Life should NOT be a journey to the grave
with the intention of arriving safely
in an attractive and well preserved body,
but rather to skid in sideways,
cigar in one hand,
favorite beverage in the other,
body thoroughly used up,
totally worn out,
and screaming,
"WOO HOO, what a ride!!"
Remember: This is not a dress rehearsal!
The incredibly kind and interesting nurse practitioner who gives me my allergy shots shared this with me today. Of course, she doesn't entirely agree with the drinking and smoking part! But the sentiment is spot on.
Thursday, June 30, 2005
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
Flashback: Tsunami
Just because it happened half a year ago is not a reason to forget. We need to remember. So when I came across something I wrote about it last January, I decided to go ahead and post it, with only slight modifications.
That MTV...
Intellectually, we all know what happened with the Tsunami: everything was destroyed, whole villages, towns, cities, families, everything. The coastline has been forever changed, the terrain is different. It's a different world there now. We all know that. But here's the part we don't think about:
Everything is gone.
I saw a special on MTV about the whole mess. (Yes, really. For those of you who are a bit, shall we say, "beyond the MTV generation," MTV has some excellent news specials. Yes, the VJs tend to be, well, odd. But a few of the news people are excellent.) A few international MTV folks went to the area in mid-January. They each went to a different country. The point was to see, post-Tsunami, what it's really like and how the people are doing. And whether all the money we've given is getting to them. There was a lot of tragedy. Devastation. Destruction. Death. Etc. And again, the reminder:
Everything is gone.
At one point, one of the MTV guys (I think it was Gideon Yago, one of the good ones) was in this huge... well, I guess it was a temporary orphanage. Or perhaps school? I'm not entirely sure. There were a ton of kids there (100? 200?) for an art class. Art therapy, really. Kids of all ages painting and coloring and drawing. It's one of the ways they were helping the kids to deal with the tragedy and begin to move on. But again:
Everything is gone.
Think about what that means. All the paperwork. Marriage licenses, birth certificates, everything. For the orphaned children who are too young to speak, they have no names. The names their parents gave them are lost. They'll never know what their parents named them. They'll never even know their parents' names. We take it so for granted. It's the little things that we forget. But at the same time...
Given the pictures of flowers the children were drawing and the bright colors they were using and their smiling faces and infectious laughter, the show was surprisingly uplifting. Everywhere these MTV people went, there were kids. And though we certainly saw clips of sad, blank children, it only took someone going over to them with a hug or a game or a smile to have them smiling and laughing, genuinely having fun. The adults they spoke to were just as amazing. So nice. So willing to share a part of themselves. As one of the MTV people put it, since it happened to so many, there's really no sense of "woe is me" with people. They're all in the same boat. It's amazing the way the human being bounces back. So in the end, I guess the lesson is this:
Everything is not gone. The human spirit remains. And that is more important than any piece of paper.
That MTV...
Intellectually, we all know what happened with the Tsunami: everything was destroyed, whole villages, towns, cities, families, everything. The coastline has been forever changed, the terrain is different. It's a different world there now. We all know that. But here's the part we don't think about:
Everything is gone.
I saw a special on MTV about the whole mess. (Yes, really. For those of you who are a bit, shall we say, "beyond the MTV generation," MTV has some excellent news specials. Yes, the VJs tend to be, well, odd. But a few of the news people are excellent.) A few international MTV folks went to the area in mid-January. They each went to a different country. The point was to see, post-Tsunami, what it's really like and how the people are doing. And whether all the money we've given is getting to them. There was a lot of tragedy. Devastation. Destruction. Death. Etc. And again, the reminder:
Everything is gone.
At one point, one of the MTV guys (I think it was Gideon Yago, one of the good ones) was in this huge... well, I guess it was a temporary orphanage. Or perhaps school? I'm not entirely sure. There were a ton of kids there (100? 200?) for an art class. Art therapy, really. Kids of all ages painting and coloring and drawing. It's one of the ways they were helping the kids to deal with the tragedy and begin to move on. But again:
Everything is gone.
Think about what that means. All the paperwork. Marriage licenses, birth certificates, everything. For the orphaned children who are too young to speak, they have no names. The names their parents gave them are lost. They'll never know what their parents named them. They'll never even know their parents' names. We take it so for granted. It's the little things that we forget. But at the same time...
Given the pictures of flowers the children were drawing and the bright colors they were using and their smiling faces and infectious laughter, the show was surprisingly uplifting. Everywhere these MTV people went, there were kids. And though we certainly saw clips of sad, blank children, it only took someone going over to them with a hug or a game or a smile to have them smiling and laughing, genuinely having fun. The adults they spoke to were just as amazing. So nice. So willing to share a part of themselves. As one of the MTV people put it, since it happened to so many, there's really no sense of "woe is me" with people. They're all in the same boat. It's amazing the way the human being bounces back. So in the end, I guess the lesson is this:
Everything is not gone. The human spirit remains. And that is more important than any piece of paper.
Tuesday, June 28, 2005
Because so many have forgotten
democracy
SYLLABICATION: de·moc·ra·cy
NOUN: 1. Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives. 2. A political or social unit that has such a government. 3. The common people, considered as the primary source of political power. 4. Majority rule. 5. The principles of social equality and respect for the individual within a community.
The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. Fourth Edition. 2000.
and now back to me
By the people, of the people, for the people. You cannot force democracy onto a country. The people of that country must choose it for themselves. When one forces a government on a people, that's not democracy. What's more, it's against much of what we're supposed to believe in and stand for in this country.
Currently our administration wants to force democracy on the world. They defend themselves by claiming that we're bringing freedom to the world. The problem is that imposing our beliefs on others is not freedom. Forcing people to do what we want them to do because we think we know best, because we think we're smarter than they are, because we're so self-centered that we believe that our way is always the best way is not freedom.
SYLLABICATION: de·moc·ra·cy
NOUN: 1. Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives. 2. A political or social unit that has such a government. 3. The common people, considered as the primary source of political power. 4. Majority rule. 5. The principles of social equality and respect for the individual within a community.
The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. Fourth Edition. 2000.
and now back to me
By the people, of the people, for the people. You cannot force democracy onto a country. The people of that country must choose it for themselves. When one forces a government on a people, that's not democracy. What's more, it's against much of what we're supposed to believe in and stand for in this country.
Currently our administration wants to force democracy on the world. They defend themselves by claiming that we're bringing freedom to the world. The problem is that imposing our beliefs on others is not freedom. Forcing people to do what we want them to do because we think we know best, because we think we're smarter than they are, because we're so self-centered that we believe that our way is always the best way is not freedom.
Monday, June 27, 2005
Monkeys on trial... again
So they've put evolution back on trial.
Besides the fact that this whole thing is just dumb, there's something I've never, ever understood about this argument (this argument being evolution versus "intelligent design" or whatever they're calling it this week). Evolution is a scientific theory that is taught in science classes. What's wrong with that? "Intelligent design," on the other hand, is a religious theory; how exactly does that fit into a science class?
And let's look at this quote:
"Detractors also argue that evolution is invalid science because it cannot be tested or verified and say it is inappropriately being indoctrinated into education and discouraging consideration of alternatives."
And how exactly can "intelligent design" be tested? What, some guy wrote it down in a book a long time ago, ergo it's true? Hey, guess what, same thing happened with evolution. That's it, question answered, trial over!
I don't even have the patience for these kinds of arguments. People are homeless, starving, being killed by suicide bombers, 13 year olds are pregnant, mothers are trading their children for cars and/or money, we don't have a cure for cancer, there's a whole universe to explore and discover but we don't seem too interested in funding NASA, the US has a disgusting infant mortality rate, and I'm too depressed to even go on... and these people are spending how many hours and how many dollars arguing over evolution? Why? What's it going to help? How many homeless people will it shelter? How many lives will it enrich? How many children will it save?
Now granted, I'm no saint. I certainly don't spend my days and nights rescuing abandoned puppies (though a few friends and I did spend a couple hours one night trying to "rescue" a kitten from a drain; but that's another story...) and feeding homeless mothers, and yet, I'm not quite the drain on the system that this foolishness is.
And one final note, it really makes me sick that people are so damned impressed with themselves that they think it's just unfathomable that they're the result of evolution (a "process" I think the article called it). You know, if they'd go work in a soup kitchen for a while, they just might find the meaning that their lives are apparently lacking.
Besides the fact that this whole thing is just dumb, there's something I've never, ever understood about this argument (this argument being evolution versus "intelligent design" or whatever they're calling it this week). Evolution is a scientific theory that is taught in science classes. What's wrong with that? "Intelligent design," on the other hand, is a religious theory; how exactly does that fit into a science class?
And let's look at this quote:
"Detractors also argue that evolution is invalid science because it cannot be tested or verified and say it is inappropriately being indoctrinated into education and discouraging consideration of alternatives."
And how exactly can "intelligent design" be tested? What, some guy wrote it down in a book a long time ago, ergo it's true? Hey, guess what, same thing happened with evolution. That's it, question answered, trial over!
I don't even have the patience for these kinds of arguments. People are homeless, starving, being killed by suicide bombers, 13 year olds are pregnant, mothers are trading their children for cars and/or money, we don't have a cure for cancer, there's a whole universe to explore and discover but we don't seem too interested in funding NASA, the US has a disgusting infant mortality rate, and I'm too depressed to even go on... and these people are spending how many hours and how many dollars arguing over evolution? Why? What's it going to help? How many homeless people will it shelter? How many lives will it enrich? How many children will it save?
Now granted, I'm no saint. I certainly don't spend my days and nights rescuing abandoned puppies (though a few friends and I did spend a couple hours one night trying to "rescue" a kitten from a drain; but that's another story...) and feeding homeless mothers, and yet, I'm not quite the drain on the system that this foolishness is.
And one final note, it really makes me sick that people are so damned impressed with themselves that they think it's just unfathomable that they're the result of evolution (a "process" I think the article called it). You know, if they'd go work in a soup kitchen for a while, they just might find the meaning that their lives are apparently lacking.
Friday, June 24, 2005
Do you believe in the goodness of people?
Do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you step off the subway and walk past the homeless lining the tunnel, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you turn on the news and see the latest person sent to death row, this one for blowing up an office building with a daycare, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you read a history book that details the atrocities of the death camps in Germany in WWII, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you listen to the radio and hear of the latest suicide bombers on the other side of the world, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you walk down the street to work and watch as person after person walks by a young mother struggling to get her baby’s stroller through a cafe entrance, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you drive down the highway and swerve to avoid the trash thrown out the window of the car in front of you, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you go to the grocery store and see a man grab his young son by the arm and scream at him for tasting a grape, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When the kids (not your own) ask why they didn’t have more gifts from you under the tree this Christmas, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When the New Year arrives and the poor are still poor, the hungry are still hungry, the unloved are still unloved, and the forgotten are still forgotten, do you believe in the goodness of people?
Do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you see a new mother smile at her baby, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you hear the wonder and joy in a child’s voice upon seeing their first rainbow, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When the parking garage attendant lets you out with a wink and a wave on Christmas Eve, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When a stranger catches your favorite hat as it blows away from you down the street, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When a man drives through a blizzard to take insulin to a stranger, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you discover that your neighbor is the one who’s been clearing the snow from your walk every morning, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you sit glued to the news in the days after 9/11 and see the spontaneous memorials and tributes from around the world, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When a stranger lets you have their place in line because you look tired, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When the New Year arrives and the flag still waves, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you step off the subway and walk past the homeless lining the tunnel, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you turn on the news and see the latest person sent to death row, this one for blowing up an office building with a daycare, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you read a history book that details the atrocities of the death camps in Germany in WWII, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you listen to the radio and hear of the latest suicide bombers on the other side of the world, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you walk down the street to work and watch as person after person walks by a young mother struggling to get her baby’s stroller through a cafe entrance, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you drive down the highway and swerve to avoid the trash thrown out the window of the car in front of you, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you go to the grocery store and see a man grab his young son by the arm and scream at him for tasting a grape, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When the kids (not your own) ask why they didn’t have more gifts from you under the tree this Christmas, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When the New Year arrives and the poor are still poor, the hungry are still hungry, the unloved are still unloved, and the forgotten are still forgotten, do you believe in the goodness of people?
Do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you see a new mother smile at her baby, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you hear the wonder and joy in a child’s voice upon seeing their first rainbow, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When the parking garage attendant lets you out with a wink and a wave on Christmas Eve, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When a stranger catches your favorite hat as it blows away from you down the street, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When a man drives through a blizzard to take insulin to a stranger, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you discover that your neighbor is the one who’s been clearing the snow from your walk every morning, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When you sit glued to the news in the days after 9/11 and see the spontaneous memorials and tributes from around the world, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When a stranger lets you have their place in line because you look tired, do you believe in the goodness of people?
When the New Year arrives and the flag still waves, do you believe in the goodness of people?
Thursday, June 23, 2005
Crash (into me)
All I can think of when I hear the title of this movie is the song by the Dave Mathews Band. I hear Dave singing "crash into me" over and over and over. Which is not at all a bad thing. It goes very well with Don Cheadle's line about us all living such isolated lives that we crash into each other just for the contact.
Anyway, I did not love this movie as a few of my friends did. Nor did I feel an overwhelming sense of hope at the end (just the opposite, actually). To understand why I felt this way, let's start with some comments from the critics.
The director dares us to assume we know these people, and then neatly offers conflicting evidence (Ty Burr, Boston Globe). The missing word that would make me agree with this is tries. The director tries to neatly offer conflicting evidence. The problem was that it didn't work. Everything these people did made them live up to the stereotype that had been assigned to them.
Haggis is telling parables, in which the characters learn the lessons they have earned by their behavior (Roger Ebert). That was his goal, I will agree with that. However, the characters in this movie didn't manage to learn much of anything. One particularly clueless character was Brendan Frasier's DA. The most surprising thing about his character is that there wasn't even a chance for him to learn anything. It's as though that part of the film was left out.
If there is hope in the story, it comes because as the characters crash into one another, they learn things, mostly about themselves. Almost all of them are still alive at the end, and are better people because of what has happened to them (Roger Ebert). Roger Ebert's review seems to be a summary of what the film set out to do. However, quite simply, it failed. These characters don't learn things about themselves. There's little to no growth involved in this film, for any of the varied cast of characters.
I believe anyone seeing it is likely to be moved to have a little more sympathy for people not like themselves (Roger Ebert). Though I do believe that this is one of the very lofty and admirable goals of the movie, I also believe that the film failed on this score. I suspect that what many will get from this movie is that the stereotypes they hold are absolutely true and that the sympathy would therefore be lost on those people who are different from them. And that leaves me much more scared than hopeful.
Don Cheadle as another harried cop forced into corruption… (Michael Wilmington, Tribune Movie Critic). Don Cheadle's character was forced into nothing. He had choices available to him. That he took the corrupt path was the easy way out, which, quite frankly, works only to make the character live up to the stereotypes associated with both his race and his profession.
I must admit that the acting was fantastic. I will confess to being a Sandra Bullock fan in order to say that I really disliked her (well, her character) in this movie. She did the yuppy, snobby, white, rich bitch perfectly. The soundtrack added to the movie without being distracting. The characters and the story lines do still manage to be moving. There were tears. Overall, though, I'm just not a big fan of this movie. That so many others are had me confused for a bit, but then I found a theory for that, too (I have lots of theories, as you'll see if I continue writing this blog and you continue reading it): the Oprah Phenomenon.
The Oprah Phenomenon defined: If Oprah loves something, then I do, too! Remember that little thing called Oprah's Book Club (the original one, before she started with the classics)? An Oprah pick was an automatic bestseller. The thing is, a lot of those books are really mediocre books and others are outright bad. But there are many, many people out there who can't see that much less admit it. Because if Oprah likes it, it must be good! Heaven forbid we think for ourselves; heaven forbid we actually act and think and feel and react as individuals. It's like those lit freaks (and no, I'm not saying that everyone who reads literature is a freak; I'm speaking of a certain subsection of the readers of the world) who absolutely refuse to dislike anything labeled a classic. I read pretty much everything. And I read a lot. I'm (over)educated; others claim that I'm intelligent. And I do like some of the classics. But I really, really dislike some of them, too. For instance, I'm not at all ashamed or hesitant to admit that I hate Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. That is an awful book. Horrible. "Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and…" I promptly fell asleep.
Yes, I know that's just my opinion. And by rolling your eyes and screaming that at your computer screen, you've just realized my point, so give yourself a pat on the back! This movie has fallen victim to the Oprah Phenomenon. Smart people who know these things (aka movie critics) say it's really good and I should like it and I'll learn to be a better person just by watching it. And therefore, the masses fall in line, do what they're told, and go on to say that the movie's really good, they like it, and they learned to be a better person by watching it.
I say, think it over. Really think about it. Do you really believe Sandra is all warm and fuzzy at the end? Do you really believe she's going to start hanging at the mall with her new buddy? Or do you believe, as I do, that not too long after that ankle heals, she'll be back to griping about the lazy maid not emptying the dishwasher of the clean dishes before dawn every morning?
I'll give you a break and not walk you through every character. If you've already seen this movie, do yourself a favor and think about it again. If you haven't seen it, go ahead and go. Just keep a really open mind. Try not to be influenced by what you've been told (by the critics who liked it or by me) and just see what your gut reaction to the movie really is. And remember, a movie's just not the same without popcorn.
Anyway, I did not love this movie as a few of my friends did. Nor did I feel an overwhelming sense of hope at the end (just the opposite, actually). To understand why I felt this way, let's start with some comments from the critics.
The director dares us to assume we know these people, and then neatly offers conflicting evidence (Ty Burr, Boston Globe). The missing word that would make me agree with this is tries. The director tries to neatly offer conflicting evidence. The problem was that it didn't work. Everything these people did made them live up to the stereotype that had been assigned to them.
Haggis is telling parables, in which the characters learn the lessons they have earned by their behavior (Roger Ebert). That was his goal, I will agree with that. However, the characters in this movie didn't manage to learn much of anything. One particularly clueless character was Brendan Frasier's DA. The most surprising thing about his character is that there wasn't even a chance for him to learn anything. It's as though that part of the film was left out.
If there is hope in the story, it comes because as the characters crash into one another, they learn things, mostly about themselves. Almost all of them are still alive at the end, and are better people because of what has happened to them (Roger Ebert). Roger Ebert's review seems to be a summary of what the film set out to do. However, quite simply, it failed. These characters don't learn things about themselves. There's little to no growth involved in this film, for any of the varied cast of characters.
I believe anyone seeing it is likely to be moved to have a little more sympathy for people not like themselves (Roger Ebert). Though I do believe that this is one of the very lofty and admirable goals of the movie, I also believe that the film failed on this score. I suspect that what many will get from this movie is that the stereotypes they hold are absolutely true and that the sympathy would therefore be lost on those people who are different from them. And that leaves me much more scared than hopeful.
Don Cheadle as another harried cop forced into corruption… (Michael Wilmington, Tribune Movie Critic). Don Cheadle's character was forced into nothing. He had choices available to him. That he took the corrupt path was the easy way out, which, quite frankly, works only to make the character live up to the stereotypes associated with both his race and his profession.
I must admit that the acting was fantastic. I will confess to being a Sandra Bullock fan in order to say that I really disliked her (well, her character) in this movie. She did the yuppy, snobby, white, rich bitch perfectly. The soundtrack added to the movie without being distracting. The characters and the story lines do still manage to be moving. There were tears. Overall, though, I'm just not a big fan of this movie. That so many others are had me confused for a bit, but then I found a theory for that, too (I have lots of theories, as you'll see if I continue writing this blog and you continue reading it): the Oprah Phenomenon.
The Oprah Phenomenon defined: If Oprah loves something, then I do, too! Remember that little thing called Oprah's Book Club (the original one, before she started with the classics)? An Oprah pick was an automatic bestseller. The thing is, a lot of those books are really mediocre books and others are outright bad. But there are many, many people out there who can't see that much less admit it. Because if Oprah likes it, it must be good! Heaven forbid we think for ourselves; heaven forbid we actually act and think and feel and react as individuals. It's like those lit freaks (and no, I'm not saying that everyone who reads literature is a freak; I'm speaking of a certain subsection of the readers of the world) who absolutely refuse to dislike anything labeled a classic. I read pretty much everything. And I read a lot. I'm (over)educated; others claim that I'm intelligent. And I do like some of the classics. But I really, really dislike some of them, too. For instance, I'm not at all ashamed or hesitant to admit that I hate Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. That is an awful book. Horrible. "Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and…" I promptly fell asleep.
Yes, I know that's just my opinion. And by rolling your eyes and screaming that at your computer screen, you've just realized my point, so give yourself a pat on the back! This movie has fallen victim to the Oprah Phenomenon. Smart people who know these things (aka movie critics) say it's really good and I should like it and I'll learn to be a better person just by watching it. And therefore, the masses fall in line, do what they're told, and go on to say that the movie's really good, they like it, and they learned to be a better person by watching it.
I say, think it over. Really think about it. Do you really believe Sandra is all warm and fuzzy at the end? Do you really believe she's going to start hanging at the mall with her new buddy? Or do you believe, as I do, that not too long after that ankle heals, she'll be back to griping about the lazy maid not emptying the dishwasher of the clean dishes before dawn every morning?
I'll give you a break and not walk you through every character. If you've already seen this movie, do yourself a favor and think about it again. If you haven't seen it, go ahead and go. Just keep a really open mind. Try not to be influenced by what you've been told (by the critics who liked it or by me) and just see what your gut reaction to the movie really is. And remember, a movie's just not the same without popcorn.
And so it begins
If you haven't read Steve Jobs' recent Commencement address at Stanford, do yourself a favor and check it out at the following link.
http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html
http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html
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