Lisa Moscatiello

This blog has moved

2010-03-09T17:34:00.001-08:00

This blog is now located at http://lisamosc.blogspot.com/.
You will be automatically redirected in 30 seconds, or you may click here.

For feed subscribers, please update your feed subscriptions to
http://www.lisamoscatiello.com/blogtest/atom.xml.

Dad and computers and runtime environments

2009-12-19T12:31:00.000-08:00

My dad doesn't like his Mac. He doesn't understand it. He doesn't want to understand it. He knows how to use a slide rule and understands non-Euclidean geometry, so it's not that he can't do math or can't grasp concepts. He just resents the terminology. He doesn't like the word "server," and all the other made-up, insider-y sounding terms that computer people toss around all the time. He tries to learn about it by reading books sometimes, but as soon as he sees a word like "hypertext," he gets disgusted and shuts the book.

I share some of this novelty anxiety and terminology fatigue, but I want to make myself a more useful and employable member of society. Also, I really love the internet and truly envy people who can create their own little worlds online, and so I genuinely want to overcome this temperamental limitation. A prerequisite for transcending this is a capacity to recognize when I have reached my daily limit of new concepts and unfamiliar terms. In addition, it's equally important for me to acknowledge when some term just plain annoys me.

I just experienced this annoyance upon reading the following sentence, "The Java applet runs in a generic Java runtime environment supplied by the browser...." You might guess that it was the word "applet" that got on my nerves, but I'm actually okay with that. Once I realized that it has nothing to do with Apple computers, and that instead it refers to a sort of mini "app" that you download and then kind of unpack and run on your computer, I was fine. What made my eyes roll was the phrase "generic runtime environment." It's actually the word "runtime" that annoyed me, because I'll bet it has nothing to do with time, and also because I don't care for the way the words "run" and "time" are sissily smooshed together. I'm pretty sure that the guy who thought that up was and probably still is pretty satisfied with himself because of it (and I am sure it's a "he"). I also feel resentful of and kind of excluded by the use of the word "environment." The people who are in the "in" group know darn well that the rest of us find it unsettling and confusing, because we were basically in agreement about what that word meant before they appropriated it. How can "environment" be linked back to "time" in any way other than a most annoying, clubby, cutesy kind of way?

I may have reached my threshold for the time being and should do some laundry or something.

"Runtime" is what you get when you do the fifty yard dash in an "environment' that involves grass and sun and bugs.

Blech.

Database driven web sites

2009-12-19T11:56:00.000-08:00

Trying to figure out databases. I am confused. Okay there's the client, say, a library patron trying to find a book from their own personal computer. The patron's computer is the client. They go online to the library's web site and navigate to the library's online catalog, which has some boxes to enter the title and author, call number, etc. The patron types in the title: The Road Less Traveled. The library's server does something. What? It turns it into a query or something. The library's database management system processes the words the patron types in and turns it into a query that looks like what (I don't know). The query goes to the database which is located where? On some server computer somewhere. I guess the database will have a record that has Title, Author, Call Number, What libraries in the system own the title, and then of those, which ones have one available. It might also have other details like other formats the title is in like CD, audiotape, etc., whether it is on some special status, like it can only be checked out for two weeks or something. The database doesn't "do" anything, does it? It just sits there with the data, right? And it's the Database Management System that sorts it, and then the web server puts it into a readable format and renders it into a sort of temporary web page that it sends over the internet back to the patron.

Possible solution to the "they" dilemma.

2009-10-28T00:12:00.000-07:00

I had thought that I'd read somewhere that it was now acceptable to use "they" instead of either "he" or "she" as the "variable" personal pronoun (as in, "If anyone needs a farecard, they can get one out of this vending machine"). If it makes you resentful to use "he" (I didn't realize I resented it until a St. John's tutor corrected my "they" by changing it to "he"), and it makes you twitchy to allow this use of "they" based solely on the questionable principle that "if people speak it, it's a language. If people do it, it's authentic, so get off my back," then consider this approach: think of the third person plural "they" as a completely different "they" from the other one.

In Italian, the word "lei" is used both for the 2nd person singular pronoun in formal address, and also for the 3rd person singular prounoun. If you do a subtle mental shift and decide that "they" is the new "lei" and that 1) It's about time we invented a new pronoun to represent a concept that sorely needs to be represented linguistically, and that 2)if we all agree not to obssess about subject-verb agreement, then we can pull one of these deals: "the pronoun "they" in this sense takes the plural verb form."

So, to review, the main idea is that the two "theys" are now offically (if I were dictator, that is, heh heh) NOT the same word. Instead, they are homonyms, two drifters that just happen to look and sound the same but are headed for distinct, yet related destinations.

Voila! What was once an awkward, cheesy workaround, the "poor relation" of the pronoun family, is now suave and European, with greasy hair, five o'clock shadow, and a single gold earring.

And the good news is that we were entitled to an extra pronoun all along, since we didn't take the one we would have needed for using formal address.

A test on "The Farthest Wave"

2009-07-24T23:54:00.000-07:00

In case you are wondering what the chicken scratches are in this post, they were my attempts to get myself to practice a few songs. I am an inveterate non-rehearser. I just HATE it. Especially if I'm by myself. So, in the spirit of the 'webcam,' I decided to share my little self quizzes on one of the songs I learned for a memorial service recently.

I don't usually test myself like this (btw, these were 'closed book' tests). I usually just 'run over' the songs a couple of times and figure it'll all come out in the wash. But that worked when I was sixteen and had a young brain with no bills to pay. I have do to more now to prepare. I learned this at St. John's, trying to demonstrate proofs in front of the class. In my head I knew what was supposed to happen, but I couldn't do it in front of the class. I tried to explain this to my tutor that, like Nigel Tufnel (pictured above), "I get the sense of it. I just don't understand it."

So, this is what I was doing at 3:00 am the morning of the service. I just wrote out some questions on the song, called "The Farthest Wave," and tried to recall the answers from memory. Wow. Pretty revealing, especially after I had already writren out the lyrics and a chord chart. Talk about ADDDDDD.

The 11:30 P.M. of the soul

2009-07-24T20:31:00.000-07:00

Image by Tamar Messer used without permission.

I think I understand why so many people like to set up webcams so that the world can see them living their lives. I believe that they do it out of loneliness. Or, if not loneliness per se, something like it. When I was a little kid, I used to pretend that my life was a documentary on PBS. For some reason, this gave me a bit of dignity when my first grade teacher was cornering me in the section of the classroom she called the 'cloakroom' where all the 'cubbyholes' would be with our coats hanging in them. On many mornings I would be hurriedly trying to get out of my coat and into my desk well after the bell had rung. "A diller, a dollar, a ten o'clock scholar." That was the first time (and probably not the last) I was to hear that phrase. But for some reason, imagining that a camera was following me as I nervously walked to my desk made me feel as if I had company, or that my life had some significance and shape to it, and a bit of drama. Maybe it allowed me to get some distance from the shame, and from that slight remove, to "make" some sense out of what was happening. That sense making is one of the chief therapeutic benefits of the process of creating.

It was around that same age that I started fantasizing about performing on stage. I'm sure that I wanted to have as much fun as the Osmonds and Jackson Five seemed to be having. But also, I wanted to do something that other people would see and remember.

The lack of an audience is a major factor in my dread of 'rehearsing.' Oh, god. There's something about it, especially when I try to do it by myself, that is so lonely and desperate and formless. I have a similar feeling when I try to write anything, particularly for a class on a subject that isn't personally compelling to me. During my last semester at St. John's, I experimented with blogging while writing, and it did make me feel less lonely. Like maybe there was more at stake since I was giving "updates" to unknown readers and therefore owed it to "them" to finish my paper.Plus, it provided a little breathing room between me and my tutor. Maybe having one person out there judging my performance was paralyzing, too much pressure to bear. Having imagined "others" out there gave me a sort of hedge against total rejection. My tutor might think my work was worthless, but someone else out there might not. Another fear that haunts me is that I will have "wasted time," particularly if I spend time on something that I ultimately scrap. If I blog about it, I will at least walk away with some nicely illustrated little tableau to look at some day and recall the struggle.

So, tonight, I am preparing for a memorial service. The person who died knew in advance that she had a terminal illness, and so she planned her own service, right down to hand picking the music and the performers. I like the songs I will be singing, for the most part. Two of them are new to me: "Let the Mystery Be" is by Iris DeMent, and it's all about how it's okay not to know what happens when we die, "I choose to let the mystery be." I like the way she and her band do it. It's a nice, bluegrassy arrangement that gently percolates. Moving forward but not in a big hurry to get there. Oh, and it is a song that definitely wants to be sung in the key of F major. We tried it in G and it refused to be sung in that key.

Another selection she wanted is called "The Farthest Wave." This one is by Cathie Ryan and Karine Polwart. It's going to be the highlight of the program, I predict. It's a song about separation that could be about death or divorce, but definitely something insurmountable. The lyrics are well crafted yet natural, and the melody is perfect. It's got that magic combination of familiarity and novelty with the all-important unexpected couple of melodic surprises. I know that this song could be a major hit if someone like the Dixie Chicks or Mary Chapin Charpenter or Kathy Mattea got ahold of it - someone who is a grownup and a real singer.

Now I have to get to it. Here is how the sausage gets made. I have plotted out the basic forms of these songs and have a general idea of the melody of each, although I'm notorious for making up my own melody in the heat of the moment. It's unlikely that I will have the lyrics memorized in time for the service, so I'll have a music stand. I have to be able to spit out, like my name, rank, and serial number, what happens in the intro, who starts it, how many verses and choruses there are, where the instrumental break goes, and how the song ends. I also have to go back over my chords to make sure they are correct, and fix some of the lyrics that I transcribed and that I know are incorrect. OK, it's 12:14 am. I'll check in after I'm done with proofreading the charts for these two songs. Bye.

Get ready for StupidGate

2009-07-23T15:02:00.000-07:00

Sean Hannity must be licking his chops right now. Who do you think is going to come on his show tonight to get peppered with leading questions? I have a feeling that Officer Crowley, the Cambridge cop who arrested Henry Louis Gates in his own home, has too much class for that.

Let's see - what is he going to sputter tonight?

"Don't you think, in this day and age, that the President of the United States, would have enough respect not to refer to men and women who put themselves into harm's way on our crack pipe littered URBAN STREETS as "stupid"? Do you agree that the President thinks ALL WHITE POLICE OFFICERS are STUPID?"

or this:

"Is Obama's POST RACIAL AMERICA officially over?" (Hannity hopes it is, so he can keep using racial innuendos to sow discontent and advertising revenues for Fox Opinion Network.)

Have I said before that I have no respect for Sean Hannity? This is his philosophy:

If you criticize anything the government does, you are unpatriotic, unless there are Democrats in the White House and Congress. If everyone would just stop whining and play by the rules and go to church and be NORMAL like me, Sean Hannity, there'd be no problems in this country. All liberals hate America. If I disagree with you, all I have to do is turn the music up and cut to a commercial. It's my show.

His screechy voice and self satisfied smirk give me agita. He has zero insight and is incapable of engaging in civil discourse with anybody who is not reading straight off of the RNC talking points. He makes Archie Bunker look like the Dalai Lama.

I would rather spend eternity in hell, carrying golf clubs for Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter than so much as share a cab with Hannity. Why? Because those guys may be mean spirited and intellectually dishonest, but they are clever and have some measure of wit and legitimate show biz chops. What about Bill O'Reilly? Hmm, well, he's a blowhard, but like Ted Baxter, to whom Limbaugh himself has compared him, there's something adorable about O'Reilly, so I'd carry his golf clubs if I were to end up eternally damned. But Hannity is just boring and a bully.....HOW DID HE GET HIS OWN SHOW?? He can carry his own gold-plated clubs.

Mireille Mathieu sings La marseillaise

2009-07-13T20:16:00.001-07:00

Job hunting

2009-06-29T09:26:00.000-07:00

I've been told by a reliable source that my resume needs more "white space" in it. Also, apparently there's no need to have complete sentences after those bullet points, and so I'm going to go take out all the personal pronouns. That's okay - they did seem unnecessary since it's pretty obvious that it's "all about me." But...right now I have to go look at the job announcement and make sure it's still being advertised. I'm scared. I keep putting this off. Okay here goes...

It is on the web site. I'm actually surprised that it's still there. It's been advertised since April. Doesn't that seem odd? It's not like it's a posting for a blacksmith. This is a public interest/publicity job that every third person is probably qualified for. Hmmmm. Just stop procrastinating and apply for it. What's the worst that could happen?

Why is Dick Cheney getting air time?

2009-05-23T22:48:00.001-07:00

Why did George "All Too Human" Stephanopoulos find it necessary to create a fake news story on a "Showdown" between Cheney and Obama about the President's foreign policy? It's actual news when someone who is in office and who has something at stake makes a major statement on foreign policy, knowing that he or she must live with the consequences. It is fake news when a member of the previous administration takes a pot shot at the current administration from within the walls of a like-minded institution of which he is a board member. I'm not suggesting that the former Vice President does not have the right to voice his opinion in public. I am merely suggesting that only the Fox Opinion Network should be expected to consider this "news," and that no one but Mr. Cheney's publicist should ever be forgiven for calling the event one half of a "Showdown."

Will someone please ask him a real question? Like, for example, why should we listen to you, Mr. Vice President? Or (be honest) what part of the Constitution is not expendable? If you think we should do away with the fourth amendment, there is a process for changing the document. The Founding Fathers fully expected that we would need to make changes to the Constitution, and so they set forth a specific procedure for doing so. They made it fairly difficult to amend the Constitution to protect us from rash, emotionally-based decisions, but it is nevertheless possible to revisit what was written in the 18th Century and conclude that circumstances have changed so much that some of our institutions are outdated (such as the electoral college, for example), and that possibly some of our rights will have to be trimmed back in the interest of national security. By the way, I am not saying that I believe this to be the case; my point is simply that if, as Cheney and other Bush-ites have insisted, these threats to our very survival are so great that we don't have time for the usual way we have always done justice and conducted war, then they need to make a case before the American people for amending the Constitution. That would not endanger our security in any way.

Instead, Bush and Cheney simply ignored the Constitution, domestic law, and the treaties that we have signed, and acted unilaterally, outside the authority of the American people. That is dictatorial. That is assuming fake authority based on nothing, not even any presumed divine right, like the monarchies of old, or by brute force, but by chicanery on the part of the Bush Administration and weakness and laziness on the part of, well, the rest of us. They scared us into thinking there was "no time" to deliberate (this was what, eight years ago? We are still not discussing the real questions of liberty versus security in any meaningful way). In the case of Mr. Cheney, rather than deliberate, he chose to secretly break the law, stare down anyone who would question his decisions, talk in a monotone, and tell the rest of us to go fuck ourselves.

Mr. Cheney, if you are so worried about our safety, why not come out of retirement and lend a hand in the the Global War on Terror? You should be nervously pacing around with five o'clock shadow and sweat stains under your arms, over in some "situation room" like the Kennedy administration during the Cuban missile crisis, not playing with your grandchildren in McLean. Why are you still talking?

Is there not a news person out there who is willing to risk his or her career to ask him a real question on live television? How about Campbell Brown? She's been showing more spine than anyone else on network TV these days. That is, assuming she still has a show on the air. Sober, impartial analysis does not sell.

Anybody else out there man enough?

"We asked about influenza, and they said that it had been eradicated in Mexico."

2009-04-28T14:55:00.000-07:00

"Lagoons" filled with pig excrement, decomposed body parts and other waste in Veracruz, Mexico

Government officials in Mexico suspect Smithfield Ham industrial hog processing facility as the petri dish that grew the latest swine flu

Dead pigs at Granjas Carroll laid out to be eaten by birds.

"Some people started getting ill in February and an eight-month-old baby died. After that another baby died on March 21st. Suddenly most of the village got ill. It was weekend and the tiny clinic here was closed. The state health authorities then did send doctors and nurses to look after us, and give us medication. About 60% of the village were ill and we asked them what it was and they said it was a severe and atypical cold. We talked about influenza and they said that was impossible, that influenza had been eradicated from Mexico."
Resident of La Gloria, Veracruz, Mexico, speaking on condition of anonymity.
(Reported in the UK Guardian, Monday, April 27)

In early April, a Washington State based company called Veratect, which monitors disease outbreaks around the world, reported an unusually high number of people becoming ill with flu like symptoms in the town of La Gloria. At least one sample taken from a resident has tested positve for swine flu. Two children in La Gloria have died so far.

The Mexican government has reported findings linking the Granjas Carroll plant, which is located twelve miles away from La Gloria and is owned by Smithfield Ham, to the virus. According to the Mexico City based newspaper La Jornada, the virus could have been spread by the "clouds of flies that come out of the hog barns, and the waste lagoons into which the Mexican-US company spews tons of excrement," although according to the Guardian, it is so far only known to be spread by direct contact with animals and humans infected with the disease and not by flies.

Smithfield was fined over ten years ago for having repeatedly violated EPA pollution regulations by dumping pig feces and other wastes into the Pagan River in Virginia, which feeds into the Chesapeake Bay.

Smithfield issued a press release today stating that there have been no cases among either its livestock or its employees of "North American Influenza," citing a WHO study calling it "inaccurate" to call the virus "swine flu," since it is a combination of pig, avian and human viruses.

Can you tell me, O Socrates?

2009-04-25T18:39:00.000-07:00

In the last installment I said that Jesus reminds me of Socrates, and it was in part just a way to tranzish to my next entry. If you have not figured this out I am involving you in my schoolwork for my master's program. I graduated from college twenty-one years ago, and while I did okay, grade-wise, I always felt as if I had not put as much effort in as I could have and did not learn as much as I wanted to. Since I work at a HUGE library, I decided to make IT my grad school for a long time. It's great - I read tons of books about psychoanalysis, religion, addiction, everything Augusten Burroughs has ever written, labor-management relations, everything Camille Paglia has written. For a long time my favorite genre was what I call "true therapy." Some people love true crime, but for me, I can't get enough of reading case studies by psychotherapists, and in particular those of a depth psychological or psychoanalytic orientation. Irving Yalom is my favorite, but I love to read Freud, Melanie Klein, Winnicott, Harold Searles, Joyce MacDougal, and a few years ago I read, for months on end, book after book of therapist-treating-incest-survivor case studies.. The frustrating thing about reading these heavy books is that they invariably refer to those Great Books that all educated people were supposed to have read until sometime in the 1970s & 1980s when I was growing up. So, for the past two years I have been doing some catch-up going through an actual master's program that has me reading Greek plays, Plato, Aristotle, Francis Bacon, Shakespeare, etc.

I have learned that I still have a huge aversion to writing papers of any kind. It makes me so anxious I feel like throwing up. I procrastinate. I taught myself how to make a music video last weekend on iMovies, for example. I hate the idea of being alone, staring at that piece of paper, trying to decide, as sands slip through the hourglass, whether it would be a good idea to reread the book (hint: it never hurts to reread the book). I hate the idea of trying to come up with something intelligent to say about somebody else's work. Who cares what I think? Why is it necessary to analyze everything all to bits?I feel so pretentious. But I think that's partly due to bad habits I picked up in college. I went to a pretentious school and wasted a lot of time trying to figure out how to fit in academically. In the process I learned how to write a completely useless, dishonest, contorted paper. No wonder I hate it so much.

I am just realizing that I probably would be doing better in my current program if I had gone in straight from high school, where I had loved learning and discussing books. One of my biggest problems in school and in life is that, whenever I am working on a sustained project that does not come to fruition all at once, I panic that whatever part of it that I am working on at the moment is the Wrong One. All that does is keep me from devoting my attention to that particular component, because half my brain is anxiously focused on the amount of time I have left to finish and worrying that maybe I am looking for a needle in a haystack. I start to doubt that whatever book I am writing about that has been cherished and revered for centuries and has changed the face of history, actually has anything of any value to say to me. Maybe I should change my paper topic, write on a different book altogether, work on an assignment for a different class for awhile, clean all this shit up that's lying around, take a nap, exercise. I usually rebel and do something that is instantly gratifying. Unfortunately, next to surfing the internet, the thing I turn to most often is food."Maybe I'm just wasting my time. I think I'll go see what's in the refrigerator for the fourteenth time." In some ways I have not changed at all since I was nineteen. But I am more humble, more willing to accept that I'm not the sharpest pencil in the box and that I often do things more slowly than others and need to seek help. I'm taking Ancient Greek, and it is incredibly difficult. It is painful for me to acknowledge this, but I am probably the worst student in the class. I spend hours and hours trying to figure this stuff out, and invariably, when my turn comes to read my translation there is always something wrong with it. I may be the slowest student, but I did hang in there, whereas a few people have dropped out along the way. It is interesting, and I do not at all regret taking it. After I went on sabbatical from playing music, I made myself be quiet inside, and asked myself what I would regret not having done if I were to die tomorrow, and I realized that it was reading these books, and studying Ancient Greek.

So, this weekend I have to write a paper on the Meno, one of Plato's dialogues. When I said in my last post that Jesus reminds me of Socrates, I was only partly using it as an abrupt transition. Both men were unconventional and said and did things that people found annoying at best, dangerous at worst. Both had a small group of devoted followers, some of whom lived to write accounts of their teachings. Both were tried under strange circumstances and charged with ill defined crimes. Socrates was accused of corrupting the youth, making the weaker argument the stronger (?) and worshipping gods other than the ones the city worshipped (he attributed any orginal ideas or wisdom of his to his daimon, a sort of personal deity or deva. People didn't like that). Both were tried, neither one put up much of fight, and both were put to death, Socrates by government sponsored self-poisoning and Jesus by torture and crucifixion. While Socrates never claimed to be God, and Jesus by several witnesses' accounts did, it is hard to determine whether Socrates believed in any sort of deity or not. Another similarity is that neither of them wrote anything down, and so everything we know about them both is from other peoples' accounts. Jesus' life was recorded by a number of witnesses, while Socrates' life was recorded primarily by Plato, although Aristophanes mentions him and Xenophon wrote his own account of the trial of Socrates.

Take this cup away from me

2009-04-24T14:04:00.000-07:00

Okay, so maybe I'm feeling a little overdramatic and a touch grandiose. Hopefully nobody finds this offensive (because if you do, there's more coming and you should probably go back to Susan Boyle and/or lolcats) It's just that, as inevitably happens, my paper writing anguish has now intensified. I have left behind Stage 1 "Book Report on Peter Rabbit" distress and have moved on to full-on "take this cup away from me" dread. All alone, looking down the barrel of some deadline, wishing there were a way out but knowing that there is no turning back now.

"Gethsemane" from Jesus Christ Superstar. This is one of those rare songs whose music tells the story just as much as its lyrics. And the Jesus in this scene is so alone. I am so glad that Andrew Lloyd Webber and Co. had the courage and artistic integrity to let him go there. At one point he screams at God, "Watch me die," and the music kicks into this tragic, epic, relentless death march as photos of famous paintings and sculptures depicting the crucifixion flash up on the screen, one after the other, mercilessly.

I've mentioned on this blog before that this Jesus is my Jesus, and I was gratified to read on YouTube that there are plenty of others who feel the same way. Most, if not all of the Biblical scenes in Jesus Christ Superstar are from the Gospel of John, which I've got on the brain. I'm supposed to have an oral exam on it on Sunday. I had forgotten how beautiful it is. It's so passionate and poetic. This semester we read the Gospels of Matthew and John. I went into it assuming I would like Matthew the best. As my gf says, "Matthew has got all of Jesus' greatest hits" - the Sermon on the Mount, the Golden Rule, plus it's definitely the book in the Bible that best proves that while God may be a Republican, Jesus is definitely a Democrat. It's the one where he tells the rich man who wants to follow him but can't part with his stuff that it's harder to for a rich man to get into heaven than it is for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.

At the same time I thought I would not like John because instead of preaching about compassion and taking care of the poor and less fortunate, in the Gospel of John, Jesus and all of the other 'main' characters are obsessed with his identity and supposed divinity. The Gospel of John is where the phrase "born again" comes from. which is the Protestant equivalent of that which Protestants are baffled by in Catholicism. Protestants do not have a pope, relics, transubstantiation, or rosary beads, but are instead fixated primarily on being "saved." Getting saved is something that happens to both nonbelievers living in non-Christian countries and to atheists, but more often it happens to people brought up in the church. Instead of going to the Vatican and buying a souvenir that has been blessed by the Pope, a saved, born again Christian has to be able to point to a specific, often emotional, conversion experience that has occurred at a particular point in time. The day you are saved is the most important day of your life. Once you are saved, you become a completely different person. You have "accepted Jesus Christ" into your heart, as your Personal Lord and Savior, and once you have "Got Jesus," as a bumper sticker currently in circulation puts it, you now have to get as many people saved as you can, because without salvation they are going to hell to suffer the worst torment possible for eternity. There are no 'mortal sins' in Protestantism. There is no semi-saved state. You are either saved or not saved, and it makes no difference if you are Pol Pot or Lenny Bruce - both are currently burning in hell, and only because (we assume) they were not Saved. Being saved is the orgasm, it is the Super Bowl. It is the reason that Evangelical churches tend to be devoid of architectural majesty, mystery and musical sublimity, because what matters is not the way in which any project is carried out. All that matters is that there is a final product, and the most important product is salvation and making sure that as many people as possible get saved before they die or before Jesus returns, whichever comes first. It's why we have Interstates and strip malls, and why we elected George W. Bush President twice. It's the reason why so many Protestant Christians are so sanguine about the idea that the world might end because of global warming, since The World does not matter and was going to be destroyed at some point anyway. It is the ultimate victory of function over form.

John 3:16 is the e=mc2 of evangelical Protestantism. It is the focal point of the Bible, sucking up into itself anything that looks like it might taste good, be beautiful, intriguing, outrageous, or humorous.

This is the Good News.
16For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

17For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.

And this is the Bad News:

18He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

19And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

The part that scares me is where it says "he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." I've always read that and thought how sick it is to go on about how much God loves you, when if you don't love him back, he's unfortunately going to have to stick you in hell forever to roast in unbearable torment. What if you just don't have that faith? You can't just fake it.

But, looking at it again--and I am pretty sure I am not reading this in some kind of gay, French, San Francisco-style liberal way-- it says "he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." Maybe that's it. That's the condemnation. NOT believing. And if you think that sounds like heresy, just look at the next verse, which pretty much confirms what I just said, "And this is the condemnation, that light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil."

That's hell. Missing the Love Boat. Maybe that is so wonderful that just to stay your same old, shallow, resentful, bitter self feels like eternal, Old School Hell by contrast. What if the mode of life that so many of us experience as 'normal' is actually what has been Hell all along?

It's funny, but Jesus kind of reminds me a little bit of Socrates....

Feel My Pain!!!!

2009-04-24T13:40:00.001-07:00

I LOVE this song from You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown, "A Book Report on Peter Rabbit." The Peanuts kids all have to write a school book report on the story of Peter Rabbit, and each one goes about it in a different maladaptive way, completely in character - Charlie Brown has existential angst, Lucy tries to beat the system by just counting all the vegetables in the garden to meet her minimum word count, Linus tries to be deep, and Schroeder goes off on a tangent about Robin Hood. I have done ALL of these things every time I have to write something for school. OH GOD! What was I thinking!!! I hate this. Next time I tell somebody I want to go back to school, could you do me a favor and, maybe not shoot me, but just lock me in a room somewhere until the urge passes?

This little video makes me feel like I have company. I have concluded that it's the loneliness that I can't stand. I want to do anything but sit with my book and try to squeeze out some idea that is going to suck, anyway. And then I will have spent hours and hours that I'll never get back, working on something that is half-assed and lame, and will be embarrassing and humiliating to turn in. I love Charlie Brown's cri de coeur at the end. It's like something out of a Rossini opera, climaxing with his aria of agony, "How do they expect us to write a book report...of any quality....in just two days...?" as the other characters are finishing the ends of their own reports, also in song. I love this particular cartoon version, which has Charlie Brown singing woefully, all the while standing in the kitchen making himself a peanut butter sandwich, which he eats in front of the TV as he sings his big aria at the end. Charlie Brown, I feel your pain.

In the Beginning

2009-04-23T09:37:00.000-07:00

The Gospel of John starts with the statement, "In the beginning was the Word..." John goes on to say, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth." John intends to make clear that by "the Word" he means not only the promised Messiah, but also the man, Jesus. But why in particular does he choose to call him the "word"? Why does John not start instead by saying something like, "In the Beginning was the Son. And the Son was with God, and the Son was God"?

This narrative of Jesus' life thus starts off not in a particular place and time, i.e. "Judea, year One, A.D" but instead in a timeless "beginning." This beginning is intentionally disorienting, in the way that stories that begin "Once upon a Time" are intentionaly disorienting, inviting the mind to open to its visionary, poetic language.

For a reader familiar with the Torah, "in the beginning" brings to mind the account in Genesis of the creation of the earth. To the extent that John is writing for those very readers, he undoubtedly intends for them to make that connection to Genesis, and if we go back to John and "the Word," could it not be that John means for us to notice that in Genesis God creates the world through words: "Let there be light." Might then the "light" in Genesis similarly redirect us back to the Light in John, which he describes as "the true light," but who, he says "was in the world" and who "made the world," and yet, "the world knew him not."

When John says that Jesus "made the world" is this necessarily a reference to the "Beginning" of Genesis and the original creation of the universe? I wonder if, looking ahead to Chapter Three where Jesus tells Nicodemus that he must be "born again," perhaps John means something other than literal creation when he says Jesus "made the world." The phrase that John uses in Chapter 1 is "panta di'autou egeneto," which means "everthing came to be from him." The verb he uses, "egeneto," is a form of "gignomai," which means "comes to be." This verb is closely related to "gennaw," which means "to beget," and it is a form of this word that Jesus uses when he tells Nicodemus that he must be born again. So, just as Jesus tells Nicodemus he must be born again, is it not possible that when John 1 refers to the Word as having "made the world" he means it in a sense that is closer to "giving birth" to the world rather than "making" it in the sense in which an artisan makes something. The Greek verb that means "to make" in that sense is "poiein," and John does use this verb in this same chapter, but it is in reference to the miracles that Jesus does or "makes." So he creates miracles and he creates the world, but not in the same respect. The world comes forth from him like a child and not like an object that he builds. And he gives birth to the world through the Word. It might be, then that the "creation" in John 1 is a spiritual rebirth of the world like the one Jesus tells Nicodemus he must undergo.

Why, though, in both Genesis and John, does the "word" command so much power? It is true that certain words can have great power, for example, "Will you marry me?" or "He's the culprit" or "Off with your head," and indeed throughout this Gospel words are used to give testimony, betray, deny, and condemn. But those words have no inherent power. They require a second person, a listener, to take some action as the result of having heard them. By contrast, God's words "Let there be light" actually bring the light into the world, by themselves. It is not as if God commands someone to do it for him. But why does Genesis not say simply that "God created light." What is the significance of having God speak light into being? To whom is he speaking?

"...well, I AM insulted"

2008-12-16T11:33:00.000-08:00

The Election Files - help Greg Palast investigate Bush

2008-09-27T21:05:00.001-07:00

Greg Palast is a patriot and a hero. If you think that we have a free press in this country, ask yourself why BBC showed Palast's films about 2000 and 2004 Florida election tampering, and no major media outlet in the U.S. would touch it. He is working on a new film on stolen votes in this year's primaries. He needs to raise about $24,000 right away to release this before election day. Please donate to www.gregpalast.com and then call your Congressmember and tell them to investigate the 2000 vote in Florida and subpoena Katherine Harris and Clayton Roberts. They have no claim of executive privilege since they were supposedly not working for George W. Bush at the time.

Eyes On The Prize: U.S. Civil Rights Movement

2008-03-19T11:50:00.001-07:00

If you are an American and have never heard of Fanny Lou Hamer, Michael Schwerner, Medgar Evers, James Meredith, Emmett Till,or Viola Liuzzo you need to watch this series or read the excellent companion book by Juan Williams.

Birmingham Church Bombing

2008-03-19T10:57:00.001-07:00

Pro-Segregation Riots Draw Federal Troops

2008-03-19T10:55:00.001-07:00

Obama Speech: 'A More Perfect Union'

2008-03-19T08:50:00.001-07:00

Please listen.

Inwood Coffeehouse Part iii: Interview with Steven and Lesley Choy

2007-12-14T08:55:00.001-08:00

This is the final installment of a series on the Inwood Coffeehouse in Wheaton (or Greater Silver Spring if you like), MD which is where I'll be tonight with the Ocean Quartette performing a seasonal concert. Show time is 7:30 p.m. Admission is $5. Location is 10921 Inwood Avenue, Wheaton, MD. See Part I and Part II

This past Spring, I performed at Inwood for the first time, in a duo with cellist Fred Lieder.
The week after the show, I decided to interview organizers Steven and Lesley Choy for my blog. Lesley's mom Annette (pictured) was there for dinner. As my cassette recorder rolled and Lesley began her story, the Choys' two birds, who had been squawking in their cages throughout dinner, suddenly fell silent.

Lesley was born and raised in New York City. She thrived on the city's vibrant culture and energy, and was devastated when her father's job forced the family to move to Maryland.

Lesley: I missed everything. Suburban Maryland was a wasteland. New York was just extremely textured. That was the only way I could describe it to people. They thought I was crazy. I said 'There's no texture here. In New York, there was a texture to everything. Every face had a texture'

Shortly after the move to Maryland, Lesley (pictured) fell into a profound depression. While it had been building for quite awhile, she recalled that there had been a catalyzing trauma:

Lesley: When I was 16 it really got bad. I remember what precipitated it. I was walking through the halls and I saw a poster of this beautiful German shepherd dog. It was an anti-animal cruelty poster, and it said, "This beautiful dog died of a scientist-induced heart attack." I went into the journalism class and sat under the desk. I sat there every day, under the desk, for weeks on end, as classes went in and out. I didn't attend any of my own classes. I was blindsided by depression.

This was during the 1970s, and like many school systems, Montgomery County had begun to explore alternative approaches to education. Lesley's school, John F. Kennedy High School in Wheaton, was an alternative school that encouraged experimentation and individual choice as well as more informal interactions between students and teachers. The close bonds between teachers and students at the school may have saved Lesley's life. Her English teacher had started to worry about Lesley, and one day he showed up at her front door.

Lesley: He came over to the house and told me I was going to fail English. He mandated that I write out all 20,000 compositions that I hadn't written. So that got me out of it, because I didn't want to let him down. I wrote all 20,000 compositions, and he graded all of them, and jokingly pointed out how unfair it was that I could spend fifteen minutes per composition and earn a B when the rest of the class took a whole semester.

Lesley and Annette recalled that when he first came to the door, he hadn't told them the real reason why he was there.

Lesley: He came under the pretense that he was cold and he needed to borrow some socks.

Annette: And we gave him the socks!

Once Lesley had weathered this crisis, she threw herself into acting in productions by the school's extensive theater department, which put on what she described as "gorgeous, full-blown student productions." Among the roles she played were Ophelia in Hamlet and the Duchess of York in Richard III.

Lesley: I love high school drama. We had three teachers doing drama; one who specialized in musical productions, one who did Southern drama, and one who did Shakespeare, Mr. Teunis. The kids had ample opportunity to direct, to perform, write and direct and produce our own productions. My friends and I would do existentialist theater and theater of the absurd. I directed Endgame.

Around this time, Lesley met Steven Choy (pictured-on guitar in group photo), a local musician performing in a pickup band of revolving musicians sometimes appearing under the name The Internationals. Steven, who also grew up in the DC area, had been practicing the guitar at his parents' dry cleaning plant. One of the Choys' customers was a guitar player who happened to be in the Navy. Steven's mom offered to clean his uniforms in exchange for guitar lessons, and Steven eventually became proficient enough to do paying gigs. At the time they met, Lesley had been dating another band member, but as she spent more time with the musicians she developed a friendship with Steven that ultimately led to their marriage, two children, and an ongoing creative partnership.

After she graduated she became one of the first members of the brand new Folger Shakespeare Group and the Shakespeare Theatre.

Lesley: But we weren't doing Shakespeare. The first show was a rock musical called Dionysus Wants You: A New Rock Musical. It was lousy. I've never seen anything so horrendous in my life. It was a horrible show. I was playing Semele, who gives birth to her son onstage. I was playing opposite Ernest Thompson, as Zeus, who later won the Pulitzer Prize for On Golden Pond.

Although she was landing professional acting gigs as a member of this new company, Lesley discovered that she had a problem:

Lesley: I realized that I don't really like actors. Ultimately, what got me out of it was witnessing a homicide. I was on the way to a rehearsal at St. Mark's Church on Capitol Hill, and somebody stole my purse. I thought he was holding mace, but it was actually a gun. A bystander saw what happened and interceded, and got himself killed. This also happened to be my very first day of college studying drama at Catholic University.

The police advised me that it was probably gang-related, and that there were probably witnesses, and that I should probably absent myself. And there was no sympathy from the producer or the director, or my colleagues or anything. The director said that if I didn't show up to rehearsal and attend every performance, he'd have me blacklisted from every theater in Washington. So, I decided at that point that I really don't like these people at all. So I quit. For good.

I stayed at Catholic for three years, and then I realized that they were really catering to the Equity actors and the graduate students. From sheer pushing I began to direct some graduate student productions while I was still an undergraduate. Nobody who was an undergraduate was going anywhere. It was strictly about show biz, so if you were an undergraduate you got to do the grunt work that equity actors weren't allowed to do. But because of my Folger experience, I was considered the cat's meow. It was, 'Oh my God, she's an undergraduate who had been an extra in Julius Caesar.'

After three years, Lesley transferred to the University of Maryland, and landed a major role on the main stage her first day of school. While studying drama, she took teacher certification courses, which would ultimately lead to her work with disabled people in the Montgomery County School System. But inwardly she had already felt a pull in this direction. One of her drama classes had been a course called Creative Dramatics. It was through this class that Lesley came to the understanding that, for some people, the drive to create is actually an urgent need, and that even if a person is severely disabled, that need still needs to be met. Lesley was gradually discovering that she had a gift - and a calling - to help disabled people meet their artistic needs.

Lesley: In Creative Dramatics class, we were given the assignment to create an activity for a population. I devised a method for allowing paralyzed children to create and perform in a theater production. In this hypothetical production, the performers were children who still had enough range of motion to move their eyes. By moving their eyes from one object to another, they could create stories using the progression from one object to another create character, setting and plot. It occurred to me that while people who were completely paralyzed couldn't speak and couldn't walk, they still had ideas and could still create. When you are in an institution, only your basic bodily needs are seen to. Having only those needs acknowledged and addressed adds insult to injury, and if you are an artist and have no way to engage your artistic side, that can be a great loss.

Lesley went on to teach disabled children in the Montgomery County Public Schools for several years, taking a break after becoming a mother. She continued to work with disabled individuals even after leaving the public school system. In 1995 she was commissioned by Washington Very Special Arts to write an opera. Her piece, called Perfection: A Space Opera in One Act, included performers with physical and mental disabilities as well as nondisabled professional musicians.

For Lesley, one of her chief aims is to provide opportunities for disabled artists to share their work with the public and also to collaborate with other artists who are not disabled.

Lesley: One of my themes is to be totally inclusive. So, pretty much, if someone auditions for one of my productions in an amateur capacity, not for a leading role necessarily, but in an amateur capacity, I will have a part for them. Period.

One such inclusive musical production the Choys helped to launch took place in November 2001 at the F. Scott Fitzgerald Theatre in Rockville, MD.

Steven: At the time that we produced the show the whole country was in mourning, and this was their way of expressing themselves to get relief. It was a big show. We spent months rehearsing the show. We did "America the Beautiful," and helped them pick out other songs. The featured act was a zydeco band. Our friend Peter who's a professional singer came in and sang a duet from a Broadway musical with one of the disabled women.

It was this experience that ultimately led to their involvement with Inwood Coffeehouse. Meg Marshall, who was one of the show's organizers, was also an administrator at Inwood House, an apartment complex in Silver Spring for people with disabilities.

Lesley: At the end of that show people were saying that they wanted to do more performances like that in the future. Ultimately Meg (pictured, left, with volunteer) invited me to come work with her at Inwood, and she got together the funds to make the coffeehouse happen on a regular basis. By coming up with the funding, Meg Marshall turned what could have remained a pipe dream into a reality. This was the first time Steven and I had ever had a backer. Before, we were expected to bring in money and finance the show through the proceeds alone. Meg found financing for the coffeehouse; I'm not sure how!

Steven : At first we didn't have any idea how to proceed. The first one was very freeform. It was around Christmastime, so we knew we were doing Christmas music, which made choosing material easy. And we also did some of (locally based singer songwriter) Eileen Joyner's music. Eileen stayed with us, actually, for the whole first season, and then she moved out of the area.

Lesley: Initially there was minimal resident participation; we did a couple of group songs.

Steve: The drummer at the first show was an Inwood resident who has continued to play at the Coffeehouse on a regular basis. Since he started playing at the coffeehouse, he's become a different person. He's been so happy.

Eventually Lesley had the idea to bring in performers from the outside.

Lesley: I don't like isolation. I don't like barriers. There are so many barriers. Even within communities, they set up barriers. There are so many misconceptions about people with any disability. One misconception is that they are monolithic, that everybody's exactly the same, and that all disabilities are the same disability. There's no understanding. The only way to change this is to have dialogue and contact. So, that's why...this was my dream. I've had lots of time to think about it. We bring people together.

We are going for good art, and it is good art. You can achieve it with anyone. People have different levels of accomplishment. You know, they aren't at a professional level, but still, there are different levels of accomplishment that are beautiful and artistically accessible.

LM: This is what really struck me. In the folk world, it's about inclusiveness, but it's a cheap kind of inclusiveness where you can have no talent and have put no effort into this, or have no sense of what an audience might want to hear, but still be allowed to perform on stage. I was contrasting what I experienced at Inwood with all these times I've seen people on stage who aren't disabled, but who seem to have no musical sensibility. At Inwood you can feel the creative struggle going on with your group. You may have someone who can't see or can't walk, but you still make them do the work.

Lesley: Steven and I are really clear that we don't accept second rate, and by first rate, I mean we are glad to work with you provided you work, and that you're committed to art, and you defer to our judgment as artistic directors.

Steven: We've had members drop out because they didn't want to go along with this. They didn't want to put any effort in. They just wanted to show up and do whatever they felt like doing.

Lesley: We're interested in bringing people who otherwise wouldn't have an opportunity to fulfill their artistic needs...to give them that opportunity. But we're not pushovers, and we're musicians. We really abhor shoddy performances.

Steven: They aren't at the same technical level as you.

Lesley: But we expect them to put in as much heart as you would put in, and as much effort as you would put in, and to also, again, be flexible enough to defer to our direction.

LM what kinds of things do you come up against?

Lesley: We fight, especially with people who are writing their own original things. Some of it is just bad. And you have to come up with a way to be gentle and stand back, and offer criticism. Sometimes people storm off and say "I'm never coming back." I pretty much say, "Oh that's unfortunate." They always come back and apologize.

LM: I guess you have to know how much you can demand.

Lesley: Exactly--without going overboard. It's been an ongoing effort for me to explain to one of the performers that he doesn't really know how to play the guitar. We focus on showing him how to hold the guitar and how to move like someone who is playing the electric guitar, but I don't want to foster a delusion or fool him or flatter him since he's actually playing air guitar with the band backing him. That would be really horrible.

We have all our performers pick their own music. With one singer, we talk about what key she wants to sing in, and if necessary Steve transposes it to her key. And then, when it's all set, he comes up with an arrangement. Steve makes her go through it about fifteen times, and he'll focus on problem measures. She has problems with rhythm. But hey, she can sing high G, so I'm not complaining.

Bring Them Home, don't be fooled again

2007-08-30T09:04:00.001-07:00

Tell Congress to stop the war. They are going to be told that they are "not supporting the troops" if they vote against continuing the war. They need your encouragement to do the right thing. Call them now.
http://www.congress.gov

That's what I'm talking about!

2007-07-04T18:46:00.001-07:00

Lovely singer, great song, awesome band. It's Sandra Joyce on vocals, Niall Keegan on flute, and Micheal O'Suillebhain on piano - according to the credits. The song - For Ireland I'd Not Tell Her Name is the air and the last line that's in Irish.

Peggy Noonan

2007-06-02T12:54:00.000-07:00

Who's the goddess of the Right,
Who coined "a thousand points of light?"
Who can make a man out of a buffoon,
And cause a Democrat to swoon?

Peggy Noonan, fair of face!
How can this bleeding heart not race?
I'm not her type, or so it seems
But Bush may drive her to switch teams.