UPDATE
I've had this phrase going through my head lately. It seems like an old adage or saying but the more I think about it the less sense it makes.
(I refuse to Google it at this point but I may reconsider…)
Is there really a saying that goes: “Take care of the little things and the big things will take care of themselves”?
Don't Big Things always take care of themselves?
-----------
About 3 weeks ago I had arrived at a decision that I was going to work on this blog-- at most-- for 2 weeks out of every month. And since I worked on the blog in October between the 9th through the 23rd, I decided I should do my monthly blog posts each month between the 9th through the 23rd.
Then I thought posts I might make in October…
Then I didn't do make any of them…..
Sooooo -- back to the original decision: my monthly blog posts will appear each month between the 9th through the 23rd.
Final answer.
__________________________
Self assessment
This blog post-- brief as it is-- was a long time coming. Just coming through a stretch of feeling no need or use in communicating.
Answer tba
Wednesday, October 24, 2018
violet passion flower & R O Y G B I V
 |
| violet passion flower san pablo avenue, oakland, ca
Final photo from this first lap across the spectrum
_____________________________________________________
R O Y G B I V
This was the proposal for an art exhibit I recently submitted to a gallery in SF.
I wasn't accepted.
Perhaps my photography wasn't good enough, perhaps they weren't interested in submissions from Oakland.
____________________________________________________
Name of Show: R O Y G B I V
Tagline: A Rainbow Seen by Colorblind Gay Eye
Photography by Donald Cooper
Theme
I am one of the 10% of males who “suffer” from a specific type of color perception (aka “color blindness”) called a “red/green seeing deficiency”.
There's almost certainly a scientific name for the condition but “defect” is the word I remember being told I had that day in elementary school when I was tested and diagnosed. The news was shared with me in a pitying tone, I thought. The school nurse implied that the defect would hamper my pursuit of any number of careers careers.
I was even told I couldn't be a bus driver because I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between a red light and a green light.
So, no one's perfect. We all have defects and talents to overcome them. I didn't let having a “defect” limit me...but the concerning idea that the rainbow I see may differ from what the “90%” sees stayed with me through the decades.
And I do see in color. I know “red” and “green”. Apples are red. And green too…. I didn't have a defect. Through trial and much error I learned not to make the sort of wardrobe choices that made me look like an escapee from a circus.
And I got very reluctant about discussing visual art.
But, for 17 years I had a job which allowed me to travel extensively and I learned I enjoyed photography. Investing in a genuine SLR never seemed practical-- given my “defect-- but did all right with a basic disposable camera.
In 2010, I finally got a phone which came with a decent camera…. And I finally had the capacity to challenge my longtime self-perception as “defective’.
Describe your work, your vision for the type of art you want to be exhibited on the second floor, and why you want to show it at Strut.
Capturing images of my home in the Bay-- as well as a handful of other locations-- started out as a pastime something which simply brings me joy. The Gay Bay is often seen exclusively as San Francisco’s clubs and organizations, and the sights and scenes of San Francisco. Of my 30 years in the Bay, Oakland has been my home for 16 years.
Oakland’s unique combination of natural beauty and “hella” gritty realness has sharpened my eye to such qualities wherever I travel and has made me a more assured photographer. In fact, the photos I’ve contributed to Google Maps as a Local Guide have been viewed 538,000 times.
I have visited 40 States (and DC) on my way to all 50 and have trained my eye to see details many might miss,
The significance of the rainbow is-- naturally-- the image of the Rainbow flag representing our LGBTQ community.
But R-O-Y-G-B-I-V also represents the range of color I was told I could never physically perceive.
As I facetiously recounted above, I spent decades doubting my “visual sense. I only gradually started to consider the images I took with my Nexus 5 phone “photography”, developing a love for the art past the age of 50.
------------------------------------------------
Self assessment
This piece was already for the most part composed. It simply required some editing. Posted in the niddle of the night as a result of insomnia
|
Tuesday, October 23, 2018
The Quake and Mrs. Eccleston
It’s been 29 years and a week since 1989’s Loma Prieta Earthquake; quake anniversaries are significant in the Bay Area so commemorations were abundant of late. It's funny how I remember a point in time most clearly sometimes by recalling my interaction with one person.
Most of my specific memories of the '89 quake are associated with my friend and coworker at Runaway Tours, Dorothy Eccleston.
Dorothy was a charming affable woman in her 70s who was very much comfortable as a peer among us 20-something pseudo-bohemians. She lived with her mentally challenged adult daughter, Andrea, in a small tidy apartment in San Francisco's Tenderloin.
Her husband, Dr. Eccleston was deceased. He had been an obstetrician who, Dorothy attested, would say of every baby he delivered-- not matter how ugly---, “Now THAT’S a baby!”.
Dorothy and Andrea subsisted on Andrea's social security and Dorothy’s meagre earnings from Runaway. As reservation agents, both Dorothy and I were entitled to a commission over a certain threshold--- I don't recall ever making commission but Dorothy's cheerful attentiveness in her dealings with travel agents who were the company’s clients made her one of their favorites.
Undoubtedly, Dorothy netted commission frequently. Nevertheless, she often spoke with dread about being only a paycheck away from the street,
Despite any existential concerns Dorothy Eccleston was the purest version of a bon vivant: she still kept up her season tickets to the San Francisco Opera and spoke rapturously of the performances she attended. She had gentlemen friends: I recall her giddy account of an outing on the weekend to one of the local race tracks. She laughingly recounted how-- after a few glasses of champagne-- she’d applauded a race finish so enthusiastically her rings flew off her fingers.
We were all at work late in the afternoon October 17, 1989 when the Loma Prieta Earthquake entered our lives.
Our offices were then on Union Square and the building, 291 Geary, was actually two buildings somehow lashed together. The building was quite “live”. In describing it to my cousin, I once mentioned that the office seemed to move when one of the “big girls” walked through the office. My cousin chided me for making a sexist remark-- I replied in SF, “big girl” didn't apply exclusively to females.
I was on the phone with a travel agent in San Jose at a few minutes after 5 o'clock
Out of the blue she said, "Oh my God. We're having an earthquake!"
At the second she said that, all was calm in SF but before I could say "Really?", suddenly our building started shaking violently.
The quake was 17 seconds of sheer terror--- as if the building that you were in suddenly an airliner in the midst of horrific turbulence. It went like this: shakeshakeShakeShakeSHAKESHAKESHAKESHAKEShakeShakeshakeSLAMSHAKESHAKESHAKESHAKEShakeShakeshakeshakeshakeShakeShakeshakeshakeshakeshake.
As it began someone yelled “Get under your desks” and we did. Dorothy cries of worry for Andrea who pealed out and each of us-- imagining she was running about-- yelled back, “Dorothy, get under your desk”.
After the fifth such direction to her, she rather bluntly replied “I AM UNDER MY DESK!!!”
When the shaking stopped, we evacuated into Union Square and milled about unsure of what to do or where to go as San Franciscans must have in 1906. People asked, “Are you
okay?” and said “oh my God” a lot. Someone with a transistor radio cried out, “The Bay Bridge collapsed!” and I wondered how since from the Square I could still see the top of one of the suspension section’s towers.
Dorothy was understandably anxious to get back to her apartment to check on her daughter. A handful of us accompanied her up Geary Street into the Tenderloin. At her building we climbed five flights of darkened stairs to her floor.
When we reached Andrea, I recall her being fortunately quite calm, more concerned about her mother-- I guess it runs in the family.
As the initial relief of the reunion ebbed and I announced I was going to head to my boyfriend's apartment, Dorothy turned to me. She and Andrea owned two flashlights and I was about to be sent on a mission of mercy.
“Donald,” Dorothy urgently explained, “You have to take this flashlight to my friend upstairs on the sixth floor. She’s an elderly woman and with the power out she must be terrified. Bring her this flashlight and tell her it’s from Dorothy.”
I agreed to do so, silently marvelling at Dorothy’s perception of her neighbor as bing “elderly”. I climbed another flight of darkened stairs and peered down the sixth floor hallway.
As I proceeded along in the twilit quake-shook dusty space, it seemed that every apartment door was wide open and in each stood an at least somewhat terrified elderly lady-- partly terrified from the quake, and probably by the fact that, in its wake, a strange man was stalking down their hall, peering in their apartments. Regardless, I felt I had to solve the puzzle of just to whom I should deliver the flashlight.
I received the incentive to solve the puzzle as the quakes first powerful aftershock hit. As the building shimmied, I turned to the nearest elderly lady, pressed the flashlight into her hands and yelled, “Dorothy wants you to have this!”. With that I fled, exiting to Geary Street and made my way to the home of my boyfriend-at-the-time.
For weeks after that day such aftershocks continued happening at uncertain intervals, morning noon and night. The random terrestrial echos of Loma Prieta wore nerves down and going to stand in a doorway for protection got to be rote and annoying, I recall watching a segment on aftershocks on the local evening news during which an aftershock struck.
But I must note that, on the day of the quake I witnessed a sort of shell-shocked benevolence from everyone I saw from Union Square to the Western Addition to Alamo Square. Out of a newly discovered sense of shared frailty people began looking out for each other; for example. as there were no traffic signals operating civilians even stood in intersections, directing traffic. This I witnessed.
The quake shook common purpose out of us all and ruptured the lines that alienated one from the other. A lot of good was unleashed on October 17, 1989. Years later, I heard a phrase that rang out most truth listening to a CD I'd bought outside a supermarket from an aspiring hiphop artist. “The only time we deal with one another's when there's an earthquake”.
The Loma Prieta Earthquake, of course, took lives and those aftershocks left scars.
Ten days after the quake my friend Robin Dolan and I took BART into Oakland to see Eurythmics at the Kaiser Auditorium. The train rolled past the collapsed Cypress Freeway where several lost lives-- their l. As the concert began, Annie Lennox strutted on stage asking us all “How are you doing Bay Area”?
We were okay just then-- some of us. Qr just starting to begin to be okay.
After the quake, Dorothy became even more anxious about Andrea and phobic of going pretty much anywhere.
She stopped going to the opera. She offered me her tickets to a performance of Tannhauser and wished me well.
As I climbed all the stairs to her nosebleed seats, I recall seeing the many cracks running through the walls of the Opera House stairwell.
-------------
Self Assessment
This was hard.
I began this account about a traumatic experience while waiting in Oakland's Housing Assistance Center-- ground zero for anxiety. I had paperwork to fill in to challenge a capricious rent increase but I have made an appointment with an attorney and will fill in the paperwork with her. I'm writing this to step out of the stress of the moment.
The attorney appointment this Wednesday was the victory I sought on Monday.
My city's current rental plight is this day's earthquake of greed, taking lives and leaving many unsheltered.
I completed this Tuesday afternoon.
In the morning I attended a poll workers' training and, although I'd had a full night's sleep, an hour and a half in, I became sleepy and was almost unable to concentrate.
After a short break two and quarter hours in, the course went on for another hour and I grew edgy and-- internally-- upset.
I was ravenously hungry when I got home so I cooked and ate lunch then wrote for an hour and a half but grew weary.
I posted this in the evening, after wrapping up just before 7pm.
It'll undoubtedly will need clean up.
Most of my specific memories of the '89 quake are associated with my friend and coworker at Runaway Tours, Dorothy Eccleston.
Dorothy was a charming affable woman in her 70s who was very much comfortable as a peer among us 20-something pseudo-bohemians. She lived with her mentally challenged adult daughter, Andrea, in a small tidy apartment in San Francisco's Tenderloin.
Her husband, Dr. Eccleston was deceased. He had been an obstetrician who, Dorothy attested, would say of every baby he delivered-- not matter how ugly---, “Now THAT’S a baby!”.
Dorothy and Andrea subsisted on Andrea's social security and Dorothy’s meagre earnings from Runaway. As reservation agents, both Dorothy and I were entitled to a commission over a certain threshold--- I don't recall ever making commission but Dorothy's cheerful attentiveness in her dealings with travel agents who were the company’s clients made her one of their favorites.
Undoubtedly, Dorothy netted commission frequently. Nevertheless, she often spoke with dread about being only a paycheck away from the street,
Despite any existential concerns Dorothy Eccleston was the purest version of a bon vivant: she still kept up her season tickets to the San Francisco Opera and spoke rapturously of the performances she attended. She had gentlemen friends: I recall her giddy account of an outing on the weekend to one of the local race tracks. She laughingly recounted how-- after a few glasses of champagne-- she’d applauded a race finish so enthusiastically her rings flew off her fingers.
We were all at work late in the afternoon October 17, 1989 when the Loma Prieta Earthquake entered our lives.
Our offices were then on Union Square and the building, 291 Geary, was actually two buildings somehow lashed together. The building was quite “live”. In describing it to my cousin, I once mentioned that the office seemed to move when one of the “big girls” walked through the office. My cousin chided me for making a sexist remark-- I replied in SF, “big girl” didn't apply exclusively to females.
I was on the phone with a travel agent in San Jose at a few minutes after 5 o'clock
Out of the blue she said, "Oh my God. We're having an earthquake!"
At the second she said that, all was calm in SF but before I could say "Really?", suddenly our building started shaking violently.
The quake was 17 seconds of sheer terror--- as if the building that you were in suddenly an airliner in the midst of horrific turbulence. It went like this: shakeshakeShakeShakeSHAKESHAKESHAKESHAKEShakeShakeshakeSLAMSHAKESHAKESHAKESHAKEShakeShakeshakeshakeshakeShakeShakeshakeshakeshakeshake.
As it began someone yelled “Get under your desks” and we did. Dorothy cries of worry for Andrea who pealed out and each of us-- imagining she was running about-- yelled back, “Dorothy, get under your desk”.
After the fifth such direction to her, she rather bluntly replied “I AM UNDER MY DESK!!!”
When the shaking stopped, we evacuated into Union Square and milled about unsure of what to do or where to go as San Franciscans must have in 1906. People asked, “Are you
okay?” and said “oh my God” a lot. Someone with a transistor radio cried out, “The Bay Bridge collapsed!” and I wondered how since from the Square I could still see the top of one of the suspension section’s towers.
Dorothy was understandably anxious to get back to her apartment to check on her daughter. A handful of us accompanied her up Geary Street into the Tenderloin. At her building we climbed five flights of darkened stairs to her floor.
When we reached Andrea, I recall her being fortunately quite calm, more concerned about her mother-- I guess it runs in the family.
As the initial relief of the reunion ebbed and I announced I was going to head to my boyfriend's apartment, Dorothy turned to me. She and Andrea owned two flashlights and I was about to be sent on a mission of mercy.
“Donald,” Dorothy urgently explained, “You have to take this flashlight to my friend upstairs on the sixth floor. She’s an elderly woman and with the power out she must be terrified. Bring her this flashlight and tell her it’s from Dorothy.”
I agreed to do so, silently marvelling at Dorothy’s perception of her neighbor as bing “elderly”. I climbed another flight of darkened stairs and peered down the sixth floor hallway.
As I proceeded along in the twilit quake-shook dusty space, it seemed that every apartment door was wide open and in each stood an at least somewhat terrified elderly lady-- partly terrified from the quake, and probably by the fact that, in its wake, a strange man was stalking down their hall, peering in their apartments. Regardless, I felt I had to solve the puzzle of just to whom I should deliver the flashlight.
I received the incentive to solve the puzzle as the quakes first powerful aftershock hit. As the building shimmied, I turned to the nearest elderly lady, pressed the flashlight into her hands and yelled, “Dorothy wants you to have this!”. With that I fled, exiting to Geary Street and made my way to the home of my boyfriend-at-the-time.
For weeks after that day such aftershocks continued happening at uncertain intervals, morning noon and night. The random terrestrial echos of Loma Prieta wore nerves down and going to stand in a doorway for protection got to be rote and annoying, I recall watching a segment on aftershocks on the local evening news during which an aftershock struck.
But I must note that, on the day of the quake I witnessed a sort of shell-shocked benevolence from everyone I saw from Union Square to the Western Addition to Alamo Square. Out of a newly discovered sense of shared frailty people began looking out for each other; for example. as there were no traffic signals operating civilians even stood in intersections, directing traffic. This I witnessed.
The quake shook common purpose out of us all and ruptured the lines that alienated one from the other. A lot of good was unleashed on October 17, 1989. Years later, I heard a phrase that rang out most truth listening to a CD I'd bought outside a supermarket from an aspiring hiphop artist. “The only time we deal with one another's when there's an earthquake”.
The Loma Prieta Earthquake, of course, took lives and those aftershocks left scars.
Ten days after the quake my friend Robin Dolan and I took BART into Oakland to see Eurythmics at the Kaiser Auditorium. The train rolled past the collapsed Cypress Freeway where several lost lives-- their l. As the concert began, Annie Lennox strutted on stage asking us all “How are you doing Bay Area”?
We were okay just then-- some of us. Qr just starting to begin to be okay.
After the quake, Dorothy became even more anxious about Andrea and phobic of going pretty much anywhere.
She stopped going to the opera. She offered me her tickets to a performance of Tannhauser and wished me well.
As I climbed all the stairs to her nosebleed seats, I recall seeing the many cracks running through the walls of the Opera House stairwell.
-------------
Self Assessment
This was hard.
I began this account about a traumatic experience while waiting in Oakland's Housing Assistance Center-- ground zero for anxiety. I had paperwork to fill in to challenge a capricious rent increase but I have made an appointment with an attorney and will fill in the paperwork with her. I'm writing this to step out of the stress of the moment.
The attorney appointment this Wednesday was the victory I sought on Monday.
My city's current rental plight is this day's earthquake of greed, taking lives and leaving many unsheltered.
I completed this Tuesday afternoon.
In the morning I attended a poll workers' training and, although I'd had a full night's sleep, an hour and a half in, I became sleepy and was almost unable to concentrate.
After a short break two and quarter hours in, the course went on for another hour and I grew edgy and-- internally-- upset.
I was ravenously hungry when I got home so I cooked and ate lunch then wrote for an hour and a half but grew weary.
I posted this in the evening, after wrapping up just before 7pm.
It'll undoubtedly will need clean up.
Sunday, October 21, 2018
Saturday, October 20, 2018
Karaoke Tunes - You're Only Lonely
If “So I Heard” exists to present songs that I especially admire, I guess the best indication of my admiration of a song would be the fact that I attempt it or assail it when at Karaoke.
So that is the meaning of “Karaoke Tunes”.
I love both the lyric and the melody of J.D. Souther's “You're Only Lonely”.
If the KJ can modulate the key of a song, this song is absolutely one that I ask to be taken down at least three keys-- or else my rendition of it is far less than lovely.
This song should not be confused with Roy Orbison's “Only the Lonely” which is an anthem for every lonely soul.
While “You're Only Lonely” has a sound-alike title, the lyric is a heartwarming and tender address from one vulnerable person to another pledging understanding if contacted for the mere reason of loneliness.
The original performer, J.D. Souther, has a estimable body of work. Though possibly largely unknown to most pop and rock followers, he is by no means obscure.
Souther may be regarded as a one hit wonder. “You're Only Lonely’ is his only solo recording to chart in the Top 40, but he can be heard dueting with James Taylor on 1981’s “Her Town Too”. He also co-wrote an Eagles hit or two including "Best of My Love", "Heartache Tonight", and "New Kid in Town".
(An Indugence While on This Topic/Tangent: I must note that another karaoke fave of mine is “Best of My Love”.
Once, when I put in that song title for karaoke, when I got the mic I was surprised to discover that-- while the karaoke book listed the Eagles song-- the track that came on was the Maurice White-penned “Best of My Love” performed by the Emotions.
Unfazed, I performed the lyrics of the Eagles song--as I remembered them-- to the tune of the Emotions song.
The refrain of both is the same:“Oh-oh-oh-OH! You got/get the best of my love, etc.” The one difference; the Eagles say “Sweet darling”.)
J.D. Souther
You're Only Lonely
https://youtu.be/quglprlSQ8k
I don't own the rights to this song or performance.
The link is offered to facilitate an appreciation of the song named.
--------------------
Self Assessment
This post gestated a long while in concept so was relatively easy to write given my connection to the song. As with the previous written posts, I imaging some cleanup will be necessary
So that is the meaning of “Karaoke Tunes”.
I love both the lyric and the melody of J.D. Souther's “You're Only Lonely”.
If the KJ can modulate the key of a song, this song is absolutely one that I ask to be taken down at least three keys-- or else my rendition of it is far less than lovely.
This song should not be confused with Roy Orbison's “Only the Lonely” which is an anthem for every lonely soul.
While “You're Only Lonely” has a sound-alike title, the lyric is a heartwarming and tender address from one vulnerable person to another pledging understanding if contacted for the mere reason of loneliness.
The original performer, J.D. Souther, has a estimable body of work. Though possibly largely unknown to most pop and rock followers, he is by no means obscure.
Souther may be regarded as a one hit wonder. “You're Only Lonely’ is his only solo recording to chart in the Top 40, but he can be heard dueting with James Taylor on 1981’s “Her Town Too”. He also co-wrote an Eagles hit or two including "Best of My Love", "Heartache Tonight", and "New Kid in Town".
(An Indugence While on This Topic/Tangent: I must note that another karaoke fave of mine is “Best of My Love”.
Once, when I put in that song title for karaoke, when I got the mic I was surprised to discover that-- while the karaoke book listed the Eagles song-- the track that came on was the Maurice White-penned “Best of My Love” performed by the Emotions.
Unfazed, I performed the lyrics of the Eagles song--as I remembered them-- to the tune of the Emotions song.
The refrain of both is the same:“Oh-oh-oh-OH! You got/get the best of my love, etc.” The one difference; the Eagles say “Sweet darling”.)
J.D. Souther
You're Only Lonely
https://youtu.be/quglprlSQ8k
I don't own the rights to this song or performance.
The link is offered to facilitate an appreciation of the song named.
--------------------
Self Assessment
This post gestated a long while in concept so was relatively easy to write given my connection to the song. As with the previous written posts, I imaging some cleanup will be necessary
Thursday, October 18, 2018
Iowa
Iowa - State #36
"I hate hate hate Temecula
On a level that's almost moleculah"
This is one of several rhymes I invented with my friend Eric Birnbaum to keep ourselves laughing and sane during our days in the travel industry.
I'd never been to Temecula. I don't know whether I really would hate it on a level that's almost molecular. Temecula was once described to me by friends who'd been there as a decidedly lackluster town where one building housed the local fine arts center and the town jail.
But never mind: I'm not trying to discuss Temecula.
I'm here to discuss the state of Iowa.
"I hate hate hate hate Iowa
And if you ask why, I'll reply, 'Uh, duh'”
As I mentioned earlier, I find something to love about most places-- but one place I've been which rubbed me all the way the wrong way is the state of Iowa.*
My Arrival
I arrived in Iowa on public transit: a city bus. I boarded the bus in Omaha, having “detrained” from Amtrak's California Zephyr a few hours earlier.
My departure from the train began with the sleeping car attendant’s cheerful wake-up notice: "YOU HAVE TO GET OFF THE TRAIN NOW!!"
Several slapstick minutes ensued as I hastily packed and tried to locate my wallet and was essentially thrown off the slowly moving train onto the siding along with my bags.
The Zephyr chugged away.
I sat awhile in the sad modern one story Amtrak station situated between Omaha’s TWO rail palaces. In the station’s molded plastic peace, I located my wallet in my luggage and tried to unjangle my nerves.
Dauntlessly, I then proceeded out to catch a local bus to cross the river--- and discover Council Bluffs, IA.
Council Bluffs
The name Council Bluffs conjures an image of an earnest windswept hamlet perched high above the mighty Missouri.
The bus instead deposited me with my wheely in what appeared to be a forlorn industrial park. I'd misjudged my stop and was still about a mile from my destination.
In the still June morning, everything was flat (no bluffs). There was no view but everywhere that there wasn't lawn there was asphalt. I saw a Bass Pro megastore. I saw an Applebee's. I saw a strip club.
I wended my way to the distant Hilton Garden inn.
When I found it, I was surprised to discover it was connected to a casino, and on the far side of the casino, another undistinguished hotel.
This entire gaming complex sat beside a large factory which, given its smell, served to produce any number of noxious chemical concoctions used in agriculture.
The “Iowa Way”
It was early so I didn't expect I'd get a room right away. I did get something unexpected-- big time front desk attitude. I acknowledged my early arrival and acknowledged I knew that being assigned a room would be a courtesy.
I believe the charming reply I got was, “Well, you'll have to wait.”
I parked myself on an ugly lobby couch and sipped nasty lobby coffee. After twenty minutes of looking cheerfully expectant as several parties arrived after me and received rooms, I opted instead to look sullen and irritated, hoping the front desk would give me a room just to relieve themselves of their view of me.
After two hours, there was an apparent shift change.
I stepped up and asked the new desk clerk “Yes yes, I know I'm terribly early but might be assigned a room?”
The new clerk fairly quickly found me a room.
"Memories of your Stay in Iowa"
I recall that there might have been in issue with the room key and the need to exchange it for another key but why make that part of the narrative?
Why continue to tell of going to eat at the casino buffet and discovering , that unlike most casino food outlets, this one was extravagantly expensive?
The die of my Iowa experience had been cast in that lobby and for the next 24 hours there was no way I could learn the love this place.
I woke next morning, had the lobby breakfast included in the room rate, grabbed my bag, checked out and was soon waiting for the city bus back to my comparatively beloved Omaha.
Did I Give Iowa a Chance to Unspool her Charm?
One night does seem like short shrift and I believe I haven't fully enjoyed some states in which I passed only one night.
Texas definitely, Utah almost certainly, very likely Arkansas when I get there. (I intend to “cross-river-one-night” on a return trip to Memphis).
But, Iowa…. No. Girl, you had your chance and you showed me all kinds of ugly.
Who can say what rural dystopian shocks would await one in yet another night in Iowa?
Next up: I'll discuss some place I found charming. I haven't decided which-- most places I've been qualify.
* This account is not the experience I had two years earlier when I crossed the Bob Kerrey Pedestrian Bridge from Omaha into Iowa in 100° heat and posted on Facebook these words: I am abandoning this expedition into Iowa. Iowa is uninhabitable.
Self Assessment
This piece wasn't written cold. It's an account of actual occurrences, really its composition involved deciding how much of the history of a bad bit of travel I wanted to share. I'd begun composing it on a walk and sat down to write. This slight effort took just over three hours to complete-- it seems to make sense that a piece about a place remembered bad memories would inspire a written piece which can be completed briskly . I'm sure it will need some cleaning up.
"I hate hate hate Temecula
On a level that's almost moleculah"
This is one of several rhymes I invented with my friend Eric Birnbaum to keep ourselves laughing and sane during our days in the travel industry.
I'd never been to Temecula. I don't know whether I really would hate it on a level that's almost molecular. Temecula was once described to me by friends who'd been there as a decidedly lackluster town where one building housed the local fine arts center and the town jail.
But never mind: I'm not trying to discuss Temecula.
I'm here to discuss the state of Iowa.
"I hate hate hate hate Iowa
And if you ask why, I'll reply, 'Uh, duh'”
As I mentioned earlier, I find something to love about most places-- but one place I've been which rubbed me all the way the wrong way is the state of Iowa.*
My Arrival
I arrived in Iowa on public transit: a city bus. I boarded the bus in Omaha, having “detrained” from Amtrak's California Zephyr a few hours earlier.
My departure from the train began with the sleeping car attendant’s cheerful wake-up notice: "YOU HAVE TO GET OFF THE TRAIN NOW!!"
Several slapstick minutes ensued as I hastily packed and tried to locate my wallet and was essentially thrown off the slowly moving train onto the siding along with my bags.
The Zephyr chugged away.
I sat awhile in the sad modern one story Amtrak station situated between Omaha’s TWO rail palaces. In the station’s molded plastic peace, I located my wallet in my luggage and tried to unjangle my nerves.
Dauntlessly, I then proceeded out to catch a local bus to cross the river--- and discover Council Bluffs, IA.
Council Bluffs
The name Council Bluffs conjures an image of an earnest windswept hamlet perched high above the mighty Missouri.
The bus instead deposited me with my wheely in what appeared to be a forlorn industrial park. I'd misjudged my stop and was still about a mile from my destination.
In the still June morning, everything was flat (no bluffs). There was no view but everywhere that there wasn't lawn there was asphalt. I saw a Bass Pro megastore. I saw an Applebee's. I saw a strip club.
I wended my way to the distant Hilton Garden inn.
When I found it, I was surprised to discover it was connected to a casino, and on the far side of the casino, another undistinguished hotel.
This entire gaming complex sat beside a large factory which, given its smell, served to produce any number of noxious chemical concoctions used in agriculture.
The “Iowa Way”
It was early so I didn't expect I'd get a room right away. I did get something unexpected-- big time front desk attitude. I acknowledged my early arrival and acknowledged I knew that being assigned a room would be a courtesy.
I believe the charming reply I got was, “Well, you'll have to wait.”
I parked myself on an ugly lobby couch and sipped nasty lobby coffee. After twenty minutes of looking cheerfully expectant as several parties arrived after me and received rooms, I opted instead to look sullen and irritated, hoping the front desk would give me a room just to relieve themselves of their view of me.
After two hours, there was an apparent shift change.
I stepped up and asked the new desk clerk “Yes yes, I know I'm terribly early but might be assigned a room?”
The new clerk fairly quickly found me a room.
"Memories of your Stay in Iowa"
I recall that there might have been in issue with the room key and the need to exchange it for another key but why make that part of the narrative?
Why continue to tell of going to eat at the casino buffet and discovering , that unlike most casino food outlets, this one was extravagantly expensive?
The die of my Iowa experience had been cast in that lobby and for the next 24 hours there was no way I could learn the love this place.
I woke next morning, had the lobby breakfast included in the room rate, grabbed my bag, checked out and was soon waiting for the city bus back to my comparatively beloved Omaha.
Did I Give Iowa a Chance to Unspool her Charm?
One night does seem like short shrift and I believe I haven't fully enjoyed some states in which I passed only one night.
Texas definitely, Utah almost certainly, very likely Arkansas when I get there. (I intend to “cross-river-one-night” on a return trip to Memphis).
But, Iowa…. No. Girl, you had your chance and you showed me all kinds of ugly.
Who can say what rural dystopian shocks would await one in yet another night in Iowa?
Next up: I'll discuss some place I found charming. I haven't decided which-- most places I've been qualify.
* This account is not the experience I had two years earlier when I crossed the Bob Kerrey Pedestrian Bridge from Omaha into Iowa in 100° heat and posted on Facebook these words: I am abandoning this expedition into Iowa. Iowa is uninhabitable.
Self Assessment
This piece wasn't written cold. It's an account of actual occurrences, really its composition involved deciding how much of the history of a bad bit of travel I wanted to share. I'd begun composing it on a walk and sat down to write. This slight effort took just over three hours to complete-- it seems to make sense that a piece about a place remembered bad memories would inspire a written piece which can be completed briskly . I'm sure it will need some cleaning up.
Sunday, October 14, 2018
Saturday, October 13, 2018
The Chronic Pain of Naivety
I've had this lifelong insecurity around the dreaded suspicion that my very nature is hobbled by chronic naivety.
This culture’s general attitude is that naivety is childish, a foolish and easily fooled frame of mind out of which a well-adjusted adult must grow. It's regarded as shameful to an adult yet naive. But, it's apparently not a state out of which some of us grow.
Perhaps our culture should recognize that the inability not to be naive-- like blindness or deafness-- is not a deficiency. And, just as it would be morally repugnant to mock a person's blindness or deafness, asserting cynical advantage on a person unaware of deviousness is stooping beneath acceptable human stature.
Merely a suggestion-- and admittedly one made out of self-preservation.
Perhaps our culture should recognize that the inability not to be naive-- like blindness or deafness-- is not a deficiency. And, just as it would be morally repugnant to mock a person's blindness or deafness, asserting cynical advantage on a person unaware of deviousness is stooping beneath acceptable human stature.
Merely a suggestion-- and admittedly one made out of self-preservation.
The best illustration I can make of the nature of my character to which I refer is my reaction to two separate friends playing the same game.
Sometime in the mid-80’s, I and a group of friends-- artsy theater types-- sat and played the game “Scruples".
The game, as I recall, consisted of selecting cards, each presenting a moral dilemma. The card-drawer would share with the group how she would react to this dilemma. The group in response would share their opinion of the card-drawer’s “confession”.
It's significant that I don't have a clue from that first experience how the game is scored or how one wins. I don’t recall who won-- that wasn’t the point, it seemed.
The second time I played “Scruples” was about year later, again with a completely different group of artsy theater types. My initial enthusiasm about participating drained away as I witnessed this group’s approach to the game.
Scoring and winning was very much the point of the game and one successfully gained points by being utterly disingenuous about how one would react to the moral dilemma presented on the game’s cards. The more convincingly you lied, the more points you gained. It was explained to me that the game had no point otherwise.
I’m sure I grew huffy; I don’t recall who won but, even though I must have tried to adjust to this new and unexpected strategy, I’m sure I didn’t score many points. (My passive-aggressive revenge was to contribute names such as “Dame Kiri Te Kanawa” and “Hermes Pan” in a subsequent game of Charades.)
I consider most of the individuals with whom I played these two different versions of the same game friends and make no judgment on their character or morality.
But I do assert that I believe we are now in the midst of a massive national game of Scruples and I am appalled at the utter dishonesty of those have always claimed the higher ground-- which I will assert include members of my own family.
Much has been made of the recent confirmation hearings for a very dishonest individual to sit on this country’s highest court. Sharp criticisms have been made of the uncertain and ultimately unsuccessful efforts of the Democrats on the Senate Judicial Committee to hold a arrogant undistinguished man to account for recent unethical professional behavior and his patter as a young adult of exploiting intoxicated individuals.
I’ve heard for years of the U.S. Senate’s decorum, a kind of institutional naivety, grounded on the high-minded and-- perhaps-- utterly foolish notion that we as a nation are all pulling in the same direction. If the Democrats on the Judicial Committee seemed haplessly unmoored, they were-- from the principle that the Senate’s decorum would surely prevent the Republicans from forcing rotten meat into the country’s gullet.
But-- lo and behold-- there was the wizened Senator from the Smelly Dump of Rot in the Heart of the Heartland (this, by the way, is a clue to the riddle on the So I Went page) presiding over the foisting of diseased mediocrity onto another national institution which demands always superior candidates.
I can’t prescribe a remedy for the pain of such injury. Personally, pain relievers have never worked on me and my other meds are not showing much effect on my overall depression and confusion.
It is not wrong to feel unmoored when the person opposite you abandons principle and continually changes the rules, so much so that the once familiar game is unrecognizable.
It is, at last, all one can do to stand aghast regarding these New Strangers, who once were countrymen and family, with an unconcealed expression of stricken naivety.
Expecting them to have a corrective crisis of conscience is a voyage beyond naivety’s Final Frontier.
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Self Assessment: This was an unusually easy task in conception and composition, especially given the wretched insomnia I suffered last night and my lack of sleep.
Sometimes, when feelings are strong, words flow more readily and for most of the day yesterday I was more depressed than I've been in months.
While I'm pleased with the way this came out, it doesn't represent work I'm capable of under the weight of a deadline or expectations of consistency.
This links back to my first examination by a neurologist. After a brief series of simple tests his estimation was that I was all right. I had to advise him that I am conditioned to perform well on tests and let him know the mnemonic tricks I used to get my replies. Having coping skills to succeed at tests are literally brilliant-- until your coping skills begin to fail.
Sometimes, when feelings are strong, words flow more readily and for most of the day yesterday I was more depressed than I've been in months.
While I'm pleased with the way this came out, it doesn't represent work I'm capable of under the weight of a deadline or expectations of consistency.
This links back to my first examination by a neurologist. After a brief series of simple tests his estimation was that I was all right. I had to advise him that I am conditioned to perform well on tests and let him know the mnemonic tricks I used to get my replies. Having coping skills to succeed at tests are literally brilliant-- until your coping skills begin to fail.
Friday, October 12, 2018
“What Exactly are You Trying to Accomplish Here?”
Thank you, dear reader, for asking.
This blog is a space in which I can write while assessing my capacity to successfully write what I intended to write.
My unremarkable brain lately has been presenting me with a host of cognitive issues. In some instances, I've concluded that some of these issues have been lifelong and I am suffering from an onset of being unable to compensate for them.
Oh, just forget I wrote that…
I am attempting a blog to tell the world:
- So I Thought - my opinions, my musings and recipes (there will be at least two recipes). I know I share my opinion frequently on Facebook but why give it away free? If you believe my opinions on Facebook-- or anywhere-- are obnoxious, please proceed to number 2;
- So I Went - wherein I regale the reader with tales of adventure abroad and an occasional frightful mishap;
- So I Saw - hopefully the blog's simplest page to enjoy, where I share images and possibly explain what's in the picture;
- So I Heard - I intend to write a brief appreciation of the songs and pieces of music I love. Trying to sort out if I can link to a YouTube video of a song and not invite a lawsuit-- otherwise I may be reduced to explaining which Christmas carol is sheer Hell for folks afflicted with anxiety;
- Sale. aka Page In Process - a fifth page where anyone can go to order a print of one of my images, at a nominal cost (which I still haven;t done the math to figure out). If you wish to have a lovely 8' x 10' print of any of my images before the "Sale" page is up and fully operational, please contact me at dcooperate@gmail.com.
Just to make things interesting, I created a "The Brain is Unremarkable" blog first on WordPress, before I finally chose Blogger on which to unfurl the Unremarkable Brain flag.
If it is mad to do something in a mad rush, then to do the thing twice in the mad rush is, well, madness.
My commitment to Blogger proceeded my knowledge that having a blog with separate pages is not a Blogger thing.
But there are workarounds which, dear reader, we shall explore together.
We're on a journey and you have my promise that-- if the bridge is out-- I will have figured out a way to cross before we reach the river.
Or we may just sit and admire the river awhile.
Tuesday, October 9, 2018
orange clamoring dahlias
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| orange clamoring dahlias old oakland farmers market, oakland ca |
Sunday, October 7, 2018
red POW rose
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red POW rose
gardens at lake merritt, oakland, ca
This page, ”So I Saw”, will showcase my photography.
I make no claim to great skill as a photographer. Basically, what I present are simply moments that I have had the good fortune to capture.
The page’s launch will progressively feature a collection of seven images entitled R O Y G B I V.
I’ll explain the wherefore of the collection and its name in detail after I've posted one complete trip through the spectrum.
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...and after a year I had an obligatory CAT scan...
The brief report of the scan's non-findings might have read, “Looked inside patient's head. Found nothing”.
But a medical professional would never offer a diagnosis with such an insulting subtext.
No? My report concluded with this observation:
"The sinuses are clear. The brain is unremarkable."
And so it goes...
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