7.29.2026 – clumsiness of world

clumsiness of world
behavior compared to
powers of planning

The New York Times article, In Ohio, Toxic Wastewater Is Bubbling Up Out of the Ground by Quinn Glabicki, climate reporter for The New York Times, is a good, if scary read.

Mr. Glabicki writes:

The fracking boom has transformed the United States into the world’s largest producer of natural gas. But fracking also produces huge volumes of salty wastewater laden with heavy metals, radioactive materials and cancer-causing benzene, as well as hazardous chemical additives from the fracking process.

Ohio became a destination for wastewater because decades ago, long before fracking, it received permission from the federal government to regulate its own injection wells, which were then just a small part of the oil and gas industry. As a result, today it’s easier to drill injection wells in Ohio than in states like Pennsylvania where there’s federal oversight.

The industry says injection wells are tightly regulated, and that thousands of feet of rock and shale safely contain the wastewater. Injection wells, “when properly sited, constructed, operated, and regulated, do not pose a significant threat to drinking water,” said Rob Brundrett, president of the Ohio Oil and Gas Association.

At a Republican Party executive meeting last August, Ohio State Senator Brian Chavez, who stepped down as DeepRock’s chief executive after taking elected office in 2023, downplayed the threat posed by injection wells, describing the brine as “ancient seawater,” according to an ethics complaint filed against him with the state’s legislative ethics committee. Mr. Chavez, who chairs the senate energy committee, also compared the radioactivity levels of the waste to that of a banana, according to the complaint, which was filed by residents of Washington County over his relationship with DeepRock.

A spokesman for Ohio Senate Republicans called the ethics complaint meritless.

In a statement, Laura Goins, an attorney for DeepRock, said, “We respect the concerns that have been raised by members of the community and believe those concerns deserve to be addressed through a science-based regulatory process.” She said “DeepRock remains committed to protecting public health, drinking water resources, and the environment.”

Got to love the language and words here.

… when properly sited, constructed, operated, and regulated, do not pose a significant threat to drinking water,

… remains committed to protecting public health, drinking water resources, and the environment.

Yeah ………… sure.

Remember any one of us who grew up in the United States between 1923 and 1975 will show the effects of leaded gas in our bones.

Centuries from now, if the world still exists, archeologists will be able to date skeletons by measuring the lead in our bones.

So all this Fracking that leads to large amounts of natural gas and some oil has an unseen price tag.

Who would have guessed that pumping wastewater from fracking underground could have unforeseen negative impace.

Of course had they been predicted, they would no longer have been unforeseen.

And isn’t the word, unforeseen, a great word?

According to the word history website, etymonline: “not foreknown,” late 14c., from un- (1) “not” + past participle of foresee. Similar formation in Middle Dutch onvoresien, Dutch onvoorzien, Middle High German unvorsen. A verb unforesee “fail to anticipate” is attested in 17c.“

I like that dutch version.

Onvoresien.

Fail to anticipate.

Unforeseen points to it wasn’t our fault, who knew?

While, Fail to anticipate …

Seems like someone should have known better.

I am reading the book Random Harvest by James Hilton (Boston: Little, Brown And Company, 1941).

Neither here nor there but if you are casting about for something to read this summer I recommend downloading the epub version from FadedPage (click here) for free.

Mr. Hilton also wrote Lost Horizons of Shangri-La fame and Good bye Mr. Chips.

Random Harvest starts with the epigram:

“According to a British Official Report, bombs fell at Random.” — GERMAN OFFICIAL REPORT

Anyway, reading along I came to this passage that is the source for today’s haiku.

Mr. Hilton writes about the hero of Random Harvest that:

He was increasingly interested in the background of knowledge and theory behind the lives of men, and the astounding clumsiness of world behavior compared with the powers of the planning mind. To use Werneth’s favorite word, he found the paradox teasing.

There is a lot packed into those two lines, especially:

the astounding clumsiness of world behavior compared with the powers of the planning mind.

To use Werneth’s favorite word, he found the paradox teasing.

That Mr. Clausewitz writes that no plan lasts 5 minutes after the battle starts.

Still, when you read about all the planing, meetings, proposals, public hearings and investigations when anything from a sidewalk crossing to a super highway to a bridge to some corporate marketing plan, the clumsiness of world behavior compared with the powers of the planning mind is truly astounding.

The paradox is assuredly teasing.

It seems even God himself looking down on the world today might murmur … something went wrong here.

7.28.2026 – to see, the craving

to see, the craving
of sailors, as of rest of
blind humanity

Adapted from a passage in Chapter 27 of The Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1906), where Mr. Conrad writes:

To see! to see! —

this is the craving of the sailor, as of the rest of blind humanity.

To have his path made clear for him is the aspiration of every human being in our beclouded and tempestuous existence.

I have heard a reserved, silent man, with no nerves to speak of, after three days of hard running in thick south-westerly weather, burst out passionately: “I wish to God we could get sight of something!”

Looking ahead to next day, the next week, the next month … I wish to God I could get sight of something.

I know it should be enough that I know that God sees far far ahead of anything I could see and I should let it sit there with God.

Truthfully I would LOVE to be able to let it sit there.

But as Mr. Conrad also writes: Love and regret go hand in hand in this world of changes swifter than the shifting of the clouds reflected in the mirror of the sea.

7.27.2026 – heart has its reasons

heart has its reasons
le coeur a ses raisons, which
reason does not know …

First published in The New Yorker Magazine today, July 27, 91 years ago in 1935.

Wikipedia states that the phrase, Le cœur a ses raisons que la raison ne connaît pas or The heart has its reasons which reason does not know, Notwithstanding its frequent use in popular culture regarding emotions , this aphorism deals with religion .

This is a shorthand for Pascal’s concept that reason is not the best way to understand God.

The phrase has become a maxim evoking, with a certain indulgence, the intimate complexity of certain choices, difficult for an observer to read, particularly in matters of choosing a romantic partner.

Whether man trying to understand an attraction between a man and a woman … or man trying to understand God, reason is not the best way.

7.26.2026 – view history as

view history as
prime tool to advance ideas
of social justice

Taken as sentence, who would find anything to complain about if anyone said that we, as people of the world, should view history as a prime tool to advance ideas of social justice?

Taken as sentence, who would find anything to complain about if anyone said that we, as Americans, should view history as a prime tool to advance ideas of social justice?

Would it not be accurate to say that we, as Americans, are proud of our history and the world can use the history of America as a prime tool to advance the ideas of social justice?

Would it not be accurate to say that we, as Americans, would want a place where we could present American history as a shared national inheritance to be taught and celebrated and a “prime tool” to advance ideas of social justice?

As Lee Corso might have said, NOT SO FAST MY FRIEND.

That current man in office is upset and angry that it has been reported to him that the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History does not present American history as a shared national inheritance to be taught and celebrated, but instead views American history as a “prime tool” to advance ideas of social justice as stated in an executive order titled Restoring Trust in the Smithsonian Institution (white house – July 24, 2026).

For the sake of clarity, that current man in office is angry at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American BECAUSE it views American history as a “prime tool” to advance ideas of social justice.

Not that the current man in office has been to the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History but something called the Domestic Policy Council told him that the Museum does not present American history as a shared national inheritance to be taught and celebrated, but instead views American history as a “prime tool” to advance ideas of social justice.

According to Wikipedia, The Domestic Policy Council (DPC) is the main White House body that coordinates domestic policy, advises the president, and manages policy implementation. Housed within the Executive Office of the President, it brings together cabinet members and agency leaders to handle internal national issues.

This may be the worst idea in American Government since HUAC.

HUAC?

The House Un American Activities Comittee.

UN – American?

Going to a baseball game and getting nachos instead of a hot dog?

BUT I DIGRESS!

Last time I read the Constitution of the United States, I couldn’t help but notice that it starts, We the PEOPLE:

in Order to form a more perfect Union,

establish Justice,

insure domestic Tranquility,

provide for the common defence,

promote the general Welfare,

and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.

In other words advance ideas of social justice?

The order calls for appropriate signage to be placed on sidewalks outside the building with appropriate warnings that notify visitors that the Museum exhibits should be renovated consistent with the findings in the Report and direct visitors to locations and resources for accurate information regarding America’s history

I also have to report that in looking up the executive order at the official White House website, the branding on the website proclaims, Welcome to the Golden Age.

We arrive at a Golden Age made possible by denying our past?

As George Orwell wrote in 1984:

The past not only changed, but changed continuously.

What most afflicted him with the sense of nightmare was that he had never clearly understood why the huge imposture was undertaken.

The immediate advantages of falsifying the past were obvious, but the ultimate motive was mysterious.

7.25.2026 – fight without rancor

fight without rancor
or selfish object, seeking
nothing for ourselves

Adapted from Woodrow Wilson’s Joint Address to Congress Leading to a Declaration of War Against Germany (1917) where President Wilson said:

We desire no conquest, no dominion.

We seek no indemnities for ourselves, no material compensation for the sacrifices we shall freely make.

We are but one of the champions of the rights of mankind.

We shall be satisfied when those rights have been made as secure as the faith and the freedom of nations can make them.

Just because we fight without rancor and without selfish object, seeking nothing for ourselves but what we shall wish to share with all free peoples, we shall, I feel confident, conduct our operations as belligerents without passion and ourselves observe with proud punctilio the principles of right and of fair play we profess to be fighting for.

But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts,

for democracy,

for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own Governments,

for the rights and liberties of small nations,

for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations

and make the world itself at last free.

To such a task we can dedicate our selves and our fortunes,

every thing that we are and everything that we have,

with the pride of those who know that the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured.

God helping her, she can do no other.

According to the National Gallery of Art website, This painting commemorates the nation’s entry into World War I in spring 1917. Childe Hassam shows Fifth Avenue in New York City decorated with red, white, and blue flags. It had been declared “the Avenue of the Allies” in honor of the military alliance between the United States, Great Britain, and France.

This is part of a series of flag images in which Hassam used brilliant sunlight and color in the style of the French impressionists. The breezy, celebratory air glosses over the horrors of modern warfare that American soldiers would face fighting in Europe.

fight without rancor
or selfish object, seeking
nothing for ourselves

I just holding up the mirror.

You can take from this whatever you bring with it.

For myself, it like talking about an entirely different country sometimes and I wonder where that county went.