Thought for the day
by chuckofish
“You don’t have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.”
–C.S. Lewis
“Angel of the Lilies” by Louis Comfort Tiffany in the Unitarian Universalist Society of Amherst
dual personalities
Tag: quotes
February 10, 2015
January 23, 2015
Friday movie pick: “Well, they’ve got a very good bass section, mind, but no top tenors, that’s for sure.”*
by chuckofish
On this day in 1879 the Battle of Rorke’s Drift ended.
The Battle of Rorke’e Drift by Alphonse de Neuville
Just over 150 British and colonial troops successfully defended the garrison in Natal, South Africa against an intense assault by 3,000 to 4,000 Zulu warriors. The Battle of Rorke’s Drift lasted 10 hours, from late afternoon till just before dawn the following morning. The massive Zulu attacks on Rorke’s Drift came very close to defeating the tiny garrison. By the end of the fighting, 15 soldiers lay dead, with another two mortally wounded. Surrounding the camp were the bodies of 350 Zulus. Eleven Victoria Crosses were awarded to the defenders, along with a number of other decorations and honors.
You can read all about it here. I am more interested in watching the movie Zulu (1964), which is one of our all-time favorites.
My dual personality and I were, of course, too young to see it when it came out, but my parents did and so did my older brother. They all loved it and we heard all about it in vivid detail. When we eventually got a chance to watch it on television, we were not disappointed.
My heroes: Bromhead and Chard
It has all the elements of a great battle yarn. As Victor Davis Hanson writes, “…in the long annals of military history, it is difficult to find anything quite like Rorke’s Drift, where a beleaguered force, outnumbered forty to one, survived and killed twenty men for every defender lost.”
So my movie pick for this Friday is Zulu (1964). The film stars Stanley Baker and introduces Michael Caine (“Well chin-chin…do carry on with your mud pies.”)–in his first major role, with a supporting cast that includes Jack Hawkins (“You’re all going to die!”), James Booth (“I’m excused duty.”), Nigel Green (“Because we’re here, lad. Nobody else. Just us.”), and Patrick Magee–a veritable who’s who of 1960s English actors. The film begins with a narration by the famed Welshman Richard Burton and ends with his reading a list of the eleven defenders who received the Victoria Cross for the defense of Rorke’s Drift, the most awarded to a regiment in a single action up to that time.
I should also note that the soundtrack by John Barry is one of the greatest. We had the LP when I was a child and we loved it. It includes the narrated parts by Richard Burton.
Zut alors! This movie is over 50 years old! Can you believe it? Well, chin-chin, have a good weekend!
*Private Owen
January 22, 2015
Valuing the poet
by chuckofish
Therefore we value the poet. All the argument and all the wisdom is not in the encyclopedia, or the treatise on metaphysics, or the Body of Divinity, but in the sonnet or the play. In my daily work I incline to repeat my old steps and do not believe in remedial force, in the power of change and reform. But some Petrarch or Arisoto, filled with the new wine of his imagination, writes me an ode or a brisk romance, full of daring thought and action. He smites and arouses me with his shrill tones, breaks up my whole chain of habits, and I open my eye on my own possibilities. He claps wings to the sides of all the solid old lumber of the world, and I am capable once more of choosing a straight path in theory and practice.
–Ralph Waldo Emerson, Circles
January 20, 2015
Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening
by chuckofish
Did you enjoy your long MLK weekend?
We celebrated (belatedly) the birthday of daughter #3
and I celebrated (belatedly) the birthday of an old friend with my pals.
The OM and I watched American Sniper
with Bradley Cooper and–this is the last thing I thought I would be saying–he was awesome. He really deserves the Oscar. This movie is really, really good. Clint Eastwood–and I am not a big fan of his directing–knocked one out of the ballpark. I also have to say kudos to Clint, who is eighty-four, for even being able to attempt this at his age. (I know a lot of guys in their eighties and it is hard to imagine any of them making a movie in the desert.)
Put this movie on your “to do” list!
According to Forbes, American Sniper blew past all reasonable predictions and crushed the January record books with a scorching $90.2 million Friday-to-Sunday and an estimated $105 million Friday-to-Monday debut frame. Well, no kidding. This is a movie with an actual (non-comic-book) HERO in it, with a plot, characters, action, tension–the whole nine yards. Of course, people are going to go see it. Duh. Wake up, Hollywood.
In between bouts of reading Middlemarch, I read a Louis L’Amour oater, Ride the Dark Trail, about one of the innumerable Sacketts. I enjoyed it thoroughly. I am also enjoying Middlemarch, which is full of passages like this:
“My mother is like old George the Third,” said the vicar, “she objects to metaphysics.”
“I object to what is wrong, Camden. I say, keep hold of a few plain truths, and make everything square with them. When I was young, Mr. Lydgate, there was never any question about right and wrong. We knew our catechism, and that was enough; we learned our creed and our duty. Every respectable Church person had the same opinions. But now, if you speak out of the Prayer-book itself, you are liable to be contradicted.”
It is a sure sign that I am really getting old, that I identify with the minor, comic characters, I suppose.
Oh, lordy, life is good, right?
January 12, 2015
“I live my life a quarter mile at a time.”*
by chuckofish
So here we are well into January and I haven’t written anything about the new year or January or anything like that. Tant pis. I haven’t been feeling it.
This weekend, however, I spent all day Saturday and a good part of Sunday putting away Christmas decorations and generally getting the house in order. I feel much better about Life and 2015 and all that.
It is good to welcome back a few old friends who were put away for the holidays.
Hello, Nigel and Errol, you handsome devils. (My mother named these guys many moons ago.)
I hesitate to make any great claims for change in the new year. Change happens despite us, so I prefer to stay on course and hope for the best. The OM and I have pledged to clean up the storage area in the basement and Throw Away a lot of accumulated stuff. This seems like a worthy goal for the rest of the winter months.
Meanwhile I am back reading Middlemarch, which is really good!
People haven’t changed so much since 1871. I recognize quite a few in this study of provincial life.
The OM and I have also enjoyed watching the Fast and the Furious movies he received for Christmas.
I mean who can resist these two cuties?
Vin Diesel and Paul Walker
So onward, I say, in 2015.
Almighty and eternal God, so draw our hearts to thee, so guide our minds, so fill our imaginations, so control our wills, that we may be wholly thine, utterly dedicated unto thee; and then use us, we pray thee, as thou wilt, and always to thy glory and the welfare of thy people; through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Amen.
–BCP
*Dom in The Fast and The Furious (2001)
January 1, 2015
Happy New Year!
by chuckofish
Can you find the pixilated Dual Personality in this festive bunch?
I give you an old reliable–but still wonderful–poem for the new year by Alfred Tennyson. Nothing much has changed since he wrote it in 1850. I mean people are still people and it is good to keep that in mind. Tennyson was writing about the “faithless coldness of the times” back then too.
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light;
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more,
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.Ring out the want, the care the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.Ring out old shapes of foul disease,
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darknss of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
December 17, 2014
This and that: “Um Dasher, Dancer… Prancer… Nixon, Comet, Cupid… Donna Dixon?”*
by chuckofish
A Christmas Carol was published on December 19 in 1843.
Have you read it recently? One year our headmaster read it in chapel and was much mocked for his efforts. He was new, following a genuine Englishman who could read anything he liked (although there may have been some eye-rolling when he hauled out A Child’s Christmas in Wales every year). Unfortunately the new guy set the tone badly for his tenure at our school with his oafish and over-dramatic reading of this classic (“God bless us every one!”). At least that’s the way I remember it.
I usually watch one of the many versions filmed over the years. Scrooge, made in England in 1951, stars Alistair Sim, and is I believe a very close rendition of the original.
Indeed, much of the dialogue is taken word-for-word from the book (“An intelligent boy!” said Scrooge. “A remarkable boy!”).
I’ll admit I cheated yesterday and read the end of the book online. Dickens writes that the reformed Scrooge:
…went to church, and walked about the streets, and watched the people hurrying to and fro, and patted children on the head, and questioned beggars, and looked down into the kitchens of houses, and up to the windows: and found that everything could yield him pleasure. He had never dreamed that any walk — that anything — could give him so much happiness.
Dickens himself was a great walker in the city and this passage probably is a pretty good description of himself, don’t you think?
Anyway, I think a re-reading might be in order.
In other news, here’s some interesting advice for my fellow introverts.
I love the “Humans of New York” blog, but I really liked this one. Is the world random or is there an unseen finger guiding us? Hello.
The first episode of The Simpsons, “Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire,” aired on this day in 1989–25 years ago!
You will recall that in this episode Homer gets a second job as a Santa Claus in a shopping mall in order to pay for Christmas presents. He doesn’t make enough, of course, so he goes to the dog track where Santa’s Little Helper enters into the story and Homer says, “Did you hear that, Boy? Santa’s Little Helper. It’s a sign. It’s an omen.” Bart replies, “It’s a coincidence, Dad.”
Again with the random/not-so-random question. Hmmm. Amazingly, it all ends well.
Have a good Wednesday–we’re over the hump! Daughter #2 arrives on Friday! Can daughter #1 be far behind?
*”Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire” (1989)
December 15, 2014
Sleepers, wake!*
by chuckofish
Advent Three. The second lesson was I Thessalonians 5: 16-24, which you will recall I blogged about last month.
Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise the words of prophets, but test everything; hold fast to what is good; abstain from every form of evil. May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this. (NRSV)
You would think that it would be easy to rejoice during this particular holiday season as we await the birth of our saviour. But it isn’t, is it? We feel harried and under the gun. We try so hard and no one seems to notice. We aren’t included causing us to feel left out and once again like our 8th grade personas. We miss our loved ones and feel lonely. Sigh.
Well, I say turn off Facebook and turn to your prayer book (or Walt Whitman) instead. Take a walk. Give thanks that you can. Have a glass of wine. Give thanks in all circumstances.
It’s all good.
*Hymn #61
December 9, 2014
“There’s a certain Slant of light”*
by chuckofish
Today is Emily Dickinson’s birthday!
Emily lived her whole life (December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886) in Amherst, Massachusetts. She lived in this beautiful house, called by her family “The Homestead”.
She had a room of her own, and for Emily, this seems to have been enough. She also had her family and she did not lack for friends. She may have seemed “eccentric” to some, but plenty of people thought she was pretty cool. If she was mysterious back in her day, she is increasingly misunderstood now.
The Emily Dickinson Home, a National Historic Landmark, is located at 280 Main St. in Amherst, MA. Although I lived in the vicinity during my college years, I never visited the house. I saw it, but never went inside. The property, which is now owned by Amherst College, is a museum and is open to the public for guided tours March through December. It is definitely on my “to do/see” list.
So tonight let’s toast Emily and read a few of her poems. Here’s a good one for a winter afternoon:
There’s a certain Slant of light,Winter Afternoons –That oppresses, like the HeftOf Cathedral Tunes –Heavenly Hurt, it gives us –We can find no scar,But internal difference –Where the Meanings, are –None may teach it – Any –‘Tis the seal Despair –An imperial afflictionSent us of the Air –When it comes, the Landscape listens –Shadows – hold their breath –When it goes, ’tis like the DistanceOn the look of Death –
December 5, 2014
Yet what I can, I give Him
by chuckofish
Today we celebrate the birthday of Christina Rosetti (December 5, 1830 – December 29, 1894), a 19th century English poet and devout Anglican. She wrote the poem that was set to music and is one of my favorite Christmas carols, In the Bleak Midwinter.
In the bleak mid-winter
Frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron,
Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow,
Snow on snow,
In the bleak mid-winter
Long ago.Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him
Nor earth sustain;
Heaven and earth shall flee away
When He comes to reign:
In the bleak mid-winter
A stable-place sufficed
The Lord God Almighty,
Jesus Christ.Enough for Him, whom cherubim
Worship night and day,
A breastful of milk,
And a mangerful of hay;
Enough for Him, whom angels
Fall down before,
The ox and ass and camel
Which adore.Angels and archangels
May have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim
Thronged the air –
But only His mother
In her maiden bliss
Worshipped the Beloved
With a kiss.What can I give Him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd
I would bring a lamb;
If I were a wise man
I would do my part;
Yet what I can, I give Him –
Give my heart.
Here is a lovely rendition of this beautiful carol:
This may get you headed in the right direction–that is, not toward the mall, but to wherever you go to listen to that still, small voice in your heart.
Have a great weekend and enjoy Advent II.
