Yearly Archives: 2008

Art and Culture, Family

The Miracle of Hydraulics

Leave a comment

-13  64%  19%  omph WSW bar30.43 steady  windchill-13  Winter

            Waxing Gibbous Winter Moon

Annie came over and we moved the old TV out near her car.  But, it was -10 and I couldn’t lift the damn thing into her car.  A real Minnesota moment. The air blistering cold and I’m trying lift this way too heavy TV in the back seat of a Chrysler generic car.  I’m a little guy and even when I work out I have real limits.  This was one. So.  I backed the truck out of the garage, put down the lift gate and horsed the TV onto the gate.  Lifted it up with the miracle of hydraulics and Kate will take it out to Annie on Monday.  Course, I have to secure it in their before she takes off with it.

I’ve got enough on the religion and art historical perspective to write tomorrow.  My packet for the docent book club will contain a book recommendation, James Elkin’s The Strange Place of Religion in Contemporary Art and an essay by Camille Paglia entitled, “Religion and Art in America.”  I’m going to summarize the beginning of Elkins because he lays out 5 different positions toward the religion and art question, each one helpful in its own way.  The bottom line appears to be the corrosive affects of modernism, seen first in what is now often called the early modern period which includes the Renaissance.  I’ll finish with this tomorrow and start work on Transcendentalism next.

This is great way below zero work. 

Art and Culture, Weather +Climate

Art’s Beginnings

Leave a comment

-2  46%  20%  0mph S bar 30.37 steep drop windchill-4  Winter

            Waxing Gibbous Winter Moon

As predicted the day has continued cold, thought we’ve warmed a bit from the early readings.  Still, when the high is below zero, you know you’re dealing with a bitter time.  We have the most trouble with the whippets when the temperatures drop.  They have zero body fat, so they do not like to go outside.  This increases the pressure on their bladders.  Accidents do happen.

The work of the day involves the waning religious influence on art in the modern era, though, as I’ve learned, the decline can really be seen post-Renaissance.  James Elkins makes a creditable argument for the pervasive nature of religious art during most of the millennia of human existence.  Art’s beginnings lie somewhere in our murky transition toward full consciousness, a transition accelerated when humans realized they would die.  If not in the service of the hunt, a ritual activity in its earliest form, then in the service of funeral rites, early humans drew elegant animals on cave walls and adorned their dead with red ochre, feathers and other items felt necessary to the afterlife.

This general trend continued for many cultures well into the modern era, but in the West, sometime in the Renaissance/post-Renaissance period, religious art became a particular kind of art, rather than the primary purpose for artistic work.  It was during the Renaissance that an emphasis began on the skill of the artist in addition to the importance of the subject matter rendered.  These two factors, appreciation of the talents of individual artists and the addition of subject matter like history, portraiture and mythopoetic themes opened a fissure between what had previously been art’s sole domain, the religious, and other forms of art.

More on this as it gets clearer to me.

General

Sunny and Cold

Leave a comment

-14  67%  21%  0mph W  bar30.42 steady windchill-14  Winter

              Waxing Gibbous Winter Moon

We hit -18 at 7 AM this morning.  Sleep comes easy when the nights are cold.  We have down duvets that adjust without the need for extra blankets or wiring.  The day is clear and bright, though the outdoors has a certain foreboding at this temperature; cold weather can kill you and it wouldn’t take long.

Having said that I’m inside, warm and looking outside.  Today I hope to finish my work on the religious influence on contemporary art piece I have to do for the docent book club in March.  I want to get off an object list, book recommendation and an essay or two for advanced reading along with a series of questions/observations.

Kate and I will have our money meeting this AM, made much easier by her recent earnings and deferred compensation.  We’re going to have to get another TV (darn) because the workout TV has developed a wavy line pattern that annoys big time.  This means we’ll be all HD all the time, at least when we have HD programming.

Annie’s coming up today and will get our old Sony and the DVD player that goes with it.  It’s a fine TV and never gave us any trouble, though we bought it in 1994.  TV’s last a long time these days, so spending a good bit on one is not quite as illogical as it may seem.

Faith and Spirituality, Great Wheel, Great Work, Weather +Climate

A Gospel for These Heavens and This Earth

Leave a comment

-10  59% 23%  0mph  WSW bar30.36  steep rise windchill-12  Winter

              Waxing Gibbous Winter Moon

How low will it go?  Pretty low.  These are the days for staying inside, watching movies, drinking hot chocolate, reading and studying.  I’ll do all these tomorrow.

Driving into the MIA this week, on Monday and then again today, I saw sundogs.  A sundog creates a rainbow like lens, in this case pointing toward the west.  As I understand the presence of a sundog indicates ice crystals in the air which act as a prism.   Just checked, that’s right.  Also, it says they always form at 22 degrees on either side of the sun. 

Both days an earth centered faith was on my mind, as it often is these days, in fact, these last few years.  It is not, perhaps, most accurate to say earth centered, since the  sundog itself is a good reminder that any faith which grounds itself in the material reality of this world also relies, for life itself, on the heat and energy received from the sun.  So, I don’t know, perhaps a solar system centered faith.  The earth’s orbit around the sun orchestrates the seasons and the moon pulses the oceans through bays and onto beaches with tidal flows.  Even a rudimentary understanding of the creation of the solar system acknowledges the intimate nature of our relationship to other planets that share Sol.  So, there’s a puzzle here in terms of where to focus, but I don’t think the parameters are much wider than the solar system, although there is the whole star formation, interstellar dust cloud thing which makes us part of the ongoing galactic reality. Even so, those relationship are distant both in distance and in terms of direct affect, if any on our daily lives, where Sol makes our life possible and its planets are our neighbors.

Anyhow, more thoughts on the notion of Ge-ology.  What I might write, rather than a Ge-ology, is a gospel for these heavens and this earth, a faith focused on the intricate and delicate and complex interdependence between and among life and the inanimate yet critical context in which it exists; a celebration of the wonderful and the awesome we experience each day.  Our heart beats.  The winds blow.  A lover or a child smiles.  The sun warms our face.  We recall times that seem long ago; we think and imagine.  The stars shine.  Snow falls.  These are miracles which do not require walking on water, a Pure Land or a night ride to Jerusalem.  No exodus or burning bush. 

Gospel means good news.  I see this faith as good news for all humankind and for all living creatures on our planet.  It means we can turn our face toward each other and our hands toward the earth in love, not lust. 

As I see it, this is the ur-faith, the one prior to all the others.  It came naturally to indigenous communities through faith traditions like Taoism, Shintoism, Native American faiths, the faith of those who painted Lascaux and who erected Stonehenge.  Are all these the same, no, of course not; are they all similar in their insistence on loving attention to the reality within which we dwell and move and have our being? Yes.  This is the ur-faith because it was one we all know in our deep heart; it is not exclusive, if you want to follow the path of this ancient faith and the way of Jesus or Buddha or Shiva or Mohammad, there is no conflict. 

Art and Culture, Faith and Spirituality

Buddha Natures Come Out

Leave a comment

-1  47%  24%  0mph WNW bar30.21 steady  windchill-5  Winter

          Waxing Gibbous Winter Moon

Today I used the Templeman Tea Service and I went in early to find the damned thing.  It was in the hall where the period rooms are, not in with the other silver.  No wonder I couldn’t find it last week.  Well, now I know.  Two very different groups: white bread Catholics from Coon Rapids (near home) and a group of African-American, African, and Asian kids, three with headscarves.  The Catholics got the highlights tour and the diverse group wanted a Taste of Asia.

The diverse group, sixth graders, had a street-wise look and I wondered if they’d pay attention at all.  Turns out I had to pry them out of the Japan galleries.  They got interested in the Buddha and then the bodhisattvas, how to identify them, what enlightenment was.  They got me off my route entirely, so we went in the Wu family reception hall and spent time figuring out Chinese families lived.  By the Shiva Nataraja, the last object, their attention had begun to wane, but they were delightful.  Both groups were wonderful.

It’s cold now, the windchill has dropped to -8 and we’ll see lows of maybe -20 by tomorrow.  This is Minnesota.

A long nap and now some treadmill time. 

Politics

A Recession? We’ll Know When It’s Over.

Leave a comment

2  74% 23%  0mph WSW bar29.84 windchill2  Winter

                Waxing Gibbous Winter Moon

This is not my area of expertise, but the economy is something none of us can afford to ignore.  A recession for some of us is a depression for others.  While poking around on the net about just what constitutes a recession, I happened onto the following information. 

The folks who make the official decision about whether or not we are in a recession work at the National Bureau for Economic Research.  They gather in an aptly named Business Cycle Dating Committee.  Here are the criteria they use:

“The National Bureau’s Business Cycle Dating Committee maintains a chronology of the U.S. business cycle. The chronology identifies the dates of peaks and troughs that frame economic recession or expansion. The period from a peak to a trough is a recession and the period from a trough to a peak is an expansion. According to the chronology, the most recent peak occurred in March 2001, ending a record-long expansion that began in 1991. The most recent trough occurred in November 2001, inaugurating an expansion.

A recession is a significant decline in economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP, real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales. A recession begins just after the economy reaches a peak of activity and ends as the economy reaches its trough. Between trough and peak, the economy is in an expansion. Expansion is the normal state of the economy; most recessions are brief and they have been rare in recent decades.”

The most interesting part to me is that they never “call” a recession until the data is available.  In a Q & A on their website is this entry:

Q: Typically, how long after the beginning of a recession does the BCDC declare that a recession has started?

A: Anywhere from 6 to 18 months. We never consider forecasts. In general, the BCDC does not meet until it is reasonably clear that a downturn has occurred.

This means we probably won’t know for sure we’ve been in a recession until we’re just about out of it since recessions tend to be brief.  According to the Business Cycle Dating Committee. 

Family

RIP Aunt Dorothy

Leave a comment

Aunt Dorothy was a bright, vital, strong presence in our family and remained so until her death.  A loss for us all. 

The last of my aunts and uncles (with the exception of a divorced uncle by marriage).   My cousins and I are now the older generation, that body of relatives standing between the young ones and death.  A sobering, bracing position.  I like it.

Dorothy Louise McGregor Brown, 100, passed away January 16, 2008.  She was born October 26, 1907, in “Wheatland Territory,” Indian Territory, to Charles and Jenny Ellis.  She was the oldest of two brothers and three sisters.  Growing up, she worked hard on her grandparent’s farm, milking, harvesting wheat, corn, hay, and apples, and canning vegetables and fruits.  She loved music and played the piano for her church and funerals, played basketball, and was on the debate team.  She was the high school class president at Union City.  Dorothy watched her mother teach and chose teaching as her career too.  She attended both Oklahoma State University and the University of Oklahoma to receive her teaching certificate.  She began teaching in a one-room school house in Lone Star, OK, then taught in Mustang.  She received her lifetime teaching certificate from Edmond’s State Teacher’s College, before taking a teaching position in Bartlesville.  In Bartlesville, she met and married James Wilson McGregor and they had four children, three sons and a daughter.  She was active in the church, teaching Sunday School and attending Women’s Guild, in the lives of her children, serving as scout leader and helping at school, and in the community, volunteering for the Mutual Girls Club board.  In the 1964, she received her bachelor’s degree from Tulsa University in History.  She resumed her teaching career in Bartlesville and taught a total of 14 year there.  After 37 years of marriage, she was widowed in 1972.  Always adventurous, she began attending church camps, traveling abroad extensively, and participating in Elderhostels, with her sisters and friends.  In 1980, she moved to Norman to help with her grandchildren.  She joined the First Presbyterian Church where she soon was recognized as an Outstanding Presbyterian Woman.  She continued her travels and learning adventures.  She audited carefully selected (choosing only the best professors, she shared) University of Oklahoma college classes.  She wrote a book about her life and dedicated it to her children.  She met Dr. Harley Proctor Brown at First Presbyterian Church and they were married on October 26, 1997, her ninetieth birthday.  They continued to travel, learn, and enjoy plays and concerts together, then moved to Rivermont Retirement Community in 2005, and to the Gardens at Rivermont in 2007.  She celebrated her centennial birthday and tenth wedding anniversary in October, 2007. 

General

Clear, Bright and Cold

Leave a comment

7  53%  22%  0mph WNW  bar29.81 steep fall  windchill3  Winter

            Waxing Gibbous Crescent Moon

Busy day so far.  Rechecking and reading questions for the highlights tour and the Asia tour tomorrow.  Editing and revising a very short article for the Muse on poetry and touring.  Beginning to tease out some graphics for my discussion session on whatever happened to religion’s influence in art?

Got a note today from Headwaters Parish, reminding me of my April 13th date with them and requesting more info.  Have to get a topic to them soon.  I’ll probably go with either some version of  the Transcendentalist presentation I plan to give at Groveland in March or a version of the religious influence in contemporary art.  I might, however, choose something completely different.

The day is clear, bright and cold.  Saturday looks like it will be quite chilly, at least -14, probably colder up here in the northern suburbs. 

General, News of the Strange, Politics

Which is More of A Health Threat: Al-Qaeda or Homeland Security?

Leave a comment

1  64%  25%  1mph WNW  bar29.97  windchill-1  Winter

            Waxing Gibbous Crescent Moon

OK.  This is interesting.

 Which is more of a threat to your health: Al Qaeda or the Department of Homeland Security?

“An intriguing new study suggests the answer is not so clear-cut. Although it’s impossible to calculate the pain that terrorist attacks inflict on victims and society, when statisticians look at cold numbers, they have variously estimated the chances of the average person dying in America at the hands of international terrorists to be comparable to the risk of dying from eating peanuts, being struck by an asteroid or drowning in a toilet.

But worrying about terrorism could be taking a toll on the hearts of millions of Americans. The evidence, published last week in the Archives of General Psychiatry, comes from researchers who began tracking the health of a representative sample of more than 2,700 Americans before September 2001. After the attacks of Sept. 11, the scientists monitored people’s fears of terrorism over the next several years and found that the most fearful people were three to five times more likely than the rest to receive diagnoses of new cardiovascular ailments.”

The article goes to identify roughly 10 million people affected by the, what else to call it, fear-mongering of the Department of Homeland Security.  Can anyone say Committee of Public Safety?  I agree with the article and the physicians that the health consequences to individuals are significant and in themselves alarming; but, I believe the larger health problem is that of the body politic.  10 million voters with a fear of terrorism so significant that it affects their personal health represent a voting bloc, a demagogues paradise.  Now let me see, have we had anyone playing the terrorism card in recent elections?

Going to the Walker Art Center tonight to see the TEAM, a group of performance artists who have a work called, Heartland.  I’ll let you know how it was. 

Faith and Spirituality, Family, General

I’m Feeling Born Again!

Leave a comment

20  65%  23%  1mph WNW bar30.04 steep rise  windchill 19  Winter

                    Waxing Gibbous Winter Moon

The truck had to go in today for repairs to its CV boots.  Which were leaking.  And its sway bar linkage.  And some plug somewhere on the differential. But it’s all better now.  Carlson Toyota has some more cash.

Kate and I went to the grocery store together for the second time in a month or so.  I do the grocery shopping, almost always alone, so it feels strange when we’re there together.  OK, but strange.  She likes to drive the grocery cart, so my role changes.  I know the store better than she does so I go find things while she forages among the vegetables and fruits.

Back home I worked on an article for the Docent Muse, trying with some frustration to find objects with poems translated.  I didn’t write down the label copy on Monday when I did my research since I thought I could find it online.  Not so easy.  There’s plenty of material for another article on poetry.

If we accept prevailing health notions as a secular form of salvation (Latin root word, salve, to heal or make whole), then I’m feeling born again.  My weight is down.  My exercise schedule continues to work.  My eating patterns have become downright healthy.  I have interesting intellectual work and creative work.  The relationships in my life are at an all time calm.  Hallelujah, brothers and sisters!