The Prince and the Queen

I vaguely remember Elizabeth's coronation ... or do I only remember the multi-colored stamps that I later owned. The early years of life are covered in a fog of other interests. So much centers on the family. Brother, two Sisters, Mother, Father, Grandparents and even some cousins. And while we lived not far from the ocean, just across the pond, aye, from the new Queen in England, unlike Sister Sarah and her Alaskan scrutiny of Mother Russia, I lacked the vision to see Father England from my kitchen window.

When I heard that Prince died, yesterday, I was totally blindsided. The Prince? Bandar of the Saudi Royal Family? One of the boys of the young lovely we all loved whose hubby, another Prince, was madly-deeply in love with another? No, no, M explained.

The greatest singer, the most sellingest of all Funk Rockers, Prince!

Prince who, I protested. Well no use.  Everybody on TV from Brian Williams to Lefty wonks like Rachel Maddow and Chris Hayes all knew his music. Maybe I finally had something in common with T-Rump in missing out but then I heard Donelle talk about Prince, too.

What is the Last Quarter for a nerdy Pater Familias? I don't rightly know but one of the discoveries made during that time is that the Second and Third Quarters were taken up with lots of stuff beyond Pop Culture.

IF I had to do it all over, again?

If I could do it all over again, I'd "let my freak flag fly" and high, at that, and I'd know lots about Michael Jackson, Iced Tea, Prince, the Big Cool J guy who plays a detective on a show whose name I can't recall, and Kim Kardashian ... I would finally get to know who-the-fuck or WTF is a Kim Kardashian and whether OJ really killed his wife, whose name I may have once known. As Gunther Toody might say: Oo-oo, I almost got the name.

AM I talking regret? NO, I don't think so ... More like acceptance that at every fork in the road we implicitly decide which road not to take though we convince ourselves of a different narrative.

Election 2016 ... Queries of the Night

I'm confident that I'm not alone in suffering from Pavor Nocturnis ... Nightmares of the Night ... usually brief. For me, they take the form of Questions and Queries not for the Candidates but for the Voters. An unsolicited selection follows:

Would you vote for Bernie Sanders if he was transgendered?

One dream took the form of a New Yorker cover ... split screen. Left part has Bernie in a floppy Sunday-best hat and a colorful mu-mu about to walk into a Women's Bathroom.

The other split image was Sen/Secy Clinton sidling up to a urinal between two men leading to another question: Would you vote for Sen. Clinton if she were a he?

Would you support T-Rump if he weren't a craven guttersnipe?

Would you vote for Clinton if she were a Republican selling dinner-invites for $300,000+?

Would you vote for Cruz? Indeed, ... why would you vote for Cruz?

Why would you vote for a Billionaire who won't release his Tax Returns?

Why would anyone vote for a candidate who won't proudly release transcripts of speeches.

Is it Right and Proper to have a President who talks with a Brooklyn accent?

Why would any God-fearing person vote for a spoiled kid from Queens who tried to screw -- some say -- everything in a skirt, who -- again, some say -- cheated in his marriages and talked on the Howard Stern show about his package and his prowess? And one who contradicts himself in many sentences? I mean ... WTF?

And why won't people vote for the Good Governor of Ohio? As is not quite written in song: 

Why-O-Why-O-Why-O would we ever ignore Ohio? 

Frustrating ... I was kinda hoping for a Sanders/Elizabeth Warren ticket and it just ain't gonna be. I will vote for Secretary Clinton, though I'm still pissed with her for her attacks on Obama. I'll really miss Obama, his way of thinking (if not his particular thoughts) and his charming and dignified family. The Obama's are, to my of thinking, a class act .... 

Aside: In the chapter of Deuteronomy that discusses the appointment of leaders, the Writer (writer) the need to be above bribery and willing to chase after justice (צדק צדק תרדוף). It then, out of context, inserts: Though shall not plant a tree of idolatry next to the altar of God (לא תטע אשירה כל עץ אצל מזבח ה׳). My memory isn't what it once was but somewhere around page 11 of Tractate Sanhedrin, the Masters of the Schools of the Babylonian exile tried to explain this curious juxtaposition:

Any one who elects an unsuitable leader? 

It (must be that it) is as if they planted a tree of idolatry near the Altar of God.

כל המעמיד דין שאינו הגון ... כאילו נטע אשירה אצל מזבח ה׳

California Dreamin' ... on a beautiful Spring Day!

Just us Chickens

Getting a big boost out of reissuing of my 1997 volume in paperback that respectfully disagrees with Professor Freud over the central position of Sex and Aggression in human emotional disturbances

The back of the book has a picture of M and I taken by our youngest. The picture of the hunk on the front lower-left -- contrary to rumor (that I began) -- is not me. The idea for such an image of Adam confronted by a multiplicity of gods or influences was first shared with me by a student (Matt Dalberto) in a Mathematics and Art class that I taught at Tyler School of Art some many years ago. It captures, for me, the situation that humankind inherited when it evolved into a self-aware being ... a being that could reflect on multiplicity ... a being that no longer would simply follow its singular instinct in the pursuit of some goal but had a complexity of desires that wove themselves in almost-infinite-variety into notably distinct tapestries. As I once noted in a footnote somewhere in my scribbles: I've never know a cur who needed either candle-light, soft-music or the assistance of Secrets from Victoria to, as they say, get it on. No. For GuntherDog, it's nothing more than his nose that is necessary for him to be sexually inspired to initiate the choreography of sexual desire. 

Which gets me to a picture from this morning walking down the stairs. It was a morning like others. I stirred in bed and immediately heard Gunther groaning like an old man from his nearby oversized chair. M, still recovering from the barbaric replacement of her knee-joint with an aftermarket knee likely produced by a shop left over from the days of the booming US auto industry ... there was M ... My stirring ... GuntherDog's kvetching ... and M's quietly expressed knee discomfort. There are rituals, too. Unless it's an emergency, I get to pee first and then Gunther kvetches off his chair, shakes off sleep and leaves our bedroom for the upstairs hall. He walks over to what once were the kids' bedrooms, smells no one and walks to the top of the stairs and sits. As his Sancho Panza, I sit next to him for all of thirty seconds and scratch his head ... he makes loving little noises and when he's prepared to do so stretches and does the four-legged dog-walk down the stairs. I follow and walk towards the back door with him. He walks out without showing the least bit of urgency ... Gunther has his pride and I swear that I can almost hear his words:

"Hey, Old Man. I coulda held my pee for a long time.

Not like you, y'Old Fart."

The Last Quarter has much in it ... many opportunities ... much camaraderie ... and, yet, in some profound way, it's "Just Us Chickens" ...  M, GDog and Me ... each in our own way trying to make sense, even as we attempt to maintain relevance in the lives of the kids and grandkids who'll visit with us, tonight, and with those others who choose to hang out with us in Q IV. 

Did I maybe hear GDog just quietly query: 

GD: Hey, Old Man. Why am I not on the back cover of yer Scribbles?

HC: Sorry, Guy. Guess I forgot where I hid the Ginkgo Paloba (& how to spell it)