30 June, 2013

Gone Fishing


There was a new family who just moved into town. Their son came to Sunday School but seemed a bit upset. Concerned, his teacher asked him if anything was wrong.

The boy replied, "No, but I was going to go fishing -- until my dad told me that I needed to go to church instead."

The teacher was very impressed with the boy's parents and asked the boy if his father had explained to him why it was more important to go to church than to go fishing.

The boy replied, "Yes, he did. My dad said that he didn't have enough bait for both of us."
Author Unknown   

29 June, 2013

Tree

Almost every day I photograph this tree near my office window - always from the same angle and about the same time of day. This is my favorite image from the past week.
TGB   

Copyright © 2013 Thomas G. Brown

To view a video set to music that contains 135 images taken over 12 months, click here.

For the 2010 collection of images, click here.
For the 2011 collection of images, click here.
For the 2012 collection of images, click here.
For the 2013 collection of images, click here.

27 June, 2013

{this memory} 83

This is the story behind last Monday's {this moment}.

Well, you don't see pants like that anymore! - unless you're on a golf course, maybe. This photo was taken on June 9, 1973. How do I remember the day so precisely, you ask? In a word, Secretariat.

I was attending a good friend's wedding in Virginia, and the photo was taken after the outdoor reception. At some point we all - well, many of us - gathered in front of a television to watch the Belmont Stakes. What we saw, of course, was historic as Secretariat completed the Triple Crown and won the race by an amazing 31 lengths. His times in all three races are records that still stand today, and he is easily rated as one of the greatest thoroughbreds of all time.

Anyway, back to the dude, dude. In my defense, it was the early 70s, and I was very much 24-year-old product of the 60s. I no longer have those pants. Or the jacket. I think the tie my have been in the bottom of my closet until a few years ago when I made a massive clothing donation to a local charity. No moustache today, but the hair isn't much different - except for all that brown stuff. I don't have very much brown any more.

One thing has never changed. That would be my desire for peace.

I am filled with wonderful memories and consider myself a fortunate man.
TGB



26 June, 2013

Scar Wars

My posts occasionally refer to scars. We all have them - at least in the figurative sense. Some might say in that case I'm talking about "baggage," but for many of us, they really are scars - which are "heavier." You can "unpack" your baggage which is a great metaphor for learning from your misfortunes, and baggage is easily left by the door, stored in a closet, or lost by your airline. Scars aren't.

Scars are ... well ... more permanent. That's not to say they are disfiguring. That determination, by the way, is purely in the eye of the owner of the scar, and I am the owner of mine. I will be the one to decide if they are beautiful or only merely gorgeous. I refuse to delegate that responsibility. I refuse to give someone else the power to label me and treat me according to their label's expectations.

I wrote the following a couple of years ago.

          There are twenty-four scars on my body.
          Each one tells a story.
          No one asks to see them.
          Only a few know they are there.
          But ... there are twenty-four scars on my body.


There is a very literal truth in that stanza. There really are two dozen scars from various medical instruments scattered around my body. Some are quite minor, some not so minor. Some are quite faded, some not so faded. On a typical day, however, only one site lies unhidden by clothing. So people are generally unaware of them - at least until I began writing and discussing that medical history, the one I described as "remarkable" in a previous post (See Missing Extremities).

The passage of time and support from family and friends has taught me to be proud of them; they are badges, not baggage. After all, a scar is evidence of healing, and only we survivors have scars.

          And there are more stories on the inside.

This is also literally true, but it's accurate in that figurative sense as well. The experiences - both good and bad - of our life's Journeys leave marks. I'm still learning to see each of those as beautiful, but that's a life-long process. I'm pretty happy with my progress.

My wish for you is that you learn to see the positives inherent in your own scars but also that when you notice the scars of others, you see only their beauty. That would be a good thing.
TGB   

25 June, 2013

Be The River

"Be a river and not a pond?" was the comment a friend ventured in response to another of my introspective musings. I liked that, this image of being a river. More accurately though, the image that I love is of being carried by the river - the River of Life - toward some place unknowable.

Once adrift on the river, we repeatedly encounter the unexpected around each bend, and although our journey is usually routine, when darkness falls or the mists are heavy, it can be more difficult to find sufficient clarity to discern and appreciate what awaits us on the banks of the river. We are, nevertheless, confronted with choices about where and even whether to stop.

Sometimes we are carried more slowly, sometimes more rapidly, but always forward. When the current runs deep beneath us, all appears tranquil, but at other times we are pushed and pulled by irresistible forces in circular eddies and in spirals around pieces of driftwood or rocks. And then there are those rapids and falls where we tumble precipitously only later to find ourselves once again in relative calm.

Ultimately we are changed by our Journey. Yet somehow we arrive at an appropriate destination, usually completely unaware we are the ones who chose our Journey’s end.

I always smile when remembering that I am alone neither on the river nor in these thoughts. There are many with me on the Journey and many who helped create this image, an image in which I have found warmth and comfort and serenity.
TGB   

24 June, 2013

{this moment} 83

A Monday ritual. A single image - no words - capturing a moment from the past. A simple moment along my life's Journey - but one over which I wish to linger and savor each treasured aspect of the memories it evokes. If you are moved or intrigued by my {this moment}, please leave a comment. On Thursday in a companion ritual called {this memory}, I'll share the story of this moment.

{this moment}

{this moment} is a ritual copied and adapted from cath's wonderful blog ~just my thoughts. She, in turn, borrowed it from Pamanner's Blog. Check out their blogs, and if you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your {this moment} in the comments for each of us to find and see.
TGB  

23 June, 2013

Satan


A few minutes before the services started, the townspeople were sitting in their pews and talking. Suddenly, Satan appeared at the front of the church.

Everyone started screaming and running for the front entrance, trampling each other in a frantic effort to get away from evil incarnate. Soon everyone had exited the church except for one elderly gentleman who sat calmly in his pew without moving, seeming oblivious to the fact that God's ultimate enemy was in his presence.

So Satan walked up to the old man and said, "Don't you know who I am?" The man replied, "Yep, sure do."

"Aren't you afraid of me?" Satan asked. "Nope, sure ain't," said the man.

"Don't you realize I can kill you with a word?" asked Satan. "Don't doubt it for a minute," returned the old man, in an even tone.

"Did you know that I could cause you profound, horrifying, physical AGONY... for all eternity?" persisted Satan. "Yep," was the calm reply.

"And you're still not afraid?" asked Satan. "Nope."

More than a little perturbed, Satan asked, "Well, why aren't you afraid of me?" The man calmly replied, "Been married to your sister for the last 48 years."
Author Unknown   

22 June, 2013

Tree

Almost every day I photograph this tree near my office window - always from the same angle and about the same time of day. This is my favorite image from the past week.
TGB   

Copyright © 2013 Thomas G. Brown

To view a video set to music that contains 135 images taken over 12 months, click here.

For the 2010 collection of images, click here.
For the 2011 collection of images, click here.
For the 2012 collection of images, click here.
For the 2013 collection of images, click here.

21 June, 2013

Mighty Finn - Update #16

I'm back. Did you miss me?

When I last updated you, I was getting some new shoes.
Cool, yes?

Let's get this one over with.
I look like an old man on a park bench in Florida
I still got the old magnetism though. She's older,
but she couldn't stay away.

Joe Cool? No, it's me.
Sometimes it's the only way I can get away the ladies.

This is interesting. I've been working
on a new technique that uses only one chopstick.

Here I am with my grandma. I'm holding her hand so
she won't be afraid at the zoo and won't wander off.
It's hard taking care of older folks, but important.

Here I am explaining how Jung's theory of a collective unconscious
is related to Lucas's description of midi-chlorians and the Force. 

Oh boy! My first ice cream!
They let me sample a lot of different flavors.
I really liked the black raspberry.

20 June, 2013

{this memory} 82


This is the story behind last Monday's {this moment}.

This photo was taken around 1973. It was certainly post-1971 and pre-1975. That is the living room of the small cottage I rented while a doctoral student at the University of Maine at Orono.

All the usual stuff - comfortable chair, sofa bed, carpet. The coffee table is special. My father had cut the pedestal of an antique oak dining table to shorten it to coffee table height. He then gave it a wonderful new finish. I still have it although it's currently in storage. It was in projects like this that he taught me if something was worth doing, it was worth doing well.

I've written before about the photo of the old man that is above the couch. See {this moment) 23 and {this memory} 23.

Then there are the guitars, two of the three I own. A Gibson 12-string and a Goya classical. I discussed them in Singin' On The Brain. Needless to say, the guitars are still with me and continue to mean a great deal to me even though I can no longer play.

I am filled with wonderful memories and remain a fortunate man.
TGB


19 June, 2013

Wishes And Horses

We all read them. And all the time. You know those clever signs or posters with their pithy and sometimes deep advice about or commentary on life. We love them because we suspect that Socrates was right - the unexamined life isn't worth living. So we examine - sometimes looking for the humor, sometimes for the seriousness that is offered offered by these oversimplifications.

The number of these phrases is rapidly approaching infinity, and almost all of them have popped up on Facebook in some form or another and usually with an image that was oh so carefully selected to amplify the importance. I could do with fewer of them though and have learned to skip or delete rapidly. I have to say, however, that most of them, at some level, possess a modicum of truth.

The creation of bucket lists also continues to be popular with bloggers, and the encouragement to do those things on one's list is strong - leading to its own related advice. Better to feel the regret of something you did than to experience the regret of not having done something. There's a lot of advice in there.

Yesterday I learned of a book by Bronnie Ware in which she describes the years she spent tending to the needs of those who were dying. She went on to write about the most common regrets expressed to her by the people she had cared for. What were they? Here are the top five regrets of the dying, as witnessed by Bronnie Ware:

          1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself,
                    not the life others expected of me.
          2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.
          3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.
          4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
          5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

The first one was by far the most common, and the second, not surprisingly, was often expressed by men.

What struck me was that each was a statement of regret for something left undone or never done. She rarely heard people express regret over something they actually had done. So, dictum supported? Who knows, but it seems so to me.

It begins early. We are encouraged in nursery rhymes: "If wishes were horses, beggars would ride." So actually DO something. Lee Ann Womack sings about it: "And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance." And Zachary Scott said: "As you grow older, you'll find the only things you regret are the things you didn't do."

I've learned the lesson, but it took 60 years. I hope you're a better student.
TGB

18 June, 2013

{this moment} 82

A Monday ritual. A single image - no words - capturing a moment from the past. A simple moment along my life's Journey - but one over which I wish to linger and savor each treasured aspect of the memories it evokes. If you are moved or intrigued by my {this moment}, please leave a comment. On Thursday in a companion ritual called {this memory}, I'll share the story of this moment.

{this moment}
Copyright © 2013 Thomas G. Brown

{this moment} is a ritual copied and adapted from cath's wonderful blog ~just my thoughts. She, in turn, borrowed it from Pamanner's Blog. Check out their blogs, and if you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your {this moment} in the comments for each of us to find and see.
TGB

17 June, 2013

Ghostly Proof

There was a new preacher in town who wanted to rent a house in the country. The only house available was rumored to be haunted. Since the preacher didn’t believe in such things, he rented it.

It wasn’t long before the ghost made its appearance. The preacher told his friends about the ghost, but they didn’t believe him. They told him the only way they would believe was if he would take a picture of the ghost.

The preacher went home and called for the ghost. When it appeared, the preacher explained the situation and asked the ghost if it would mind having its picture taken. The ghost agreed.

When the picture was developed, the ghost wasn’t visible. Feeling very disappointed, the preacher called again for the ghost. When it appeared, the preacher showed it the picture and wanted to know why the ghost wasn’t in it.

The ghost thought a minute and replied, “Well, I guess the spirit was willing, but the flash was weak.”
Author Unknown   

16 June, 2013

Father's Day

If you are a regular Reader, you are here expecting to read a humorous story related to religion. I promise to post one tomorrow, but how can I let today pass without honoring my father, Harold Clifford Brown, Sr. Much of what follows was part of a tribute to him I first posted on Veterans Day, and it is no surprise that my attention focused on him at that time. He served in the US Navy for just over thirty years.

My father died in 1975, and although he rarely spoke of his life or his career, I have been able to research much of it. He was just 66 when he died. I was 27, fresh out of graduate school, and had barely finished the fall semester at Utica College, my first job - important only in the sense that we never had a chance to be "adults" together. I am diminished by that.

My father was born in 1909 in the very small town of Crossville in southeast Illinois and not far west of the Wabash River. He was abandoned as an infant by his father. Somehow my grandmother ended up in the even smaller town of Naylor in southeastern Missouri, barely ten miles north of Arkansas, where she remarried and had three more children. My sense is there was no real attachment between the new husband and my father, and my father may have been the proverbial unwanted stepchild. He never spoke of these things.

He was schooled and graduated from high school in Naylor. Although he had the opportunity to go to college on a baseball athletic scholarship, he enlisted in the navy in 1927 five months after being graduated from high school. He had signed his papers months earlier but had to wait until he turned 18 in October. Although the Great Depression was a couple of years off, he had grown up very poor. He never had a bicycle, and my mother tells me when she baked him a birthday cake soon after they married, he admitted it was the first birthday cake he had ever had. His family needed money, and he regularly sent half of his pay home to help raise his two half brothers and one half sister.

After basic training, he went to Norfolk for further training as a Machinist Mate and then to New London for submarine school. He reported to Pearl Harbor in 1929 and served there aboard three different submarines, all tiny by today's standards with officers and crew totaling only 30-40 (versus 150 today).

In 1938 he shifted to the surface navy and was assigned to the battleship USS Pennsylvania aboard which he served for two years in Pearl Harbor before returning to the Navy Yard in Norfolk to help "fit out" a brand new ship, the USS Raven, as Engineering Officer. By this time, he had worked his way up from Seaman Apprentice to become a commissioned officer.

The Raven was a minesweeper and part of Operation Torch - the British-American invasion of French North Africa in November of 1942. Think Casablanca. He was there but saw neither Bogart nor Bergman. Operation Torch wasn't smooth sailing by any standard, and many died.

He retuned to Norfolk and for the next six months worked convoy protection up and down the east coast and even as far south as Panama. In August of 1943, he was sent to the Pacific theater where he saw action in the Marshall Islands, Saipan, and Guam as Materiel and Operations Officer for a flotilla of landing craft. Still in the Pacific, he received his first command position - the USS Mink. He was a lieutenant at this point, and after assisting with the occupation of Japan, he brought the Mink back to Norfolk.

After a tour of shore duty, he joined the cruiser USS Portsmouth as Main Propulsion Officer. I have the actual official naval message he received aboard telling him of my birth. He then commanded the USS Krishna and the USS Minos, both amphibious ships stationed in Little Creek, VA.

His last command was a reserve training center, and he retired as a Commander in 1958 after serving 30 years, two months, and 27 days and with two dozen decorations and awards. I was nine.

I have no idea how many times my mother must have seen him off as he went back to sea, sometimes in harm's way. She tells me that once the good-bye was said he would never look back as he walked down the pier to board his ship. Navy custom supposedly suggested that to do so would be bad luck. I can't argue; he always came home in spite of some close calls with Japanese torpedoes in the Pacific.

He was a good man, and I often think of and am thankful for his service to our country. More importantly though, I am thankful for his love. There has never been a day when I doubted that love or that he was proud of me, and I am thankful for everything he taught me through his words and his deeds. As I stand here today only one year younger than he when he died, I can only hope that he would still proud of me and that I have lived up to the example he set.
TGB   

15 June, 2013

Tree

Almost every day I photograph this tree near my office window - always from the same angle and about the same time of day. This is my favorite image from the past week.
TGB   

Copyright © 2013 Thomas G. Brown

To view a video set to music that contains 135 images taken over 12 months, click here.

For the 2010 collection of images, click here.
For the 2011 collection of images, click here.
For the 2012 collection of images, click here.
For the 2013 collection of images, click here.

13 June, 2013

{essential truths} reading

It's not enough to learn to read.
You also need to learn to read
what's between the lines.

12 June, 2013

Down In Flames


As I enter my last year of teaching, special memories are popping up every so often. This one describes a meeting I had with a father and son when I was Dean of the College.

The son had failed a couple of classes and had told his father that he thought he was passing until the final grades came. Dad wanted to know how this could happen. Why didn't the faculty warn him he was in danger of failing?

"Gee," I said. "I don't know." I described to him our Mid-Term Deficiency System as it was called then. The system was optional for faculty, but if they wanted to warn students with Ds or Fs at that mid-point of the semester and suggest some possible remediation before it was too late, it represented a non-official way of doing that. Some faculty used it, but I was aware that many did not.

After explaining the sytem and apologizing to the father. I looked toward the son to confirm he has received no warnings. He again said he had not.

That's when I opened the folder I had before me and produced Mid-Term Deficiency Reports for the two classes the young man had failed. I said, "You never received these?"

The father understood immediately that his son had lied to him, caused him embarrassment, and wasted my time (which was not, btw). That's when the father apologized for taking up my time and said he needed to have a conversation with his son.

Now there's a conversation I would have loved to have heard.
TGB   

11 June, 2013

(picture perfect) Tom Morris

Swilcan Bridge
On 18 - Tom Morris -  The Old Course
St. Andrews, Scotland
Just before The Open, 2005. 

Copyright © 2013 Thomas G. Brown

10 June, 2013

My Inconvenient Truth

I worry about our future. I worry about my future.

The campus is becoming busy again, and as I walked to my office a few days ago, I couldn't help but hear a class having lots of fun. It was the same program as last year when I overheard part of a lecture that stopped me in my tracks. I didn’t know the instructor, but I knew he was teaching a group of middle school students who, given the estimates of their abilities, were at risk of becoming undereducated due to one or more environmental factors. It’s a great program with a tremendous success rate – genuinely transformational for these young people.

The lecture was on the metric system, and a few of the basic unit names had been written on the board. Meter. Centimeter. Kilometer. Millimeter. I guess they were focusing on units of length. After all, everyone is a specialist these days.

Question: What unit would I use to describe the size of my foot? Answer: Inches. What the fractals! This is actually when I stopped walking – thinking this was going to be good. Where that response came from I had no idea, but I guess feet are made up of inches. Right? BUT they are picking from the list of four metric units on the board, and it’s not on that list. Oh, my.

Next question: What unit would I use to describe how far it is from here to the cafeteria? That would be two buildings over; I see it right out my window. Answer: Kilometers. I continued on to my office thinking sad thoughts and not wanting to listen to the teacher have a melt down.

Sad thoughts, you say? Yes, indeed. The metric system is not complicated after all. In fact, it is far simpler that the US Customary System - often called the American System because we are just about the only ones in the world who use it.

Yet we don’t change because we are too lazy to learn something new. It would be inconvenient, and if there is one thing the typical American doesn’t want, it is to be inconvenienced. We have raised several generations now who don’t get that there is joy to be derived from “learning a difficult thing well.” Okay. I understand that this is difficult to appreciate, but with metrics, we’re talking about learning a simple thing. And one that would actually make our lives easier. Unfortunately, many in our younger generations seem to think education is a joke, that it is not worthy of genuine effort, and that everything’s gonna be alright. Don’t worry - about a ting - every little ting - gonna be alright.

Well, I’m worrying. I’m worrying because I need these young people to have jobs. I’ll be retiring in the next year or so, and I’ve been paying into the Social Security system since my first summer job in the early 1960s. Yes, I’m worrying - because I need these young people to have jobs so that their FICA contributions can help keep my benefits coming. If they can't embrace the fact that learning is a good thing and if we can't embrace the metric system, my benefits are ultimately in jeopardy.
I also worry that I’ve become so discouraged about the demise of a learning ethic in this country that whether young people pay their Social Security taxes may be all I really do care about. I don't want to be that person, and I'm not there yet.
TGB   

09 June, 2013

Healing

An elderly couple was watching one of those television preachers on TV one night when the preacher faced the camera and announced, "My friends, tonight I'd like to share my healing powers with everyone watching this program. If you place one hand on top of your TV and the other hand on the part of your body that ails you, I shall heal you."

The old woman had been having terrible stomach problems, so she placed one hand on the television and the other hand on her stomach.

Meanwhile, her husband approached the television, placing one hand on top of the TV and the other hand on his groin.

With a frown, his wife said, "Ernest, he's talking about healing the sick, not raising the dead."
Author Unknown   

08 June, 2013

Tree

Almost every day I photograph this tree near my office window - always from the same angle and about the same time of day. This is my favorite image from the past week.
TGB   

Copyright © 2013 Thomas G. Brown

To view a video set to music that contains 135 images taken over 12 months, click here.

For the 2010 collection of images, click here.
For the 2011 collection of images, click here.
For the 2012 collection of images, click here.
For the 2013 collection of images, click here.

07 June, 2013

{essential truths} Green Light

Even if the light has turned green,
it's best look both ways before proceeding.

06 June, 2013

{this memory} 81


This is the story behind last Monday's {this moment}.

This sign hung near my office door for many years. I spent about four years as dean of one of the five divisions of Utica College, and I then spent a dozen years as Vice-President and Dean of the College, the chief academic officer.

I'd like to think we laughed a lot in my office. Okay - I know we did. I had purchased this sign at the San Diego Zoo, although it read "animals" rather than "the dean." It seemed a natural change.

I should add that I didn't want to experience any of those things, and they were rare occurrences. I can recall only once, in fact. I loved those years, and as is often quoted "if you love your job, you'll never work a day in your life." It's true.

So when I see this sign, I recall sixteen wonderful years of a nearly 40 year career. As I near retirement, I think I'll give the sign to someone I like who needs it. Maybe it will work for them.

I am filled with wonderful memories and am a most fortunate man.
TGB


05 June, 2013

Just Sayin'

There ought to be some rules, maybe even laws, and the first of which should be to ban the phrase used in the title. What I'm really concerned about today though is male behavior. Let's face it - by and large, we're pigs, but never more so than in the restroom.


I suppose there are a few customs, rather than rules, that relate to your choice of position in the above photograph. If this were the situation I discovered, I would use the one on the left or the right so that if someone else happened in, they could attend to business while maintaing some personal space. If I were on the left, for example, another visitor would probably select the right, not the center. I mean ... with a choice, why would you elect to be right beside someone? Harumph. It's not a rule though - just a custom. If you have no choice, well ... then you have no choice, but it's never good form to check out your neighbor's ... um ... package.

What really irritates me are all those men who can't bring themselves to flush that urinal. What is wrong with you?! If you're afraid to touch the lever, get a paper towel to shield your hand, but for crying out loud, flush the damn thing!

There are actually six urinals in this restroom, and I have arrived when none of the six had been flushed. If the truth be told, I flush them all and then wash my hands before attending to my business - followed, of course, by another handwashing.

But really. Is it too much to ask that you FINISH WHAT YOU STARTED?!

There ought to be a rule. Or a law.
TGB   

04 June, 2013

Finn-ally Talking

I just wanted to update you folks and let you know that a couple of weeks ago I decided it was time to start speaking. I'm easing into it though. I do all the usuals: "mama" "nonna" "more" "car" "bye" "up." Of course, I may not say them exactly the way you do.

My favorite, though, is "doggie." Last week we went to the zoo, and I never knew there were so many kinds of doggies! This was my favorite doggie. Isn't he cute?


03 June, 2013

{this moment} 81

A Monday ritual. A single image - no words - capturing a moment from the past. A simple moment along my life's Journey - but one over which I wish to linger and savor each treasured aspect of the memories it evokes. If you are moved or intrigued by my {this moment}, please leave a comment. On Thursday in a companion ritual called {this memory}, I'll share the story of this moment.

{this moment}

{this moment} is a ritual copied and adapted from cath's wonderful blog ~just my thoughts. She, in turn, borrowed it from Pamanner's Blog. Check out their blogs, and if you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your {this moment} in the comments for each of us to find and see.
TGB   

02 June, 2013

Sunday Dinner


A young couple invited their pastor for Sunday dinner. While they were in the kitchen preparing the meal, the minister asked their son what they were having.

"Goat," the little boy replied.

"Goat?!" replied the Pastor, "Are you sure about that?"

"Yes," said the youngster. "I heard Dad say to Mom, 'We might as well have the old goat for dinner today as any other day.'"
Author Unknown   

01 June, 2013

Tree

Almost every day I photograph this tree near my office window - always from the same angle and about the same time of day. This is my favorite image from the past week.
TGB   

Copyright © 2013 Thomas G. Brown

To view a video set to music that contains 135 images taken over 12 months, click here.

For the 2010 collection of images, click here.
For the 2011 collection of images, click here.
For the 2012 collection of images, click here.
For the 2013 collection of images, click here.