecorating whatever's in their path, and then run back under the bed. Still, they're coming out for longer periods now and even letting us pet them, though picking up is still on the forbidden list. They're even starting to venture into areas lit well enough for that strange man they see living with them to take pictures. Not great pictures yet, more like the surveillance photos Jim Phelps used to pull out of the envelope before the tape self-destructed, but it's a start. They're easy to tell apart. The white triangle between Lillie's eyes points to her left/our right. On Willy it points to his right/our left.

 

It's fascinating to see their personalities start to emerge. So far, Willy seems to have a lot of the life-in-the-slow-lane approach to life that Skids had, though it may just be shyness he'll get over. Lillie is already showing great spitfire potential. She's transporter-cat, going from point A to point B apparently without ever being at any point in between. For a fraction of a moment I thought about renaming her Lamont Cranston because of her ability to cloud men's minds so they can't see her, but I'm not sure how many people would get it. Besides, we like the names their rescuers gave them, even if they are spelled funny. The other day she came running up the stairs and under the bed with a glove in her mouth that was nearly as big as she is. It's good to know if our home is ever overrun by gloves she'll track them down and kill them. As it is, I nearly fell over laughing, in spite of hating myself right then for not having a camera poised and ready to shoot at any moment.

 

Willy, still preferring the shadows

 

Lillie

 

Lillie

Proud Daddy

Quite a weekend here.

Did some baking - always a good sign - and after two attempts successfully made some really good strawberry jam. (The first attempt resulted in a brick-like substance that smelled like burnt strawberries.) And we went to the Cat Championship Show at Madison Square Garden. (Most readers probably already know where this is going.)

The show itself was great. Thousands of people paying $15 each to look at other people's cats and worth every bit of it. There were hundreds of the most exquisitely colored and patterned pedigreed cats. Short-tailed breeds considered exotic here but that are common street cats in Japan. (To be fair, the Japanese consider our typical short-hair long-tails to be exotic. Go figure.) Abyssinians, Maus, Russian Blues, Himalayans. (That last one's a particularly interesting breed, their unique faces naturally forming a kind of scowl, making them the only cat breed with a facial expression to match the attitude.) In one area, a woman was leading, if it can be called that, a cat through a series of obstacles. (The "tricks" consisted of her dangling a toy while the cat climbed the steps, went through the tube, or did whatever else to get to it. Seems to me any cat will do that, but what do I know?) Finally she held the toy on the other side of a hoop, expecting the cat to go through to get to it. The cat, no doubt aware of the symbolism of going through a hoop at a human's bidding, look at the toy, the hoop, and the woman, and turned around and went back into the tube, refusing to come out. As the folks in the American Express commercials would day, priceless. And exactly the reason why all those people who came love cats so much. You don't have to spend much time around cats to understand why they weren't made with middle fingers.

And I'm sure you still know where this is going.

Another area was an adoption fair for rescued strays. So many cats of so many ages and enthusiasm levels. Though it's far too late to make this long story short, our interest in meeting a short-hair kitten of moderate energy level (and, I admit, that didn't look just like Skids, the better to view a new family member as an individual) led us to Willy and Lillie. They're four-month old white and grey brother and sister short-hairs who cuddled together, cleaned each other, and generally displayed a mutual devotion that would be somewhat disturbing between human siblings but that is adorable in cats. We were only looking for one cat, but it seemed unimaginable to separate them. Two adoption fees and one train ride later, I am the proud poppa of two beautiful furry new family members. At long last, my sons, who are twins, will get to be the ones saying, "Which one are you?"

I'd hoped to have pictures to include here but after only a day Willy and Lillie are still in the "we'd better stay under this chair or that strange man will eat us" phase.

Leaving the supermarket last night with a cart loaded with cat things, a lady I passed watched my cart intently. I saw her and beamed like a proud new poppa.

As I said...you knew where this was going.
 

Ach Du Lieber Augustine

Good thoughts can show up in the damnedest places. I found this one in an ad for a church on the downtown #2 subway to Brooklyn. It's from St. Augustine:

 

"People travel to wonder at the height of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars; and they pass by themselves without wondering."

 

I've seen a few entries in other journals criticizing them harshly, and even was told (by a close friend, no less) that my own is "a desperate cry for help." These bothered me a bit - ok, more than a bit - and then St. Augustine came along and the whole thing got put into perspective. I don't know about you, but I don't care much about the height of mountains and have never been a beach person. You can't see the stars here a lot of the time, and if the river you've lived with your whole life were the Hudson you wouldn't be any more enamored of its size (or chemical content) than I am. What we do in these journals - really, what anyone who writes from their insides does - is refuse to pass by ourselves without wondering.

 

So here's to us, the people who give ourselves over to that creative urge just because it's ours, with or without permission. To sculpting thoughts and feelings into words, infusing them with rhythm and making them breath, and approaching it no differently whether we're being read by 12 or by 12,000 because we know no other way. To understanding the minor miracle of getting pixels on a glass screen, or bits of ink on a piece of paper, to induce a reaction in another person's mind, or heart.

 

This applies to more than writing, of course, but if I'm going to be self-serving why not go all the way?

 

In an unrelated news item, I see that Newt Gingrich has said he will not be running for president in 2008. What I really want to know is this: who's the twit who asked him that in the first place?

 

In another unrelated item, to the collection of "frequent buyer" cards I carry (for the supermarket, pharmacy, and office supply store) recently got added one for Lindt Chocolate shops. What have I become?

 

Third unrelated item (I promise to stop after this): yesterday the Yankees lost a playoff game due in part to an enormous swarm of gnats that descended onto their pitcher late in the game while they were holding onto a slim lead. I love my team, but when that happens it's hard not to think that mighty Umpire in the sky clearly does not want you to win. Our best chance in tomorrow's must-win game will be to get good starting pitching, mark the locker-room door the night before with lamb's blood, and hope there are no first-borns in the starting line-up.