Food for the Spirit and the Soul

Border Ballads: Have You Herd? Border Collies Don’t Track

We all like to think ourselves safe from the depredations of common criminals, particularly if we reside in suburban America, but a few days ago, I had an experience that shattered my faith in both the pastoral character of my neighborhood and the general usefulness of my dog.

Sometime just after noon, I was walking home from the grocery store with a sack containing six pork chops that I had planned to barbecue for dinner, when suddenly I was waylaid by a felonious cur who demanded that I hand over my package. Fearing for my life, I naturally gave the miscreant my parcel, and he ran off with it in the general direction of my house. However, just before the varlet seized what was to have been my evening repast, I took a photograph of him with my cell phone camera, a copy of which I have posted immediately below this paragraph.

Alas, as everyone can see, the villain cleverly disguised himself with a mask, and so I could not identify either the individual dog or his breed. After fruitlessly searching for this canine criminal for the better part of two hours, I decided to return home to enlist Jack, my Border Collie, in the task of bringing this malefactor to justice. In this hope, I was to be bitterly disappointed.

I entered my house and yelled, “Jack, come quickly, I’ve been robbed!,” but my loyal dog failed to appear. After calling him a few more times, I walked to the back of the house, and there he was, napping on my bed. I called to him yet again, and he opened one eye and said, “Please, leave me alone. I’m trying to digest a rather hefty meal.” I was surprised that he had eaten, since he usually waits for suppertime to arrive before ingesting anything substantial, but he is sometimes a mysterious dog.

“Listen,” I persisted, “I was coming home with a sack of pork chops, when a malevolent mutt accosted me and ran off with them. Here, look at this photograph of him that I took with my cell phone camera.”

He dragged himself off the bed, yawned loudly, and then condescended to scrutinize the picture. After examining it for a long moment, he said, “Beastly cunning of him to wear the mask, since it disguises him so completely, and while I cannot identify either the dog or his breed, I must say that he is an uncommonly resourceful and devilishly handsome rogue.”

“You’re neither grading an aptitude test nor judging a beauty contest,” I insisted, “but given what might be termed his somewhat foppish appearance, do you think that he could be a renegade poodle?”

For some reason, Jack winced noticeably at this suggestion, then started to say something but thought better of it and remained silent. After a moment’s reflection, he somewhat testily said, “Most things French are renegade is some manner or other, but this splendid creature possesses far too much poise, wit, and style to be a poodle.”

“Well, then,” I asked, “do you have any suggestions? Can you help me track him down?”

“My dear chap,” he replied, still a bit peevish, “how many times do I have to tell you that I am a herder and not a tracker? If you want to put an expert on the trail of this perpetrator, I suggest that you find some flea-bitten hound to assist you. Or, better still, why don’t you go down to the K9 Unit at the local constabulary and ask to borrow Fritz for a few hours?”

Jack made the latter suggestion in a tone thick with unalloyed sarcasm, since he invariably refers to Fritz, the German Shepherd who assists local policemen (whom Jack, ever the proud Anglophile, calls “Bobbies”) in their search for illicit drugs, a “perpetually stoned Nazi dimwit – all snout and no brains.” In truth, Fritz is a bit, well, slow on the uptake, and Jack loves teasing him, though “mocking” might be a more accurate descriptor. For instance, the last time that they met in the city park, Jack looked at Fritz contemptuously and said, “Well, how are you, my dear Seig Heil? I must say, our lads really kicked your Hunnish butts at El Alamein. Don’t you agree?” Fritz, who had understood little or nothing of what Jack had said, nodded his head slowly and replied, “Jah, Jah, it is a very nice day, thank you.” I would not be seeking help in apprehending the pork chop thief from old Fritz.

Jack then yawned again, and said, “I’m going outside for a bit of sunbathing, and I do not wish to be disturbed.” As he was about to walk out the door, he paused, belched loudly, and added, “Oh, and we’re out of barbecue sauce.” Then he swaggered into the yard, leaving me to ruminate darkly about “man’s best friend” – a treasured belief come decisively to grief upon the grim shoals of Border Collie actuality.

For a time, I considered putting up wanted posters containing a picture of the supper-snatching brute all over the city, but Jack convinced me that the enterprise would prove a waste of time and resources, and so I have made this posting instead. Anyone who has information that might abet the capture of this masked bandit can contact me through this Web site, and until this brazen highwayman is in police custody, I counsel everyone to be wary when walking the streets of my neighborhood, especially if he or she happens to be carrying pork chops.

Jack: The Border Collie In Sun-Drenched Repose

The Call of Cthulhu

For Dougal Tukten Neralich

“Ph-nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn.” – “In his house at R’lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.”

Almost everyone has had the experience of unexpectedly discovering a book that changed his or her life, even if the character and degree of that change was, at the time, largely imperceptible. In this posting I will describe the first such transformative moment in my life, and when they have finished this essay, I invite readers to contemplate similarly important literary occasions in their own lives, occasions which, like seeds planted but then forgotten, eventually blossomed and bore unexpected fruit.

During the summer following my tenth birthday, my mother took my grandmother, my brother, and me on a week-long vacation to Bermuda at the St. George hotel. I still vividly remember how, on the morning of our arrival, my brother and I were eager to get to the beach, where we spent hours playing under the warm sun. That night, the last thing that I remember thinking before turning off the lamp beside my bed and drifting off into blissful slumber was how pleasant it was to watch the billowing white curtains at my bedside window cast intriguing shadows on the floor, a consequence of the bright light burning on the balcony just outside the room.

The next morning at breakfast in the hotel restaurant, our waiter, a wonderfully friendly man named Buddy, introduced me to orange marmalade and good tea, both of which became life-long addictions, and later in the day he took my brother and me to our first cricket match, which, for American boys devoted to baseball, proved to be a decidedly baffling and, finally, incomprehensible experience.

That night, before going to sleep, I decided, fatefully, as it turned out, to read one of the books in the ancient glass-fronted cabinet in our room, and the one I selected was a musty volume with the deceptively innocent title, H.P. Lovecraft: Collected Stories. I opened the text and began reading the first story I turned to, “The Call of Cthulhu,” and within moments the horizon of my life had expanded dramatically, for never in all my youthful experience with books had I found anything like Lovecraft’s richly evocative prose. Never before had I encountered words like “pullulate,” “Cyclopian,” “antediluvian,” and “chthonic,” and despite strong misgivings consequent to the dire themes of Lovecraft’s stories, I nevertheless mustered the courage to leave my bed to retrieve from the book cabinet an archaic copy of The Oxford English Dictionary – the single-volume edition that comes with a small magnifying glass to abet the reading of its cramped entries – and place it on the pillow beside me. For the first time, I was absolutely enchanted by language, truly and literally spellbound by words, and I could not wait to tell my friends back home about Lovecraft and his dark tales.

Soon, however, my fascination gave way to stark terror, and I had the decidedly unpleasant experience of repeatedly having my spine tingle and the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. By the time I had finished five of the book’s fifteen stories, I was almost paralyzed with fear, and the light streaming into the room from the balcony seemed far less bright than it had on the evening previous, and the shadows cast by the white curtains seemed somehow menacing – in fact, they were almost sinister. I was in thrall to a darkness more pervasive than any I had known before, and though I could, of course, turn on more lights in the room, even as a young boy I knew that it wouldn’t do any good.

Appalled by thoughts of the awful fate that might overtake me were I to fall asleep, I finished reading the entire volume, but despite my best efforts to remain awake, I drifted off into restless slumber sometime near dawn. Later that morning, seeing the dark circles under my eyes, my grandmother threatened to take me to the hotel physician, but I convinced her that they were merely the visible signs of an allergic reaction to a musty book I had read, which was, in a sense, close to the truth. I admit that the stories left me shaken and filled with vague but troublesome forebodings, but at breakfast I nonetheless asked Buddy if there were any more Lovecraft books in the hotel’s library, and later in the day, when I returned to my room, there were four slender volumes on my bed. Not only had Buddy found two more Lovecraft books in the hotel, but this saintly man had also taken time out of his lunch break to visit the public library and retrieve two additional Lovecraft collections for me, so that, for the following four nights, I was again able to answer the Call of Cthulhu, as I have done on so many subsequent evenings.

By all accounts, Howard Phillips Lovecraft (1890-1937) was an unusual man, reclusive but friendly, and always willing to help aspiring writers. A confirmed materialist and agnostic, he lent no credence to the sorts of fantastic creatures who populated his extraordinary tales, and he was amused by individuals who approached his stories with undue seriousness. Influenced by, among others, Poe, Dunsany, and Machen, this quiet, skeptical man produced some of the great horror stories of the twentieth century, and his masterful prose and darkly imaginative storytelling influenced many other writers, including the peerless Stephen King. His ominously ingenious fables capture their audience with a linguistic artistry that is as seductive as it is richly-textured. While Lovecraft is justly famous for what critics have termed his “Cthulhu Mythos,” many of his stories that lie outside this genre are equally masterful. In any case, the universe which the characters in these tales inhabit is, at best, indifferent to human purposes and, at worst, inimical to them, and since any action based on a rational assessment of things leads only to doom or madness for these hapless individuals, the only possible response to such a cosmos is a resigned pessimism. Needless to say, I understood little of such matters when I was ten years old, but I did appreciate the fact that, whenever I began reading a Lovecraft story, I soon felt that something was lurking in the darkness just outside the circle of light in which I was sitting, and that this something was, for reasons either unclear or unspeakable, just biding its time. How could a boy not adore such tales, especially since their gloomy, altogether fatalistic vision contradicted so much of the mindless optimism that informed the suburban culture in which he grew up? How could the man he grew to become not remain grateful to stories that, whatever their horrific content, introduced him to what were until then the undreamt-of possibilities of eloquent self-expression?

Lovecraft’s influence extends beyond literature and can be found in music and in any number of movies, though to date, no film based directly on one of his stories has been unduly successful, although this might be an instance of a prose style that is simply too complex to translate well onto the screen, or maybe Lovecraft simply awaits a director or screenwriter possessed of sufficient talent and vision to give cinematic expression to his genius. Regardless, from The Crawling Eye to The Mist,, any number of terrifying films are at least in part homages to dread Cthulhu, and I confess that, partly because of my youthful infatuation with Lovecraft’s stories, I relish watching horror movies, no matter how awful others might judge some of them to be.

Since he worked in the minor genre of horror fiction, Lovecraft will never receive the same degree of respect accorded by literary critics to major writers, but there are many rooms in the Mansion of American Literature, and while Lovecraft’s chamber in this edifice might be a modest one, it is nonetheless well-appointed, albeit darkly. I still have several of Lovecraft’s books on my shelves, and many editions of his work remain in print. I particularly recommend The Best of H.P. Lovecraft, a Del Ray Book paperback, published by Ballantine Books, both because it has a representative selection of tales and because it contains a splendidly instructive “Introduction” by Robert Bloch. It also features a suitably lurid cover and the appropriately baleful subtitle, “Bloodcurdling Tales of Horror and the Macabre.” I promise that most first-time readers of these tales will quickly appreciate and fear the dread implication of the words, “When the stars are right, the Great Old Ones will rise from their sleep,” especially since foremost among the Great Old Ones is, of course, Cthulhu. Even now, I shudder slightly when I read this passage in my well-lit study, just as I did in a dimly-lit hotel room on a night long ago in Bermuda.

In a sense, I have never left that room. I am not claiming that I became an incipient English major when I first encountered Lovecraft, but my initial acquaintance with his work did give me an inkling of the grandeur that the English language can attain when in the creative hands of a master stylist, instilled in me a passion for reading that still burns fiercely, and fueled my boyish imagination in ways that have abided ceaselessly for decades. While I soon discovered that R’lyeh was not on any maps, I eventually learned from Melville that real places never are, and I eventually realized that in some mysterious way, good stories can, like great myths, be true, despite never having happened. Above all, I learned that words matter, and that their artful employment is one of the greatest feats to which humans can aspire.

And so, in my Lovecraft-inspired imagination, it seemed only natural that I would do postdoctoral work in Eldritch Studies at Miskatonic University in Arkham, Massachusetts, where I could assist Dr. Ted Klein in the forbidding task of explicating the Book of Ebon and work with Professor Laban Shrewsbury investigating the balefully cryptic implications of Juntz’s Nameless Cults.. Of course, none of us would ever dare to mention the Necronomicon,though whenever anyone referred to the “Mad Arab,” there would be no mistaking that he was alluding to Abdul Alhazred, the benighted author of this darkest of books. In some wonderful and timeless way, that postdoctoral work continues, and it quite naturally involved my introducing Lovecraft’s work to my sons, who in consequence have acquired a profound love of language and an equally acute understanding of insensate evil.

I will close by recommending that individuals who are not acquainted with the work of Howard Phillips Lovecraft should acquire a volume of his stories and begin reading them immediately. Timid souls can postpone their encounter with beautifully-crafted horror until daylight, and bolder, foolishly optimistic individuals can, of course, attempt to keep terror and panic at bay by leaving lights burning all night, both inside their bedchamber and outside its window . . . even though it won’t do any good.

Border Ballads: To Be, Or Knot To Be: Bathing The Border Collie

For three years, I have had the pleasure and privilege of living with Jack, my wonderful Border Collie, and because he is such an extraordinary companion, I have decided to publish a record of our adventures together – under the heading “Border Ballads.” Most people are aware that Border Collies are intelligent, but fewer of them, I suspect, know that these peerless canines have many other virtues, including immense wit, which sometimes expresses itself as an almost clownish sense of humor, boundless affection for those they choose as members of their family, and a touching gentleness, especially with children. However, they can also be quite difficult to live with, as I hope to show in this and subsequent postings.

For example, when he read the first paragraph of this essay, Jack immediately insisted that I inform everyone that the use of “my” in “my Border Collie” is strictly relational and not possessive. No human being, in his view, can “own” a Border Collie, and most people, including and especially me, are lucky to be in the presence of so noble a creature. I could describe almost countless instances of this haughtiness, which Jack terms “truthfulness.” For example, when Jack first entered my life, I looked forward to spending many happy hours throwing a Frisbee for him, but my expectation was confounded on our first visit to the park, when, after I had hurled my disc a considerable distance, Jack looked at it and then at me, and said, “If you want that Frisbee, you’re going to have to get it yourself. I’m a herding dog, not a retriever.” Further, Jack is boundlessly, not to say obnoxiously, proud of his heritage, by which I mean he is a relentless Anglophile, for whom few things American measure up to their British equivalents. His favorite television shows are ‘Allo ‘Allo and I, Claudius, though lately he has become modestly addicted to Extras. The only American programs that he deigns to watch are The Office (though, of course, the British version is “vastly better”), Arrested Development, and, above all, Reno 911, which he considers to be “the finest comedy in the history of American television.” Since he presents all of his opinions in the form of edicts, there is little sense in my arguing with him about these or any other of his views. Finally, Jack is vain, though he quite naturally disputes the allegation, since, in his flawless reckoning, when one has features as “engagingly handsome” as his, it is not vanity to broadcast them but rather “generosity.” At his insistence, I will post below a recent photograph of Jack, and allow readers make their own judgment.

In order to better demonstrate the sorts of challenges that I face almost daily in living with Jack, let me provide a typical episode from our frequently contentious life together.

Jack is not fond of baths, since he regards them as an offense to his dignity, and he does not suffer such things either readily or silently. For instance, during a recent bathing, I was using a hose to rinse his belly, and he growled at me. I told him to stop acting like a sissy, and he replied, with thick sarcasm, “Well, how would you like it if I were to spray your undercarriage with cold water?” I ignored the provocation, but it was at that moment that I accidentally sprayed some water into Jack’s eyes, and he distinctly muttered “Get knotted!”

I had never heard this expression before, and when I asked him what he had said, he replied, “Nothing,” but when I pressed him, he finally stated, “I was informing you that your shoe laces had come untied, and I did not want you to trip over them.” I offered my thanks and then finished bathing him, but afterward, when I had partly dried him with the soft towel he requires on these occasions and left him in the yard to let the sun finish the job, I discovered upon entering the house that I was wearing sandals, and so I went to the computer to determine the precise origin and meaning of “Get knotted.” The expression turned out to be a British epithet, likely of Cockney provenance, and it is less than kind in general intention.

I decided not to pursue the matter, and while I was inside changing into something presentable for our post-bath walk, Jack yelled to me, “I’m feeling a bit formal today; so bring me my black collar and pick out one of your better ties,” and then he laughed. His amusement derives from the fact that I have only one tie in my possession, all the others having been mysteriously chewed to pieces. “Probably the cats,” Jack unhelpfully and implausibly suggested. Perhaps it is only a coincidence, but the one tie that avoided destruction is Jack’s favorite, for reasons that will be obvious to everyone when they view it at the end of this posting.

I don’t actually mind sporting a tie on our walk, since in the past I have endured a much greater trial. I once lost a bet on a cricket match with Jack, and my penalty involved my wearing one of Jack’s less-attractive collars on our afternoon walk, while Jack kept hold of the leash. This was humiliating enough, but what embarrassed me beyond measure was the fact that every time I stopped to talk with one of my neighbors, Jack would soon tug on the leash and tell me to “get on with your business.”

At any rate, I first brushed Jack to the point of what he terms “lustrous perfection,” and then we set off on our walk, during the course of which he flirted egregiously with a female Lab who lives a block away, even though he claimed that he was merely “giving the wee lass a chance for some intelligent conversation.” This purportedly “wee lass” outweighs Jack by nearly thirty pounds – or, as he prefers to put it – by about “two stones.” The rest of the walk proceeded without incident, and by the time we returned home I thought that we had both put our most recent “battle of the bath” behind us. As usual, I was wrong.

As Jack sat at the table, sipping his afternoon tea – Earl Grey, I believe – and munching contentedly on a digestive biscuit, he turned his attention to me and, after a moment’s appraisal of what he usually calls my “sartorial challenges,” he said, with a twinkle in his eye, “Well, Old Sport, I can’t speak for your person, but I must say that your tie, at least, is nicely knotted.”

Training Journal: Entry I: The Cart Before the Horse

For Jon Tenzing Neralich, Exercise Guru Extraordinaire

Like many time-mellowed males, I have undertaken an exercise program that includes doing roadwork four mornings a week. Please note that I did not use the term “run,” because that would misrepresent the truth, nor did I employ “jog,” since I associate this prissy word with self-indulgent yuppies whose athletic wardrobes often cost more than the annual income of people in undeveloped countries, nor did I use “plod,” even though this bluntly unattractive term is closest to the reality of my movement. Besides, “roadwork” is fundamentally honest: My feet make painful contact with a road, and the endorphin high-related claims of marathon jocks notwithstanding, it is work – hard, unpleasant work.

As long as I am being frank, I should justify my unduly poetic usage “time-mellowed,” which is, of course, a euphemism. After all, the word “elderly” is both quaint and demeaning, though in my case accurate, and the term “decrepit,” while apt, is rather discouraging, though in unguarded moments I am wont to confess that rather than “staying in shape,” my chief ambition in undertaking a disciplined approach to exercise is merely “to slow down the rate of my increasing decrepitude.” Men for whom middle age is now a phantom rapidly receding in life’s rear-view mirror know perfectly well what I mean. For the uninitiated, by which I mean the obnoxiously young, I offer this anecdote: I have elected to run on a mile-long circular roadway on the top of a local hill, rather than along the boulevard nearest my house, because on the latter there is an antique shop, and dragging myself past it four days each week made me self-conscious.

Soaking in a tub of hot water a few days ago, in a futile attempt to sooth my sore and time-ravaged muscles, I decided that it might be instructive and even inspiring (I dream a lot) if I were to share some of my training experiences, at least selectively, with a wider audience. After all, my fellow “athletes” (please indulge me – we all require a few harmless but sustaining fantasies to get through the day, even if describing them requires stretching the definitional limits of words to near their breaking point), especially younger ones, might discover in my brief narratives something of the joys that lie ahead of them, while “battle-hardened road warriors” (see my comments on “time-mellowed,” above) will likely find much that is familiar in the tales of my victories (regrettably few) and follies (alas, legion), and misery truly does love company. I begin, then, with an incident that took place during my morning plod just a few days ago.

I was hobbling along at super-sub-sonic speed, which I call my “stealth mode,” since I am moving so slowly that no one notices me, when I saw a man sitting in a battery-powered golf cart on the road ahead of me. As fate would have it, I came upon this cart in the exact spot where I used to speed up as part of my interval training, until I discovered that doing so took effort, and, being a dedicated foe of the work ethic, I immediately amended the alternating pace of my intervals from slow-fast-slow to slow-stop-sleep. Nonetheless, when I saw the driver sitting in this cart, my competitive spirit suddenly quickened, and with the bravado characteristic of all emotionally mature males, if any such there be, my immediate thought was, “I can take this guy.”

A few words about my pace on these runs: I generally move along at a fairly good clip, except, of course, for those occasions when I either begin crawling, stop for an extended rest, or collapse in a ditch, times which grow increasingly frequent. I know that “fairly good clip” is vague, but everything is, after all, relative. I mean, I move slowly compared with, say, a speeding bullet, but I move quite quickly compared with a tree, at least when a breeze is not blowing too briskly. However, honesty (not one of my favorite virtues in matters involving my numerous shortcomings) compels me to admit that I was once lapped on my morning circuit by a snail, but those ready to mock my infirmities should know that this was no ordinary snail. As the creature sped by me, I noticed that it was wearing a shell made of a titanium-carbon fiber composite, just like expensive, ultra-lightweight bicycle frames, while I was burdened with two t-shirts, and so any comparison of our respective speeds must take into account the heft of the two layers of thin cotton with which I was handicapped. Besides, this snail-related humiliation took place on a day when I was feeling a bit sluggish.

Returning to my narrative, as I sped up in an effort to overtake the golf cart, and keeping in mind how much I detest effort, I noticed that the driver had what I interpreted to be a look of disdain on his face, though it could also have been indifference, but his body language seemed unambiguously to suggest contempt (hand placed provocatively on the steering wheel, back arrogantly braced against the seat – he might as well have spit at me). I am always prepared to meet any challenge, especially one that hasn’t been offered, and so I shifted my pace into a higher gear (from first to first and a smidgen, to be exact), and raced past the cart. Its prideful driver did not take this insult to his prowess lying down, since he was, after all, sitting, and so he, in turn, shifted his vehicle into a higher gear, or perhaps he just started it, but in either case it took no more than a few seconds for him to pass me. As the distance between us rapidly increased, I recalled something that I have always told my sons, a sort of code by which I have always lived, a code that has brought me most of what I call success, such as it is, in my life. “Boys,” I always began (Well, not always, since I usually address them as “hey you”; there are three of them, after all, and I have trouble recollecting their names, and their birthdays, and, truth be told, their appearances; that’s all Mom stuff, anyway.), “there is one thing that I want you always to remember. Life will present you with many difficult challenges, but you must face them all boldly. You must never give up. You must never quit. Never! Unless, of course, no one is watching.” And since no one was present to witness my being embarrassed by a golf cart, I quit.

I have tasted the bitter dregs of defeat many times in my long life – marriage and the aforementioned three sons spring immediately to mind – but this loss, this debacle was of an altogether different and far more baleful order from my usual setbacks. However, while almost anyone can learn from success, I am one of those rare people who can learn from failure, which is the only reason I passed high school trigonometry, albeit barely. Therefore, when I returned home, I swore to myself that I would learn a valuable lesson from this defeat, and so I have. I am not a man given to making casual promises, unless love or money is involved, and so I have made a pledge to myself, a pledge that I fully intend to honor. I vow that someday soon – very soon – I am going to purchase a golf cart.

No Cause For Worry

For Corrigan Neralich

I know that my family, friends, and former students have been concerned about my recent decision to enter government service. For those who have not yet heard the news, the Obama administration has asked me to be our country’s unofficial representative to Freedonia, with the hope that I can help to bring peace to this currently volatile part of the world. While I quite naturally accepted this great honor, I admit that the appointment does come at a time of crisis. The current problems in Freedonia, particularly the tensions that exist between it and its neighbor Sylvania, tensions which on one occasion flared into armed conflict, are, to say the least, formidable. Therefore, in order to allay the fears of people concerned for my safety, let me explain briefly why I chose to accept this challenge.

Freedonia is an openly Marxist country, but its leader, President Firefly, has expressed an interest in allowing the United States to help solve his country’s contentious differences with Sylvania in a manner acceptable to both nations. To that end, he has enlisted the services of Gloria Teasdale, who is both a loyal citizen of Freedonia and a notably skilled diplomat. She is in constant communication with Mr. Trentino, Sylvania’s ambassordor to Freedonia, and the two of them have laid the diplomatic foundation for my mission.

Further, I shall be working closely with Bob Roland, President Firefly’s personal secretary, as well as with Mr. Chicolini, Freedonia’s Secretary of War. I have even expressed a willingness to engage in a dialogue with the mysterious “Pinky,” purported to be the leading member of Freedonia’s spy service, but he has never replied to my many messages, and rumor has it that though he rarely speaks he is nonetheless given to blowing his own horn. Nonetheless, with so many cabable assistants, I have every hope that my peace-making efforts in Freedonia will prove successful.

Finally, I know that many skeptics have already dismissed my appointment as a mere “fact-finding mission,” but I have some advice for these cynical people. When two parties are engaged in a conflict, whether they are individuals or nations, don’t underestimate collecting knowledge; sometimes order unexpectedly prevails.

And so I am off to Freedonia. I will continue to make postings from this distant land, and I hope to have good news about my endeavors there very soon. Until then – Hail Freedonia!

Something Handy

Students often help their teachers discover interesting things, and thanks to my pupils, a few years ago I learned a great deal about an area of American culture that has been largely neglected by scholars. I noticed that many of my students used hand lotion almost constantly, and when I teased them about it, they informed me that this “practical cosmetic” is immensely popular, and not just with young people. Confucius said that if everyone likes something, it must be examined, and I therefore decided to investigate the appeal of hand lotion.

I know that some people will consider this a lightweight topic, and they probably regard hand lotion as merely another manifestation of our national obsession with self-adornment, but I am convinced that something subtler is also involved in its popularity. Important matters often reveal themselves in small things, and I believe that hand lotion is a quietly eloquent example of the poetry inherent in American life. I therefore ask readers to put aside their skepticism and consider the results of my research into the surprisingly lyrical character of some of these immensely popular emollients.

My first stop was at a local Yuppie Store; I rarely shop in this place, because it is largely filled with overpriced items designed to satisfy the status hunger of socially insecure people. But I was pleased to discover that my cynical views about this shop were at least partially modified by what I found on its cosmetics shelf. Its hand lotions bore lovely floral names, such as Lavender and Freesia, and it was delightful to find a distant echo of pastoral gardens in the aisles of a pretentious boutique.

Alas, my hopes for yuppiedom were soon dashed, for I found a lotion that contained nonfat dry milk (for hands on a diet, I suppose), avocado, and shea butter in its blend. When I asked the clerk if shea butter is what fans of the New York Mets spread on their toast, she stared at me uncomprehendingly and then said, “I don’t have a clue. I’m just here to sell product.” I immediately left the place and headed for the New Age Emporium.

The staff at this establishment is invariably friendly and informative. After smelling an aggressively floral concoction, I asked a sales clerk why it is necessary to so heavily perfume some lotions. “Sir,” she replied, “have you ever smelled an unlotioned hand?” I stood before her, utterly mortified, my offensively lotionless hands hanging at my sides. Later, when no one was looking, I gave one of them a surreptitious sniff, and though it was not stenchful, I confess that it did smell of soap, and unscented soap, at that.

Most of the labels on New Age lotions follow the same pattern: They tell what the product is for and then list its ingredients. For example, people in need of “Relaxing” can cover their hands with a blend of rose, lavender, camomile, and safflower essences – a very attractive combination. For individuals who require “Renewing” (And who doesn’t?), the shop offers a lotion that contains rosemary mixed with oils of spruce and pine – another appealing blend.

I was tempted to try a lotion laced with the essence of Green Tea, a concoction that advertised itself as an “anti-oxidant” that would help to keep hands young. But I finally rejected this emollient, mostly because I think that my hands should age at the same rate as the rest of me; I don’t want to end up in some circus sideshow being gawked at by people who paid a dollar to see “The Old Man With Baby Hands.” Nor was I inclined to follow the clerk’s suggestion and cover my entire body with the stuff. My appearing in a classroom smelling like tea would be an invitaiton for one of my clever students to pelt me with stale crumpets.

My favorite discovery at the New Age Emporium, and a fine example of populist poetry, is something called Star Dust Lotion; I did not care a whit about its ingredients; just holding the bottle in my hand made my aura tingle.

I concluded my investigations by visiting the
Hippie Store, an establishment that still maintains a steadfast loyalty to the social activism of the 1960s. Happily, a former student of mine works there, and she proved a knowledgeable and judicious guide to the store’s many lotions.

I first sampled something called Borage Dry Skin Therapy; the word “therapy” is nearly always a provocation for me, and in this instance it seemed to suggest that my hands needed to deal with their “wrinkle issues.” But this lotion had a lovely aroma, and the word “borage” is somehow conducive to fantasy. I would like an attractive lady to ask me, “My dear sir, do I detect the heady fragrance of borage emanating from your person?”

Another hand lotion proclaimed itself an Intercellular Cleansing Gel; now I’m not happy with the filth that has accumulated between the cells of my hands, even though I hadn’t been aware of the problem until I visited the Hippie Store, and I hope that I haven’t unintentionally offended anyone with my manual impurity. My parents never instructed me in the importance of intercellular hygiene, and I cannot recall my mother ever saying, “You’ll get no dinner tonight unless you wash your hands thoroughly; and we’re having company – so I’ll be checking between your cells.”

My guide allowed me to sample a lotion with the lovely name “Milk and Honey,” and at first I thought that I might purchase some, but then she said, “All the girls who work here use this, and they tell me that it really attracts men.” After reflecting for a moment, I decided that perhaps I needed a different sort of hand lotion.

Some of the lotions had names that are saucily impertinent (Wild Banana and Vanilla), one excited my Inner Coach (Skin Fitness), others had a Woodstock-era tone (Coconut Skin Trip), while some were so exotic (Caribbean Heat) that they immediately filled my head with pleasant daydreams: I imagined myself in the company of a beautiful Oriental woman who tells me, “The scent of your hands is attractively tropical.” I reply, “Yes. You are right. It’s my hand lotion. I bought it at the Hippie Store.”

I actually purchased some hand lotion at the Hippie Store, a delicately fragrant blend called “Chinese Botanical” – a name laden with irresistible implication for an Asian Studies teacher. It contains about twenty ingredients, and all of them have alleged benefits. Here is a sampling: Asparagus for healing – though I do not customarily think of my hands as sick; Wild Ginger for its anti-inflammatory properties; I rarely set fire to my hands, but I now keep a small bottle of wild ginger extract next to the stove; Chrysanthemum for clarifying; while my hands have frequently been dirty, I cannot recall an instance when I thought of them as nebulous, but I intend to examine them carefully on the next cloudy day; Peony Root for its nourishing qualities; I had never before considered the matter, but I cannot remember the last time that I fed my hands; the poor things must be famished.

One ingredient in “Chinese Botanical” deserves special mention – Kudzu Root, which, like asparagus, supposedly helps to heal. I have a suggestion for State Highway Departments: Advertise the “healing qualities” of kudzu root in a few New Age journals, and I predict that very soon this pestiferous weed will be picked clean from our roadways.

While I am amused by our collective preoccupation with hand lotion, I am also charmed by the poetry that sometimes informs these products and by their capacity to nourish the imagination of those who use them. Americans have always been visionaries – our Republic is itself a noble dream – and it is therefore not surprising to find in even the humblest and most unexpected places an affirmation of our love for romance and adventure. Some might scoff at such claims, but I believe that, in its own modest way, hand lotion is another expression of our depthless capacity for wonder, and I am delighted by the several ways that, beneath its cosmetic appeal, it ministers to our national spirit.

Some Comments on Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is upon us, and I am quite naturally awash in sentiment, which is equal parts smarm and charm. While it is as easy to puncture the syrupy pretensions of this day with satirical barbs as it is for Cupid to ravish human hearts with his honey-tipped arrows, I have decided to bring a measure of fairness, if not balance, to this romantic occasion by discussing this sweetest of days and the human affection that accompanies it in ways that might convince even love-smitten readers that I am not a complete cynic.

I know that some men buy their lady loves jewelry for Valentine’s Day, but the idea somehow suggests a sixteen-year-old boy purchasing a golden, heart-shaped locket for his first steady girlfriend. Perhaps advertising has conditioned us to believe that diamonds last forever, but most contemporary relationships seem a bit less durable.

I’ve been told that some Romeos buy lingerie for their Juliets, but I’ve never met one of these men, largely, I suspect, because they spend most of their time lurking in dark alleys, hanging around bus stations, or cruising the seedier neighborhoods of eBay.

Women need to understand that it is very difficult for men to give them chocolates for Valentine’s Day, especially if the confections come in frilly boxes. In fact, seeing the word “frill” in print can cause otherwise insensitive males to break out in a rash, and some men believe that touching the stuff will infest them with cooties.

I am aware that some love doctors advise their masculine patients to get an anti-cootie booster shot each February, but I have a simpler remedy for sentiment-borne diseases. Any male who wishes to remain psychologically balanced on Valentine’s Day should watch the “Oprah Winfrey Show” until he passes out from boredom; for any man with an emotional IQ above the double digit level, ten minutes of viewing should suffice, and his immunity to mawkish drivel will last at least one month.

However, the major risk males face when giving candy to their girlfriends is that doing so might result in a discussion of weight, one of the most hazardous minefields in the relationship battle zone. Nothing will more quickly reduce a man to stammering incoherence than seeing his lady stare ruefully at her Whitman Sampler and, after a few deep sighs, have her ask, “Do you think that I’m too thin?,” a statement that even the most poetically obtuse male can interpret as, “Don’t you love me the way I am?”

Alas, a dangerously prideful man who seeks to avoid this doleful conversation by purchasing diet chocolates for his beloved will likely compound his emotional felony, and in these technology-driven times, the almost inevitable question, “Do you think that I’m too fat?” translates as, “The moment you leave, I’m going to access dumphim.com.”

Women need to be prudent about the sorts of conversations they initiate during special Valentine’s Day dinners, since men, especially young ones, fear that in such a romantically-charged atmosphere even the most casual talk might suddenly veer into a discussion of “us,” the most emotionally taxing subject for males. Just thinking about this calamity can give some men a migraine.

Rather than take his current love interest to a restaurant, a man would be wiser to cook her a good meal, but always at her place, so that if the subject of “our relationship” comes up, he can make a quick exit. I also suggest renting a movie, in part to forestall any risky after-dinner conversation, and it would be thoughtful for men to choose a film that steers a middle course between excessive love interest and its complete absence. Thus, Return to Me and Predator would be bad choices, while Die Hard 2 would be perfect.

Some boyfriends like to buy their sweethearts perfume for Valentine’s Day, and while this seems like a selflessly sweet gesture, I suspect that part of their motive for doing so involves the fact that they get to flirt with the pretty, alluringly fragrant women who sell the stuff. It’s a good thing that girlfriends don’t know this, or else their male consorts might be charged with scent-based cheating.

Buying flowers is a daunting challenge for some men, and florists should therefore understand that they can make male customers feel uncomfortable and incompetent by the simple and altogether innocent expedient of asking, “Can I help you?” In truth, men often purchase a dozen red roses not because they are unimaginative but because doing so is conventional, and there is emotional safety in convention. In matters of the heart, being creative or original can be a dangerous tactic. What if the lady fair doesn’t like yellow roses or had actually been expecting red ones? Males are not especially intuitive creatures, but they are born knowing exactly why roses have thorns.

Some men fall prey to the “amplification fallacy,” the misguided assumption that, “if twelve roses are good, then twenty-four must be better.” These hapless males fail to comprehend that many women will regard this largesse as evidence of their “non-specific guilt,” a female synonym for “being male.” If in the course of the relentless interrogation that is almost sure to follow such suspicious behavior, the accused should for any reason whatsoever utter the words, “I’m sorry,” his apology will be construed as proof positive that he has “done something,” which of course he has, by virtue of drawing breath.

Even if a man is financially destitute, I recommend that he should think carefully before engaging in the floral subterfuge undertaken by one of my college classmates, especially since it is decidedly at odds with the spirit of the day and more than a little morbid. Finding himself short of cash but long on ardor, this enterprising young man presented each of his three girlfriends with a lovely Valentine’s Day bouquet that he had acquired at a local cemetary. Unfortunately, his romantic duplicity was exposed when one of the girls discovered a card inside her flowers that read “Condolences.”

Flushed with sentiment-induced pride, some men might be tempted to compose a poem to accompany their sweetheart’s Valentine’s Day gift. If they are reckless enough to do so, they should avoid using the archaic “thee,” even if comparing their lovely lady to “a summer’s day” or, in a less exalted idiom, “a Chevy truck,” unless, of course, the female in question is either a Quaker or a clerk at AutoZone.

As I promised at the beginning of this posting, in the interests of fairness, I will now make a few brief but positive comments on the subject of love. Naturally, I cannot defend its delusional excesses, but I will nonetheless advocate its possibility. Whenever I find myself despairing over the fact that so many things in modern life conspire to degrade the human heart, I reread A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and I regain confidence that, with a bit of magic, the haunted wood of self-absorption can once more become the enchanted forest of romantic love.

Leo Tolstoy once worried that human love is entirely self-centered, but he changed his mind after witnessing a modest but remarkable event. Walking down a boulevard, he came upon a grandfather seated on a bench next to his granddaughter; the old man was feeding the little girl strawberries, and while Tolstoy was not surprised by the delighted look on the child’s face, he was converted to the cause of altruism by the sight of the old man beaming, since his joy had nothing to do with self and everything to do with the happiness of another.

My last bit of testimony on behalf of romance concerns a paradox that no one can logically explain but which all lovers have experienced: the profound weight of absence. That is, when the beloved person is not present, the heft of nothing sits upon one’s heart like a cold mountain. Despite the mass-produced sentiments and emotional froth that regrettably attend Valentine’s Day, its rituals can nonetheless remind us that love is related to levity, since it lifts our hearts by affirming the truth that we truly love only when we take ourselves lightly for the sake of someone else.

A New Superhero?

I recall my sorrow many years ago when I learned that Superman, at least in one updated and “improved” version, would no longer fly or even wear a cape. I was dismayed not only by the fact that an American cultural icon had been toppled in the name of progress, but also because it seemed to me at the time that there were a diminishing number of traditional heroes in the modern world, especially those of the super variety.

In fact, upon further consideration, wine lovers have never had a superhero of their own, and so I am considering undertaking the project of personally providing one. While it is true that I am neither faster than a speeding bullet nor more powerful than a locomotive, I do wear glasses, I am very mild-mannered, and for many years I wrote for a great metropolitan newspaper.

I have even decided on a heroic name (Vineman), a logo (a “V” decorated with grapes), and a costume (svelte burgundy tights, claret shirt and cape). As Vineman, I would pit myself against wine criminals and their nefarious deeds, at least on this Web site.

I took my first test as a superhero earlier this week, when I went to the local mall to buy part of my superhero uniform – the tights, to be precise. I was a bit abashed when the first salesclerk I approached at Dillard’s referred me to the women’s lingerie department, and I admit that I told the young lady who waited on me that I wanted to buy a pair of burgundy leotards for someone with a “full figure.”

Alas, when I got home and examined my purchase, I discovered that the tights were not, after all, burgundy, but a more sensitive color – magenta. I suppose that this initial setback confirms the fact that that part of the schooling for those with a newly-assumed superhero identity is the discovery that their vocation can involve trials more complex than those one expects in combating vinous villains and detecting their heinous wine crimes. In short, the world will test Vineman in unexpected ways. But I am fully prepared to meet all manner of challenges, and besides, after donning my tights and studying myself dispassionately in the mirror, I have to admit that, at least in my opinion, Vineman doesn’t look too bad in magenta.

Note: I first published this posting in 1997 as a frame for one of my wine columns, and I still think that the wine world needs Vineman, despite the very vocal doubts of my sons, all of whom had the insolence to suggest that the entire idea is preposterous. Well, that’s what they said when John McCain chose Sarah Palin as his running mate, though, upon reflection, that might not be a very effective example to employ in a counterargument. At any rate, I still think that it would be of immense benefit to the wine community if I were to drive around the country in my Vintage Van, which would sport all manner of wine-related pictures and paraphernalia, as a deterrent to wine crimes, whatever they might be. As for my disrespectul sons, I have decided that will they will all be the leading candidates for the demeaning job of comic sidekick to Vineman, and while I have not yet settled on a name for their group, I am considering both Yeast Youths and Bouquet Brats but favoring Grape Goons. As a much-put-upon father, it would be deeply satisfying to turn to these unfilial brutes and say, “Quick, Grape Goons – to the Vintage Van!”

The Year of the Ox

The Year of the Ox arrived on 26 January 2009, and as I used to enjoy doing when I wrote editorials and wine reviews for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette , I am going to offer my predictions for the coming lunar year for people born under the twelve signs of the Chinese zodiac. Readers can be as certain of the accuracy of these forecasts as they can of the authenticity of prognostications made by Western astrologists, since both are equally grounded in reality. However, it might help to establish my credentials if I mention two facts: I did live and teach for a year in Taiwan, during which time I was able to study the methodology of Chinese horoscopes under the tutelage of accomplished masters; second, I spent two years of post-doctoral work at Miskatonic University, where I was a student of many arcane arts.

I know that for most Westerners, the Ox has only a few postive associations, and being called an ox is hardly a compliment, unless you are an offensive lineman in the NFL, but in East Asia people born under the astrological influence of this sturdy beast are respected for being sensitive to the value of tradition while being receptive to new things. At a time when America is facing a severe economic crisis, this is not a bad outlook to have on life. Further, Ox people are usually loyal, determined, and realistic, and it is said that they have the ability to inspire confidence in others. It is perhaps auspicious for America, then, that Barack Obama was born in the Year of the Ox.

Indivuals can determine the zodiac sign under which they were born by counting in multiples of twelve from the dates that I have provided for three of the birth years of each horoscope animal. Finally, it is important to remember there is no such thing as a “good” or a “bad” sign; they each have strengths and at least a few potential weaknesses. However, some signs, like some people, have character tendencies that are particularly annoying, at least to me, and I am the one writing this posting. Finally, I am not going to discuss the sorts of relationships that can obtain among people born under these signs. With Valentine’s Day approaching, there is already enough emotional treacle in the air for me to bother adding to it.

Year of the Rat (1984, 1972, 1960). Rats belong to the triangle of affinity that includes Dragons and Monkeys – the “doers” of the zodiac cyle, and although most Westerners associate them with betrayal and pestilence, in the Chinese view, Rats are usually shy and sensitive people who make good friends. While thrifty, they are also generous, and while uncommonly loving, they also tend to be demanding perfectionists. Because they are such clever, prudent, and hard-working creatures, Rats are likely to have a very properous year during the reign of the Ox. My youngest son is in many ways a little Rat, and the list of famous Rats includes Al Gore, David Carradine, Samuel L. Jackson, Marlon Brando, William Shakespeare, and, for an uncommonly pestiferous example, Ann Coulter.

Year of the Ox (1985, 1973, 1961). The Ox is part of the triangle of affinity that includes Snakes and Roosters – the three intellectual signs, though their intelligence is inflected in different ways. As I have already indicated, the Ox is a paragon of patience, discipline, and hard work who possesses immense strength of character. The Ox should enjoy a year filled with opportunity and good fortune. In addition to President Obama, famous Oxen include Napoleon, Jack Nicholson, Bach, Meryl Streep, and, for hideous balance, Adolf Hitler.

Year of the Tiger (1986, 1974, 1962). Tigers belong to the action-oriented triangle of affinity that includes the Horse and the Dog, and while they are passionate about life and love adventures and enterprises that require aggression and courage, Tigers are often given to extremes. This means that Tigers must exercise uncharacteristic prudence in the coming year, during which they should curtail – or at least circumscribe – most of their personal and professional ventures. It is not surpising that the list of famous Tigers is somewhat polarized; “good” Tigers include Dwight Eisenhower, Alec Guiness, and Karl Marx; “bad” or “paper” Tigers include Tom Cruise, Karl Rove, and Rush Limbaugh.

Year of the Rabbit (1987, 1975, 1963). The Rabbit belongs to the triangle of affinity that includes the Sheep and the Pig, which are generally termed the emotion-guided signs, but which I think of as “The Food Group.” Rabbits are civil, unassuming, artistic, and affectionate, though their love can sometimes be smothering. Many horoscope authorities consider Rabbits to be lucky, though having people cut off your feet and carry one of them around in their pocket is an odd sort of luck. At any rate, Rabbits are usually good with money, and so they will likely have a wonderful year in business ventures, and they are not likely to encounter many unpleasant surprises. Famous Bunnies include Judy Collins, Ali McGraw, Bob Hope, George C. Scott, and that old softy, Mike Ditka.

Year of the Dragon (1988, 1976, 1964). Dragons are powerful, attractive, and vigorous, but they also tend to be pompous and egotistical. It is not surprising, then, that if the Dragons are just moderately prudent in the coming year, they will enjoy good fortune. Unsurprisingly, many Dragons find success in show business, including Al Pacino, Nick Nolte, Shirley Temple, Ringo Starr, and Martin Sheen, along with writers George Bernard Shaw and Pearl Buck.

Year of the Snake (1989, 1977, 1965). Snakes are wise, seductive, and deeply intuitive. Of all the zodiac signs, they are the most mysterious, with an outward calm and inner intensity that can be either immensely attractive or deeply disturbing. Snakes can also be vain and, despite their considerable inner resources, insecure. However, being eminently compatible with the Ox, Snakes should enjoy a year filled with creative possibilities. Famous Snakes include John F. Kennedy, Mae West, Pablo Picasso, Edgar Allan Poe, Oprah, Abraham Lincoln, and Greta Garbo. I think that Snake women are the most beautiful and alluring creatures on the planet.

Year of the Horse (1990, 1978, 1966). Horses are sensuous, fashion-conscious, independent,
and theatrical, though they are just as commonly garrulous, insensitve, self-centered, and impatient. My olderst son is a Horse, and his decidedly Equine character convinces me that there can be a great deal of truth in Chinese zodiac lore. Given their impetuosity, Horses will need to be extremely cautious in the coming year, especially with respect to money and romance, though they probably won’t be. Famous Horses include Igor Stravinsky, Rita Hayworth, the peerlessly graceful Audrey Hepburn, Rembrandt, Barbra Streisand, Sean Connery, and Harrison Ford.

Year of the Sheep (1991, 1979, 1967). The Sheep is the most feminine of the signs, and so Sheep tend to be sensitive, artistic, compassionate, and gentle, though they can also be painfully shy, needy, and given to whining. With this combination of strengths and shortcomings, Sheep will probably experience a fairly successful year under the reign of the patient Ox, though they should also try to burden other people with their problems less frequently. Famous and infamous Sheep include Robert De Niro and John Wayne, as well as Geraldo Rivera, Jerry Springer, and Pamela Anderson.

Year of the Monkey (1992, 1980, 1969). Monkeys tend to be much too clever for their own good; they possess nimble minds and, in equal measure, inquisitiveness and mischievousness. Monkeys are extremely competitive and uncommonly crafty, and they are not above taking advantage of the trust or gullibility of others. In fact, Monkeys are notorious for their slender allegiance to truth, which might be why they make such good writers and excellent hosts, as well as successful politicians. Monkeys tend to land on their feet, and so they will probably have a great year under the influence of the Ox. In my opinion, Monkeys make splendid, endlessly-entertaining friends, though not very good spouses. Famous Monkeys include F. Scott Fitzgerald, Lyndon B. Johnson, Charles Dickens, Edward Kennedy, Tom Hanks, and Ian Fleming. Since Monkeys are alleged to be notorious liars, it is perhaps not surprisng to learn that Donald Rumsfeld is a Simian.

Year of the Rooster (1993, 1981, 1969). The Rooster is both the most eccentric and the most misunderstood sign in the Chinese zodiac. Intelligent, witty, adventurous, and almost fanatically devoted to work, Roosters nonetheless can be reckless, overly sure of their own opinions, and insensitive about the feelings of other people. My middle son is a Rooster, but he is much kinder and more thoughtful than some of his zodiac peers, perhaps because he was born in Taiwan.
Because Roosters have so many affinities with the Ox, this should prove a good year for them, and they can expect many projects to come to happy fruition, but they must also exercise caution and be ready to assume a great deal of responsibility, especially in financial matters. Famous Roosters include Caruso, Steve Martin, Neil Young, Carly Simon, Katharine Hepburn, and Alex Haley.

Year of the Dog (1994, 1982, 1970). While Dogs are quite appropriately associated with loyalty, this does not mean that they have the necessary acumen to determine whether the principles or persons to whom that loyalty is directed are worthy of it. Dogs tend to be honest and open-natured, but they can also be secretive, petty, and spiteful. The Year of the Ox should be one of mixed results for Dogs, and so prudence is probably the best approach to all matters, as is generally the case, but especially those concerning business or romance. Famous Dogs include Elvis (nothin’ but a Hound Dog, of course), Cher, Sylvester Stallone, Winston Churchill, Bill Clinton (a reminder that not all Dogs are capable of staying on their own porch), George W. Bush (a reminder that not all dogs are bright, something my border collie constantly insists on), and Madonna.

Year of the Pig (1995, 1983, 1971). Pigs can be gallant and noble, but they also have a tendency to fall apart when their hopes fail to materialize. While Pigs are renowned for seeking harmony in personal relationships, they can also be almost wantonly hedonistic, and this self-indulgence can take many misfortunate forms. Generally speaking, the Pig will probably enjoy good luck during the Year of the Ox, though not necessarily in romantic matters. Famous Pigs include Woody Allen, Steven Spielberg, Humphrey Bogart, and Arnold Schwarzenegger; Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon are also Swine.

I wish everyone a Happy New Year, and I hope that all my readers enjoy much good fortune and a great deal of happiness during the Year of the Ox.

Hippie Puritanism

I know that the expression “Hippie Puritanism” will stirke many readers as peculiar, but I employ it in a light-hearted way to introduce a potentially serious subject, namely, the manner in which many Americans simultaneously maintain an allegiance to two quite distinct and even adversarial value systems. By “Hippie,” I mean that part of our national character that is almost reflexively antinomian and deeply distrustful of established authority, attributes that might generally be termed countercultural; hippies have a sensuous engagement with life, and they take beauty and pleasure seriously.

By “Puritianism,” I do not mean the world-hating theology that so damaged the sensibilities of the earliest settlers in Massachusetts and which can still regrettably be heard in the blathering of many of their televangelist heirs. Rather, I mean the unconscious habit of seeing – and evaluating – the world in a melodramatic way, by which I mean dividing it into rigidly dualistic moral categories, such as good vs. evil, white hat vs. black hat, and decent people vs. neoconservative Republicans. This cultural Puritanism is something that we absorb with the Saturday morning cartoons of our childhood and continue to experience – and at least unconsciously expect – in many of our popular entertainments. Finally, Puritans distrust pleasure and seem, at least at times, to dislike beauty, as well.

Now it should be obvious to everyone that our pleasure-loving Inner Hippie (henceforth, IH) is rarely going to agree on anything with our equally strident and world-denying Inner Puritan (henceforth, IP), and finding a successful means to satisfy them both takes constant effort. Hollywood has found a very profitable way to do this in its seemingly endless cycle of teenage slasher/horror movies. In all of them, IH will get to see a suitable amount of scantily-clad (or less-than-scantily-clad) young flesh on the screen, much to the outrage of IP, but then IP has the satisfaction of seeing these youthful sinners (the ones who dared to have fun, by which I mean those who had forbidden, non-marital sex) killed in suitably gruesome ways, much to the distress of IH, who at least gets to watch the virtuous (by which I mean celibate and generally more fully-clothed ) young man or woman survive. Thus we have our cake and eat it too; IP finishes his popcorn (no salt or butter, of course), IH finishes his soda (sugar-free, naturally), and then they leave the theatre together, in a mutually-happy state of temporary truce.

There are many less-sanguine ways of simultaneously pleasing IH and IP, but in this posting I am going to share a very modest one with readers – my choice of breakfast cereals. I purchase these three products in a local health food store, which delights IH, since the visits allow him to take stock of all the latest advances in New Age nostrums, and which pleases IP, because despite his having serious reservations about the moral rectitude of the hippies who both run and frequent this store and their regrettable allegiance to the (fallen) natural world, he recognizes with smug satisfaction that much of the preoccupation with wholesomeness in the place (non-allergenic products, organic ingredients, holistic medicine, etc.) is actually displaced Puritanism. At any rate, I have found a way to please both my fun-hating IP and unabashedly hedonistic IH in the three breakfast cereals that I will describe for readers as a potential model for their own inner reconciliations. I am not claiming to be the Cotton Mather of the Woodstock Nation in this enterprise, but if I were, my middle name would be “Cotton” and my first name would be “Sustainably-Farmed.”

NATURE’S PATH ORGANIC HERITAGE O’S. IH is quite naturally ravished by both “Nature’s” and “Organic,” while IP likes “Heritage,” since he interprets it as a tribute to the morally upright customs of a now sadly bygone era, customs like dressing in black and white, stealing land from native Americans, and burning witches. This cereal is made from three “heritage grains” – kamut, spelt, and quinoa – and one expert in the science of grains claims that kamut “takes an hour of simmering in order to soften,” a view with which I concur, since Heritage O’s can sit in a bowl of milk overnight and still remain “crisp,” to say the least. IP approves of any food the eating of which involves a contest, and that is also why he likes the “Eco-Pac” which contains this cereal, since the material from which it is made is stronger than titanium, and not even my oldest son, who can bench press a compact car, is able to tear it open. Thus, anyone who wants to eat this wonderful and highly-nutritious cereal must first indirectly affirm his allegiance to the Puritan work ethic in his attempt to open the container in which it is packaged.

The three grains of which this cereal is made provide narrative sub-texts that please both my inner characters. IP knows that spelt comes from the Transcaucasia region, which is the location of Mount Ararat, the purported location of Noah’s ark, and it pleases him to think that while eating his breakfast he is in some gently self-righteous way validating scripture. IH regards the ark story as mythic, though IP insists that it is as firmly grounded in historical truth as the fact that the earth is just six thousand years old. Because quinoa originated in the Andes, IH automatically associates it with Peru’s Nazca lines, which, as everyone who believes that crystals possess magic powers knows, were actually built as landing fields for flying saucers. Further, Kamut originally came from Egypt, and as anyone who believes that they can recite spells that will allow them to call down mystical energy from the moon will be happy to inform you, E.T. built the pyramids. The Chariots of the Gods, man – it’s all true!

Given its multiple satisfactions, I am tempted to adore Nature’s Path Organic Heritage O’s, but I do not, since IP is always reminding me that adoration is merely one more form of idolatry.

BARBARA’S BAKERY SHREDDED WHEAT. The box this cereal comes in advertises “Same Great Taste,” but though I have enjoyed it for many years, this shredded wheat is nearly lacking in anything that could meaningfully be called flavor, which impresses IP; he is also secretly pleased that, after cracking his bicuspids on Heritage O’s, Barbara’s Shredded Wheat turns pleasantly soggy at the first touch of milk. IH especially admires the fact that this cereal is uncommonly nutritious and is low in sodium and sugar, since he, like so many seekers in the spiritual marketplace, is almost morbidly obsessed with his health.

I eat many bowls of Barbara’s Shredded Wheat every month, and I would call it my favorite cereal, if I had not learned so painfully that choosing favorites can lead to some of life’s greatest disasters, including, but hardly limited to, partisan politics, fantasy football leagues, and marriage.

KASHI 7 WHOLE GRAIN NUGGESTS. In some ways, this cereal is best described as Post Grape Nuts on steroids. IP is delighted by the fact that it has the texture of driveway gravel; IH loves its flavor and is pleased that one bowl provides him with a day’s worth of whole grains. However, it is the number of grains in these delectable nuggets that intrigues both sides of my inner nature. For IP, seven is a reminder of the Seven Deadly Sins, and so he girds his loins with righteousness while munching his morning repast. For IH, seven is reminiscent of the seven chakras, which are part of Hindu and Buddhist spiritual practice, and so he imaginatively visits the Mystic East at breakfast. Further, IP likes to recall that the Seven Deadly Sins are a sure and certain path to Hell, while IH regards them as either a summary of an attractive executive-level job description or, in his baser moments, as a list of interesting hobbies. This fundamental disagreement over the meaning of a number explains why IP and IH rarely converse during breakfast.

I close with two confessions, which for IP are necessary to cleanse myself of the burden of guilt that attends my being an inherently sinful creature, but which for IH are simply an additional means to broadcast his narcissism, as he does when discussing vitamins or aromatherapy with his New Age acquaintances or as is the case of many of the insecure whiners who appear on Dr. Phil’s silly show to revel in their nonexistent “issues” and thereby make pathetic spectacles of themselves. First, I do sometimes give in to temptation and permit myself to wander down the cereal aisle of my local, inorganic grocery store. I will linger for a moment, allowing myself to cast a few salacious glances Frosted Fripperies, Concupiscent Corn Flakes, and Honey Nut Harlotries, all of them laden with sugar, salt, and artificial ingredients, but after a brief ogle I recover my virtue and pass them by. Naturally, I never make eye contact with the degenerate individuals who place these slatternly cereals in their shopping carts.

Second and finally, I admit that sometimes I succumb to worldly folly and put yoghurt on my Heritage O’s, but only the plain, fat-free variety. However, when I lack sufficent moral restraint, I will place some sliced banana on my Barbara’s Shredded Wheat, and when no longer constrained by decency, I will add some walnuts. In fact, when I am completely in thrall to gastronomic lust, I will set a strawberry atop my Kashi Nuggets, or, on those occasions when my gluttony is boundless, two strawberries. However, on such wanton occasions, in order to prevent people walking past my house from seeing me in the throes of illicit pleasures and thereby be tempted by my example to surrender themselves to unbridled self-indugence, I quite naturally close the curtains of my dining room window, curtains which are, of course, tie-dyed.