Author: esomogyi

18. ADVERTISING SLOGANS FOR GUITAR MAKERS

I’ve been taking a class in marketing and have learned a lot.  Marketing for handmade guitars such as the ones I make has not been well studied.  The luthier’s slogan is the luthier’s initial statement about his work to the yet unseen customer that creates the all-important first impression; and the crucial importance of The Right Slogan is often overlooked.  Slogans are effective insofar as they are concise, immediate, and serve to encapsulate a complex message into an easy to assimilate sound-byte sized phrase or sentence.  It is the way of the new millennium, and everybody knows this.

The raison d’etre of the slogan is to get the client’s attention and invoke a receptive mental state in him.  An effective slogan is formed by strict adherence to principles of marketing long known to professionals in important fields such as advertising and politics.  These are: pithiness, contrast, understatement, humor, hyperbole, mellifluous glibness, humility, claim to excellence, authority of tone, and flat-out lying. There’s also Putting Down The Competition … but we’re honest people and we don’t do that. We leave that to the politicians.

We have received a Glossary of Advertising Terms and Their Exact Meanings from the Sum, Wan, & Orother Advertising Corporation of Compton, California.  It is a primer for education about some basic building blocks to successful sloganeering.  Amazingly, all their examples apply to lutherie. Here is a sampling:

Improved: some of the most obvious faults eliminated

New Improved: we also changed the box

All-purpose: does a mediocre job in several ways

Jumbo: too big to fit in the airplane’s overhead compartment

Compact: understanding or agreement (such as our no refund policy)

Disposable:  can be used only once

Durable: can be used twice

Delicate: breaks easily

Fine:  imposition of a monetary penalty

Subtle: inaudible or invisible

Compensated nuts and saddles: these have been paid for

Fun Stuff #3

SOME (OFF THE) WALL HUMOR

A journalist who works for a newspaper in Jerusalem lives near his office, and he walks to and from work every day.  His walk takes him right past the famous Wailing Wall.  [NOTE: This is the remaining wall of the original Temple of Solomon that was destroyed by the Romans two thousand years ago, but that has become a holy shrine for people to come to and pray.  They pray, write prayers on notes and place them between the cracks in the stones, and so on.  A lot of them cry.]

The journalist walks past this twice a day . . . and twice a day, without fail, for months on end, he sees this old fellow standing at the far end, in a prayerful attitude.  Eventually, curiosity gets the better of him and he decides to approach this prayerful stranger.

He introduces himself, and says that he sees this fellow at prayer all the time . . . and he got curious . . . and wanted to know if he could ask what the fellow is praying for.

The old fellow explains that he’s had a good life, he’s comfortably off, and that he doesn’t need material possessions . . . so he prays for world peace.

“That’s amazing”, the journalist says.  “What dedication and generosity of spirit.  How is it for you, to do that, all this time?”

The old fellow replies, “it’s like talking to a fuckin’ wall!”.

37. ON JEWISH CULTURE . . . AND HUMOR

I’ve been writing about Jews and the Bible, and Jewish culture . . . which brings me to the matters of  jokes and humor and silliness as expressed in different cultures.  As far as jokes go, University of California folklorist Alan Dundes has written some wonderful books about the folklore of humor . . . and humor in folklore . . . across different cultures.  Jewish humor, in particular, comes in various forms: there’s American Jewish humor, which is largely based in stereotypes (focus on merchants and money, marriage, my-son-the-doctor, mothers and mothers-in-law, big noses, Jewish princesses, hypochondria, God in the desert, etc.).  There’s also Eastern European Jewish humor, which is based in irony and a darkish view of the world; but of course that sensibility was fermented in a rather pessimistic and oppressed culture.   ‘Authentic’ Jewish humor is dark dark dark.  And, not surprisingly, Western European Jewish humor is colored by the culture of the specific country in question: Germany, Spain, France, England, etc.  I am having trouble imagining Scandinavian Jewish humor, although I assume that there must be some.  I’ve heard German humor; I honestly don’t understand much of it . . . although Germans laugh a lot at it anyway.

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Anyway, here’s an example of ‘authentic’ Eastern European Jewish humor.  

Two men are talking.

One says: “Life is hard”. 

He pauses thoughtfully, and then he continues.  He says: “Life is so hard . . . that death doesn’t seem like such a bad thing”.

After a bit more thinking he says, with finality: “In fact, life is so hard that it’s better to never have been born”.

His friend listens, and says: “You’re right.  But how many people are so lucky?  Maybe only one in ten thousand!”

See?  It’s pretty dark.

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Here’s another, less dark and more stereotypical, Joke:

A Frenchman, and Englishman, a German, and a Jew are mountain climbing.  [This is how I heard this joke; notice how it’s three Nationalities vs. a Religion?  What, there are no English, German, or French Jews??!?]  About halfway up the mountain they take a lunch break and discover that they’ve forgotten to bring any water along with them.  They’re really parched and thirsty.  And there’s no other water anywhere near.  The climbers begin to imagine their favorite thirst quenchers.

Weak from dehydration, the Frenchman says: “I . . . must . . . 

have . . . wine!”

Panting from thirst, the Englishman can barely croak out: “I . . . must . . . have . . . tea!”

The parched German says: “I . . . must . . . have . . . beer”.

The very thirsty Jew says:  “I . . . must . . . have . . . diabetes!”

Sorry about that.

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And here’s one from Alan Dundes’ book on Eastern European Jewish humor.  It lacks the stereotypical touch but makes up for it by being a bit on the dark side:

A man stands in front of a house in one of the less respectable neighborhoods in Bratislava.  He knocks on the door.  No response.  He knocks again, more loudly.

A second-floor window opens and a man sticks his head out.  “What do you want?”, he asks.

“I’m looking for Goldstein, the baker”, he replies.

“He doesn’t live here”, says the second-story guy.

“What’s your name?”, asks the visitor.

“Goldstein”, replies the man at the window.

“Are you a baker?”, asks the man at the door.

“Yes”, replies the man above.

“Well, how can you tell me that Goldstein the baker doesn’t live here?”, asks the visitor.

Goldstein looks around at the decrepit surrounding neighborhood, and says: “You call this living??”.

Better be careful next time you go to Bratislava.

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Have you noticed that the funniest people, the ones with the most active sense of humor, wit, etc., are the ones who’ve had the worst childhoods and the most difficult life experiences?   If you pay attention, I think you’ll find this to be true.  Who else would have a NEED to see life through that kind of lens?  I believe that the same principle applies in general to the historical difficulties and challenges that have resulted in national, ethnic, etc. humor.

As far as Jewish humor is concerned, I learned about its origin recently from a lecture from one of the faculty in Ethnic Studies at U.C. Berkeley.  It’s an interesting story.

The Jews, as we all know, had been dispersed all over the Western world: all over Europe, and over into Eastern Europe.  That’s known as the Jewish Diaspora.

In the 1500s there were a series of brutal pogroms in Eastern Europe.  (A pogrom is to Jews what race riots and lynchings have been to Southern blacks.)  Those pogroms were a problem for the Jewish community because they couldn’t figure out what they had done to offend God sufficiently that he allowed this to happen.  Seriously.  The Jews thought that if they could stop annoying God he’d stop hitting them over the head with the Cossacks.

They thought and thought and debated . . . through the filter and lens of the Torah, of course . . . and finally decided that they’d offended God by laughing too much.  So they decided to outlaw comedians.  Really.  I am not joking here.  They banned all comedians and revelry makers.  Go figure.  They thought God would like them more if they were serious people.

However, no people can survive without some  form of humor.  So the Jews allowed one category of “humorist” to exist: the bodchan. That’s pronounced bud-Hun, with a guttural “h”.  The bodchan  was the Medieval king’s jester’s evil twin; his job was to make fun of people.  The bodchan  said unkind things, especially at weddings.  He goaded people.  He would insult them.  Think Don Rickles; Don Rickles would have made a superb bodchan.  I’ve seen him in action and he was amazingly quick with his pointed jibes.  Anyway, in the past, at Jewish weddings, the bodchan would, for example, reduce the bride to tears with his descriptions of how she would soon be a wrinkled old hag with grey hair, brought down by disease and illness.  And ditto everybody else.

Well, you get the point.  For a long time, that was the only permitted Jewish humor.  Make people hurt until they laugh.  Or cry.  Well, life was hard, so why not?

From that, there arose an ironic sensibility of the world that mellowed a bit over the centuries . . . and by the time America made a place for such a thing in Vaudeville it had morphed into a very wry and self-effacing form of communication.  It had the bite and irony of containing a bit of truth, but now without sounding so horribly bad.  Think Henny Youngman (“Take my wife . . . . . . . . please”) or Rodney Dangerfield (“My luck is so bad that if I bought a cemetery people would stop dying”.)  That kind of humor worked because those narratives were based in living life, and witnessing its imperfections and disappointments from up close, rather than in the more simple-minded two-dimensional stereotypes, wit and puns, putdowns, or outright insults.  Oscar Wilde exercised tremendous wit and cleverness, but he was merely brilliantly ironic; his material wasn’t dark material.  He hadn’t suffered enough to do that.  As for me, I’m very comfortable with Jewish ironic humor.  My brain comes up with that kind of stuff.  I believe that the fundamental building blocks of the universe are Nitrogen, Hydrogen, Oxygen, and Irony.

Anyway, that’s the history that such a sensibility all came out of.  Isn’t that interesting to know?

Speaking of Rodney Dangerfield, whose self-ironic humor I’ve always liked . . . his spin on humor touches on a form of rhetoric that the Greeks called paraprosdokion (sometimes spelled paraprosdokian).  Paraprosdokion, as I’m certain you all know, is a form of rhetoric in which there are two parts, and in which the second part denies or undercuts the first one.  Or modifies it in a subtly humorous way.  A lot of American humor used to be of this type: comic one-liners or two-liners that had a comically self-contradictory feel.  Like Rodney Dangerfield’s delivery.  Will Rogers and George Allen were pretty good at it too.

Here are some examples of paraprosdokion.  They range from the funny to the not-so-funny:

I asked God for a bike, but I know God doesn’t work that way.
So I stole a bike and asked for forgiveness.

He has hit rock bottom
and has begun to excavate.

I want to die peacefully in my sleep like my grandfather,  
not screaming and yelling like the passengers in his car.

The last thing I want to do is hurt you. 
But it’s still on the list.

Light travels faster than sound. 
This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

If I agreed with you
we’d both be wrong.

They hired a band that was so lousy
that every time a waiter dropped a tray we all got up and danced.

Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit;
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

I have so much
to be humble about.

I was brought up to respect my elders. 
I’m just having a hard time finding any these days.

Whenever I fill out an application, in the part that says “If an emergency, notify:”
I put “DOCTOR”.

I didn’t say it was your fault,
I said I was blaming you.

I saw a woman wearing a sweatshirt with “Guess” on it…
so I said “Implants?”

I’ve had a wonderful evening. 
Unfortunately, it wasn’t this one.

He took umbrage
when I called him a thief.

Behind every successful man is his woman.
Behind the fall of a successful man is usually another woman.

If at first you don’t succeed . . .
well . . . then maybe sky-diving really isn’t for you.

I want to make you feel at home,
even though I wish you were. 

I discovered I scream the same way whether I’m about to be devoured by a great white shark
or if a piece of seaweed touches my foot.

Some cause happiness wherever they go.
Others whenever they go.

I used to be indecisive.
Now I’m not sure.

I always take life with a grain of salt,
plus a slice of lemon, and a shot of tequila.

When tempted to fight fire with fire,
remember that the Fire Department usually uses water.

He was at his best when the going was good.

Nostalgia isn’t what it used to be.

Some people hear voices.  Some see invisible people.
Others have no imagination whatsoever.

I’m a Scorpio,
so I don’t believe in Horoscopes.  

Where there’s a will,
I want to be in it.

He started out with nothing,
and through sheer hard work and determination made his way to the very highest point on the Bell Curve.

I was approached by a man who told me he hadn’t eaten in three days. 
I said to him, “my dear man, you must force yourself”.

If all the debutantes from Vassar were laid end to end . . .
well, I wouldn’t be a bit surprised.

Nothing is better than having dinner with you. 
Much better, in fact.

I’m glad you’ve rested your case. 
It’s weak.  It needs the rest.

He really turned the situation around
a full 360 degrees.

I think you should put your money where your mouth is,
and ignore the fact that money has a lot of germs.

He started out with nothing,
and has retained most of it.

Never wrestle with a pig. 
You’ll both get filthy, and the pig will enjoy it.

If you have a stack of applications on your desk, throw the first ten of them out.
You don’t want to hire unlucky people.

Sex at age 90 is . . .
like trying to shoot pool with a rope.

He put out a good vibe. 
I mean, he squelched it completely.

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More later.

25. MARTIN LUTHER AND THE LAW [2/2]

and SOME AMERICAN HISTORY,  or “KEEPING PEOPLE IN LINE” vs. “HELPING THEM”

MUSINGS, NO. 25, written in 2022  

Part 2 of  2

I’ve been talking (writing?) about incompatible views of the proper functions of government . . . and the mindsets that support such incompatible opinions.  This is a continuation of that topic.

Those incompatible mindsets are formed early in life, and they are formed entirely unconsciously.  No kid sits down to think about the ethics of abortion, for instance; he/she learns that from how his/her parents feel.  Ditto re: households in which the power structure is patriarchal, or dictatorial, or hierarchical, or egalitarian, or racist, or whatever else.  Those attitudes are installed — and deeply so — by age four or five.  Whatever you may ever go into therapy to deal with, it’ll go back to then.  Everything else is simply a metaphor, or vehicle, for those early-learned attitudes and mindsets.

Here’s something interesting.  It was only relatively recently that, in our own history, anyone in authority thought to make sure that “the people” had enough to eat; up until then it was most certainly every man for himself.  You know, Social Darwinism and all that.  This new idea came to the fore with the Democrats under Franklin Roosevelt — out of the desperate straits of the Depression.  Roosevelt rolled out help and aid programs of all kinds: the New Deal, the Works Progress Administration, social security and health care . . . etc.  The Republicans have been fighting that mindset ever since.  

I think of them as the “Throw People Off The Raft” Party.

Historically, it was the Roman Empire that first had the idea that the government had a responsibility to ensure that the people had enough to eat.  Isn’t that amazing?  They were the first.  

But they had to.  They were, after all, managing a “tribe” in which most members didn’t know the others, and certainly weren’t related to any of them, and would have had no reason to look out for any of them.  Without a “government” to hold things together, all the groups and tribes and factions would be at each other’s throats in no time.  And Rome itself was huge . . . and needed a steady food supply.  It was like the United States is today, actually — with the added bonus that our government is, under Trump, alienating all of our former allies while simultaneously having anal sex with Russia, our former biggest enemy.  Wow.  Even science fiction types couldn’t make this stuff up.

The IDEA that the government should make sure that the people had enough to eat was, in fact, the Communist idea also.  It didn’t turn out to work that way in Russia, as we all know.  Still, the Scandinavian and European countries have “Socialized Medicine”, and that seems to be working better than our own paltry efforts at national “non-Socialized” health care.  As far as the Republicans go, their platform is that people should get the health care that they can afford, and in the last political campaign Mitt Romney actually poo-pooed working people’s idea that they thought they had a right to health care.  

Well, it’s hard to miss the complete absence of any sense that the Republicans, as prosperous citizens, have ANY responsibility for their less prosperous fellow citizens.  They see the government as TAKING THEIR MONEY AWAY FROM THEM in the form of taxes . . . but without wondering what things such as medicine, education, health, and services to the community [that paid the taxes!] the government might use it for.  It’s just too difficult a concept for them.

It makes one ill.  But on the other hand: wow.  Who knew that Franklin Roosevelt was a Communist!?  Well, he was!  He made efforts to distribute to the people what the people needed, both in the second half of the Great Depression and World War II.

And still, all that considered — insofar as it is a good and decent idea for a government to look out for its citizens — our own Republic didn’t lift much of a finger to help with the feeding-everyone effort while the Communists were advertising that that was their ultimate goal.  Our own ruling class saw doom and upper-class bankruptcy in the Communist scenario, and the U.S. fought the Communists and their egalitarian ideas tooth and nail.

Well, we all know that “Communism failed”.  It might have done so anyway, of its own internal complications, and without our help.  But we don’t know that.  We did help.  And our help was MASSIVE: we opposed, fought, resisted, propagandized, disinformed, misinformed, undermined, blackballed, vilified, and attacked Communists and Communism in every way we could, and justified our every move by pointing to their nefariousnesses.  Any government under that kind of assault will not be free to develop in peaceful ways.  

By “our own ruling class”, as I mentioned above, I mean pretty much anyone who made a lot of money by hook or by crook and has become part of “the American way”; that is, after all, the principal social message that any and all schools will have taught.  Or, if they didn’t teach it, they certainly never examined or questioned the principal pillars of American though.  These are the “we’re-the-good-guys” trope, the “right-to-get-ahead” part of the American Dream, and the Sanctity-of-Private-Property promoters.  

That has of course spread far and wide: and the propaganda got so thick that you could be lynched in the South if someone called you a Communist.  Under the highly alcoholic senator Joe McCarthy many people got persecuted, prosecuted, fired, blacklisted, boycotted, injured, etc. for thinking Communism was a good idea.  Yes, we all know that Communism failed. But the idea of it was nonetheless excellent: that everyone chips in and participates in a classless society.

The main idea was that You Should And Will Get Yours (“from everyone according to their ability to everyone according to their needs”) . . . but You Shouldn’t And Will Not Get Anyone Else’s.  Here, if you’ve noticed, the 1% has gotten the 99%’s share.  The financial world certainly stole a bunch of everyone else’s in the 2008 fiasco . . . and no one has rectified any of it.  Nor will they, from what I can see.  Well, neither Hillary Clinton nor Donald Trump hinted that this was going to be a plank of their platform, in the past election.  And I don’t hear whispers about it in the election to come.

Well, the F.B.I. was going to take care of the Communist problem; its mandate was to oversee Domestic law and order.  (The C.I.A., born out of the earlier O.S.S., had the task of overseeing Un-domestic law and order.)  It was, therefore, the F.B.I.’s main job to get rid of all the domestic Communists (well, the ten most wanted criminals too, but mainly the Communists).  

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However, the F.B.I. allowed the Communist party to remain active in this country.  Yes, it did.  

And why did it do so?  Well, mostly because it needed bad guys.  The F.B.I. understood that once the Communists were gone it would have no reason to exist.  It would be out of a job.  There weren’t enough “ten most wanted” people to keep that many F.B.I. people employed.

I was told this many years ago by an old Communist fellow who knew this history.  I’ve never read about this, by the way; and neither have you. Why would we have?  It’s simply the most credible political strategy scenario imaginable.

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How things have changed.  I was saying that individuals will have internalized the imperative to uphold the function of the Government to “keep things in line”, as far as their sociopolitical lives go.  This will have been internalized as a rule for running their own personal and family lives as well.  

THE CURRENT SITUATION:

I’ve created a life for myself via making guitars.  I learned it by exercising hand skills, perceptual skills, analytical skills, and experienced common sense.  I have the sense that I now live in a world in which hand skills and common sense are less and less needed.  Well, electronic devices and computers have taken over.  By the same token, I seem to live in a world in which following one’s conscience and common sense of humanity is less and less the thing to do.  Especially by those who have influence and power they feel the need to defend.  Exercise of conscience and common sense appear to have been replaced by “following policy” or “following the rules”.  This seems to me quite true in the realm of politics — particularly the politics of the Right — as well as the corporate (financial, manufacturing, medical and scientific) sectors.   

You know, “carry out the Policy and don’t complicate things or waste time by being nice, empathetic, helpful, or a bleeding heart to people”.  

I probably sound like I’m overstating this, but that last part is very absent in today’s politics.  All you have to do is listen to any current official’s explanation of how the government has to separate illegals from their children.  And there’s Kelly Ann Conway’s famous “alternate facts” spin.  They mean it.  This is these functionaries’ job description.  It has to be, because of party policy.  And they’re paid to carry it out.

I wrote about this aspect of the plight of “illegals” in my last newsletter.  “It’s Disneyland for the kids”; someone actually said that . . . as the children live in cages without their families nearby, and “supervised” by people assigned to feed them, make sure none of them get too sick or try to escape.  The official line is: “well, we don’t want to do that, but it’s unavoidable; the main thing is that we have to keep the nation safe.”  Basically, it’s “we have no choice”.  I keep on hearing that on news programs.

I got an interesting email in response to my thoughts, from a friend; he wasn’t happy with the separating of families and children but, but he did make a point of letting me know that these people were here illegally and that we were merely sending them back to their own countries.

I don’t wish to start fights with people.  But it seems to me that this little conversation contains two entirely separate issues.  On the one hand, well, yes, they’re not here legally, and something ought to be done about that.  On the other hand — and I seem to be emphasizing this one in my own mind — how does that entitle anyone to mistreat them?  

I don’t need to tell you that the countries that many of the refugees are coming from (Mexico, Honduras, Nicaragua, Syria, Iraq, some African countries, etc.) are DANGEROUS to live in, do I?  I guess that my thinking focuses on how untenable it is to live in those countries, as opposed to the fact that those people were born in those countries and should stay there if they don’t have the papers with which to immigrate here.  Would that life were that easy and hold on as I peel my blood pressure off the ceiling.  

As I’ve written before, my family and I are/were Hungarian immigrants.  We left Europe after the second world war, along with millions of people who had been displaced by that war, whose lives had been destroyed, and who wanted a new beginning.  In our case we left Hungary and went to Austria.  Then we moved to England.  Then we moved to Cuba.  Then we moved to Mexico.  No one wanted us. 

Is this sounding familiar? 

We did arrive here in the U.S. “legally” in 1959, after 14 years of wandering.  World War 2 was over as of 1945.  Plus, I think my parents knew we’d get in if we waited long enough (the U.S. was “the good guys” back in those days, much more than it is now).

I don’t think it works like that for the refugees I just mentioned, though.  Their nations are quite active areas of poverty, disease, and civil war.  And it is largely civil war that is supported by various world powers – us included.  That’s really different than the situation my parents and I faced.

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After World War II Cuba was one of two countries on this side of the Atlantic that accepted refugees without quota limitations.  The other was Ecuador.  So, those who didn’t want to rot away in some European internment camp flocked to Cuba or Ecuador, just to have a place to rest until they could figure out what to do with the rest of their lives.  Those became staging areas.  And from them expatriate Europeans moved on to Canada, the United States, Latin America, Palestine, Australia, back to Europe, or even Africa.  My family and I were part of that flow of humanity.  And we knew what it felt like to be strangers in a strange land, whom no one wanted and who would have been persecuted as “illegals” had we snuck in somewhere.  A lot like today’s Muslims and Mexicans.  These can be considered this administration’s M & Ms.   And they don’t have staging areas like Cuba and Ecuador to escape to.

Eventually, my family and I got green cards.  And here we are.

Here’s a question that I don’t have a good answer for.  An awful lot of Americans are from immigrant stock.  How can they feel this way about the next wave of people who are on that same track?  

What’s that?  What did you say?  Oh, we’re white and they’re not?  They lack the skills and education the U.S. needs?  Yeah, that explains it.  And they hate the U.S.?  What was I thinking?  And of course we did take in the Jews, the Italians, the Irish and the Scots of “the Celtic migration”, and other Europeans; these have been here a while and have by now become “American” – everything that the wanna-bes are not.  Pardon me for saying it but, from what I can see, that includes not being white.  Darker skinned people may or may not hate the U.S. . . . but what they all mainly want is to be able to feed their families and live in peace.  

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Just so.  As I try to put all these pieces together so that they make some sense to me I’m left with the conclusion that beauty, sympathy, charity, and kindness toward others seem to be quite useless in the minds of . . . well . . . Evangelicals, xenophobes, anti-gays, Tea Party people, America Firsters, and such.  They’re certainly useless and pointless in the struggles against the people who are now being labeled as bad and dangerous.  At least, that’s what it seems like from what I’m seeing and hearing.  

I probably sound very facetious in saying this, but I’m being straight.  It really doesn’t matter whether anyone thinks I’m saying that those are bad people or not; that’s beside the point.  I’m saying that the “nationalists” seem to think*** like that.  The qualities I named seem to not be useful to those people.  If they were useful or valued, well, they’d use them.  Would they not?

*** “Think” is such a silly-sounding word.  Try saying it to yourself a few times.  Doesn’t it sound like someone clanking a fork on some plumbing pipes?

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Aldous Huxley, in his book Brave New World, describes a futuristic society in which everyone kowtows to Big Brother; everyone participates in the daily five minutes’ hate that is directed against whoever big brother doesn’t like that week.  Once a week, everything stops for five minutes and people focus their hatred on someone or some group.

Behold Fox news and Rush Limbaugh.

Man, those scare me.  Hatred, hatred, hatred.  It’s like Germany before World War 2.  Can we be reassured by the fact that the current White House’s [Donald Trump’s] staff has already many times the turnover that Adolph Hitler’s staff did?  It’s like a tire that’s had sixty or seventy re-treads.  If anyone has any helpful insights into this, I’d be interested in hearing them.

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HERE’S SOME HUMOR ABOUT SOMETHING USELESS:

Paddy, the Irishman, walks into his favorite pub one afternoon.  Well, he’s not actually walking; he’s limping and dragging his leg.  

He’s covered in scrapes and black-and-blue marks.  His arm’s in a sling and he has a bandage wrapped around his head.

The barman looks at him in shock and says, “Paddy!  What happened to ye?”

Paddy replies, “Tim O’Malley gave me a beatin’ ”.

The barman, still shocked, asks, “what did he beat you with?”

Paddy replies, “he beat me with a shovel”.

“Well”, says the barman, “ ‘tis a fine beatin’ he gave ye, I can see.  But did ye no’ have anything in your hand you could defend yourself with?”

“Aye, I did”, says Paddy.  “Mary O’Malley’s breast.  ‘Twas a thing of rare beauty . . .  but I have to tell ye, honestly, t’was useless in a fight”.

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The Harvard-like Test

This is based upon typical graduation requirements at Harvard.  Try to finish within 5 minutes.  When you are done, count the number correct and see how you compare to others. OK, here we go…

1. Is there a 4th of July in England? Yes or no?

 2. How many birthdays does the average man have?

 3. Some months have 31 days. How many have 28?

 4. How many outs are there in an inning?

 5. Can a man in California marry his widow’s sister?

 6. Take the number 30, divide it by 1/2, and then add 10. What do you get?

 7. There are 3 apples and you take two away. How many apples are you left with?

 8. A doctor gives you three pills and tells you to take one every half an hour.  How long will the pills last?

 9. A farmer has 17 sheep. All but 9 of them die. How many sheep are left?

10. How many animals of each sex did Moses bring with him on the ark?

11. A butcher in the market is 5’10” tall. What does he weigh?

12. How many 2 cent stamps are there in a dozen?

13. What was the President’s name in 1960?

NO CHEATING

So how do you think you did?

(Answers below.)

TEST ANSWERS:

1. Is there a 4th of July in England? Yes or No?

     Yes. It comes right after the 3rd.

2. How many birthdays does the average man have?

     One (1). You can only be born once.  The others are birthday anniversaries.

3. Some months have 31 days. How many have 28?

     Twelve (12). All of them have at least 28 days.

4. How many outs are there in an inning? Six (6).

     Don’t forget there is a top and bottom to every inning.

5. Can a man in California marry his widow’s sister?

     No. He must be dead if it is his widow.

6. Take the number 30, divide it by 1/2, and then add 10. What do you get?

     Seventy (70); thirty (30) when divided by 1/2 is 60.

7. There are 3 apples and you take two away. How many apples are you left with?

     Two (2). YOU take two apples . . . therefore YOU have TWO apples.

8. A doctor gives you three pills and tells you to take one every half an hour.

     How long will the pills last?

     One hour. If you take the first pill at 1:00, the second at 1:30,

     and the third at 2:00, the pills have run out and only one hour has passed.

9. A farmer has 17 sheep. All but 9 of them die.

     How many sheep are left?

     Nine (9). Like I said, all BUT nine die.

10. How many animals of each sex did Moses have on the ark?

     None. Moses never had an ark.

11. A butcher in the market is 5′ 10 tall.  What does he weigh?

     Meat … that is self-explanatory.

12. How many 2 cent stamps are there in a dozen?

     Twelve (12). How many eggs are in a dozen? TWELVE … it’s a dozen.

13. What was the President’s name in 1960?

     George Bush. As far as I know, he hasn’t changed his name.

So, how did you do?

13 correct………GENIUS…you are good.

10-12 correct….ABOVE AVERAGE…but don’t let it go to your head.

7-9 correct……..AVERAGE…but who wants to be average?

4-6 correct……..SLOW…pay attention to the questions!

1-3 correct………IDIOT…what else can be said?

0 correct…………CONGRATULATIONS, you are a certified MORON

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HERE’S A RIDDLE FOR YOUR ENJOYMENT.  IF YOU’RE LESS THAN 12 YEARS OLD YOU’LL  HAVE FIGURED  IT OUT EASILY.  IF YOU’RE  30 OR OLDER,  IT MAY WELL STUMP  YOU:

A COWBOY RIDES INTO TOWN AT NOON ON FRIDAY.

TWO DAYS LATER, HE RIDES OUT OF TOWN, AT EXACTLY NOON, ON FRIDAY.

HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?

FRIDAY IS THE NAME OF HIS HORSE.

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21. MARTIN LUTHER & THE LAW [1/2]

(Or: “KEEPING PEOPLE IN LINE” vs. “CATERING TO THEIR NEEDS”)

“Newsletter” No. 21, written in 2020

Part 1 of  2

I’ve been writing on and off about Martin Luther, the mental and spiritual spark plug behind the European Reformation of 500 years ago.  His influence lives on in various versions of social belief and outlook, among American Evangelicals of all stripes, and in the Alt Right, and among Neo-Conservative groups.  Not to mention in newly re-emerging conservative, racist, and nationalist groups all over Europe.

Luther’s most earnestly argued contribution to society appears to have been his championing of the rights and privileges of the Authoritarian Personality.  Luther stood for the position that everyone should be subject to the governing authorities.  Well . . . one would need to understand the historical context within which this idea first lifted its head, in order to more fully understand that dictum better than this single bald sentence can explain anything.  However, I can give you the short version.  

Luther himself left a record that shows him to have been an explosively belligerent, intransigent, and uncompromising defender (propagandist? shill?) for his view of things.  His message was that Faith alone would save one, and that otherwise the proper function of government was to Impose Order.  The proper function of government was NOT to be Helpful, Sympathetic, or Supportive of its citizens’ various human needs.  

In other words, “Governing Authority” was there to keep those in line who had insufficient Faith and/or trust . . . in . . . uh . . . God, and also the government authority.  That’s rather circuitous, but I think Luther’s message really did boil down to this.  And it certainly is more fun for whoever is in power and authority.  Well, Authoritarianism certainly was the European model for civic behavior, as well as for child rearing, all the way through my parents’ generation — particularly in the Germanic countries.  I believe that it still is so in the Germanic countries . . . and no doubt other ones as well.  

My own family is European and my father treated all of us as his personal property.  Well, that’s exactly how and what he’d been taught.  His job was to “impose order” by getting the rest of us to obey him.  It was NOT his job to advise, act as a model, to support us personally or emotionally or sympathetically or morally, nor to philosophize or problem-solve.  He didn’t have much of a clue about any of that that.  But of course, he wouldn’t have: he was brought up in exactly the same way — but with much more physical punishment than he imposed on me.  So kudos for him for acting better in that way.  He merely frightened the shit out of me.

For my father and people who have been brought up as he was, everything is a struggle for power and control . . .  and even survival . . . precisely as even the smallest thing appears to be for Donald Trump.  He has NO sense of scale, perspective, boundaries, or proportion.  He has to be Respected and Obeyed.  For him, being criticized by a nine-year old seems to hold the same charge as being dissed by the leader of another nation.  Never mind that the nine year old is not likely to have nuclear weapons.  

NARCISSISTIC INJURIES

There is the concept of the “narcissistic injury” in contemporary psychology.  This is code for “a psychological injury that is so massive that it makes one feel that one has ceased to exist”.  This probably sounds fanciful, and a mere sentence like what I just wrote doesn’t at all do justice to the reality of the experience.  But I’ve seen such things happen and can vouch for the fact that they really do exist.  

I think it’s likely that most people have seen a bit of this kind of thing but have had no category of experience or knowledge to put it into.  If you’ve ever seen anyone in a mindless rage that they are powerless to stop, or seen someone completely collapse into a helpless puddle, then you’ve seen a narcissistic collapse too . . . perhaps without understanding what you were seeing.

Some people have so little sense of self, and have a personality that is so fragile, that it takes rather little to make them feel that they have ceased to exist.  As I said before, such sentences really don’t convey what that’s like. But, really: one’s sense of self and one’s sense of existing in the world disappears completely.  That is what the psychological literature is actually describing.  One minute one might be cooking dinner and the next thing one finds one’s self in an internal black vacuum of nothingness . . . in some dimension for which there are no words . . . just as infants have no words.  

Or, imagine that you’re in a department store surrounded by hundreds of objects, merchandise, things, colors, sounds, etc.  Then, POW!  It’s all gone and you’re in a large, empty, silent, and dark room . . . or in a room that’s chaotic with too-bright, colors, changing shapes, and loud sounds.  Either way, you have the primitive mental powers of a freaked out five-month old.

The adult person who is caught up in a narcissistic injury may in fact talk or rant, but that’s not the feeling state.  I repeat: the feeling state is that any coherent sense of one’s self will have completely vanished.  It’s just that one can have tantrums in which he can now throw loud words about, and also flail around uncontrollably, and even harm people.  Also, as I said before: this is impossible for someone who is a stranger to such mental states to imagine; but believe me, it happens.

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HERE’S A RIDDLE FOR YOUR ENJOYMENT.  IF YOU’RE LESS THAN 12 YEARS OLD YOU’LL   BE ABLE TO FIGURE IT OUT EASILY.  IF YOU’RE 30 OR OLDER, IT MAY WELL STUMP  YOU:

A COWBOY RIDES INTO TOWN AT NOON ON FRIDAY.

TWO DAYS LATER, HE RIDES OUT OF TOWN, AT EXACTLY NOON, ON FRIDAY.

HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?

     – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – <> – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

More later, along with the answer to the riddle.

Fun Stuff #2

THE BROKEN CLOCK PUZZLE

Michael is a handy guy who makes things.  He makes ukuleles, tooling, jigs, furnishings, displays, takes photos, and so on.  While he is active in many kinds of such projects, the people who use them generally agree that Michael’s stuff is much better than it looks or functions, despite how overpriced it all is.

Michael recently made a wall clock out of scraps, cutoffs, and leftovers of various materials.  It worked fine . . . until a particularly volatile series of anti-government rants by Bob knocked it off the wall.  The clock hit the floor, just missing Denyse and Carol-#1-the-taller, and broke into three pieces.  They, being used to Bob’s rants, continued chatting.

  Sarah A. jumped out of her seat in fright, fearing a ninja assassination attempt in progress.   Sara S. emitted a shriek so high-pitched that only the dogs could hear it; every cup and glass in the room shattered.   Carol-#2-the-shorter, in an unexpected manifestation of fight-or-flight syndrome, was reduced to the only-recently-discovered third reaction: helpless giggles and hiccups.  Jamie clung to both her doggie and Liz with an alacrity heretofore unseen, leaving indentations in them that would last the rest of the day.  Ervin was . . . well, it was hard to tell.  He might have had a hangover or was experiencing flashbacks.  You never know, with him.

Just as Michael and Trini were about to clean the mess up, Barbara walked in.

She took one look at the broken clock and — in a breathless utterance delivered with Laurence-Olivier-like composure and accompanying British accent said: “OH MY GOD, MICHAEL.  LOOK!   THE CLOCK BROKE INTO THREE PIECES IN SUCH A WAY THAT THE NUMBERS ON EACH CHUNK ADD UP TO THE SAME TOTAL!” 

 HOW DID THE CLOCK BREAK?  WHAT NUMBERS FROM ONE TO TWELVE DID EACH PIECE CONTAIN?

16. A LETTER TO WELLS FARGO BANK [June, ’18]

This was written in June of 2018

I don’t know if I’m just getting grumpy in my old age, or if I just am tired of all the lies that I soak and marinate in every day via all the media. Oh, you know: 

I’m your friend; I’m here to help you. You just have to . . . 
    buy me; 
      eat me; 
         drink me; 
           smoke me; 
             admire me;
               be happy with me;
                 have faith in me; 
                   be beautiful with/for me; 
                     fuck me; 
                      own me; 
                        trust me;
                         use me;
                          wear me; 
                           be loyal to me; 
                             send me a check;
                               have a nicer car; 
                                vote for me;
                                 keep up with me;
                                   be more with it; 
                                   etc. etc. etc.
                                    etc. etc.
                                    etc.
                                    etc.
                                    etc.
                                    etc.
                                    etc.
                                    etc.

Anyway, I went to my bank two weeks ago, to make a bank wire transfer.  As it happened, I was directed to a newbie bank officer with whom to do the necessary paperwork.  Being a newbie, he was accompanied by a (female) supervisor who helped him through the various steps.  I’d never met either of them before, and between the three of us we did this task in about 20 minutes.  The next day I got a follow-up email telling me the status of the wire transfer.  The email said:

“Good Afternoon Ervin,

I just wanted to follow up with you in regards to the wire we processed yesterday at the banking center. As we discussed it will be going out Monday due to it being late in the afternoon. And I wanted also to thank you for your continued business with us.  Your relationship is important to me and I appreciated having the opportunity to assist you. My goal is to help you succeed financially and to provide you with an exceptional level of service, while ensuring your service requests are met. 

If you have questions, or would like assistance or information please call me using the information below.  

Thank you. We appreciate your business.

(The guy’s name appeared here, without a “yours”, “sincerely”, or other sign-off word or phrase)

I sent him the following response:

Hi, Mr. ________;

Thank you for getting back to me, and I appreciate your help in the matter of the international wire transfer.

 You emailed me the standard politenesses about appreciating my business and eagerness to assist me. It’s nice of you to say things like that; but if you’ll forgive me, that is not my experience of Wells Fargo bank. I’ll tell you up front that this is not your fault; it’s just that banking at Wells Fargo is unpleasant for me. 

 Over the years I have seen Wells Far-to-go turn from a reasonably friendly bank full of people whom I’d see every time I went there into a building that is perpetually full of strangers.  I’ve seen tellers, officials, loan officers, managers, personal bankers, credit card staffers, portfolio advisors, etc. come and go countless times. The parking lot attendants have longer tenure.  There’s only one person left that I recognize from long ago: ______; and she’ll be retiring soon.   _____ has been around for a while, and so has that very nice ______ (?) fellow whom I sometimes bring a coffee for.  But everyone else is a stranger to me.  

I met you and Ms. _____ for the first time only last week, over the matter of the bank wire transfer.  You greeted me when I walked through the door.  In the past three months I’ve been greeted at the door by three other people whom I’d never seen before and have not seen again.  As things are going, both you and Ms. _____ will both soon leave and I’ll never see either of you again.  The very nice connection I made with her will disappear forever.  Wells Fargo is not really there to help me, I’m afraid.  If it were, there would be familiar faces for me to feel comfortable with, and to have built up some familiarity with and create some sense of community.  Frankly, I have a more personal relationship with my grocery store checkout person, whom I at least see most times I go there.  But this is not your fault. 

A bit of history: I’ve banked at that branch of Wells Fargo since before you were born.  As I said, you and met for the first time only last week.  I am twice your age and I come from a different generation and culture than you do.  It would be polite for someone in your position to address me as Mr. Somogyi.  You have, as far as I’m concerned, no license to do differently.  

It’s a bit awkward to point this out but, while it is common in this culture to casually call people by their first names, ours is a professional/commercial relationship in which we are not friends or equals.  You don’t know me; I don’t know you; and you are paid to deal with me.  As a matter of fact, Wells Fargo makes the money with which it pays you directly off my patronage, and that of others like me.  I’m fairly responsible about things like how people address one another; I was brought up to call my elders Mr. or Mrs., or even Ms.  You may not have noticed that I am at least three times your age.

Please forgive me for this longish letter; you’ve done almost nothing to deserve it.  You are not responsible for the bulk of my frustrations.  I’m sure you have your own troubles.  But you should have some idea about manners.

Years ago my bank branch was full of visible and audible activity.  Now, when I walk in it’s almost deserted.  There are two (or occasionally three) tellers at ten teller’s windows.  The other seven or eight windows look like cemeteries waiting for a visitor.  That’s probably because everyone is doing electronic banking.  But I’m old-fashioned and I go to the bank.  And these days that feels sort of like sitting next to the girl no one wants to dance with; the effect on me is somewhere between disconcerting and creepy.

Mostly, however, it’s not that the bank is inefficient or thoughtless or greedy; your employer is a criminal.  You work for a criminal organization.  Wells Far-to-go claims to be benevolent and civically responsible, but it famously opened MILLIONS of unauthorized accounts for its customers without their knowing about it.  It didn’t really have to do that, you know; but it did because it could.  It refunded the money, of course (or claimed it did); but it did so unwillingly and under threat once the secret was out.

My honest opinion is that Wells Fargo’s board of vastly overpaid directors should rot in a Nicaraguan prison.  A few people did lose their jobs over that act of out-and-out piracy, but not much more than that happened.  Wells Far-to-go participated in the financial debacle of circa 2008; it also has financed and continues to finance all kinds of corporate projects that devastate the environment and is PRIMARILY focused on making money for its already moneyed customers. Its mortgage track record ranges from unsatisfactory to horrible; I know that from experience and from others who have spoken with me.  I also have a friend who is a financial attorney, who has spoken with me about having had way too much experience with how utterly shabby, shady, and corrupt Wells Far-to-go’s behaviors and policies on the whole have been.  

I’m embarrassed to be one of Wells Fargo’s customers.  Not that most of the other big banks are any different.  But I don’t know of any more benign bank to put my money into. 

You are a youngish man trying to make his way through life and who has found a career with this institution.  And you are simply doing your job. I mean you no ill or disrespect whatsoever.  As far as I know, you are not dishonest and you are not in a position to engage in malfeasance.  You should, though, observe the niceties of acknowledging your elders with some politeness; and in your job most of the elders you meet are not your friends; you’re engaging in monetary transactions.  I’ve met people at that bank over the years that I’ve honestly liked.  However, I’m unable to like Wells Fargo itself. 

Once, a long time ago, the bank had mounted a promotional campaign that advertised business loans to small and struggling community businesses. Being young, and starting a struggling small business, I applied for such a loan.  The bank official I spoke with seemed to be kindly disposed toward the young and naive young person I was at the time, and told me straight out that despite what they say in their advertising the bank has little to no interest in that kind of activity, and wouldn’t loan me anything.  Those weren’t his precise words but that was EXACTLY what he said to me.  Ditto with my mortgage some years later: Wells Far-to-go said yes almost right off the bat, of course; and then it said no.  In the world of sales, this is called bait-and-switch.

Today, a bank wire transfer should go through to any place in the world in microseconds.  I’d give the paperwork, etc., 24 hours, max.  As it is, I was told that it may take five to ten business days . . . during which, in addition to the fee that I was charged, Wells Fargo gets to use my money gratis for that length of time.  As far as service goes, whom exactly is that a service to?  Well, it is business as usual, is it not?

I may or may not see you next time I go to the bank.  If I do, I’ll offer to bring you a cup of coffee.  Ditto Ms. ________.  Nothing of what I’ve been writing is your or her fault . . . although, as I intimated above, I’ve been subject to the bank’s various business practices for as long as you’ve been on this planet (and I think Ms. ________’s lifetime too).  Finally, Wells Fargo has made money off me every month and every year of that time.  Coffee-wise, I usually go to the place up the block; they have decent coffee.

Respectfully (toward you, not the bank), Ervin Somogyi

Fun Stuff #1

Real Test: Count the “F’s” in the following text:

FINISHED FILES ARE THE RESULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIFIC

STUDY COMBINED WITH THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS…(see below)




Managed it ?

Scroll down only after you have counted them, okay?  Do you think there are three?  How many?  3?

Wrong, there are 6 !!–no joke.

Read it again.

The reasoning behind it is that . . . . . . . . . . . .

 . . . . . . . . . . . . . The brain cannot process “of”.

Incredible or what ? Go back and look again!!

Anyone who counts all 6 “F’s” on the first go is a genius.

Three is normal, four is quite rare. Send this to your friends — it drives them crazy.

ABOUT MY ARTWORK

Not too long ago, pretty much all guitars looked pretty much alike (certainly the steel string ones) except for some that were a bit smaller or larger than others.  Classical guitars didn’t vary much at all except for their woods and the colors in their rosettes, and the ornamental design at the top of the peghead.  The steel string guitars came in a few standard shapes, and their rosettes, bridges, bindings, pegheads, and tuners were pretty much the same. 

Over time, those things changed.  In part this was because the market had expanded (with the popularization of the acoustic guitar during the American Folk Movement, and the expansion of different styles of guitar playing), and companies were looking for ways in which to make their guitars look different from their competitors’.  People like me came along too; we wanted to enhance the look of our instruments in artistic ways.  And the field was wide open: no one had done very much of such useless ornamental work.

There was good reason to not add such ornamental touches, too.  The public tends to stay away from anything new (I think there’s a gene for that), and such artistic work was accepted slowly, to the point that there are now a good handful of woodworkers who specialize in inlays – and a lot of the new inlays are tasteful, imaginative, and spectacular.  And the inventiveness of inlay work is increasing; look some examples up on Google and Pinterest.  But I remember having exhibited my work in a lot of guitar shows earlier on and having people stop by my table and say things like “Oh, that’s nice! . . . it’s wonderful! . . . that must have taken you some time to do! . . . splendid work! . . . well, thanks; goodbye!”

ABOUT MY ARTWORK IN PARTICULAR

I’ve been thinking.  (Pause for applause to die down.)  Life is . . . strange.  I’ve been doing a lot of retrospection, introspection, re-evaluating, re-living, re-examining, etc. about the path I’ve traveled in the past 7-1/2 decades.  There’s some interesting stuff there and I think you might enjoy reading about some of it.  Well, you’ve probably noticed that whatever can be said about ANYTHING AT ALL . . . is NEVER the whole story.  There’s always something else to it.  And this is true of the part of my life that has to do with both my wood-art and my “artistic guitar” work.  If you don’t know about these, do please visit my website at www.esomogyi.com and take a look.

Artwork has been a big part of my life for thirty-some years . . . even though there’s been zero money in for me as far as just producing artwork goes.  However, this impulse to be artistically creative is strong in me, and it has made a difference in my guitar-making work.  

I didn’t start out making guitars like that, of course; I segued into it in a rather unusual way.  The following account of my creative work is true; I’ve only changed the names to protect myself from a lawsuit 🙂  

But, first things first.  My particular story goes back to the late 1980s; I was in the process of a divorce. The word “bummer” hardly does justice to how demoralized I felt.  It was bad.  I looked for professional help so that I could put back together the parts of me that felt as though they were coming apart.  In due time, I found a good therapist [NOTE: We were a good match, fortunately; some matches are not so good].

As you may know, therapy (when it’s working properly) is private, and even intimate.  A level of trust is created.  The client bonds with the therapist . . . and – certainly for the first long while — projects all kinds of old and buried parent/child feelings and qualities onto him or her.  Those old feelings get acted out, and the client becomes very protective, possessive, and jealous of that relationship – to the point that if anyone else enters into it the client will feel anxious and threatened.  That’s HIS therapist, after all! . . .  and for that reason the therapist does not share information about his/her own life; the time is dedicated to focusing on the client’s life.  It’s been observed, for instance, that if a therapist gets pregnant — and shows it — it can trigger a crisis for the client.  THERE’S SOMEONE ELSE BESIDES HIM IN HIS THERAPIST’S LIFE, AND NOT ONLY IS THERE SOMEONE ELSE BUT THE THERAPIST IS HAVING SEX WITH HIM AND NOT WITH YOU!!!!  Silly, really, but it feels real.  And it’s intense.  It MUST be dealt with, talked, out, resolved, or whatever . . . or the therapy itself stops happening.  There are no longer only two people in the room.  

[NOTE: I had a conversation with a therapist once, who had a pretty dramatic version of such an experience.  Years before, when she was starting a family, she got pregnant.  She told her current clients about that, to let them know what was going on.  One fellow seemed to feel intolerably threatened when he was told this.  He stood up, grabbed a nearby book or clipboard or Kleenex box  (or something like that), and angrily threw it at a wall, and walked out.  He never came back.  Wow.]

So . . . my therapist got pregnant.  Eek.  Shudder.  She doesn’t love me any more! . . . and all that.  But seriously: it’s a turning point.  Something needs to be done about that kind of thing.  Normally, the people involved talk it out.  That’s what talk therapy is about.

But in my case, no.  I did something else.  I woke up one morning knowing how to resolve the conflict.  I hadn’t made lists or compared options; I just knew. And in my next session with her I announced that since she was going to give birth to something, I wanted to give birth to something too!  Hmmmm.  Rather than to back away, I had somehow decided to join her in the pregnancy.  That is, Metaphorically.  And even though that idea hit me with great clarity, I didn’t know what it meant at the time.  It took two days for me to realize what I’d meant.

I’m told that this is an unusual way to come to have come terms with this kind of situation but, what the heck, who am I to do something normal?  In any event, two days after my announcement I was producing art . . . and I haven’t stopped since.  It’s been a huge part of my creative life.  And even though I’ve lost money on it, it was not really about money.  It’s always been about self-expression.  And, as I said, I was doing artwork 48 hours after I made my announcement.  I wouldn’t be making art or anything like it if my therapist hadn’t gotten knocked up.  Isn’t that something?

Well, there’s more to the story, of course, and it’s sort delicious in its own way.  I don’t know exactly how my unconscious decided that I wanted to produce art.  I mean, it did send me a strongly worded memo to that effect.  But it frequently sends me obscure encoded messages that I have to decipher, and I can’t say that the decision was mine in any cognitive or intentional sense.  As I said, I woke up one morning knowing the answer to this problem.  However, the sheer clarity and suddenness with which that hit me suggested that I was already primed for such a move.  It felt right!  I mean, otherwise I’d have pondered and ruminated until way after the kid was born, right?  So: I was ready for . . . something.  It only needed a trigger, or a precipitator. 

(I wonder if I can get a good precipitator through Amazon.com?  There’ve been lots of them in use lately so they might be on back-order.  I hear the best deal is in the economo-shrink-wrapped six-packs.  I don’t think I need six, though.)

– – – – – – – – – – – – – A PAUSE FOR A COFFEE OR ESPRESSO – – – – – – – – – – – – 

Anyway . . . there’s some pertinent background to the art-follows-pregnancy thing.  To the best of my conscious knowledge it is the following:

Shortly before my divorce, when my marriage was really on the rocks, I had an affair with a woman.  I had been feeling like a dried out prune for a while and was ready for and needing something that made me feel alive; this affair helped.  It was, I might add, only technically adultery; my soon-to-be-ex-wife knew all about it and really didn’t care one way or the other.  Well, at least there wasn’t the secrecy and sneaking around that usually accompanies these kinds of liaisons.

This woman that I had the affair with, “Susan”, happened to be a therapist.  It’s impossible to avoid therapists in Northern California.  There are more than 30 schools continually cranking out therapists, health advocates, spiritual integrators, family counselors, body workers, psychologists, life coaches, psychiatrists, people trained in transpersonal counseling, etc. etc. etc.   I mean, if you crash your car into a tree around here four therapists will fall out of it.  And Susan was quite smart, and interesting, and attractive.  And a competitive scrabble player.

I like words and word play and word games, and I happily played scrabble with her.  As I said, she was a competitive player and she beat me soundly.  The first game we ever played, she beat me something like 300 points to 75.  I didn’t mind, really; I liked the game and I didn’t have anything riding on winning.  But I’m pretty smart too, and I got better at it.  She helped me by sharing with me some tactics and strategies that every successful scrabble player knows . . . and my scrabble improved.

At around the holidays of that year Susan and I decided to spend a week in lovely, gorgeous, exotic, romantic, and exciting Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.  That town is in fact none of those things, but The Night of the Iguana movie had been filmed there and everybody thought of it as a an exotic getaway place [NOTE: the word “exotic” is defined as “not indigenous to this region”.  It literally means from somewhere else.  It’s got nothin’ to do with quality; it’s about location.]  Anyway, we went down there.  And we took the scrabble set.  

It was in Puerto Vallarta that I beat Susan at scrabble for the first time.  And oh my God she got pissed at that.  She had an annoyance/intolerance tantrum. 

 !#7&∑µ¢K@?Ω8!!!!! 

She hated losing and, having lost, she became very snippy, cold, grumpy, and unpleasant to be around.  So I avoided her for a day or two.  I spent the time just walking around the town.  The tourist hotels are all about a mile out of town; they look like the fabled Emerald City of Oz, all gleaming and shiny.  The beach in Puerto Vallarta itself is certainly not worth flying down there for.  It’s quite narrow, and . . . the sand is brown.  Like brown sugar.  It’s clean, but not even close to being white.  Mostly, there’s really hardly any beach.  The tourist hotels outside of town are built in the middle of several acres of white sand that had been imported to make the place look better.  Those hotels are modern highrises that are in every way what you might imagine them to be; and that whole area looks mighty sterile and artificial. 

Puerto Vallarta itself, in contrast, is dirtier, more frayed at the edges, and more real.  It’s sort of old and weathered, and none of the buildings are freshly painted or shiny.  There was no visible police force whatsoever; however, but there is a military garrison nearby and the streets were (and maybe still are?) patroled by soldiers who were armed not with pistols or rifles, but with machine guns.  Really.  Yet Puerto Vallarta retains some of the charm of the original Spanish/Mexican architecture, with cobblestone streets, nice old wrought iron work everywhere, street vendors selling all kinds of tasty viands, a brown-sanded beach, and a pleasing kind of not-all-that-modern atmosphere.  You can walk out of town and see iguanas.

So I walked around Puerto Vallarta for a day or two.  To my surprise, I enjoyed it.  I mean, I hadn’t planned on spending time like that.  It helped that I speak Spanish; I couldn’t get lost.  And I found the architecture to be pleasantly Spanish Colonial, in an understated way.  No two buildings were the same size or shape nor painted the same color.  And they were real colors! . . . not the tame decorator pastels that you and I are used to seeing.  I liked the patterns of the cobblestoned streets.  I liked the wrought iron work.  I liked the mix of bright colors everywhere.  I liked the visual texture of the place.  I had a good time walking around . . . despite the fact that the town really is a tourist trap.  Its main industry IS tourism.  There are many art/craft galleries, restaurants, stores selling designer knock-offs, curio and trinket shops, etc.  It all brought back to mind that when I was young I had been an artsy-craftsy kind of kid and did crafts-type projects all the time.  I whittled.  I drew.  I made models and assembled kits.  I painted.  I worked with plaster and wood and clay.  I collected stamps and coins and arrowheads.  I put jigsaw puzzles together.  I carved some things.  I also had a woodburning set and an erector set — if  you know what those are — and used them a lot.  And I read a lot.  I spent my childhood doing such things.

These, however (moreover?) were all things that I hadn’t touched in years and years.  High school, college, etc. all got in the way of playing creatively like that, and I’d left it all behind me.  High school and college are institutions that are supposed to prepare one for life as an adult; but (except for the occasional art class) NO ONE EVER MAKES THINGS IN THOSE PLACES.  People study, regurgitate information, write papers, and take tests . . . and get ready to get a job . . . and a wife . . . and a mortgage . . . and all that stuff that reassures our parents that there kid can spel corectly and they have’nt razed a dud. 

But my walking around Puerto Vallarta revived those vivid memories for me.  It reminded me of the pleasures I’d taken in those activities when I was still doing them, years before.  And that reminder stirred up things of that nature sufficiently, in me and for me, so that I think I was primed to think of such things a bit later, when my therapist got pregnant.

So we’re left with this (or at least, I’m left with this):  if I’d lost that scrabble game in Puerto Vallarta I don’t think I’d be the artist in wood that I am now.  I probably would just have talked the pregnancy issue out over time, and dealt with the situation verbally.  Isn’t such a thing mindboggling????  It makes me scared to consider what kinds of things are behind a lot of the decisions that get made in the Oval Office, boardrooms, and the Pentagon.  And, not surprisingly, that trip was the beginning of the end of my relationship with Susan.

Cheers, Ervin

P.S.: About the Oval Office/boardroom/Pentagon thing . . . whatever happens in those places, or doesn’t, it’s been noted (in psychological work) that significant personal insights can occur while one is . . . in the bathroom.  It’s unlikely to be the result of any cognitive thinking; it’s more in the category of sudden realizations — and the location where such events occur undoubtedly has to do with body/mind/excretory connections of the kind that were first identified by Sigmund Freud.  I know, from personal experience, that there’s something to this.  More significantly, though, it’s known that Martin Luther, the spark plug of the Reformation and initiator of the Protestant movement, and who started this revolution with his radically controversial Ninety-Five Theses, had his breakthrough epiphany while in the privy.  No shit.  Uh . . . sorry; that just slipped out.  I mean, it’s true; I read about this in a psych book written by a guy named Fiedler, back in college.  And, as I said, I know from personal experience that there’s something to this.

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