memory depends have we intentionally apprehended it
My cousin Joy has been on my mind since I stole a photograph of hers to use in yesterday’s haiku,
In the discussion about that haiku I commented on the camera versus memory when seeing things today.
I quoted from the author, Alain de Botton that using a camera blurs the distinction between looking and noticing, between seeing and possessing.
Mr. de Botton makes the point that the camera gives us the option of true knowledge, but it may also unwittingly make the effort of acquiring that knowledge seem superfluous
That is a great discussion for the here and now.
Having a camera with you in the here and now.
But what about the then?
The back then.
Here is a snapshot of sometime in 1962.
It is me and my cousin, Joy, sitting together on our Grandfathers lap.
My sister’s Lisa and Janet stand an either side.
I have NO memory of this photograph being taken.
I have NO Memory of seeing this photograph in the many many nights watching family slides.
Recently a nephew of mine digitized the family slides allowing us to travel back in time.
Otherwise I would have NO memory of this at all.
But I remember, with the help of the photograph, everything in the photograph.
My cousin and I we are the same age.
Our Mom’s were sisters.
I was my Mom’s 8th kid.
Joy was her Mom’s, my Aunt Mernie, 1st.
They were visiting from New Jersey.
This must have been a Sunday Dinner at my Grandma Hendrickson’s house.
Someone, my Dad most likely, arranged us altogether and said SMILE.
My character, even at age 2, seems to be pretty much set.
I can look at this picture and tell you what it smells like.
My Grandma’s house at that kinda moth-ball/natural gas smell due to the gas stove with no pilot light so you turned on the gas and lit the burner with a match.
As it was Sunday dinner it also smelled of my Grandma’s famous Pork and Beef roasts together in the same pan.
We were a meat and potatoes family to be sure.
But to be more accurate we were a mashed potatoes and GRAVY family.
Our parents would fill our plates and then cover everything on our plates with this pork-beef gravy that was what gravy was all about.
My Grandfather, that solid dutch guy (notice all the BLUE EYES??) in the picture, could eat mashed potatoes and gravy like it was an Olympic event.
Want to know the real kicker to this photograph?
Today, my cousin Joy and I are about the same age our Grandpa was when this photograph was taken.
I love this photograph and the memories it brings to mind ALONG with the memories it creates.
I have no memory of this day.
Looking I the photograph I remember everything.
Using the photograph, reseeing the scene, I can repossess the memory and the knowledge of the day.
It’s an effort.
Through the snapshot, I intentionally re-apprehend to my memory.
It is anything BUT superfluous.
*Adapted from the book, The Art of Travel (2002, Vintage Books) by Alain de Botton, and the passage:
True possession of a scene is a matter of making a conscious effort to notice elements and understand their construction.
We can see beauty well enough just by opening our eyes, but how long this beauty will survive in memory depends on how intentionally we have apprehended it.
The camera blurs the distinction between looking and noticing, between seeing and possessing; it may give us the option of true knowledge, but it may also unwittingly make the effort of acquiring that knowledge seem superfluous.
Adapted from the book, The Art of Travel (2002, Vintage Books) by Alain de Botton.
According to the website, GOOD READS, Any Baedeker will tell us where we ought to travel, but only Alain de Botton will tell us how and why.
As I said in the section on Architecture , what I find irresistible in reading Mr. de Botton is his use of language.
I get the feeling that if you made a spread sheet of all the words, adverbs and adjectives used by Mr. de Botton, you just might find that he used each word just once.
We can see beauty well enough just by opening our eyes, but how long
I stole this photo from my cousin Joy who lives up the Hudson River Valley.
I have to remind myself that there may be other places, maybe not nicer than where I live, but close.
I based this haiku and several others like from the writing in the book, The Art of Travel (2002, Vintage Books) by Alain de Botton, and the passage: True possession of a scene is a matter of making a conscious effort to notice elements and understand their construction.
We can see beauty well enough just by opening our eyes, but how long this beauty will survive in memory depends on how intentionally we have apprehended it.
Mr. de Botton goes on and says:
The camera blurs the distinction between looking and noticing, between seeing and possessing; it may give us the option of true knowledge, but it may also unwittingly make the effort of acquiring that knowledge seem superfluous.
When I go places and I think ‘I’ll take my camera’ I realize I am making a conscious decision to concentrate on using my camera instead of just looking.
Why look now when, if I take a picture, I can look later.
And a picture paints a 1000 words.
*Adapted from the book, The Art of Travel (2002, Vintage Books) by Alain de Botton.
According to the website, GOOD READS, Any Baedeker will tell us where we ought to travel, but only Alain de Botton will tell us how and why.
As I said in the section on Architecture , what I find irresistible in reading Mr. de Botton is his use of language.
I get the feeling that if you made a spread sheet of all the words, adverbs and adjectives used by Mr. de Botton, you just might find that he used each word just once.
testing that nation so conceived dedicated how long can endure?
Mr. Thomas Jefferson, explaining the reasoning behind the Declaration of Independence, wrote that all men are created equal.
I feel that Mr. Jefferson really meant what he said.
But I also feel that Mr. Jefferson accepted that all men are created equal in the abstract, he could not figure a way of how it might be achieved in reality.
Mr. Jefferson saw that the wieght of human history and the current lifestyle of most Americans was proving his statement that all men are created equal to be, if not wrong, at least wistful thinking.
A fire bell in the night, Mr. Jefferson called it.
When the bell rang and the United States was called on for an answer, their answer was to fight the Civil War.
Review the history of that war and you can understand why Mr. Jefferson was reluctant to even look for an answer of how to achieve a country where all men are created equal.
It was left to Abraham Lincoln to try and explain why the Civil War was being fought.
It was 158 years ago today that Mr. Lincoln, in a short, short, short 272 word speech explained, “. . . our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure.“
Mr. Lincoln was speaking at the dedication ceremony of a vast cemetery on the battlefield of Gettysburg.
Mr. Lincoln recognized that great as the battle, the struggle that the country was in at that moment, that there was more to do.
Somehow back in 1863, Mr. Lincoln spoke to us.
Mr. Lincoln said, “It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work.“
The unfinished work.
This country is a work in progress.
No kidding.
The testing, every day, the testing goes on.
Here is the full text, all 272 words of Mr. Lincoln’s Remarks at Gettysburg.
“Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives, that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate – we cannot hallow – this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us – that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion – that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain – that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
The obit went on to state, “The words “pub” and “landlord” scarcely do justice to the Albion or to Mike. A romantic and a perfectionist, he devoted much of his life to maintaining the comfort, atmosphere and appearance of a traditional English public house. The Albion was a magnet for those who believed that a drinking establishment should be a retreat from the bustle and frenzy of the outside world, where real ale and good food should be enjoyed in a relaxed and intimate atmosphere.”
Not a bad note to go out on, is it?
When I thought about the possibility of one day having an obit, not saying I discounted the possibility of dying, just the possibility of someone writing and PAYING for an obit, I thought a worthwhile accolade would be, “Baked good bread.”
A lot of meaning could be contained in those short words.
Says a lot about the type of person you are today.
Of late, I have cut a lot of breads out of my diet so not sure what to make of that does to the plan.
Mr. Mercer’s obit also contained this line.
Its decor proclaimed Mike’s old-fashioned and benign patriotism, but the atmosphere of the place was politically ecumenical.
Old-fashioned and benign patriotism.
Politically ecumenical.
I know the as I get older, grass is always greener 10 or 20 years ago.
But when did we all get so mean?
The irreverence combined with flippancy and no real substance for the care of people.
To paraphrase slightly what CS Lewis wrote in the Problem with Pain of the people who are confident to the very end that they alone have found the answer to the riddle of life, that God and man are fools whom they have gotten the better of, that their way of life is utterly successful, satisfactory, unassailable.
Mr. Lewis wrote that back in 1940.
Maybe we were all just as mean back then as well.
But at least back then, those folks were all stuck on AM Talk Radio and not on social media.
found in rare places beauty being fugitive how to possess it
I feel lucky.
Know what I mean?
I feel lucky.
I have lived in three places in my life.
For the first 50 years of my life I lived in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
On the North End of Grand Rapids, Michigan.
I used to say I lived 1 mile from the house where I was born.
Well I wasn’t born there but where I lived, after coming home from Butterworth Hospital.
Come to think of it, Butterworth Hospital probably wasn’t much more than a mile away either.
Growing up in Grand Rapids and going to an elementary school where 90% of the kids came from Grand Rapids, I remember one of my teachers going around the room and asking each kid which hospital they were born at.
There were three possbilitlies.
Butterworth was the most mentioned and the coolest as it made you think that was where the pancake syrup came from.
Then Blodgett.
But Blodgett was such an odd sounding name that we all decided that had you been born at BLODDDDD-ghet you yourself were kind of odd.
And then there were the few Catholic kids who were born at St. Mary’s.
There were so few Catholic kids at my school as most Catholic kids in the neighborhood went to Blessed Sacrament.
BUT they didn’t go to Blessed Sacrament until 2nd grade.
So these kids were part of our class for two years and then mysteriously disappeared from school.
They disappeared from school but not from the neighborhood.
We would still see these kids in the park and such.
And the word would spread, ‘They go to Blessed Sacrament.’
As my only other exposure to Catholic churches and schools at that time was St. Mary’s Hospital, I figured ‘going to Blessed Sacrament’ meant they got sick.
It was weird too because in the morning after school started we could look out the windows at the Blessed Sacrament bus as it stopped at the corner and we would see these kids line up and get on the bus and go off to therapy I guessed.
That bus stop was at a corner right next to our school, Crestview Elementary.
The Blessed Sacrament bus in the morning came by that corner, as I mentioned, after school had started.
The Blessed Sacrament bus in the afternoon came by about 10 minutes after our school got it.
Over the years it had become part of social schedule of Crestview Elementary to gather at the corner and when the Blessed Sacrament Bus stopped at the corner, exchange greetings with those kids on the bus.
Language used in these greetings was most unusal.
It would have been okay had you been deaf as both groups of students also used sign language to express themselves.
That it was the B.S. bus was just a gift of the Gods.
In the short story, I Went to Sullivant, James Thurber writes, “Now and again virtually the whole school turned out to fight the Catholic boys of the Holy Cross Academy in Fifth Street near Town, for no reason at all–in winter with snowballs and ice balls, in other seasons with fists, brickbats, and clubs.“
I knew just what that was like.
This exchange lasted as long as the bus was at the corner and then satisfied that honor had been upheld, everyone went home.
When I got to sixth grade and was a member of the school safety squad, that was my corner.
Most of the time, being so close to the school, the kids who had to cross came and went quickly and I could take off.
But every once in awhile I stuck around … just to observe don’t you know.
That year, the Crestview Greeters must have got louder or more persistent or something because neighbors complained to school.
I never figured out how it came about but the Principal, Mr. Domagolski, arranged with Blessed Sacrament to have his wife ride along on the B.S. Bus.
Mrs. Domagolski road the bus and reported two things to Mr. Domagolski.
The first thing she said was she had NEVER heard such language.
Mrs. D needed to hang out on our playground a little more often.
The 2nd thing she said was, “AND THAT SAFETY JUST STOOD THERE AND DIDN’T DO A THING.”
I know this because both Mr. Vanderwheel, the teacher/coordinator of the school safety squad and I got called in the Principals office together.
When you think about it, this was again irony on the greek tragic play level.
It was in Mr. Vanderwheel’s class that I was awarded around 364 demerits.
And now both of us were in the Principal’s office.
Mr. D repeated the line, “the safety didn’t do anything” and glared at me.
I can’t remember what I said or if I melted into the floor.
This was big time crime.
And I was in for it.
I think I did ask what could I have done?
And what was I supposed to do?
I was about 5 feet tall and weighed about 47 pounds.
Any 4th grader could have beat me up and most of the mean 4th graders already had.
Really?
I was supposed to stop this crowd and make them shut up?
And besides that, how was this NEW to anybody?
It had been going on for as long as I could remember.
Mr. D stared at me then looked at Mr. Vanderwheel and back at me and said slowly, one word at a time, “YOU ARE OFF THE SAFETY SQUAD.”
In my mind I remember that he walked over and unhooked my orange cross belt and let fall to floor but that may not have happened but it felt like it.
You remember the TV show, BRANDED, where the show’s opening depicts Chuck Conners getting drummed out of the Army and and his sword taken away and broken over someone’s knee?
That’s what it felt like.
And we left.
Mr. Vanderwheel kinda sorta said he was sorry but there was nothing he could do.
But he did do something.
He let me stay on the squad a substitute.
Which was kind of funny as a safety had a corner every other week.
As a sub, I was getting calls almost everyday.
I never ever got that corner by school again.
I am pretty sure that once or twice Mr. D say me on a corner with my belt.
It seems to me like I waved.
But it was never mentioned again.
ANYWAY, as I was saying, I lived a mile from the house where I was born and a mile from the cemetery where I would be buried.
That was Fair Plains Cemetery, a City Of Grand Rapids Public Cemetery where my Father and Grand Father was buried.
My Dad said so many people from the North End in general and our Church, Berean Baptist, in particular, were buried at Fairplains that Resurrection Day was going to be like a Sunday School picnic.
From where we lived at the time, a small triangle connected my house, my mom’s house and the cemetery and that was my world.
Once when I was working at WZZM13 in Grand Rapids, there was a general conversation in the newsroom about travel and traveling.
General Conversation in the newsroom was one of the best things about working at WZZM13.
Here was this great big room, crammed (pre-covid) with desks, TV’s on everywhere, radios and cop scanners blaring and everyone would be engaged in a general free for all conversation on anything but the news.
Never knew what we would be talking about and what might be said, but everyone contributed.
I remember once to make a point, I raised my voice in song and sang the ‘WHERE OH WHERE ARE YOU TONIGHT’ song from HEE HAW.
I got to the second WHERE and the entire newsroom or at least all those who knew the song, joined in.
The best part was the look on the face of the people who didn’t know what was coming and when we all hit the “THHHHHHPTTTT You Were Gone” people screamed.
So into this conservation on travel, I interjected my “I live a mile from where I was born and I mile from where I am going to be buried” and Jenn, the noon show anchor, tears up and says, “That is so depresssssssssssssssssssssssssssssing.”
Little did I know or ever imagine that my job would take me to Atlanta, Georgia and then to the South Carolina coast.
I now live almost 1000 miles from where I thought I might be buried.
The plan today is ashes in the ocean but that’s another story.
I am living in a place I had never heard of before.
I am living on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean that I had only even seen twice in my life.
And I am lucky.
I have met a few local people down here.
And by local I mean people who grew up here.
It isn’t easy.
30 years the population of Bluffton, SC, was 738.
Today it is over 30,000.
Less than 1 out of 30 folks down here are locals, long time locals.
And you know what?
They don’t go to the beach.
Nothing new to see there for the long time locals.
For me?
Everything is new.
I love it.
This is a rare place.
The beauty in places like this are fugitive.
I wonder how I can possess it?
I wonder can I possess it?
And I quit wondering and just enjoy.
I am lucky.
Lucky to see this new, to see this new at my age.
And just enjoy it.
Lucky.
Moonrise over Folly Field Beach – Novemebr 2021
Adapted from the book, The Art of Travel (2002, Vintage Books) by Alain de Botton, and the passage:
A dominant impulse on encountering beauty is to wish to hold on to it, to possess it and give it weight in one’s life. There is an urge to say, ‘I was here, I saw this and it mattered to me.’
But beauty is fugitive, being frequently found in places to which we may never return or else resulting from rare conjunctions of season, light and weather.
How then to possess it, how to hold on to the floating train, the halvalike bricks or the English valley?
The camera provides one option. Taking photographs can assuage the itch for possession sparked by the beauty of a place; our anxiety over losing a precious scene can decline with every click of the shutter.
According to the website, GOOD READS, Any Baedeker will tell us where we ought to travel, but only Alain de Botton will tell us how and why.
As I said in the section on Architecture , what I find irresistible in reading Mr. de Botton is his use of language.
I get the feeling that if you made a spread sheet of all the words, adverbs and adjectives used by Mr. de Botton, you just might find that he used each word just once.
