XXXX,

I’ve told you that I view writing (letters, poetry, essays, etc.) as an opportunity to expound, to explain, to describe, or just to have fun.  So I should tell you that in order to curb my desires, you should be prepared to give me some direction of what you would like me to write about.  Otherwise it’s open season.

Since you didn’t ask me any questions or raise any thought-provoking issues in your last letter, I’ll take that as granting me license to write about anything.  Like a topic in your first letter to me:  the status of “Separated”.

Marriage is a binary concept – one is either married or not married.  However “separated” is not binary – it is a spectrum concept.  One can be anywhere on an entire spectrum from barely separated or newly separated to fully separated and/or long-time separated.  And most cases will fall somewhere in the spectrum between those two extremes. 

Then, to add an additional dimension to that approach, “separated” includes multiple domains.  One may be geographically separated, socially separated (the friends who were shared have been divided in such a way that they are not uncomfortable).  And of course there is the idea of emotional separation.  Many people may be geographically separated but not emotionally separated – or visa versa. 

So what does the one label “separated” mean to a reader who reads that another is “separated” in their profile of a dating network?  How does one communicate all the nuances in that one word when they select “separated” as their status?  Many women will avoid a man with the status of “separated” like they would a leper.  If there is a small group which will make you vulnerable to hurt, then it is easy to treat the whole group that way.  And just like prejudices against ethnics, or religions, where the fear of the few is imposed on the whole, the victims aren’t even given a chance to defend themselves against the charge of “one to be avoided at all cost”. 

Yet the man who excuses himself, often accuses himself.  I can tell you that I have been geographically separated for over four years, the I have been emotionally separated for much longer, (however my wife has been emotionally separated for a shorter time), that we are financially separated, that we have been separated to such an extent that she can now act civil and so we are now friends, the we are separated to such an extent that I haven’t even talked with her for several months (not because of animosity but just because there hasn’t been a need or a desire).  Although I can tell you all those things, if you want to be suspect, you can suspect each of the above statements and I will have accomplished nothing.

I realize the risk that women may face by becoming “involved” with a separated man or a man who claims to be separated only to try to win over the trust of a woman unfairly.  And so I wanted to let you know that I appreciated your willingness to trust me to the point of getting to know me before making any final judgments.  I really do appreciate that.  And I wanted you to know that I appreciate it.  I realize that we are not getting involved to the point of getting married where bigamy is a concern.  Nor even at a level of emotional dependency.  We’re still at the curious stage, the exploratory stage, the investigatory stage.  All stages where the risk of vulnerability is minimized.

But if you have any questions, or concerns, or whatever, please feel free to bring them up.  Your trust deserves honesty and I promise to be honest.  Unlike the stereotypical male, I don’t mind discussing relationships, emotions, feelings, etc.  In fact, I’m androgynous enough that I would rather discuss them than sports. 

Now that I’ve carried on like this, you should have learned your lesson by now that it is probably best to feed me some questions or thoughts in your e-mails, brief as they may be, lest you subject yourself to similar reflections.  (smile)

Have a good day with your pre-class preps. 

Enjoy the picture.

David

“Give, give, give – what is the point of having experience, knowledge, or talent if I don’t give it away? … It is in giving that I connect with others.”  Isabel Allende

This is close, but it’s not quite on, in my mind.  Perhaps we can give objects, but not joy, or love, or any part of ourselves.  We share those things.  When we share, we are not depleting ourselves of anything.  And we are sharing because we are receiving an equal measure back.  If I share something, I get joy back from seeing their smile, or knowing of their appreciation. 

I was eating in a Cracker Barrel one time and noticed a table a ways from me where a young man and an older women were eating.  It was obvious that they didn’t have much money and that eating out for them at this time was an extravagance.  And they looked so serious.  I don’t know what they were talking about, but it was obvious that they had experienced some kind of emotional trauma.  I performed an act of random kindness by signaling the waitress and telling her that I wanted to pay their bill anonymously.  I then got the bill and paid it and left before they even knew that it had been paid for them.

I tell this not to impress you with my “giving” but to illustrate my “sharing”.  I not only felt good at that time, but every time that I go to that Cracker Barrel, I remember the incident and I feel good from the inside out.  I didn’t “give” them a gift of a free meal, I shared with them some joy.

I am fortunate to work at a place that allows me to be generous.  But I am always surprised how many of my friends will not allow me to be generous.  I realize that they mean well, but they are actually depriving me of an opportunity to share some joy with them when they refuse my generosity. 

If we could realize that when one is operating with a true spirit, they are not giving and depleting their resources, but rather they are sharing and participating in such a way that they are also receiving what is shared.

 So, to paraphrase the above quote, I would say “Share, share, share.” 

Last night I went to an open folk mic night at a nearby Arts Center in Framingham.  I have realized for a long time that the folk music of today is far different than the folk music was back in the 60’s.  Then, it seemed that folk music was music of the common folk.  They sang songs that people knew, or could learn or that they wanted to learn.  When I moved to the Boston area, I was excited that I would be able to go to Club Passim in Cambridge (at Harvard) which was one of the biggest promoters of folk music during that era. 

But I was very disappointed when I went.  Now, all of their acts were by singer-songwriters – not folk musicians.  They had their own style of folk music and they would only play and sing what they wrote.  So you would go and not hear one song that you knew, and you would never hear those songs again unless you became a groupie of that performer. 

Another difference was that back then, the words were most important and the music was secondary.  Now, the music is most important and the words are secondary.  Actually, I think in a lot of cases, the words are tertiary or even lower in the scale of importance. 

So I was expecting the same last night but was curious – as I am about most things in life.  While there, I had an interesting thought.  While the music of the 60’s and 70’s was centered around feelings and emotions, the music of today is much more centered around attitudes.  I was thinking how that perhaps every two generations, there is a different domain that creates a barrier causing intergenerational disfavor or confounding.  Our parents hated the music of the 60’s and 70’s because they couldn’t understand it.  Perhaps it was because when they were growing up, their music wasn’t about feelings and emotions.  Perhaps it was all about mood.  (Remember the song “In the Mood”?)  So their entire lexicon of music was based on moods.  So when emotions and feelings became the domain, they didn’t understand it.  (Remember the song “Feelings” that was popular?)  And just as we were raised on music (and appreciated it) based on feelings, so it is difficult for us to appreciate music based on attitude.  Look at rap music.  It’s all about attitude. 

So much of today’s music is about “in your face attitude”, or “positive attitude”, or “you’re not going to detract from my attitude”.  It really helps me to understand the differences a little better.  (I won’t say it helps me to appreciate the attitude music better.)  Even the folk music last night.  That which was performed by the younger people was mostly attitude songs whereas the older people performed songs based on feelings.

And that got me to thinking about our previous discussion of a lexicon of emotions and feelings.  Just as there is an entire listing of feelings falling into one of seven categories, there should be a similar listing for attitudes.  But I have to admit I am dumb (in the original sense of the word) when it comes to coming up with such a list.  My list is paltry at best and to form any kind or organized taxonomy would be painful.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a list.

And of course, I’m using music as an extended metaphor here.  I think that there is a larger shift going on in more than music.  I think the same could be said of the dating scene.  Romance is no longer sought.  When I look at the profiles on the on-line dating networks, I see many more references to attitudes than I do to feelings.  Which is probably why I have been such a dismal failure on them.  I can see the same change in poetry.  Now, the big thing is slam poetry – especially among the young.  And that’s all attitude.  While the 60’s was the “Love” generation, the current generation is the Sustainability generation – which is an attitude of how we as individuals and corporations should approach the environment as well as our social responsibilities.  The right approach requires the right attitude.  The Liberal Arts major of the 60’s, which fostered a “love” for learning, has turned into a business quest with the right approach and attitude. 

As I’m thinking about this, I think there might also be something in the react/reflect approaches I’ve mentioned before.  While most people in our society today (regardless of generation) prefer to react, I seem to be different and prefer to reflect.  Which is why I would rather correspond by e-mail than by IM, why I would rather talk one-on-one than interact within a group, and why I would rather read than watch TV.  Perhaps it’s easier to react to attitude than it is to feelings.  Feelings require reflections to be communicated or even to be appreciated in another.  Attitudes don’t. 

But if there is truth that our society is making such a paradigm shift from one where the predominate domain is feelings, to one where it is predominately attitude, it would be a good idea to investigate and to develop enough of a working knowledge to discuss it.  Undiscussed societal paradigm shifts are to be feared.

What do you think?

David,

One of the things I subscribe to daily is the Writer’s Almanac (Garrison Keillor’s work).  It starts in with a poem – sometimes good, sometimes not so good, and sometimes excellent.  Then is has several blurbs of events that happened that day.  Usually the blurbs are about literary events and people.  Sometimes it will be about historical non-literary events.   Today it was both – it had a large blurb on John Hersey’s writing about the destruction of Hiroshima and his editor’s comments before publishing it in the New Yorker.  I know you’ll like it – especially if you were unaware of the exchanges that took place between Hersey and Harold Ross, the editor.

It was on this day in 1946 that Harold Ross wrote a memo about John Hersey’s Hiroshima story that began “A very fine piece beyond any question; got practically everything. This will be … the classic piece on what follows a bomb dropping for a long time to come.”

It was exactly one year and two days after the U.S. had dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima (the bomb was dropped August 6th, 1945) and The New Yorker was devoting an entire August issue to John Hersey’s reporting. Hersey had been one of the first Western reporters to arrive in Hiroshima. To document the aftermath, he decided to write about how individual persons were affected, and he focused his stories on the lives of six people in Hiroshima at the time of the explosion.

The memo that Harold Ross wrote on this day was addressed to Joseph Wigglesworth, The New Yorker staff member whose job it was to compile the query sheets from various editors at the magazine on any given piece. Harold Ross had a reputation for turning in funny, quirky query sheets — and lengthy ones, too. For Hersey’s Hiroshima article, Ross had written several hundred questions and observations. In the memo, he admitted, “I probably read it over-zealously.”

Ross wrote: “There is, I think, one grave lack in this piece. It may be Hersey’s intention that there be. If so, ask consideration for what I say anyhow. All the way through I wondered about what killed these people, the burns, falling debris, the concussion — what? For a year I’ve been wondering about this and I eagerly hoped this piece would tell me. It doesn’t. Nearly a hundred thousand dead people are around but Hersey doesn’t tell how they died. Would it be possible — if so, would be wise — to tell on Galley 7 where he gives the one hundred thousand people, how many were killed by being hit by hard objects, how many by burns, how many by concussion, or shock, or whatever it was?”

In the final version that was published, Hersey wrote: “Many people who did not die right away came down with nausea, headache, diarrhea, malaise, and fever, which lasted several days. Doctors could not be certain whether some of these symptoms were the result of radiation or nervous shock. … The doctors realized in retrospect that even though most of these dead had also suffered from burns and blast effects, they had absorbed enough radiation to kill them. The rays simply destroyed body cells — caused their nuclei to degenerate and broke their walls.”

Harold Ross suggested mentioning the vomiting earlier and describing it more thoroughly. Ross also wrote “I would suggest that Hersey might do well to tuck up on the time — give the hour and minute, exactly or roughly, from time to time. The reader loses all sense of the passing of time in the episodes and never knows what time of day it is, whether ten a.m. or four p.m.”

John Hersey’s piece appeared a few weeks later, in The New Yorker’s last issue of August. Hersey would later say, “What has kept the world safe from the bomb since 1945 has not been deterrence, in the sense of fear of specific weapons, so much as it’s been memory. The memory of what happened at Hiroshima.”

Is it appropriate for me to wish you a “Have a good day” after starting out with a description of the horrors of the bomb?

Friday I sniffed it
in the grocery store, turned it
in my hands, looking
for bruises
in the rough, webbed rind.
My mother’s voice—the one
I carry always in my head—
pronounced it fine. Ripe,
but not too soft.

I bagged and bought it,
would have given it to you
for breakfast—this fruit
first grown in Cantalupo, not far
from Rome. I imagined you,
my sleepy emperor, coming
to the table in your towel toga,
digging into the luscious
orange flesh
with a golden spoon,

and afterwards,
reclining, your smile
satisfied,
imperial.

Now I open the trunk of my car
to find the cantaloupe
still there, flattened, sour,
having baked all weekend
in August’s oven.

Grieving is useless,
my mother would say,
Just get another.

Bur why am I so certain
that no other fruit
will ever be as sweet
as that—

the one
I would have cut in half,
scooped the seeds from,
that one I would have given you
on Saturday morning?