Category Archives: Sailing Through Life

Let it Be

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Here’s a humbling statement from mariner’s desk calendar:

“Many persons have a wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification, but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.”

– Helen Keller

“Fidelity to a worthy purpose.” Everyone understands the virtue of fidelity. It represents commitment to something which requires personal value and personal discipline. Anyone, without regard for faith, politics or personal circumstances has some obligation to an idea or behavior that shapes their life and sets the standard for daily behavior.

No one would make it through a day without some set of values that keeps them anchored to who they are, what they need and how they interact with reality. While it is true that many of us need to improve our skills when dealing with daily life, the real issue is fidelity to what?

One can’t fault the fidelity of Trump followers; the question is whether that set of values is worthy of fidelity. One can’t fault the fidelity of socialist liberals; the question is whether that set of values is worthy of fidelity. This criticism can be made about any opinion. The question that must be answered is, “are these values worthy of fidelity?”

Frankly, the world, its nations and its societies are in great transition – some may say dysfunctional. What will future society look like? Taking into consideration the fact that many social institutions are on decline, e.g., churches, colleges, social service organizations, governments at all levels, reduced income opportunities and the intense interruption of global warming, what institutional structure will rise to overcome all the trauma?

Mariner suspects it will be small communities; perhaps urban neighborhoods as well; populations of about 1,500 – 10,000 or so. What has slowly disappeared is community bonding. The large agricultural family has all but disappeared; the ease of travel and a broad range of employment opportunities leave much of the population without the friendly surroundings of large families, local clubs, or common career familiarity. In mariner’s small town, the glue provided by large, multi-generational families is gone. The many clubs and organizations that afforded social gathering have dwindled to a precious few and no longer set the pace for the town; the common employment base of agriculture is a memory.

Nevertheless, in the name of sanity people must belong to something meaningful in their daily life. Without community, society cannot heal, grow or reorganize. Without community fidelity, more sophisticated institutions cannot be stable.

The best thing you can do to weather this era is to be friendly and helpful with your neighbors.

Remember the words from the Beatles song ‘Let it Be’?

“And when the broken-hearted people living in the world agree

There will be an answer, let it be

For though they may be parted, there is still a chance that they will see

There will be an answer, let it be”

When government fails, when society is disheveled, when calamity and uncertainty are in the air, people will gather into small groups to minimize fear, provide social stability, and establish common fidelity.

Evolution has declared that Homo sapiens is a tribal creature.

Let it be.

Ancient Mariner

 

Interplanetary Travel

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Mariner is an old codger – almost as old as many legislators. The truth is, the world today is quite alien to him. It is not his planet. Back on his planet, there is a President named John F. Kennedy; in fifteen minutes Charles Kuralt tells the news of the world with no gossip, no allegiance to viewer share, no conspiracy threats. Social media does not exist, only thick daily newspapers with pages of funnies and sports; mariner delivered them every day for a few years.

Computers are around but they don’t poke into everyone’s business. The U.S. is at war, as usual, but it is a strange no-bullet war with Russia. There are no mass shootings of children every month or so. In fact, when mariner was 12 years old, he would take the streetcar downtown without even knowing about the social dangers that lurk the streets on this planet. On mariner’s planet policemen walk their neighborhood beats and stop to pass the time of day.

Mariner could go on and on about how different his planet is from this planet. On this planet, he feels out of place and irrelevant because he does not understand this world. He is not rooted in the life of a child who is given a computer tablet in kindergarten. It likely is appropriate training for children on this planet but mariner finds himself confused about social values. Humanist philosophy is at a nadir.

Even television on this planet seems irrelevant. Mariner switched to a modern ‘smart’ television to no avail; little is of interest. The few programs he watches are broadcast on his planet. Listening to news today speaks only of Armageddon. Mariner’s planet, while it has issues, has no reason to fear the future demise of humanity.

But mariner can visit his planet. There is a dimension called ‘music’ that has a direct link to his planet. He steps into this dimension by listening to what people on this planet call golden oldies. Golden, indeed, and eternal.

Stack up the old 45 with names like Penguins, Everly Brothers, Presley, Ronstadt, Platters, Domino, Brightman, Little Richard, Carpenters, Ray Charles, Joni James and Cline. Or capture the next decade with Diamond, Denver, Peter, Paul and Mary, and ABBA. Mariner settles down in the music space ship chair and travels back to his planet.

Ancient Mariner

GIG Work

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Mariner is acutely aware that the Internet and its future iterations definitely will change the world of work. One of the new work models emerging is the GIG world of employment. GIG means that jobs are in response to corporate need rather than in response to career development and all the trappings of lifetime security that the +60 crowd understands.

Gig workers, generally, enjoy the freedom of earning an income providing the link between corporate automation and the corporate need to have personalized service. A simple but common example is food delivery services. With the Internet as a tool, GIG workers have unparalleled  opportunities to live where they want, with their lifestyle from living in cars with an Internet link to living in Thailand to enjoy better benefits than are available in the U.S.

Statistical studies have shown that the freedom to travel, to live eccentric lifestyles, to earn just enough to sustain their lifestyles, is all that’s needed. While it is a world of independence, it suffers from the lack of unions, standardized employment models that provide insurance, retirement and minimum wage. In the United States, a more traditional labor relations society, these shortcomings have become a court issue.

In some respects the GIG movement and the homesteader movement have a lot in common: Society has become an intense competition for assets – not lifestyle. It is not possible for everyone to be successful in the world of dollar security; especially not in the world of self-identity and personal gratification in life.

Mariner discovered a pleasant review of GIG work (that is, not politically abused) on PBS Passport/ROKU. It may be available as a local PBS documentary – mariner doesn’t know since he switched to a smart TV. The program is titled “The World Of Work – The Next Generation: Why I choose to live and work in my car”. It provides an insight into the conflict of pressurized economics versus the desire to live an unencumbered life.

Check it out.

Ancient Mariner.

Consumers have control

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Here’s an interesting quote from ProPublica about the two-decade long drought conditions affecting several western states and the disappearing Colorado River:

“A majority of the water used by farms — and thus much of the river — goes to growing nonessential crops like alfalfa and other grasses that feed cattle for meat production. Much of those grasses are also exported to feed animals in the Middle East and Asia. Short of regulating which types of crops are allowed, which state authorities may not even have the authority to do, it may fall to consumers to drive change. Water usage data suggests that if Americans avoid meat one day each week they could save an amount of water equivalent to the entire flow of the Colorado each year, more than enough water to alleviate the region’s shortages.”

It isn’t just cows. Mariner knows for certain that blue crabs in the Chesapeake Bay have a shrinking population; Maine Lobsters are moving to cooler waters in Canada; the wild salmon are threatened by new open faced mining near the Arctic Circle; Australia has drought conditions, too, so there goes ostrich and emu; Has anyone priced bison lately?

What consumers need to do is have cities and towns change their ordinances so consumers can raise rabbits, chickens, geese and invasive species like the Burmese python or the Tegu lizard – both in Florida.

But give up thick, juicy T-Bones or country ribs? It’s a lot to ask but consumers are now in charge of climate change.

Ancient Mariner

Wife versus smart TV

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Mariner often publishes the fine poetry his gifted wife produces. He has always claimed she should make a living as a poet. But now, his wife is showing that she is multi-talented. She wrote an accounting of our introduction to a new smart TV. She sent the piece to the Fort Madison Daily Democrat, a newspaper published in Fort Madison. The editor was pleased with her description of our adventure and encouraged my wife to send more articles.

Her article was headlined across the top of the opinion page and took more than half of the page. Below the article is printed in its entirety:

 

Adventures in the Brave New World of Television

When a thin purple line appeared down the middle of our TV screen, it didn’t seem too ominous.   Within a few days, the thin line became a thick stripe of purple and we knew the end was near.  I suppose we could have watched it that way for a long time–like using up the last of the shampoo in the bottle–but  we had already cut the cord of our DISH subscription, and we were ready to step into the new world that awaited us with a smart TV.

Have you bought a new TV recently?  I went online to read reviews.  We wanted to replace our massive 43 inch screen with one of the same size.  It turns out that 43 inches is no longer considered massive.  It is the size you buy for a second bedroom or a dorm room.  If we wanted to stay with that same puny size, we would not have all the bells and whistles that are available on larger screens that start at the small end at 50 inches and go up to 85 inches or larger.

We decided we did not need all the bells and whistles or have room for a theater experience in our living room,  so we ended up buying  a 43 inch TCL Roku TV that we found at Walmart.  Did I mention that it is a smart TV?  Did I mention that we had cut the cord to our satellite service?  We thought we knew what we were doing as we had used a Roku stick on the old TV to get free streaming TV from the internet.   We plugged in the new TV and it said “Welcome!  Let’s get started setting up your new Roku TV.”  That was a good sign.  Then it asked us to find the internet using our wifi password.   We knew our wifi password and typed it into the box on the TV screen using the remote control.   We were feeling fairly confident that we were just as smart as our new TV.  Then the TV screen said, “Great.  Now let’s set up your Roku Account.  Type in the email address linked to your existing account.”

The Roku stick that went with our old TV was a gift from our California son in law.  He had bought the stick, stuck it into the back of the old TV and set up a Roku account.  We did not know what email he used to set up the account.  We did not want to start a new account as we had saved a number of channels and we did not want to start over from scratch trying to find them again.  The screen said, if you do not know the email that is linked to your Roku account “go to settings/account/help.”  We couldn’t find a settings link anywhere on the TV.  I thought maybe settings was on the Roku account on the internet so I googled Roku.com.  In order to sign in to my account I needed….the email address that was attached to it.

Fortunately there was an 800 number to call if all else failed.  You may be wondering why I did not call my California son in law who had set up the account.  He was at that very moment on an airplane somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean and we did not want to bother him.  Instead we bothered Vineesha, a young woman who was possibly somewhere in India.  She asked for the number on the Roku stick from our old purple stripe TV.  Vineesha stayed on the line while we found the old Roku stick in the mess of cables behind the new TV.  With the number from the Roku stick Vineesha was able to give us the email address linked to our Roku account.  It was my daughter’s email account.

My daughter was not on a plane, but she was far away in California.  I called her to explain that she would be getting the code numbers to type into her computer that would link our new TV to the old Roku account.  She got an email from Vineesha with the code, she typed it in to her computer in California and instantly our Iowa TV said, “Success!   Now there is just one more step.  Type in your Roku password.”

Do you see the problem with smart TV’s?  They are a little condescending in their helpful tone.  They are a little smug in their assumption that we had all of our passwords in place.  Our password was, in fact, flying somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean.

My daughter in California  texted her husband on the plane, he texted the password back to her,  she called us with the password, we typed it in on our Iowa remote control and our TV was finally, finally set up and running.  It did not have a purple stripe down the middle of the screen.  It had all of our channels in place.

So what have we learned?   We learned that it takes a village to set up a smart TV.  A global village that spans the globe across multiple time zones from Iowa to India to California to a transatlantic flight somewhere in midair over the ocean.  It is a humbling experience to realize that your household devices can be controlled from a few lines of code transmitted from thousands of miles away.

And yes, we learned to use old fashioned paper and pencil to write down the email and password to our own TV.   Our wonderful new TV that is smarter than we are.

–

Multi-talented, indeed.

Ancient Mariner

Fire up some briquettes

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As regular readers know mariner is home alone for a couple of weeks. As a result of cooking only for one, he dug out his old hibachi to grill food instead of using the regular gas grill. His experience was positive enough to wonder why he hasn’t used the hibachi all along. True, it takes a bit of patience to start the briquettes but the efficiency – if only measuring that the hibachi is just outside the kitchen door – was significant. A five-gallon bucket of briquettes easily will last as long as a 7 liter LPG tank. A bucket of charcoal is about 30 pounds at an average cost of $25. A tank of LPG gas costs about the same.

The hibachi is convenient as a substitute for a campfire to cook hotdogs and make s’mores. Does anyone still have an old metal 6-cup percolator coffeepot? Make morning coffee and toast! The hibachi can substitute as a crockpot, too.

When mariner was in Taiwan, many restaurants had nothing more than a couple of ceramic style hibachis shaped like large flower pots. In Tainan mariner visited a restaurant which claimed to have the longest continuously burning hibachi fire in Taiwan. The primary menu items in these restaurants is what a crockpot or wok is used for in the U.S. Interestingly, a standard wok always seem to fit those flower pots perfectly. Genuine Chinese herbs and spices made the best stir-fries mariner has ever tasted.

Many small neighborhood restaurants were totally portable. Each morning the kitchen and seating were set up in what we would call a garage with no utilities. Customers ate outside on the sidewalk. In the evening these restaurants lit up the entire block with colorful lanterns. When the restaurant closed, everything was packed and removed leaving an empty garage. This setup method was common among many small retailers.

Being a foreigner, these kinds of social experiences were enjoyable. But alas, across from mariner’s hotel was a McDonalds. At least the food was still Asian. Mariner worked in the ‘down country’ of Taiwan. Visit the City of Taiwan on the north end and one would think they’re in New York City except everything is written in mandarin.

There are many other ways of living besides living amid Interstates and gazing at smartphones. Perhaps next our travelogue will visit Kazakhstan.

Ancient Mariner

 

Television versus Real Life

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Science Magazine – The scenes were apocalyptic. On 20 July, a flash flood in Zhengzhou, a city of 10 million on the Yellow River in China, caused a low-lying, kilometer-long section of the city’s Metro Line 5 tunnel to fill with water, trapping more than 500 riders in a subway train. In real time, passengers posted terrifying videos and photos on social media sites, showing people standing in chest-deep water that was still rising. Rescuers, hampered by extensive street-level flooding, arrived 4 hours later, but 14 people did not make it out alive.
So many things are happening in the last year or two: century floods and droughts, fires and dying coral, disappearing Pacific islands, melting glaciers and seafront catastrophes. Is something happening we don’t know about?
– – – –
Mariner is experiencing a personal renaissance, small r for sure but it ends a killing ennui, depression and isolation that started with the campaign of Donald and continues with the help of commercialized news broadcasts. What launched the renaissance was living without family for two weeks while cutting the cord on DISH and suffering empty space and time throughout the day.
Mariner has new found energy and interest in things to be accomplished. He calls it his ‘homesteader’ phase, last experienced on his farm where there was much to do in many areas of equipment maintenance and building construction, a lot to pursue agriculturally, home maintenance and still holding down a fulltime job.
The culprit: television. Having given up on the news, stopped watching lame late shows and meaningless comedy from sitcoms to SNL, the TV was forcing dissatisfaction on mariner. Not even movies were of interest. The short of it is that one’s life is all around them – not on television or smartphone or even on the Internet. Have we forgotten so quickly what we did with our hands, our family, our hobbies and sustaining our local social network and environment? Does the reader lament not being able to shop in a real store?
So when were you going to fix that screen door? When were you going to remodel that spare room? When were you going to make some cash with your hobby? When will you upgrade your rec room with ping pong, cornhole or billiards?
Remember – sociologists have identified ‘aspiration’ as the key word for the middle class. To what do you aspire by suppertime? (retired, especially)

ASPIRE [uh-spahyuhr ] to long, aim, or seek ambitiously; be eagerly desirous, especially for something great or of high value (usually followed by to, after, or an infinitive): to aspire after literary immortality; to aspire to be a doctor.

Archaic: to rise up; soar; mount; tower.


Ancient Mariner

Purgatory

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Is Purgatory required by God, the Holy Roman Catholic Church or the medical profession? Mariner is of an age where he no longer is a mainstay of society, economics or politics. Like millions of other citizens, he represents past accomplishments, past memories and lost faculties.

It causes mariner to ponder – Was the Roman Church right to declare that purgatory was after death? It seems that would make a situation similar to the American immigration policy at the Mexican border. Would God be that disorganized? True, the Church made a lot of money buying and selling souls – sort of like the smugglers bringing immigrants from Central America.

Another explanation is that, similar to the penances of the Church, the medical profession has declared that purgatory is before one dies, not after. The medical industry makes lots of money by extending the human lifespan but not extending the physical or mental capabilities that existed earlier and further makes it feel more like purgatory by prolonging half-cured illnesses and disabilities. Is purgatory a medical phenomenon?

What is God’s take on this? As best we can tell, God created humans as part of his Garden of Eden. Things were perfect until the snake came along. So because we consciously knew the procreation game, God had to modify some things. He changed humans and all creatures into beings that passed on. He said “Instead of living forever in the Garden of Eden, humans will exist as a three-generational creature then die.” So purgatory doesn’t seem to be in God’s plans.

It is true that Jesus offered a get-into-heaven-free deal in exchange for promoting God’s agenda but that quickly disappeared when the Church became the gardener.

All mariner knows is that he is not the human he was when he was forty. Purgatory, apparently, is a real thing; we just don’t know who to blame.

Ancient Mariner

You are supposed to go first

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No one denies the confrontational identity politics that prevails today; no one denies the emotional disruption of fifteen months in virtual isolation; no one denies the insecurity of a disappearing lifestyle that eliminates storefronts, careers and every day family security; no one denies the utter absence of a life of contentment, quiet comfort and satisfaction. How do we stop this hellish train to nowhere?

You go first. What are some tricks to escape the gravity of society today? The issue is, after all, how you feel as an individual. How everyone else feels is abstract; what makes YOU feel better and thereby improves life in these times, at least for yourself?

What follows are a few examples that seem to work at an individual level.

֎ Mariner’s wife rises early in the morning to prepare a simple but tasty breakfast. She eats this breakfast outdoors on the back deck just as the garden, birds, insects and other creatures are waking up and the Sun is rising on a new day. Human intervention doesn’t exist; there are no responsibilities, no reason to account for the human world, no thought of chores. In her backyard, at least, all’s well and peace is at hand.

This moment is more powerful and more rewarding than it reads. It arms the reader with confidence at a subconscious level. It is easy to imagine the difference between a morning coffee while watching morning television and a morning coffee in a pleasant, reassuring moment of solitude. It may take some practice to shut down the angst of facing the outside world but it is worth it.

Besides the magic of internal peace, its magic will soften your approach to others during the day and permit you to be less confrontational. Isn’t this an example of how to ‘pass it forward’ in an effort to slow that hellish train?

֎ Mariner lives in a small corner of town where ten homes are clustered in a manner that encourages collective activity. The residents of these homes have political and economic differences that are quite measurable. The political philosophies range from Trump allegiance including conspiracies to extremely progressive socialists. Careers range from retired tradesmen to nurses to master mechanics to systems consultants to truck drivers to school administrators to retired pilots.

In order to sustain civility, sharing, caring and the many other little behaviors that make neighborly life pleasant, everyone practices oppressed confrontation. Neighborly bonding with each other and maintaining an “I’m here if you need me” attitude requires a rule that no one talks about political, religious or philosophical mandates or condescending comments about other neighbors.

It is obvious that unity is more important than ideological supremacy. Isn’t this, too, one small step?

֎ A third exercise is to share, that is to share in a way that would not qualify as every day sharing. The secret is to keep the logistics simple but make a large impact on the recipient(s). Typically the recipient has a hardship of some kind; perhaps being a shut-in, or an invalid or a family suffering a recent death or a family who is in a state of economic hardship or maybe just a special occasion in the recipient’s life. It’s your turn to share some concern and relief to your acquaintances who are in need. Cash not allowed; put yourself and a few friends into it – show sharing, caring and compassion.

Like the first two suggestions, sharing is more powerful and more rewarding than it reads. The common result from all the suggestions is the creation of unity. It is unity that is the antidote to the nation’s infection of identity politics.

It’s your turn.

– – – –

On the side, Mariner and his wife were talking about this post. As is her wont, she quickly wrote a poem to reflect on sitting on the porch:

This garden would be perfect
The old man thought
As he leaned on his hoe
And scratched his ear
If it weren’t for that damned young rabbit.

This garden would be perfect
The young rabbit thought
As he munched on lettuce
And scratched his ear
If it weren’t for that damned old man.

This garden is perfect
The poet thought
As she ate breakfast on the deck and enjoyed the view
Having neither the work of maintaining it
Nor the necessity of surviving in it.

MKM 6-4-2021

Ancient Mariner

Demise of the Local Press

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Yes, even news value in the ‘news’paper is disappearing. It is just another severe shift everyone faces in culture’s future. Over four hundred medium and large market newspapers have been bought by hedge funds and venture capitalists. In every case except a very few, the newspapers are stripped of expensive investigative reporting and local news reporting thereby reducing overhead to gain an average of fifty percent profit versus fifteen percent.

The latest round includes Chicago Tribune, the Baltimore Sun, New York Daily News and major metro papers from Hartford, Conn. to Fort Lauderdale, Fla. These newspapers have been bought by the hedge fund, Alden Global Capital, referred to as the ‘Vulture Fund’. Fortunately, a very few newspapers are picked up by altruistic investors, e.g., Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post to assure full, unadulterated coverage of news.

So add newspapers to movie theaters, department stores, coffee houses and bars. Notice how these things all required physical movement and personal commitment to achieve? Mariner has decided not to wish for a new Maserati for Christmas.

Instead he only needs a hover board to go to the post office.

 

Mariner is reading a book titled, “The Ones We’ve Been Waiting For – How a new generation of leaders will transform America” By Charlotte Alter. Mariner swears that some of the points in this book were lifted from his Blog. Alter, like mariner, says we must wait until the old timers get out of the way, that it is the millennials who know the answers. She cites emerging personalities in several fields of endeavor like science, business, international politics and local government (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one of several in government).

Alter says we won’t really know what things will look like until the millennials are pretty much in charge of everything. For one example, they know more intuitively what a cloud is and what it can do besides make it rain.

So, millennials, will mariner and his wife ever go to the movies again? Will they ever meander among racks of new sweaters and shirts? Will they be able to go on a cheap date to McDonald’s instead of waiting for a drone?

Ancient Mariner