Category Archives: Striving

The Odd Fishmonger

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Posted by on in animal and plant life, Fiction, Striving

January 14, 2016, Prescott-  (The following is based on a Scavenger Hunt prompt including love letter, werewolves, taxi service, lost key, fish sticks.)

Laszlo had grown up in a Hungarian community in Constanta, a port on Romania’s Black Sea coast. So he found it second nature when, as a young backpacker exploring the outer limits of our world, he decided to stop a while on the island of Lamu, off Kenya’s golden shore.

He camped on the beach,  filleting and grilling the fish that he caught, each morning, and bringing it to a local woman, who dipped the meat in a spicy batter and baked it her beehive oven.  She then sliced the fillets into fish sticks, which were sold to German tourists, who reliably showed up for a quick lunch, each day, nearly ten months out of the year.  Lasz got enough of a percentage from these sales to allow him to live a simple, but satisfying life, under the radar of the National Police.

One day, while walking the beach, with a metal detector he had purchased, Lasz found a lost key.  It turned out to fit the trunk of a taxi, and had been lost by a former Somali pirate who had also settled on Lamu, and used his vehicle as sort of a Lamu-style Uber.  The taxi service was quite lucrative, and the grateful ex-pirate offered Lasz a partnership, making him an alternative driver, three days out of the week.

This, once cleared with a suddenly attentive Kenyan police captain, involved a bit of “gifting” to the captain.  Lasz drove the captain’s children to school, free of charge.  In return, he got a work visa.  Between the fish mongering and taxi service, Laszlo was becoming a fixture on Lamu.

He wrote his long-ago sweetheart, a Romanian girl, who had studied at the London School of Economics, and who was casting about for a future.  Nadia was intrigued by her dear friend’s love letter, and made arrangements to travel to Kenya.  On the night before she was to fly from London to Mombasa, she was approached by two rather scruffy, but suave, men.  They learned of her plans, and asked whether they might accompany her to Africa.  They did not seem to have any ulterior motives, and were not threatening to Nadia, so she agreed to meet them next morning, at Heathrow.

The men showed up on time, documents and tickets in hand, and the three boarded the plane together.  It was a delightful flight, from London, over Europe and the Mediterranean, North Africa and Sudan.  As the plane flew over Uganda, however, night fell.  Then, the two suave, scruffy men started to transform.  Somewhere over Lake Victoria, encountering a full moon, the werewolves appeared.

Laszlo waited several days for his Nadia, until a news flash from the BBC reported that a plane had gone down, with 300 aboard.  All but three were dead.  The three missing passengers were not found, but the word among tribesmen on the north shore of Victoria is that two hairy wolf-apes, and their captive white woman, are occasionally spotted in the rough terrain above the Lake.

Repricing

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Posted by on in Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Striving

January 9, 2016, Prescott-  I read a discussion about the current downturn in investments, even as the economy is improving, overall.  It was explained there that what is happening is the repricing of stocks, akin to maintenance that is done on equipment, necessitating a brief shutdown.  This will supposedly take another week to complete, and stocks will decline a bit more.  Then, things will reset themselves, more realistically. That is a bit less threatening than the disorganized freefalls we saw in 1987 and 2008, to say nothing of the horrors our parents and grandparents saw in the Thirties.

It set me to thinking.  I have been in transition mode, since returning from southern California, last July.  Work is more urgent, and my sense of community is more front and center. We reprice ourselves, so to speak, whenever a change is felt to be needed.  Nobody, it seems, stays in a holding pattern, even when they think that’s what’s going on.

On my recent visit to the place of my childhood, I didn’t always get the feeling that I was understood by those around me.  I tended to speak more slowly and act more cautiously when there, and it wasn’t always comfortable.  Maybe because I had a fair amount of baggage, and often felt in the way, when I was growing up, I fell into a default pattern of behaviour.

So, I made an effort to stop myself, reprice, as it were, my worth and make the effort to do for others, this time around.  It wasn’t understood, or accepted, back there, but I am going with my renewed sense of self, anyway.  Revaluing myself means that no one, no matter how important they were in my life at one time, can knock me back down to a dependent state.  I have work to do, goals to accomplish and people to love.

2016 Winter Reads

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Posted by on in Literary criticism, Striving

January 7, 2016, Prescott- I haven’t posted a reading list in quite a while, so here goes.

Reads in progress:  Terra in Cognita, William Barnes;  Extreme Ownership, Jocko Willink and Leif Babin; Keep Moving, Dick Van Dyke; The Dinosaur Heresies, Robert T. Bakker; The Witches:  Salem, 1692, Stacy Schiff.  The last two are tomes, so they will take longer than the others.

January-February:  The Disappearance of the Universe, Gary R. Renard; Marco Polo, John Man; John Adams, David McCullough.

March- Sphere, Michael Crichton; All The Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr; Prairie Erth, William Least Heat-Moon.

These are all fascinating books, of various lengths and levels of intensity.  I will also be adding books to my Kindle, the efforts of Carsten Aretz and Ally Larkin, as well as anything that Jeff Markowitz and John E. Glaze come up with, in the near future.

 

Bean Soup

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Posted by on in Personal goals, Slow Food, Striving

January 5, 2016, Prescott-  This is one of those periods when the challenges that get thrown at me, by the Universe, however maudlin they may be next to the plight of countless refugees, come to be seen as blessings.

I have resolved the financial challenge that hit me as soon as I got back here, and the compensation will be in my hands on Thursday.  In the meantime, I am warm, dry and, when I’m not working, occupying myself at home with many of the things that get put off, in the course of a busy life.

One of those things is inventorying the types of beans I have, sitting in the cupboard, and readying a multi-bean soup.  With my crock pot poised and ready, I should have a hearty series of meals awaiting me tomorrow morning.  Beans take time, but sustain me, in the few instances of this First World existence that I find the wallet empty.

Meanwhile, as I ignore calls and e-mails asking for the money I don’t have, my preparations for a more solid future go on.  It’s been a good morning, thus far, and I aim for the afternoon to be just as fine.

Calm and Bright

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Posted by on in Personal goals, Personal Values, Striving

January 2, 2016, Prescott- The sense of calmness was all around me, this blessed morning, as I walked downtown, to deposit my rent in the landlord’s account.  There were few outside, other than tourists headed to a taxi stand, baggage in tow.  In Wild Iris Coffee House, I took a hearty breakfast of oatmeal and coffee, surrounded by a dozen or so awakening souls, under the steampunk ceiling.  Calmness and brightness, then, are not confined to the ancient German skies that are illustrated in the most tranquil of all Christmas carols.

This year has started out as a benign counterpoint to the tumult of the last two years.  I’m certain it will not entirely remain so, with a turgid election facing our nation and the onward march of a world in transition.  It is, however, largely what we the people make it.

In my own space, I have determined to make small forward steps- like downsizing my possessions and their accompanying junk.  I no longer feel the need to keep every receipt from the last 7-10 years, what with the banks keeping electronic records.  I don’t have to hang on to all manner of keepsakes from every classroom I’ve covered since Penny passed on.  Books that I’ve read will be passed on to the Friends of Prescott Public Library.  My wardrobe will, gradually, be updated, with the oldies but goodies passed on to the clothing bins- a process I started this past year.

Exercise will be more consistent. I will show up in the gym more often. Travel will be more on foot, meaning I walk more, locally, and when away from this area, park in one spot and walk from there.  My visits to friends and family will be shorter in duration, and certainly less intrusive.  Indeed, as I look back, the best times I’ve had visiting with people are those in which I did not overstay.

These are commitments, not “resolutions”.  My resolve, though, has not changed, from years gone by.  I enjoy work, exercise, service, learning and being there for my loved ones.  The course will remain the same.

Highway 16

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Posted by on in Community, Family, Hiking and Nature, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Striving, Travel

January 1, 2016, Prescott-  Yes, I know it’s still 2015, here in the American West.  It’s New Year’s Day in Rouen, France, one of my ancestral homes.  It’s also 2016 in: Silesia, Poland; Bremen, Germany; and Tours, France- three of my other ancestral homes.  In 5 1/2 hours, the New Year will come to Old Town, Maine, where my Native American relatives still live.  I am starting to beat a dead horse.

I will use the road motif for this year’s posts, much as the Road took me to age 65.  Highways indicate assertiveness, clear vision and moving out with a purpose.  So I intend 2016 to be.

I came back to Home Base, yesterday, to find I have a financial issue to settle, and will tend to it next week.  In the meantime, bills and rent will get paid and I was, thankfully, able to fulfill a promise I made, last week, to help a sick friend.  My nest egg isn’t growing right now, but neither is anyone else’s, in Wall Street’s mad rush to sell anything that’s not nailed down.  My nest egg IS nailed , though, so the bears can just go back into hibernation.

Meanwhile, I am not hibernating.  The next three days will see me on one trail or another, as we enjoy crisp, clear weather.  The schools will be back in session next week, and I will be ready for whoever needs my services.  The certification process will take a bit longer- ADE doesn’t save transcripts, so those need to be re-sent, and my long-ago teaching internship host will need to verify that I did complete “practice teaching”- in Fall, 1975.  So, I see that process being successfully completed by the end of January.

My essential oils have benefited me, health-wise, and I will be at three conferences, this year, that focus on their promulgation.  This month, and June will find me in Boulder and September features an International Convention in Salt Lake City.

Travel in the summer will depend on how well I do, work-wise, this winter and spring.  A week or so in Reno/Tahoe, at the end of May, is a given.  Anything beyond that, though, remains to be seen.  In any case, the focus will be on time with friends, not on “Here’s Gary at yet another fabulous site!”  I never want the latter to be how all this is viewed.

Reading is still huge for me, and with the Kindle, an excellent library system and three nearby book shops, I will never run short of material. I am currently engrossed in “The Witches:  Salem, 1692”, Dick Van Dyke’s “Keep Moving”, “Terra in Cognita”, by a fellow Baha’i:  William Barnes, “Extreme Ownership”, and “The Dinosaur Heresies”.  My tack is to read at least ten pages of a book, then go to one of the others, and so on.

This year marks the Centenary of ‘Abdu’l-Baha’s initial offerings of “Tablets of the Divine Plan”.  I will have much more to say about this remarkable set of documents, during the course of the year.  Suffice it so say that, without the guidance I have received as a Baha’i, the person some in my family remember from long ago, and still think they see, would still be stumbling around- and I would not be blogging, to say the least.

This year also marks the Centenary of the National Park Service.  I will visit several National Park holdings in Arizona, and around the Southwest, in the course of this year.  Most certainly, my boots will meet some trails of the Grand Canyon, and Canyon de Chelly, for the first time in 18 years.

Most importantly, though, is WHO I am going to be in these next twelve months.  That will never be defined by anyone but yours truly.  To say otherwise would be to invite chaos.  Some, not far from here, want me to move nearer to them.  That is not happening.  Others would rather I stay as far away from them as possible.  So be it.  Any given decision could be resolved in at least seventy different ways.  The factors, for me, are these:  Service to those in need, especially children and youth; my own family’s well-being; my ability to fend for myself (I am not presently, nor will I be, a burden on anyone else); and, lastly, the overall circumstances of the world-at-large.

Happy 2016, one and all!

 

Square One Calling

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Posted by on in children, Education, Striving

December 7, 2015, Chino Valley- This morning, I presented the school’s director with the results of my tests, only to be told that it was too late, and that my replacement would be reporting for work on January 4.

The song is never done, until Mickey Spillane’s woman of size lets loose.  So it is, with my formerly possible work situation at Mingus Springs Charter School. The song has been delivered. The upside, for the children, is that their third teacher of the year has a Special Education background. They need that skill set.  It is imperative, however, that she also prove to be a compassionate, loving soul, and, for now, I am taking it on faith that she is.  I will maintain contact with the families, and will know if things go awry.

This job impelled me to become certified as an elementary teacher, something I had resisted for a while, out of the ignorant belief that it would require a lengthy regimen of coursework and another teaching practicum.  This proved not to be the case, and I will have a certificate in hand, by the end of this calendar year.  That will increase my worth in the Prescott and Chino Valley public schools.

Square One has been my refuge, actually, most of my adult life, and from it, I have gone on to some amazing places, career-wise.  I presently have no way of knowing what 2016 holds in store, but am certain that the possibilities are far wider now, than they were two weeks ago.

I will finish out my six days and be off.  The Spring semester, for now, will be first call, first served.

Islands Converge

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Posted by on in Personal Values, Social, Striving, Travel, Uncategorized

December 6, 2015, Marana-  There are two parts of this northern suburb of Tucson.  The “new” area is close to I-10.  The “old” section consists of older ranch-style homes and a few brick dwellings, with large lots, that are spaced apart.  The neighbours barely know one another.

A friend of mine moved into the area, about two years ago.  Yesterday, I joined her gathering of the neighbours and some of her co-workers.  About twenty-five people showed up, so a start was made at bringing the “islands” closer together.  The consensus was that a neighbourhood where people are anonymous to one another is a neighbourhood at risk.

Time was, when we knew everyone within a four-block radius of the house.  That was in the Boston area of the 1950’s and ’60’s.  When we lived in Phoenix, we knew those on either side of the house, and a few people across the street. Here in my current residence, I have a nodding acquaintance with all but one of the neighbours.  The man immediately above me is the sole first-name basis, friendly sort.

It is of course, a two-way street, and one that is rather bustling. My friend in Marana simply regards the matter as one that ought to be resolved for the overall safety and well-being of all the area residents.  We are a species that depend on interaction with others, lest we lose heart, from isolation and negative self-talk.

The afternoon, and evening, were filled with affirmations for most who attended, and heartfelt discussion afterwards brought a consensus that more such events should be planned.  Here are a few scenes of the day, including a few spirited young dancers

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The first several guests

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The repast

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The hostess

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Chennai

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Posted by on in impediments, Social, Striving

December 4, 2015, Prescott- The kids and I did a lot of work, yesterday, so I went to bed early.  Today was also full, mostly with errands that a “day of rest” finds waiting.  My life has gone well this week, culminating with the news that I had passed the third and final examination, prior to my application for elementary certification, and likely continuance in my current position.

Not so in the Indian manufacturing hub of Chennai, the Madras of colonial times.  It’s said that ten feet of water have submerged some parts of the fourth largest city in India.  Aerial photos show a series of islands, and the rain still comes.

Chennai is becoming a real time poster child for climate change, even as the ministers of 150 nations continue their deliberations in far-off Paris.  It is a fair question to ask, whether there will be a recovery this time.  This is not a matter of histrionics or handwringing.  In too many cases, politicians, conservatives mostly, play the game of the perfect being enemy to the good.   We are now considering the immediate futures of 11 million people in Chennai, to say nothing of the 60 million between the twin megalopolises of Kolkata and Dhaka, nearly 1,000 miles to the northeast, Bangkok, further east, and the myriads of islands in the Indian Ocean and in the far-flung Pacific.  The good must suffice, and the perfect be built on it, eventually.  Paris has to produce concrete results.

A popular American television program is presenting the scenario of 2 % of the world’s population disappearing, POOF!  Sounds like the alarm bells are far more real than the legislators gathered in Washington prefer to believe.

Giving Tuesday

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Posted by on in Assistance, Personal Values, Service Activities, Striving

December 1, 2015, Chino Valley-  I received exactly 156 requests for money today.  Mot of them were online.  I gave modest amounts to three charities.  That the Solicitation Industry is alive and well is more than a cliche.  Need is great, and I have to figure out a meaningful way to help some destitute friends, yet, before the month gets too old.  Said friends are across the country, and anything I do for them will only be a token, but so be it.

There have been times when I looked homelessness and extreme cold in the face, and got through it, with help from both stranger and friend, as well as through my own resources.  Institutionalized help does do a lot of good, but there is always the Administrative factor, which includes salaries for the staff.  I would strongly advise http://www.charitynavigator.org, in that regard.

It has been quite cold here, the past three days, and my Nissan complained mightily this evening, before starting up and getting me to a friend’s house, for a short visit.  Yes, my car could take a considerable chunk of my resources, yet.  That is something we all have faced, from time to time.  I may have to get an old blanket to put over the engine at night, on days to come, just as my father did a few times, in the New England Decembers and Januaries of old.

Thus has the final month of 2015, and my first full month of 65, begun.