perches in the soul –
sings the tune without words – and
never stops – at all
Hope is the thing with feathers
by Emily Dickinson
Hope is the thing with feathers –
That perches in the soul –
And sings the tune without the words –
And never stops – at all –
four way stop, wait turn
democracy in action
signal of the end?
I have long thought that the first signs of the end or at least the beginning of the beginning of the end would be a disregard for the traditional four way stop.
I am not referring to what was called the ‘Michigan Slide’ as you slowed for the stop sign and zoomed through if no cars were at the intersection.
I mean if drivers paid no attention at all the rules of the four way stop.
The State of Michigan publication, What Every Driver Must Know states: “You reach a four-way stop intersection with a stop sign at each corner of the intersection. The driver who arrived at the intersection and stopped first has the right of way through the intersection. If two or more vehicles reached the intersection at the same time, the vehicle on the left should yield to the vehicle on its right.”
I have to admit that when I started writing this I did not expect such open ended language as the vehicle on the left should yield to the vehicle on its right instead of MUST yield but I will go on.
I have to mention my pet peeve on this though.
No where does it say you wait until cross traffic has cleared the intersection completely before you enter the intersection.
I guess this leads to my ‘snooze you lose’ comments when I give up waiting for that driver on the left.
Now to go on.
The four way stop is a picture democracy and cooperation at its most base level in the ideal.
The greater good for the greatest number of drivers.
Everyone gets their turn.
Everyone has to wait.
Everyone has respect for the other driver.
Everyone is fairly inconvenienced.
No one is singled out and picked on.
No one is singled out and gets special preference.
It requires cooperation.
For the most part it works out okay.
It works when everyone follows the rules.
It works when everyone follows the same rules.
It works when everyone follows the same rules and they know what the rules are.
What happens when folks every don’t know the rules, don’t follow the rules or just don’t care?
Anger.
Frustration.
Chaos.
Hard to imagine that the four way stop could be improved on.
Like all things in America however, there are those who think this can be improved.
Don’t want to pick on anyone but it sure seems like traffic engineers are folks who can’t leave well enough alone.
Mr. Bill Bryson writes that traffic engineers cannot fix traffic problems but then can spread them out over a larger area.
And to digress, if you took all the cars in the United States and put them end to end in one place what would you have?
ATLANTA!
The answer to the ‘problem’ of the four way stop that is turning up more and more is the traffic circle.
This is happening despite the traffic laboratory that has been maintained for years in Washington DC with such nightmares as the circle around the Lincoln Memorial.
To me it would seem that if any local traffic council spent 10 minutes or 2 hours or a day or two stuck going around Mr. Lincoln they would never approve a traffic circle.
Here in the low country there is a love affair with traffic circles.
The love them so much they make them two lane circles.
The outer is supposed to be for drivers making a right turn.
The inner lane for drivers going straight through or what would have been a left turn.
The only directions at the intersection is a sign that says, “YIELD TO BOTH LANES.”
It can be a head scratcher.
Some drivers approach boldly and enter the circle at speed and weave back and forth across the lanes.
Most drivers approach tentatively and yield to any and all traffic both real and imaginary.
You can feel the frustration build up as the bold drivers and tentative drivers mix with each other.
But it at least eliminates the questions of who got their first and who is on the left.
You buys your ticket and you takes your chance and you drive right in.
It can be downright scary.
Also for some reason the State of South Carolina doesn’t seem to beleive in either street lights or roadway reflectors.
On reflectors, that may be because the State of Georgia took them all.
Anyone who has driven through Atlanta on I75 at night and gone through the I285 interchange will know what I mean.
I sometimes thought the just tossed handfuls of reflectors out there for no reason.
But back to the circle.
I can say this, it would never work in a snowy, slippery climate.
Not that that would stop the State of Michigan from trying them.
There are the latest thing after all.
I like the four way stop.
I think they work.
I can handle the circle, sure.
In place of cooperation, drivers go and expect other drivers to get out of the way.
Both get you to the other side of the road.
But if you aren’t careful.
All you do is go around in circles.
nor letteth me live
nor die at my device, yet
of death it giveth
Adapted from I Find No Peace written around 1540 by Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503 – 11 October 1542) who, according to Wikipedia, was a 16th-century English politician, ambassador, and lyric poet credited with introducing the sonnet to English literature.
Always one of my favorites and the one I would choose to have read at my funeral should sch a thing ever take place.
I find no peace, and all my war is done.
I fear and hope. I burn and freeze like ice.
I fly above the wind, yet can I not arise;
And nought I have, and all the world I season.
That loseth nor locketh holdeth me in prison
And holdeth me not—yet can I scape no wise—
Nor letteth me live nor die at my device,
And yet of death it giveth me occasion.
Without eyen I see, and without tongue I plain.
I desire to perish, and yet I ask health.
I love another, and thus I hate myself.
I feed me in sorrow and laugh in all my pain;
Likewise displeaseth me both life and death,
And my delight is causer of this strife.
This is a series of haiku drawn from this sonnet for the purpose of feeling in dates that I missed so I can complete publication string since I started this.
Forgive me this indulgence.
MJH
heavy leaden skies
dutch mist that gets in your bones
might find challenging
I was reading the online newspaper column “Lets Move To . . .”
It is a regular feature in my favorite online newspaper, The Guardian.
I mention the Guardian a lot in these essays.
I like it because it is from Manchester.
My family, the one non-dutch branch in my tree anyway, came from Manchester.
All the rest of my family tree is firmly planted in the Netherlands.
For 50 years Alistair Cooke, another person who seems to turn up often in these essays, write a weekly column, Letter from America, for the Guardian.
And the Guardian went into business in 1836 and it 1936 its ownership went into a public trust to “secure the financial and editorial independence of The Guardian in perpetuity and to safeguard the journalistic freedom and liberal values of The Guardian free from commercial or political interference.”
So there you are.
In a recent Lets Move To … column, they went to and recommended the Dutch city of Rotterdam.
They listed good points and bad points or the case for and the case against moving to Rotterdam.
The fact that the Netherlands public schools follow tweetalig onderwijs or Bij tweetalig onderwijs (tto) volgen leerlingen een deel van het voortgezet onderwijs in een andere taal. Meestal is dit Engels which means bilingual public education so that most folks speak english.
Then the article touched on the weather.
The weather was listed under THE CASE AGAINST.
“Heavy leaden skies, and Dutch mist (drizzle) that gets into your bones. Those who like beauty of a more conventional ilk might find it challenging.”
Boy HOWDY!
No wonder my ancestors moved to West Michigan.
They could write back home and say, “You would love the weather. It’s just like home.”
Heavy leaden skies.
Dutch mist?
I got to send that one off to my buddy George Lessens the weather tsar of West Michigan.
Dutch mist that gets into your bones.
Those who like beauty of a more conventional ilk might find it challenging.
NO KIDDING.
12 years ago we moved to the the south.
Just recently I relocated to the Low Country of South Carolina and the Atlantic Coast.
It is December here as well.
We spent the afternoon at the beach on Hilton Head Island.
For those who like beauty of a more conventional ilk there is nothing challenging about living here.
I lived in the West Michigan for 50 years.
I lived in the Dutch Mist for 50 years.
I lived under the heavy leaden skies.
Yes, yes, yes, there were beautiful days and beautiful vistas and if you went to the beach in July all you had to do was dig a shallow hole in the sand to the ice to keep your drinks cold.
All benefits.
But mostly exceptions, not the daily rule.
Leaden skies and dutch mist.
Distant memory.
Kind of a bad dream.
I would write more but we are just off to the beach.
where is fancy bread
miss one letter and world turns
words I wish we had
Not to proud to admit that when I hear the line, “Where is fancy bred?”, I do NOT think first of William Shakespeare and his play the Merchant of Venice.
Big Bill has the line in a song in Act 3 Scene 2 that is sung by the household of Portia while her boyfriend ponders the choice of one of three metal boxes.
One of gold.
One of silver.
One of lead.
Choose the right box and win the girl.
As the boyfriend, Bassanio, thinks about it, the household servants sing:
Tell me where is fancy bred,
Or in the heart or in the head?
How begot, how nourished?
Reply, reply.
It is engender’d in the eyes,
With gazing fed; and fancy dies
In the cradle, where it lies.
Let us all ring fancy’s knell;
I’ll begin it – Ding, dong, bell.”
Then they all sing Ding Dong Bell.
Somehow this is a clue and Bassyboy picks the right lead box and wins the girl and goes off to make a really bad deal with a loan shark.
Nope.
That is not what comes to mind when I hear, “where is fancy bred.”
What I think about is the line as used in the movie, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
After the gum-chewing Violet Beauregarde turns into a blueberry and is rolled away, Wonka muses outloud, “where is fancy bred, in the heart or in the head?”
To make matters worse, I always have heard the line as using the word BREAD and not BRED and thought that Wonka was taking about something called ‘fancy bread’ and that while it was an object to be desired, was it a desire of the head or heart … or stomach?
You can put fancy bread into the google and gets lots of recipes.
All this to say that I like that word fancy.
Its an english word or british or angelican or however you want to put it.
Like flats, crisps and biscuits for apartments, potato chips and cookies but not really.
There isn’t a good american word for fancy.
Bernard Wooley says in the TV Show Yes Minister, “That’s one of those irregular verbs, isn’t it. I have an independent mind, you are an eccentric, he is round the twist.”
Fancy.
Fancy that.
Well, fancy that.
Americans use it occasionally.
But the Brits use it a lot.
Fancy a pint?
Do you fancy her?
The online dictionary says that as an adjective it means elaborate in structure or decoration.
As a verb, feel a desire or liking for.
And as a NOUN, a feeling of liking or attraction, typically one that is superficial or transient.
It is some how connection or contracted from fantasy.
From that we get another use as a noun and that is the faculty of imagination.
As in flights of fancy.
WOW.
Simple little word.
And not so simple.
Got to find a way to use this little word more often.
Or is this just a passing fancy?
No Haiku For You 