Repromptophobia
Rewriting a new poem about an old topic is my greatest phobia at the moment, so since I wrote a poem about this topic some time ago, please go HERE for my poem about my greatest phobia!
In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Phobia, Shmobia.” Fears evolve over time. What is one fear you’ve conquered?
More Tapalpa Flowers
I’ve always thought this Tapalpa scene looked like a scene from a French painting–the mist, the trees and the muted colors of the fields of flowers in the background.
And here are other scenes from the day’s outing. Fourteen of us traveling in my van, including me, (taking the picture) and baby Oscar who is hidden in his sister’s arms.
I was trying to compensate for the shadows on the girls’ faces here and perhaps overdid it a bit. Reminds me of the bright Kodacolor prints of the sixties!
http://ceenphotography.com/2015/09/14/flower-of-the-day-september-14-2015-maarn-dahlia/
When my sister Patti and her friend Karen Bossart were little girls, they were asked to sing a song for entertainment at the Republican Convention. Unbeknownst to those who asked them, my parents and hers were some of the few democrats in town. Imagine their surprise when my sister and Karen got up and sang wearing these badges! When we all got together earlier this summer, it just so happens that Karen had saved her badge, which now forms a reasonably appropriate illustration for this post.
In response to my today’s post “The Three Stooges and Campaign Reform,” Mark Aldrich sent me a link to THIS YouTube video of Leonard Cohen singing his song “Democracy.” The lyrics are below:
“Democracy”
It’s coming through a hole in the air,
from those nights in Tiananmen Square.
It’s coming from the feel
that this ain’t exactly real,
or it’s real, but it ain’t exactly there.
From the wars against disorder,
from the sirens night and day,
from the fires of the homeless,
from the ashes of the gay:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
It’s coming through a crack in the wall;
on a visionary flood of alcohol;
from the staggering account
of the Sermon on the Mount
which I don’t pretend to understand at all.
It’s coming from the silence
on the dock of the bay,
from the brave, the bold, the battered
heart of Chevrolet:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
It’s coming from the sorrow in the street,
the holy places where the races meet;
from the homicidal bitchin’
that goes down in every kitchen
to determine who will serve and who will eat.
From the wells of disappointment
where the women kneel to pray
for the grace of God in the desert here
and the desert far away:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
Sail on, sail on
O mighty Ship of State!
To the Shores of Need
Past the Reefs of Greed
Through the Squalls of Hate
Sail on, sail on, sail on, sail on.
It’s coming to America first,
the cradle of the best and of the worst.
It’s here they got the range
and the machinery for change
and it’s here they got the spiritual thirst.
It’s here the family’s broken
and it’s here the lonely say
that the heart has got to open
in a fundamental way:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
It’s coming from the women and the men.
O baby, we’ll be making love again.
We’ll be going down so deep
the river’s going to weep,
and the mountain’s going to shout Amen!
It’s coming like the tidal flood
beneath the lunar sway,
imperial, mysterious,
in amorous array:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
Sail on, sail on …
I’m sentimental, if you know what I mean
I love the country but I can’t stand the scene.
And I’m neither left or right
I’m just staying home tonight,
getting lost in that hopeless little screen.
But I’m stubborn as those garbage bags
that Time cannot decay,
I’m junk but I’m still holding up
this little wild bouquet:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
I must admit that these lyrics puzzle me. I think its message is pessimistic and ironic and to a degree hopeless. Perhaps he is saying that everyone will get fed up enough with the decay of democracy in the U.S. to do something about it, but it still feels to me that the overall message is one of irony. Everyone is fed up. The hints of encroaching democracy are more obvious in China in Tiananmen Square (although I believe by the 1990’s democracy had been pretty much squelched in China as well) than in the land of democracy and opportunity for all. Where is this change coming from? It is obvious it is not coming from the power brokers and wealthy who have sold democracy for their own enrichment. It must, then, come from us.
How then does Cohen see us–we who must bring back democracy? The family is broken, democracy ain’t exactly real and it ain’t exactly here. Gay rights seem dead (remember, this is 1990), the homeless fill the streets, auto companies are failing, wars are being waged, sirens are wailing (much like Cohen himself) and women are complaining in their kitchens. Everybody seems pretty unhappy. Even Cohen chooses to retreat into escaping into his TV set, declaring, all the while, that he is as indestructible as those garbage bags that will still be around for the judgement day.
To me, it looks like the outlook is pretty desultory. But this was what–25 years ago? What does the situation look like now? Lest this post get too burdensome, and because I have an appointment in an hour, please come back later for my answer. Yes, I do have the beginning of one in drafts. Just not the time to complete it.
My thanks go to Mark Aldrich, one of the best commentators on the blogs today, for providing the impetus for this post. Mark, you might have more illuminating words to speak about these lyrics. I welcome the input of all. I am not as versed in politics as most. I can barely stand to watch the news anymore, and I think I’m not alone in this. But that doesn’t mean I don’t care what happens in this world. I think we each do what we can in the way that most suits our personality. If you are reading this, chances are you have chosen the same way I have–blogging–and I thank Mark and all of the others out there in the world who bring us sound and fair reportage of what is going on.
Later tonight I am actually going to bring to you another Leonard Cohen song that I think perhaps holds out a bit more hope for us–and perhaps a few solutions. Thanks for reading. I welcome your comments.
Rough, Ragged & to the Point
For more touchy-feely, go here: http://ceenphotography.com/2015/09/08/cees-fun-foto-challenge-sense-of-touch/
A Visit from Yoli and Oscar
Yoli came at my request to have her picture taken in her new school uniform! A few weeks ago, she went to her first day of nursery school and loved it from the very first day. Today, she and Morrie got acquainted and decided they liked each other. In fact, they seem to be patterning each other’s poses!
Which is more adorable? Impossible to choose. Yoli enjoyed putting Morrie in jail, and he went right along with the plan.
Oscar had more serious business to do as he came for his first English lesson.
He was a clever student and fast learner and worked his way through three lessons, memorizing words almost the first time I repeated them. See you next week, Oscar!
Can’t resist reblogging this very short, very charming treatise on first love. Puts my straightforward telling to shame. If you don’t follow Red’s blog, you should.
I just wanted to see Brad’s face in the bus window.
If I ran all the way from school and didn’t stop to see things, I could get to our oak tree in time for the school bus to come around the corner. Sometimes his face would be in the window. But I’d only see one side of it. He would be looking straight ahead.
Other days I’d forget to keep running and I’d sit on the sidewalk and take the shoelaces out of my shoes and pretend they were snakes. Once the shoelace snakes scared me so much that I had to run away from them.
And then I worried that I had no shoelaces. What would I tell my mother when she asked about my missing shoelaces? So I decided to get new ones. I knocked on the neighbor’s door and asked her if she had shoelaces for…
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Reflections & Shadows
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http://ceenphotography.com/2015/09/03/cees-black-white-photo-challenge-reflections-and-shadows/
In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Inside the Bubble.” A contagious disease requires you to be put into quarantine for a whole month (don’t worry, you get well by the time you’re free to go!). How would you spend your time in isolation?
Bubble Think
If I were to be quarantined for a month, I would see it as serendipity’s way of forcing me to confront some tasks I’ve been putting off for too long. First of all, there are the boxes in the garage cupboards that I have been neglecting to deal with for 14 years–old tax records going back to 1964, a life’s correspondence, sets of slides of Bob’s and my art that we used to jury into shows, Bob’s stone carving tools.
Also on the shelves are boxes of art made at the beach and boxes of art supplies from when I was doing art activities with the girls at La Olla orphanage last year. Other boxes of art supplies from this summer’s art camp sit on the floor in front of the cabinets along with assorted things taken out of the back of my car to enable other things to be put into it.
I want to deal with these things. I want my garage restored to its former neat order, but I dread finding places for all the supplies and disrupting my studio I just got back into a semblance of order. And I dread going through those old letters for two reasons. First, because they may be too dull to deal with and secondly because they may not be and may dredge up old feelings, sadnesses or stupidities. But most of all, because I saved all those things thinking I might someday want to write about them and if I read them, I might feel the obligation to do so. Note that I didn’t say compulsion. If I felt a compulsion, it would be wonderful; but then what things would I have to put off doing to make time for this new compulsion? My blog? My art that I haven’t been doing for the past year anyway?
I don’t know why I put off things I would really like to do. I just keep shoving them to the back of my mind, where they niggle at me from the darkness like an especially good chocolate bar saved for last from my Halloween bag of pleasures. They have been stashed for fourteen years or one year or six months. The layers most easily dealt with are on the outside of the dread cupboards, saying, “Deal with me.” Why don’t I do so?
Perhaps it is because something is telling me to simplify and to do only what I want to do. So I do the blog. Overdo the blog. I’m compulsive about it. Is there a prompt left undone? The other thing I’m compulsive about is daily exercise in the pool. Today is overcast and there was no hot water yesterday due to a break in the main pipe, so my compulsion rests for the day. Friends are coming for Mexican Train and comida, so I have a replacement activity. The pork loin and carrots are in the crock pot. Spuds prepared for baking. Lettuce for the salad disinfected and dried. My blog is about written (or so you perhaps hope.) Should I sort just one box? Or do another prompt?
If you have an especially visual imagination, you can perhaps envision me with a thought bubble coming up out of my head. “What to do?” it reads. I sit in front of my laptop at the dining room table. I’m still in my nightgown. Morrie sleeps in a curlicue at my feet. Guests are not due for another four hours. What to do?
If I were quarantined for one month, I wouldn’t have to choose. I’d have time to do them all.
Newer boxes taken out of the car and never dealt with are boxes of art made at the beach and kids’ art supplies that need to
“Las Mananitas” and Other Less Lovely Bastardizations of a Foreign Language
The prompt: What was the #1 song when you were born? Write about how the song relates (or not!) to your personality.
The #1 song in the U.S. on the day I was born was “Chi-Baba, Chi-Baba Chihuahua (My Bambino Go to Sleep) ” by Perry Como. Although I would advise against it, you can hear it HERE.
I guess the song, which I had never heard before today, reflected the attitude of most U.S. citizens at the time–that being that any language other than English was just gobbledegook and no one would notice that you weren’t speaking it if every once in a while you threw in a word they would recognize (in this case “Chihuahua”) which at even that early date had managed to blast its way over the border. Somehow, it escaped notice that “bambino” was Italian and “chihuahua” Spanish.
The song itself crosses all borders from innocuous, irritating and of small musical originality to mildly insulting to the culture. It is probably in atonement that at the age of 54, I myself crossed that border going in the opposite direction and although I, too, butcher the Spanish language a bit, at least I use real words to do so.
So here I am, Mexico, many years later and a bit worse for wear but here to atone for the ills of my birth year. Do with me what you will. Stream slightly off-key banda music into my ears nightly from regions down below. Awaken me to the strains of “Las Mananitas” (Little Mornings)–a lovely serenading song that unlike that other silly song meant to lull me to sleep so many years ago, does not offend at all.
On any given morning somewhere in Mexico, its strains may be heard outside some early morning window. It might be used to propose, to declare love or to honor a mother on mother’s day, but it has also come to be the traditional song sung on birthdays. The first time I heard it, and still the most lovely rendition I have heard, was in the movie ” Boys on the Side” with Whoopi Goldberg, Drew Barrymore and Mary-Louise Parker.
Here is Mexico’s favorite, Vicente Fernandez, singing that song.
And HERE is where you can watch “Boys on the Side”–one of my all-time favorite films.
