The Jolly Green Giant

I grew up with their advertising song on television. I suspect that the excitement of that time over the new technology of color television has something to do with the development of this icon or maybe he predated all that, but the medium sure did show him off. He was a kindly gentleman, cheerful and . . . green! He was always smiling, bending low to interact with humans, solely dedicating his life to getting us to eat more vegetables and therefore, presumably, enjoy greater health and vigor. And HOW MANY TIMES have I driven past the exit to see the fiberglass statue erected in his honor? You don't get much warning; a billboard and BAM there you are having to decide "Is THIS the exit?" Well, I was travelling low on sleep and any stop where I could get out and wander about a bit without making locals suspicious was welcome to me, so I shifted lanes and took the exit. And there he was! In all his green glory. It struck me as a bit odd that you ca climb metal stairs on the back side of his brick platform to stand on the platform between his giant legs and view the dramatic vista of the parking lot of some defunct business, but I went up there anyway, and photographed the guy from all angles. He has kind of a smirk on his face that is not quite as benevolent and kindly as I remembered, but perhaps that has much to do with the extreme angle of viewing him from below, and I am not certain his proportions are quite human and his curled shoes are more than a little creepy to me. But I present to you: The Jolly . . . . Greeeeeeen Gi-ant!

Virginia Creeper Over Lake Redstone Waters

A summer view of Virginia creeper over lake water. Makes me want to paddle!

Virginia Creeper Details

Big bluestem seedhead shadow

Indian grass seedhead shadow

Virginia Creeper Doing Its Fall Thing

Fall It Is

The crowds were at the Morton Arboretum on Sunday hoping to catch the 'fall color' but most were probably disappointed. It was a bit early and the only conventional signs of fall were the occasional brilliant scarlet of leaves of the Virginia creeper vines on the tree trunks. I suspect it will be a disappointing fall for leaf color, as the Virginia creeper that makes my garage/office into the bat cave turned reddish and dropped its leaves pretty much at the same time. There was probably not even a minute where the whole thing was red, as some were already falling off by the time others colored. This makes me expect other trees to drop their leaves soon after they color. But the determined can find signs of autumn other than the turning color of tree leaves. Purple and pink and white asters and yellow sneezeweed bloom in the fall. Seeds are nature's way of making sure there will be new plants after the killing freeze of winter. Seeds come in many forms, from berries to stalks of seeds at the former site of flowers to grassy seed plumes to acorns and black walnuts that were dropping from the car to plunk of car roofs. It is scary when they are landing all around you and missing your delicate skull by only a couple feet. We've put it off as long as we can: We finally have to admit that fall is here.

Savage Blood Sucking Beasts

I took one for this photo.

Shopping at the Kiosk

Shoppin' at the St. Mary's Chapel Self-Serve Religious Trinkets And Pamphlets Kiosk

Saints Medals













Keychain Rosaries














Plastic Dashboard Jesuses














Palm-size Crucifixes

Vices and Virtues: Never Quit

I am sure you have fallen victim to this one at some point in your life: Don't be a quitter! Stick with it! Finish what you start! The virtues of commitment, diligence, perseverance. Yet imagine a life where you were never allowed to quit anything that didn't work out? Imagine how much time would be wasted in pursuit of useless things. Gone to the store for Dial soap and there is none? You can buy the Dove or you can drive all over town looking for the right brand. Imagine the risks that would never get taken if you had to be sure up front. We would never try a new art or skill, never start a risky project, never meet new people or enter into new friendships if we didn't have the power and freedom to bail out of it if it wasn't working out. Never quit! Hah! The trick is to find the balance between what to give up and what to stick with. It is, yes, a wise course of action not giving up on a truly good thing just because the path to it turns out to be a little difficult. If it is going to take a little longer or be a little harder or require a little help from someone or require a little more work or effort or difficulty, but if it is truly achievable and worth it, then by all means, soldier on. Do what it takes, rally the forces, give yourself a pep talk and keep on keeping on. But if it is a lost cause, taking more time or energy than it is worth, causing unforeseen damage or harm or pain, turning out to be less important or less valuable than initially thought, by all means, give it up and move on. Move on to things more worthy of your time and effort and more likely to yield good benefit in proportion to the input required. It can be difficult to recognize that point in time where something is no longer worth it and it is time to give up and move on. Or it can be just as difficult to recognize in time of discouragement and pain that the thing really is worth never quitting on. But to recognize that we possess the free will to decide that and to reexamine and re-decide it frequently throughout the process is a valuable realization indeed. Never Quit. Unless it makes sense to quit. Then quit promptly, clean up the mess, and move on to something else. Guilt free, because sometimes quitting really is the right thing to do.

The Door of the Hospital Courtyard

I love signs like these. No one planned this hospital courtyard and decided in advance of its opening in the planning phases that such signage would be a good idea. No, this sign is there because somebody tried it. Somebody thought it would be a good idea to go into the courtyard of dignfied serious St. Mary's hospital with antique chapel spires with ornate stone pillars, a courtyard looked out onto by patients' rooms, visitor waiting rooms, exam rooms, and doctors' and staff offices, and take off some significant measure of their clothing to take in the sun's rays. I would love to know the back story that lead to this sign, who it was that attempted their bold bathe in the sun, when it was, what they were thinking. Was it just once that riled someone up so much that the signs went up on every door, or was it a number of times that it happened, leading to a calmer approach and voting at a meeting that lead to these signs? People can be funny, on both sides of these signs: The people who triggered the rules and the people who made the rules and put up the signs to enforce them.

Of Vices and Virtues: Procrastination

Talking to an artist friend the other day, we explored a concept familiar to the creative person: Procrastination. Self-help books and articles covering procrastination lean to attempts to aid one in 'overcoming' procrastination or 'eliminating' it from your life. Organization and time management are seen as the weapons against procrastination, as though it is an evil that needs management. And yet, as my son studies practical economics, he is finding that delivering too much too early are not good business models. In the arts, procrastination is a tool that allows maximum creative time and minimal production time. Doing the job too early often results in the desire to redo. Obviously, if one were to just ignore the creative project until the last possible moment, there could be problems, such as under-estimating the time needed for the project and failing to finish it. But in my experience, most creatives look at the problem early and then let it sit in the back of their minds where they think it through and muddle it over and try various options and possibilities while they work on other things. So at the 'last minute', quite a bit of mental work has already gone into it and a number of versions and alternatives have been explored. So for most creative people, procrastination is not a vice, but the virtue of optimization of time and effort and the realisation of the best quality work we are capable of. Is it time to move it from the list of vices to the list of virtues and explore and understand how useful procrastination really is?

Fire

Fire has long been a friend of humanity. Perhaps that is what separated us from beasts, when we tamed fire. What made us human? What thing distinguished the first real human from all its primate ancestors before? Some say it was language, some say tools. Maybe it was fire? Are other primates afraid of fire like many animals are? Was it when a primate first allowed curiosity to conquer fear of fire that we became human? Fire keeps predators away. Was it the protection of the circle of light of the campfire that freed us from fear so that we could gather and learn to communicate and plan and think and dream? Indigenous people of North America used fire to keep the prairie from becoming woodland and to bring in game to hunt and to clear land to deny invaders cover from which to attack. Some say it was there at the edge of the circle of light made by the campfire that wild wolves scavenged human leavings and learned to accept the proximity of people and so the domestication of the dog began. Fire can be a blessing and fire can be a curse. A warm fire in the hearth or at the center of camp is comforting and soothing. A burn is the worst sort of pain a person can be asked to endure. A fire cooks food and lights our way and melts metals for our use but a fire can also destroy. Fire, tamed, used, is a good thing. Fire unleashed and allowed to burn out of control is a bad thing. When one speaks of fire, one may be speaking of actual flame, of the energy released in that state change, but often,when one speaks of fire, it is a euphemism for something entirely else. One can be alive with a fiery energy, one can speak with a tongue of fire, one can experience the spark of creativity to design or invent a new thing, or one's words can burn with passion or anger. Lovers hearts are aflame for each other. A spark of lightening can burn down the barn or light a prairie fire that leads to purity and renewal. How can you know for sure when you strike that match whether your flame will comfort or destroy?

Tour Bus - Fiction

When we were younger and less known, we toured in a bus with our name on every surface along with lots of flash and dancing eye candy, hoping we would be as famous as we thought our bus's paint job made us seem to be. Then, when we were actually famous and well-known and sought after and tired of the attention when we were tired of being 'on' after a show, we started to tour in 2 plain white unadorned buses with heavily tinted windows. These sleek white beasts glide barely noticed through town after town and earn us the quiet our old bodies and brains need to sleep off the adrenaline and then pump it up again for another show in another town. But back when we partied all night on the road in our flashy bus, we were burning ourselves out and not all of us made it out alive. Somewhere on the road between Chicago and Milwaukee on one such trip, one of our bass players took on a bit too much of something or a bit too many of some things together and his heart stopped beating in the second seat of the 5th row. After that, nobody would sit in that seat, or even in that row, really, and there was frequently a disturbance when someone would forget, one of us or some lowly lighting guy or one of the costume girls would plunk down with a beer and the bus would gradually go dead silent as we gaped at him or her. They would remember and leap up or maybe have to be told and pulled into the aisle. One night, we were waiting in a parking lot in one of those big L towns in Kentucky, waiting to find out if the last minute add in some nearby college field house was a go or if we were going to hit the interstate for Georgia instead. We sat around in our funk of uncertainty and someone and someone else got into an argument that lead to people taking sides that lead to someone mentioning the dead bass player's name and that shut us all down. We sat in the gloom staring at the empty seat and each other when finally one of the drummers said "I'm gonna torch that seat," and started pushing and pulling on it. A couple others joined in and only managed to get the arm wrenched akimbo. Jimmie finally got up and skulked through the aisle glaring, which made most of us shut up and sit down. He went to the driver and asked for the toolbox. They went outside and underbins were opened and closed and Jimmie came back with a yellow plastic box. He yanked up the carpet and poked his head around under the seat and one of the sound guys joined him. Pretty soon they had the seat unbolted and 3 or 4 of them were carrying it over the other seats to the door. They set it down a few parking places away. We all sat there stunned for a few seconds before we poured out of the bus and gathered in a circle around the seat. There were a few whispers about how we might be arrested but a couple others were rolling up paper towels from the lavatory and wedging them between the seat and the back and pretty soon, the paper was lit and the flames started to creep. Well, it wasn't as dramatic as we'd hoped, for instead of bursting into wild and brilliant towering roaring flame, it mostly just sizzled as the flames crept around and over and under, melting then actually burning the polycarbons of which it was made. It took a long time and there were little plumes of black smoke now and then, yet no fire trucks roared up, no police cars with flashing lights zoomed in. Soon it was a twisted framework of angled metal and sinewave curving springs and then it was over. We left the metal remains there on the pavement and trickled back onto the bus as the driver radioed to dispatch for our directions. The spot in the row of seats stayed empty for years, until we got the new white buses, and became the place where the ice chest full of bottled water and yogurt that reflected our cleaner habits was kept. We fondly remember the removal of the seat as more violent, we remember the flames as higher and hotter, we remember cheering and yelling instead of the somber quiet observance that actually took place, and at least some remember the driver cleverly talking our way out of trouble with police or fire officials, but in the end, "the day we burned Eddie's seat" was a turning point for us. We lived cleaner and worked harder and played better music and earned more money. Remember the day we "torched the bus seat"?

Mother

We were at my grandmother's house for some family holiday with all the aunts and uncles and cousins and I was feeling sad and alone because the older cousins would not play with me. She took me home and read books to me alone and talked to me about how hurt I was by the cousins' snub and discussed with me things I might say when we got back that might get them to include me. It was obvious that day that my mother loved me dearly and greatly and would do anything to make me feel happy and secure, but it was also implicit that I would get back out there and take responsibility and do my part to make things better for myself. I don't remember what books we read nor what specific advice she gave or what the issues with the cousins even were, but I know it worked when we rejoined the gathering and I know that my mother has always loved me and given me her best so that I might find my way and make a good and happy life for myself. Today I am old enough to have been on my own for most of my days, yet she still supports and guides and encourages me; she is still there for me just as she was that sad and lonely day so long ago, kind and wise and there for me, my mother!

You Owe Them Your Good Story

Not everyone in the ICU waiting room is going to have a good outcome. For some the outcome hangs in the balance. For some, a so-so outcome is the best they can hope for. For some, the possibility of a good outcome dwindles daily. Some are merely waiting for the moment of the inevitable bad outcome. When someone asks you about your story, no matter how late it is and how tired you are and how much you really want to get back to the hotel and just go to sleep, if your story is good, you should share it with them. If you are one of the lucky ones this time, they need your good news. They need to know there is hope. They need to know there are good outcomes. They need to know there are people who will go home better off then when they came in. If your story is good, stop and take the time to share it with them. Even if it means they will hug you!

Same But Not

In Minnesota with my sister and my mom, did a little shopping, talked and talked, ate too much at dinner, talked more until we couldn't keep our eyes open, doing my nails, eating fresh fruit, reading a magazine, even a little solitaire on the old laptop. It sure has a lot in common with the old days at Star Lake, on fabulously fun and restful annual vacations. Except this time it is different. We are in a different Minnesota town for a different reason. Rochester, in a hotel a pebble's throw from the Mayo hospital where she will have major surgery in two days. We talk, we laugh, we enjoy stories about the kids and relatives and current events. It is just the same as always. But different. Can you still have fun when you are scared? Is that an okay thing to be doing?

Self Interest

Adam Smith:... "Every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By…directing that [labour] in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention."

This is saying that everyone is guided by self-interest and nothing else. I want to work for the environment not out of altruism, according to this thinking, but to make a good place for my kids because my kids are my accomplishment, my achievement, so I do better by them doing better. I promote parks and walking trails to have them available for my use and the use of my own family. I promote gay rights . . . because I have gay friends? Because I want to be seem as fair and open-minded and a little radical? A politician gets in the game for the job stability and the fame and so in general acts right to keep up the fame and to get re-elected? When an elected official is in their last term and re-election is not longer part of their self-interest, are they more likely to do corrupt things for more money? It was said many times that George W only did things in view of how his legacy would read. The more closely a person defines themselves by a religious organization, the more likely they are to promote the organization's goals because "self=organization" so things in the interest of the organization are self-interest? What self-interest is there really in the things you do that you think you do for others? Is there anything you do for others that has NO benefit to you, but only to the other? Do we delude ourselves in claiming that there is anything BUT self-interest operation for anyone? And indeed, those who give up too much self-interest to a job or cause often have families that suffer. Or taking care of a relative with an illness but not making sure you are eating and sleeping merely results in you being a less effective caregiver, so isn't it necessary that evolution shaped us first for self-interest? A parent must be strong and healthy to care for young, so cannot give up too much self-interest in their care. We care then, after self, about a hierarchy of others: Immediate family, extended family, those in our social group, those in other similar social groups, humankind, mammals, animals, and on out, which may explain why we have done so badly to the plant and mineral world, allowing such damage to ecosystems. The plant world is seen as to far removed from us to warrant out care? What would we do differently if we assumed self-interest was the sole and only motivation? If we were more honest about our motivation and made choices consciously in this regard? Just asking. Discuss freely among yourselves.

Shamelessly Lame Quoting of Song Lyrics

Sometimes when things crash around you, all you have to do is ask for help and help is there. That is one of the best things about friends and family and life. "You don't always get what you want . . . " but "you get what you need" and "you get by with a little help from your friends" and family. Yeah, life IS good.

Beauty in Strange Places

The Man In The Gallery

He had to have been able to tell I was trying to close. It was long past five o'clock and I was outside taking down my flags and bringing in my "Open" sign when he wandered in. He was rude. He was impatient. He dallied among the beautiful and amazing works of my two dozen talented artists talking only and endlessly about himself. I wished impatiently for him to go. He irritated and aggravated and annoyed me with his arrogant and self-absorbed attitude. When he finally moved on, I followed him out and locked the door behind me to go find dinner. I met up with a fellow shopkeep, and relayed the story of the annoying visitor. After exchanging a few details of physical description, she told he "Oh, he's famous. They are reading his play down at the theatre right now." And it struck me then: It does not matter what you have done or achieved or accomplished. It really only matters what you are. If you have published books or won awards or saved lives, no one can tell, unless you tell them. But if you are nice and kind and interested in others, they can tell that right away. And you will be liked rather than disdained like my 'visitor' was.
Life really is less about what you have accomplished and mostly about the kind of person you have made yourself into and how you treat others because of the kind of person you are.

Bittersweet

Sometimes things that make you very very happy can also make you very very sad.
The boys and I had this CD once and it had this song. It was called "How Can I Keep From Singing" by Ken Brown and it pretty much captured how I felt about being with my kids on vacation in the beautiful places filled with amazing nature that we visited on our vacations. Okay, it pretty much was my theme song about how I feel about everything. I played it so much that I wore it out. Well, the musician was one of those singer-songwriter types that travels around to festivals and small venues so I couldn't just go to the store and buy a replacement like when I wear out a Mick Jagger CD or a Dave Matthews CD, and I had searched on line a number of times to no avail. The other night, I got what you call a hankerin' to hear that song again. I was kinda in a bum mood for no logical particular reason and thought it might remind me of happy times and cheer me up, so I started to look around, And lo and behold I found it! Not the CD, but a blog by the artist with links to a few of the songs from the CD, including the coveted one. And I also found there some really lovely new songs that made me pretty happy too.




And I found this little poem by the artist:


Until
The wind makes no sound until it wraps itself in the leaves of the trees
and that sound is just a noise
until it makes someone feel something
then it’s music

Well, I titled this post 'bittersweet' and at this point you might be thinking this is all pretty good 'sweet' happy wonderful news, to have found the artist and the songs and some bonus good writing, so where is the 'bitter' part? Oh, it is there, because you see in my reading around the website, what I found out is that Ken Brown is 'retired' for health reasons and not touring anymore really, and that makes me a little sad that I probably will never hear him in concert anymore and that is a selfish reason, but mostly it makes me sad for him, that such a talented person that brought light to my life should suffer misfortune. That makes me very sad, even in the middle of the great joy of finding the old songs and the new songs and the sweet writings.

There's a lot of that in the world, isn't there? Sweet joy all entangled with bitter sadness.

Songs by Ken Brown

I never do this, copy stuff from other blogs or just post a link, but never say never, because here is an exeption. I have been wanting to hear this song again for years and finally found it:

the song –>How Can I Keep From Singing–from the CD ‘letters from home’, 1997 (NHC 401)

But before I found that old song, I found this wonderful new song and want to share it with you too:

the song–>These Are the Times from the CD ‘The Long View’, 2006 (LV001)

This is the blog entry where the first song resides: Songs and Tunes–How Can I Keep From Singing . You can click on the 'songs' tag at the bottom and follow it to other songs, new and old, by Ken Brown and pretty soon, you will be a 'huge fan' too!