Mar 8
THE 100 YEAR PERSPECTIVE
The year is 1909 - One hundred years ago. What a difference a century makes! Here are some of the U.S. statistics for that Year:
The average life expectancy in the U.S. was 47 years.
Only 14 percent of the homes in the U.S. had a bathtub.
Only 8 percent of the homes had a telephone, and a 3 minute call from Denver to New York City cost $11.00.
There were only 8,000 cars in the U.S., and only 144 miles of paved roads. The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.
Alabama, Mississippi, Iowa and Tennessee were each more heavily populated than California. With a mere 1.4 million people, California was only the 21st most populous state in the Union.
The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower.
The average wage in the U.S. was 22 cents per hour. The average U.S. worker made between $200 and $400 per year. A competent accountant could expect to earn $2000 per year; a dentist $2,500 per year; a veterinarian between $1,500 and $4,000 per year; and a mechanical engineer about $5,000 per year.
More than 95 percent of all births in the U.S. took place at home.
Ninety percent of all U.S. doctors had no college education. Instead, they attended so-called medical schools, many of which were condemned in the press AND the government as “substandard.”
Sugar cost four cents a pound. Eggs were fourteen cents a dozen. Coffee was fifteen cents a pound.
Most women only washed their hair once a month, and used borax or egg yolks for shampoo.
Canada passed a law that prohibited poor people from entering into their country for any reason.
The 5 leading causes of death in the U.S. were:
(1) Pneumonia and Influenza, (2) Tuberculosis, (3) Diarrhea, (4) Heart Disease and (5) Stroke.
The American flag had 45 stars. Arizona, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Hawaii and Alaska hadn’t been admitted to the Union yet.
The population of Las Vegas, Nevada, was only 30.
Crossword puzzles, canned beer and iced tea hadn’t been invented yet.
There was no Mother’s Day or Father’s Day.
Two out of every 10 U.S. adults couldn’t read or write. Only 6 percent of all Americans had graduated from high school.
Eighteen percent of households in the U.S. had at least one full-time servant or domestic help.
There were about 230 reported murders in the entire U.S.A.
Try to imagine, if you can, what it may be like in another 100 years?!
Mar 7
A LAZY SATURDAY MOTIVATOR
This picture was taken in 1918, when approximately 18,000 men were preparing for war in a training camp at Camp Dodge in Iowa. A gift from our grandfathers.
Mar 6
EVERYTHING FOR EVERYONE
AKA, Everything’s Amazing, and Nobody is Happy! Here’s a little dose of reality for you, and me (Re: The Transition Home). If this poem doesn’t give you a real world perspective, then check out the Conan “YouTube” clip below, contributed by my college buddy and former crew coxswain, Shahin Razavi, originally from Iran. The Carl Dennis work was sent by Colin McKee, formerly a featured writer, as some of you may remember, and also a Tolstoy fan.
In the Coffee Shop
The big smile the waitress gives you
May be a true expression of her opinion
Or may be her way to atone for glowering
A moment ago at a customer who slurped his coffee
Just the way her cynical second husband slurped his.
Think of the meager tip you left the taxi driver
After the trip from the airport, how it didn’t express
Your judgment about his service but about the snow
That left you feeling the earth a tundra
Only the frugal few could hope to cross.
Maybe it’s best to look for fairness
Not in any particular unbiased judgment
But in a history of mistakes that balance out,
To find an equivalent for the pooling of tips
Practiced by the staff of the coffee shop,
Adding them up and dividing, the same to each.
As for the chilly fish eye the busboy gave you
When told to clear the window table you wanted,
It may have been less a comment on you
Than on his parents, their dismissing the many favors
He does for them as skimpy installments
On a debt too massive to be paid off.
And what about favors you haven’t earned?
The blonde who’s passing the window now
Without so much as a glance in your direction
Might be trying to focus her mind on her performance
So you, or someone like you, will be pleased to watch
As she crosses the square in her leather snow boots
And tunic of red velvet, fur-trimmed.
What have you done for her that she should turn
The stones of the public buildings
Into a backdrop, a crosswalk into a stage floor,
A table in a no-frills coffee shop
Into a private box near the orchestra?
Yesterday she may have murmured against the fate
That keeps her stuck in the provinces.
But today she atones with her wish to please
As she dispenses with footlights and spotlights,
With a curtain call at the end, with encores.
No way to thank her but with attention
Now as she nears the steps of the courthouse
And begins her unhurried exit into the crowd.
Mar 5
THE ENERGY OF AN EMBRACE
This may be too touchy-feely for some of you pinheads, but so be it. It’s all about the homecoming and, unless you’ve experienced extremely long periods without any real physical contact, you wouldn’t get it. But I know this as a real, human factor that totally affects a person’s health and well-being. Contributed by my dear friend, Teressa, from Springfield, Missouri, who I met at a Ray LaMontagne concert at the Tabernacle in Atlanta not so many years ago.
The Energy of an Embrace
Hugs
The need to touch and be touched is established early in our lives, as we develop and grow in the omnipresent embrace of our mother’s womb. Once we are born, separated from that sanctuary of connectivity, we begin to crave the physical embrace of our parents. As we age, we become more independent.
Yet during times of triumph or trouble, and during those moments when we are in need of reassurance, we can’t help but long for a hug. Because a hug requires two active participants, each individual taking part in the embrace experiences the pleasure of being embraced and the joy that comes from hugging someone. As both individuals wrap their arms around one another, their energy blends together, and they experience a tangible feeling of togetherness that lingers long after physical contact has been broken.
A heart hug is when you put your left arm over someone’s shoulder and your right arm around their waist. As they do the same to you, your hearts become aligned with one another other and loving, comforting energy flows between the two of you to flood your souls with feelings of love, caring and compassion.
A hug is a pleasurable way to share your feelings with someone who is important to you. Depending on your relationship with the other person and the kind of message you wish to send to them, a hug can communicate love, friendship, romance, congratulations, support, greeting and any other sentiment you wish to convey. A hug communicates to others that you are there for them in a positive way.
In an instant, a hug can re-establish a bond between long lost friends and comfort those in pain. The next time you hug someone, focus all of your energy into the embrace. You will create a profound connection that infuses your feelings and sentiments into a single beautiful gesture.
Mar 4
THE ORACLE OF BACON
The Oracle of Bacon, as it relates to “Six Degrees of Separation,” has really nothing to do with what comes next, UNLESS you can find the common link among the posting below:
British soldiers arrived in colonial India wearing crisp white uniforms that turned light brown after being exposed to the dry earth and muddy waters. The Indians dubbed the color “khaki” - Urdu for dust - and the name has become synonymous with practical, comfortable pants.
Jon Anderson once wrote a song about a trip to Las Vegas following an all-night binge when he was stoned, gambling, and happened to look down, in his stuper, early the next morning and see a little girl with flowers in her hair….. “Caesar’s Palace morning glory, silly human race - yours is no disgrace.”
In 1940, two prototype vehicles named “QUADs” were delivered to Camp Holland, Maryland, for testing. After positive results, U.S. Army officials promptly ordered 1500 more. These General Purpose vehicles, “GP” for short, are what we commonly know as ”jeeps” today.
The well known Hell’s Angel, Sonny Barger, once stated that there are 3 kinds of people in the world: “Those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who wonder, ‘What the fuck happened?’”
When you “Google” Woody Harrelson’s photo, the series of pictures copied above appears. Profound, perhaps, yet apt. Woody, a charitable and generous sort, is also a bit of a ramrod and, as it turns out (surprisingly), quite a prolific writer. Bear witness:
“A new day, trembling with potential.
I am the potentiate, and my life is equal to the task
of living, of loving, of moving my love.
Yesterday I wallowed in me-hood,
Following a well-worn path.
Today, I jump from bridges,
Dance on tiny windowsills high above
the ubiquitous crowd of unsuspecting faces.
Combative. Angry. Hostile.
Those were the bedrock of this body’s previous tenant.
And now I,
Nameless, unnameable, ergo mysterious, incorrigible
March to the musical manifestations,
The bass and harp of distant angels,
Calling me with their many magnificent mouths:
Dance, creature!
Put down your pen,
Lift up your limbs,
And dance to greet another golden morning.
(Marconi)
Mar 3
SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION
Once again, my friends, I feel compelled to let someone else do most of my work for me, if you could call it that. Must be part of my Warrier Transition training, that whole idea of a cooling down decompression campaign to help soothe the savage beast. Anyway, I’ve been having these deja vu moments lately that seem like more than mere coincidences (running into long lost friends in Iraq, for example). And since I’m a proponent of the S.D.O.S. theory from way back (which, BTW, was apparently proven to be true as a result of a recent collaborative effort by Google and Microsoft), I figure this is a worthy topic. If you don’t think so, then go read something else.
Six degrees of separation (also referred to as the “Human Web”) refers to the idea that, if a person is one step away from each person they know and two steps away from each person who is known by one of the people they know, then everyone is no more than six “steps” away from each person on Earth. The easier way to understand this is that Person A only needs a maximum of five people in between to connect to Person B, assuming they (A & B) don’t otherwise know each other. This theory surmises that anyone on the planet can be connected to any other person on the planet through a chain of acquaintances. The theory was first proposed in 1929 by the Hungarian writer Frigyes Karinthy in a short story called “Chains.”
In the 1950’s, Ithiel de Sola Pool (MIT) and Manfred Kochen (IBM) set out to prove the theory mathematically. Although they were able to phrase the question, after twenty years they were still unable to solve the problem to their own satisfaction. In 1967, American sociologist Stanley Milgram devised a new way to test the theory, which he called “the small-world problem.” He randomly selected people in the mid-West to send packages to a stranger located in Massachusetts. The senders knew the recipient’s name, occupation and general location. They were instructed to send the package to a person they knew on a first-name basis who they thought was most likely, out of all their friends, to know the target personally. That person would do the same, and so on, until the package was personally delivered to its target recipient.
Although the participants expected the chain to include at least a 100 intermediaries, it only took (on average) between 5 and 7 intermediaries to get each package delivered. Milgram’s findings were published in Psychology Today and inspired the phrase “six degrees of separation.” Although Milgram’s findings were discounted after it was discovered that he based his conclusion on a very small number of packages, six degrees of separation became an accepted notion in pop culture after Brett C. Tjaden published a computer game on the University of Virginia’s Web site based on the small-world problem. Tjaden used the Internet to document connections between different actors. Time Magazine called his site, The Oracle of Bacon at Virginia, one of the “Ten Best Web Sites of 1996.”
In 2001, Duncan Watts, a professor at Columbia University, continued his own earlier research into the phenomenon and recreated Milgram’s experiment on the Internet. Watts used an e-mail message as the “package” that needed to be delivered, and surprisingly, after reviewing the data collected by 48,000 senders and 19 targets (in 157 countries), Watts found that the average number of intermediaries was indeed, six. Watts’ research, and the advent of the computer age, has opened up new areas of inquiry related to six degrees of separation in diverse areas of network theory.
Statist theories on optimal design of cities, city traffic flows and neighborhoods and demographics were in vogue after WWI. These conjectures were expanded in 1929 after Karinthy (the Hungarian author mentioned above) published a volume of short stories titled “Everything is Different,” which included “Chains.” Due to advances in communications and travel, friendship networks could grow larger and span greater distances. In particular, Karinthy believed that the modern world was “shrinking” due to this ever-increasing connectedness of human beings. He posited that despite great physical distances between the globe’s individuals, the growing density of human networks made the actual social distance far smaller.
In his story, the characters create a game out of this notion (remember, this was in 1929). His character waggered that, using no more than five individuals, one of whom is a personal acquaintance, he could contact the selected individual using nothing except the network of personal acquaintances. His story led to much early thought on the idea. In fact, the first primitive computer simulations ran in 1973 and, although limited, were able to predict that a more realistic three degrees of separation existed across the U.S. population.
When the Psychology Today article gave the experiments wide publicity, Milgram, Kochen and Karinthy all had been incorrectly attributed as the origin of the notion of Six Degrees; however, the most likely popularizer of the term “Six Degrees of Separation” would be John Guare (American playwright, from his 1990 play of the same name), who attributed the value ’six’ to Marconi. That’s right, fucking Marchese Guglielmo Marconi (1874 - 1937), the Italian inventor of the radio who, you may remember, figured prominently in my posts on “The Day the Pigs Ate my Sister.”
The phrase “six degrees of separation” is often used as a synonym for the idea of the “small world” phenomenon. Although the ”six degrees” claim has been decried as an “academic urban myth,” a 2007 study examined a data set of instant messages composed of 30 billion conversations among 240 million people. They found the average path length among Microsoft Messenger users to be 6.6 (some now call the theory, “the seven degrees of separation”). The following provide a brief outline of the ways such ideas have shaped popular culture:
(1) The popular games “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” and “Six Degrees of Wikipedia.”
(2) SixDegrees.com was an early social networking site based on this concept.
(3) In 2007, Kevin Bacon launched SixDegrees.org, a web site that builds on the popularity of this idea to create a charitable social network and inspire giving to charities online.
(4) A Facebook platform application named “Six Degrees” has been developed which calculates the degrees of separation between different people. It has about 4.5 million users (as of April 7, 2008), and the average separation for all users of the application is 5.73 degrees.
(5) The UK-based game company Mind Candy is currently testing the theory by distributing a picture of a Japanese man named Satoshi.
Mar 2
MARCH BIRTHDAYS
March 12th: My dear friend from college, Cindy Toda, celebrates her birthday today. I’m pretty sure she is still in her late 20’s. She has always had a youthful spirit and lots of energy, and I can’t think of too many other people I know who are as well balanced as Cindy (and my friends are all well balanced, smile). For those who don’t know her, CT is the creator of this great site which has allowed me to maintain some assemblance of contact with all of you during my deployment. Cindy resides in St. Augustine & Jacksonville, FL; Central America; Denver; Detroit; Panama and, occasionally, San Diego. Live long, my friend!
March 12th: My young friend, Micaiah, is learning to drive. She is the daughter of my very dear friend, Tarron, who shared a particular near-death experience with me now many years past. Micaiah and her mom are helping me to predict certain emotional events in the life of a teenage girl. And I am paying close attention to those clues, as Jessie Rae has hit adolescence full force. Tarron, Doron, Micaiah and Hannah live in Dallas, Tx.
March 17th: I’ve long since lost touch with my friend, Wenny Wigley, from Pensacola, FL, but I watched her grow up as a young woman, then work her way through college (Emery in Atlanta) and post-graduate school. I still keep in loose contact with her family and visit them when I am in the Florida Panhandle. I always knew Wenny would do great things in life, I’m just not sure what they are. So, wherever you are, Wen, I wish you well (D.C.?).
March 21st: My brother, Doug, the great writer, scholar, intellectual and acquirer of good music, celebrates his birthday on the first day of Spring. Doogalay is just a few years my junior and we have always been close. He was always “the smart one,” “the good looking one,” etc. Of course, he was also the prototypical middle child and he ran away on more than one occasion. The Dude spent years overcoming his mommy complex. The guy truly is brilliant and, someday, I’m sure he will write one of the many novels he’s been developing for years. He’ll probably quit smoking and lose weight, too… when pigs fly. Dougster and his better half, Cindy, and her boys, Tanner and Luke, live in Escondido, CA.
March 21st: Rich Voslow is another dear friend from college who has always been there for me, through thick and thin, and I am indebted to him for his kindness and generosity (though he has never made me feel like I owe him anything) - a true, good friend. He is the kind of guy who is happy being behind the scenes, but always has a hand in ensuring everything runs smoothly (The Wizard: “Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!”). He is also one hell of a party planner and host, and I am always pleasantly surprised at his broad range of guests and surprises. Rich live in Seattle, WA, a great place to visit for whatever ails you.
Mar 1
SUNDAY MORNING INSPIRATION
‘When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn’t bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So my grandfather does it for her all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That’s love.’ (Rebecca - 8)
‘When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth.’ (Billy - 4)
‘Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other.’ (Karl - 5)
‘Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your fries without making them give you any of theirs.’ (Chrissy - 6)
‘Love is what makes you smile when you’re tired.’ (Terri - 4)
‘Love is when my mommy makes coffee for my daddy and she takes a sip before giving it to him, to make sure the taste is OK.’ (Danny - 7)
‘Love is when you kiss all the time. Then when you get tired of kissing, you still want to be together and you talk more. My Mommy and Daddy are like that. They look gross when they kiss’ (Emily - 8)
‘Love is what’s in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen.’ (Bobby - 7)
‘If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend who you hate,’ (Nikka - 6)
‘Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it everyday.’ (Noelle - 7)
‘Love is like a little old woman and a little old man who are still friends even after they know each other so well.’ (Tommy - 6)
‘During my piano recital, I was on a stage and I was scared. I looked at all the people watching me and saw my daddy waving and smiling. He was the only one doing that. I wasn’t scared anymore.’ (Cindy - 8)
‘My mom loves me more than anybody. You don’t see anyone else kissing me to sleep at night.’ (Clare - 6)
‘Love is when Mom gives Dad the best piece of chicken.’ (Elaine - 5)
‘Love is when Mommy sees Daddy smelly and sweaty and still says he is handsomer than Robert Redford.’ (Chris - 7)
‘Love is when your puppy licks your face even after you left him alone all day.’ (Mary Ann - 4)
‘I know my older sister loves me because she gives me all her old clothes and has to go out and buy new ones.’ (Lauren - 4)
‘When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and down and little stars come out of you.’ (Karen - 7)
‘Love is when Mommy sees Daddy on the toilet and she doesn’t think it’s gross.’ (Mark - 6)
‘You really shouldn’t say ‘I love you’ unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget.’ (Jessica - 8)
And the final one - Author and lecturer Leo Buscaglia once talked about a contest he was asked to judge. The purpose of the contest was to find the most caring child. The winner was a four year old child whose next door neighbor was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife. Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman’s yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there.
When his Mother asked what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy said, ‘Nothing, I just helped him cry.’
Feb 27
WELCOME TO THE REPUBLICAN PARTY
She was deeply ashamed that her father was a rather staunch Republican, a feeling she openly expressed. Based on the lectures that she had participated in, and the occasional chat with a professor, she felt that her father had for years harbored an evil, selfish desire to keep what he thought should be his.
One day she was challenging her father on his opposition to higher taxes on the rich and the need for more government programs. The self-professed objectivity proclaimed by her professors had to be the truth and she indicated so to her father. He responded by asking how she was doing in school. Taken aback, she answered rather haughtily that she had a 4.0 GPA, and let him know that it was tough to maintain, insisting that she was taking a very difficult course load and was constantly studying, which left her no time to go out and party like other people she knew. She didn’t even have time for a boyfriend, and didn’t really have many college friends because she spent all her time studying.
Her father listened and then asked, “How is your friend Audrey doing?” She replied, “Audrey is barely getting by. All she takes are easy classes, she never studies, and she barely has a 2.0 GPA. She is so popular on campus; college for her is a blast. She’s always invited to all the parties, and lots of times she doesn’t even show up for classes because she’s too hung over.”
Her wise father asked his daughter, “Why don’t you go to the Dean’s office and ask him to deduct a 1.0 off your GPA and give it to your friend who only has a 2.0? That way you will both have a 3.0 GPA and certainly that would be a fair and equal distribution of GPA.” The daughter, visibly shocked by her father’s suggestion, angrily fired back, “That’s a crazy idea. How would that be fair? I’ve worked really hard for my grades! I’ve invested a lot of time, and a lot of hard work! Audrey has done next to nothing toward her degree. She played while I worked my tail off!”
The father slowly smiled, winked and said gently, “Welcome to the Republican Party, honey.”
