Category: Wilderness Wanderings

Missing (one of) the Cats

Published on by D. G. Hart11 Comments

For cats in the Hart home, Monday is the cruelest day of the week. It was a Monday night in the fall of 2008 when we took Skip to the Vet to be “put down.” Then last Monday, en route to the coast of Maine, our dear Isabelle succumbed to the cancer that made her little more than fur and bones (despite her voracious appetite). We brought Isabelle into our Philadelphia home to fill the void left by Skip, who had been an elegant presence for eighteen years. Isabelle saw us through a number of arresting transitions, from losing a job to moving out of our favorite city. (Thankfully, we still have Cordelia, though hers is a strange comfort since she did not find Isabelle to be a welcome housemate.)

Though a pretentious name it is, Isabelle was actually named not for a queen or writer but another cat. Joseph Epstein wrote an essay almost two decades ago, “Livestock,” about his seven-year-old cat, Isabelle. Because he is one of our favorite living writers and because the essay is full of charm and mirth about the virtues of cats, we decided to give our second pet the name of Epstein’s feline.

As a tribute to our Isabelle, here is an excerpt from Epstein’s essay about his Isabelle:

I hope that I have not given the impression that Isabelle is a genius among cats, for it is not so. If cats had IQs, hers, my guess is, would fall somewhere in the middle range; if cats took SATs, we should have to look for a small school somewhere in the Middle West for her where discipline is not emphasized. Isabelle eats flowers — though for some reason not African violets — and cannot be convinced to refrain. We consequently don’t keep flowers in the apartment. Although my wife and I love flowers, we have decided that we love this cat more, and the deprivation of one of life’s several little pleasures is worth it.

I am, then, prepared to allow that Isabelle isn’t brilliant but not that she isn’t dear. She is, as I have mentioned, currently seven years old, yet already — perhaps it is a habit of my own middle age — I begin to think of the shortness of her life, even stretched to its fullest potential. Owing to the companionship of this cat, I have begun to understand friends who, having lost a dog or cat through age or illness, choose not to replace it, saying that they can’t bear to go through it all again.

Solzhenitsyn remarks in one of his novels that people who cannot be kind to animals are unlikely to be kind to human beings. A charming sentiment but far, I suspect, from generally true. (“I wanted you to see why I work with animals,” says a female veterinarian in a novel by Jim Harrison. “I can’t stand people.”) Yet genuine kindness to animals is always impressive. One of the finest stories told about Mohammed has to do with his having to answer the call to prayer while a cat is asleep on the hem of his cloak; with scissors he cuts off the hem, lest he wake the cat, and proceeds on his way. (With My Trousers Rolled, 30)

What Happened to Gender?

Published on by D. G. Hart17 Comments

Carl Trueman has already raised questions about feminism but those thoughts returned while reading a variety of reactions to the George Zimmerman trial. You see a lot about race and class, but hear nothing about gender.

What does gender have to do with this? Well, both Martin and Zimmerman received their father’s surnames. That includes President Obama who gave a speech about the verdict on Friday (more below). What would the press and pundits have been saying about the case had Zimmerman been called George Mesa (his mother’s surname)? And what would those folks have said about race and ethnicity in the U.S. if Zimmerman were identified as a Hispanic-American with Afro-Peruvian blood (from his maternal grandfather)? And what about Zimmerman’s membership in the Democratic Party? The country has had a lot of debates for the last five years about illegal immigration or undocumented aliens (with Republicans trying to get out from under their white-only reputation), many of whom come to the U.S. from south of the border. Granted, Hispanic hardly does justice to Mexican-, Cuban-, or Peruvian-Americans, nor does Mexican do justice to the diversity of ethnic backgrounds in Mexico. But in the strange world of white/majority-non-white/minority relations in the U.S., George Zimmerman should qualify as a fellow as much on the minds of those who worry about race, class, and gender/transgender as they do about Sandra Fluke. In which case, the trial has an upside. A Hispanic-American, at a time when many Americans are skittish about immigrants from Central and South America, gained a welcome verdict in the nation’s white-dominated justice system. Obviously, that is no consolation to Trayvon Martin’s family. But since so much of the discussion of the trial and its aftermath has been about race, with the implication of how white Americans and their institutions mistreat non-whites, why doesn’t Zimmerman’s minority status provide some consolation to those sensitive to race and ethnicity?

Similar questions can be raised about President Obama. What if his name were Barack Dunham, and what if Americans perceived him as a white man instead of an African-American? (No one is really going to defend the idea that the slightest amount of African blood in a person makes them black, are they?) And what if the President himself thought more about being reared by a white mother and white grandparents before saying this:

You know, when Trayvon Martin was first shot I said that this could have been my son. Another way of saying that is Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago. And when you think about why, in the African American community at least, there’s a lot of pain around what happened here, I think it’s important to recognize that the African American community is looking at this issue through a set of experiences and a history that doesn’t go away.

Instead of the Trayvon Martin case showing how badly America treats blacks, the overwhelming reaction has been how much white America empathizes with blacks.

Does this mean that everything is fine in the U.S. and that we can all go back to work believing that this is a great land where the justice and economic systems work fairly? If you’ve seen The Wire (or read Wendell Berry), you never go to work thinking that. In fact, it is hard not to see a photo of Trayvon Martin and not think of Dukie Weems, or to have watched the series and not understand David Simon’s recent reaction:

In the state of Florida, the season on African-Americans now runs year round. Come one, come all. And bring a handgun. The legislators are fine with this blood on their hands. The governor, too. One man accosted another and when it became a fist fight, one man — and one man only — had a firearm. The rest is racial rationalization and dishonorable commentary.

At the same time, the inequities of the U.S. extend beyond white-black relations. Turning the George Zimmerman case into only a discussion of race and class will miss the larger canvass on which the tragic encounter between Martin and Zimmerman played out. I think I even learned about the complications of all social interactions from David Simon himself.

The Old Normal Is Still Normal

Published on by D. G. Hart20 Comments

Communions like the OPC (and probably the RPCNA) suffer from statistic-envy. We see other denominations that are bigger, congregations larger, and buildings newer (and owned). Turns out that small churches are par for the course among Protestants in the U.S. In a post about how much congregations would have to spend if Congress cut significantly the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also came statistics about the average size of congregations in the United States.

177,000 congregations (59%) have between 7 and 99 worshipers weekly.
105,000 congregations (35%) have between 100 and 499 worshipers weekly.
12,000 congregations (4%) have between 500 and 999 worshipers weekly.
6,000 congregations (2%) have between 1,000 and 1,999 worshipers weekly.
1,210 congregations (.4%) have more than 2,000 worshipers weekly (megachurch).

As for finances, the average congregation’s budget is $55,000.

If SNAP were reduced from $133.5 billion to $36 billion:

asking a 75-member church to absorb $50,000 in increased ministry costs works out to about $666 per person each year, a 44 percent surcharge on the average worshiper’s contribution.

To make matters worse, according to one estimate, the average church budget is $55,000. In other words, saddling the average congregation with the costs of not renewing SNAP would mean almost doubling its entire annual budget. And of course, as Sullivan points out, SNAP is just one program among many that conservatives would like to slash. You don’t need a calculator to figure out that it’s more than the churches could keep up with.

I suspect that giving in some normal congregations is better than others. So maybe it would not be that hard a hit (assuming for the moment that the church in general has a responsibility to provide physical resources for the public in general). But why should Christians have all the good charity?

(all about) My Movie Idea

Published on by D. G. Hart6 Comments

While Alan Jacobs is speculating on a script about rival realtors in Waco, Texas, the Baylys have me thinking about a movie about a letter to Congress. Having recently re-watched Broken Flowers (can’t get enough Billy Murray these days) and remembering the fairly vivid shots of a pink envelope winding its way through the USPS’ automated sorting system that open the movie, I wonder if someone could make a similar short about this letter from evangelical scientists to Congress. Here is the opening of the letter:

Dear Speaker Boehner, Senate Majority Leader Reid, and Members of the United States Congress:

As evangelical scientists and academics, we understand climate change is real and action is urgently needed. All of God’s Creation – humans and our environment – is groaning under the weight of our uncontrolled use of fossil fuels, bringing on a warming planet, melting ice, and rising seas. The negative consequences and burdens of a changing climate will fall disproportionately on those whom Jesus called “the least of these”: the poor, vulnerable, and oppressed. Our nation has entrusted you with political power; we plead with you to lead on this issue and enact policies this year that will protect our climate and help us all to be better stewards of Creation.

It goes on for a couple more paragraphs before seven (yes, 7!) pages of signatures.

This movie, after showing the letter’s advance through USPS hands (and machines) would then follow its advance to an assistant’s desk in the Capital Building, his or her disposition of the letter, and then what? Does it go to a staffer? Does it ever make it on Boehner’s desk? Who writes a response? Does anyone? And should the movie include tense scenes of evangelical scientists fervently awaiting a mere acknowledgement of the letter’s contents?

Then again, maybe no one ever sent the letter to Congress, in which case a letter is less a communication calling for action than a political gesture. Who knows? Screenplay writer’s call.

Personality Disorder Is No Fun

Published on by D. G. Hart25 Comments

Today is the anniversary of my mother’s birthday (I never called her mom or mum, though dad was fine for my father — perhaps Paul Weston could help me with that one). Aside from June 15 reminding of Ellen Marie Hart’s (nee Jones) birth, technical problems with Netflix last night were the circumstances for our viewing (with Isabelle) The United States of Tara, which provided another reminder of mother. We had begun our Roku experience with Parenthood, a series that the Mrs. has enjoyed when I travel. But when we moved from the Pilot to Episode One, Netflix wouldn’t cooperate. In searching for an alternative — we had partial access to Netflix on-line streaming, we came up with UST. It is about a middle-class interior designer, wife, and mother of two adolescents, who has a personality disorder. The posters for the show reveal four different Tara’s. We only saw three in the Pilot, which was plenty. In addition to the “normal” Tara, we saw T, a raunchy, drug-taking, sex-seeking floozy, and Buck, a Tom-woman who cross dresses as a working-class carpenter-like figure.

Weird.

As much as I admire Toni Collette, her skills could not over my discomfort with how nonchalantly the show treated psychiatric “challenges.” The children, one in high school, the other in junior high, were never phased by the arrival of the floozy or seeing their mother as a beer-drinking, cigarette-smoking, foul-mouthed, get-er-done ruffian. For them it was fun to have mom show up in different characters. And dad was not any more help. The versions of his wife caused no ripple in his countenance and the possibilities of amour with T made him wish (though he knew he shouldn’t) that Tara had more gitty-up in the boudoir.

Are you kidding? My mother was bi-polar, God bless her. For the last 43 years of her life, starting with a hysterectomy, she varied between highs that saw uncontrolled and unexplained spending, and lows that parked her in front of a steady stream of bad network television, including news about murders in Philadelphia that made her think her son was always in danger. As an adolescent, college and graduate student, young husband, and even middle-aged man, those swings were never easy to take. At first they were embarrassing. Over time they produced sorrow for the torments my mother had to endure (though she never wanted to take her meds).

If two versions of my mother were hard to handle, I don’t think doubling the trouble would have made mood swings or multiple personalities pleasant, entertaining, or life spicier. Disturbing is the notion that people in Hollywood or somewhere connected to it can trivialize psychiatric disorders in the way that this show does. I can imagine some genuine comedy material here if writers and producers explored the genuinely funny moments that come with manic-depression, say the way that Whit Stillman does in Last Days of Disco. But UTS doesn’t cut it. Meanwhile, Parenthood is premised on the family angst that comes with the discovery that a young son has Asperger’s. Go figure.

Gallipoli

Published on by D. G. Hart15 Comments

Mel Gibson enthralled female movie-viewing audiences with his big blues and his down under twang when he starred in Gallipoli (1981), a film about a pivotal battle during the Great War (we didn’t count them then). Little did I know when I first saw the movie where in the world Gallipoli was – it’s in Turkey – or that I would some day visit it (twice so far).

The Allies decided in 1915 to try to break the stalemate on the Western Front by landing forces on Gallipoli, a peninsula along the Dardanelles of strategic significance, and sending them in from the East (along with Russia’s military). The reason the Australians made a movie about the battle is that Australians and New Zealanders made up the bulk of units to attempt to land at Gallipoli, and it was their first full-fledged service as part of the British Empire’s military (as I understand it).

But thanks to poor planning and Ottoman resourcefulness, the Allies experienced a bitter defeat in one of the most brutal series of battles – 100,000 soldiers died on both sides in eight months of fighting. (One irony is that the British won the rights to name bathrooms in Turkey – rule WC!) It was a pivotal event, not only in the larger war, but also in the history of Turkey and Australia. The war gave Australians, arguably for the first time, a sense of Australian nationalism – hence the movie. And for Turkey, Gallipoli produced a military leader – Mustafa Kemal Ataturk – who would become the father of the Turkish Republic. History runs on unintended consequences.

Each year Australian and New Zealand tourists flock back to Turkey to commemorate the dead and participate in ceremonies (April 25) that honor this war. The Turks welcome the Aussies and the Aussies in turn honor the Turks. The reason for the latter has something to do with the exceptional maintenance provided to the military cemeteries that hold the deceased Australian and New Zealand soldiers (some of whom could not be buried until after Armistice). Like many military cemeteries, the neat rows of white grave markers, surrounded by closely cut grass and war monuments of various kinds, are moving in themselves.

But the epitaphs we read yesterday were as touching as they were puzzling. They were curious, partly because the biblical references were small compared to what someone might expect from British colonial culture of the Victorian era. We did see one – had to be a Presbyterian – which spoke of justification by faith and peace with God. Another one invoked the second petition of the Lord’s prayer fittingly. But the one that was the most moving was also the one devoid of religion (an impossibility I know for the neo-Calvinist). It read “my only darling boy.”

Maybe a creative grad student has already done this, but a dissertation on gravestone epitaphs might be a useful way to measure biblical literacy and religious conviction. If the student compared wars, he or she might find ascending or descending rates of religiosity.

Another Coincidence?

Published on by D. G. Hart14 Comments

Islamic Calvinism.

Religion in Kayseri plays a central part in people’s lives. The city has a traditional reputation; the only place to get a drink is at the international hotel. But where in the past in Turkey business was dominated by the country’s secular elite, which firmly kept religion out of the boardroom, in Kayseri it has a central role.

And it seems to be a winning combination. Kayseri is booming. It holds the world record for the number of factories opening in a day – 190. The city boasts 50 out of 500 of the wealthiest people in Turkey.

But you would use never guess it walking on the streets of the city. There are few expensive cars, as ostentatious behaviour is frowned upon. Kayseri does have a rather puritanical feel to it. But that shouldn’t be a surprise, according Gerald Gnaus of the European Stability Initiative (ESI).

Gnaus recently published a report which draws a parallel with the 19th century Calvinists. Gnaus argues Kayseri buries the widely held belief that Islam and capitalism are incompatible.

“Many people in Western Europe — very serious thinkers too — have held that Islam is a fatalistic religion and that it suits a trading economy but not an industrial economy,” Gnaus says. “What we found in Kayseri is that on the contrary, the kind of characteristic traits that Max Weber attributed to the Calvinists – very hard working, very sober, not given to ostentatious displays of wealth – are the characteristic traits you find in businessmen in Kayseri.”

The term “Islamic Calvinism” caused a bit of a stir in Turkey, being angrily denounced by some in the Islamic media. But in Kayseri, most seemed quite happy with the label.

Mustafa Boydak is the head of the Kayseri chamber of commerce. He also runs one of the largest companies in the city Boydak. He also sees parallels with the 19th century puritans:

“In Calvinism there is this understanding that work is a form of worship, and Kayseri people share that understanding. Islam also teaches us to be tolerant, and open to new ideas, which is very important in business, and to people living here. But Christianity shares this ideal, and the influence of Christianity here is important. For centuries many Christian Greeks and Armenians lived here and were very involved in business, and this too has shaped people’s ideals.”

I’m not sure about the tolerance bit, though Mustafa Akyol makes as good a 2k case for Islam as any Western 2ker does for Calvinism. But when it comes to work ethic, the Turks would put many residents of Massachusetts to shame.

Turkey Bound

Published on by D. G. Hart12 Comments

Was it a sign? Harmonic convergence? Coincidence? Providence? While dressing for church yesterday, I was listening to the local Hillsdale radio station which has a segment of religious broadcasting before devoting several hours to big band hits. Why station managers deem Frank Sinatra and 1940s music as appropriate formats for the Lord’s Day is as mysterious as my needing background sounds on the Sabbath. (My explanation is that I am a product of Jay and Ellen Hart who always had the radio on. Their station of choice was Family Radio. I can only listen to it through streaming audio. The transistor radio in the bathroom only receives the Hillsdale station.)

Anyhow, the song that played yesterday, the day before we leave for Turkey, was “Istanbul (Not Constantinople).” It is a 1953 swing-style song, with lyrics by Jimmy Kennedy and music by Nat Simon. The lyrics comically refer to the official 1930 renaming of the city of Constantinople to Istanbul. The song was originally recorded by the Canadian group The Four Lads on August 12, 1953. This recording was released by Columbia Records and reached the Billboard magazine charts on October 24, 1953, and it peaked at #10. It was the group’s first gold record. Another tidbit from Wikipedia: The Duke’s Men of Yale, an all-male a cappella group at Yale University, perform the song at the end of most of their concerts. The song has been in the repertoire of the Duke’s Men since 1953.

Here are the lyrics.

Istanbul was Constantinople
Now it’s Istanbul, not Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Now it’s Turkish delight on a moonlit night
(Oh) every gal in Constantinople
(Oh) lives in Istanbul, not Constantinople
(Oh) so if you’ve a date in Constantinople
(Oh) she’ll be waiting in Istanbul

Even old New York
Was once New Amsterdam
Why they changed it I can’t say
People just liked it better that way

So take me back to Constantinople
No, you can’t go back to Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Why did Constantinople get the works?
That’s nobody’s business but the Turks’

Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo / ohhhhhhh ohh ohh ohh
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo / ohhhhhh ohh ohh ohh
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo / ohhhh ohh ohh ohh ohhh
Istanbul (Istanbul)
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo / ohhhhhhh ohh ohh ohh
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo / ohhhhhhh ohh ohh ohh
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo / ohhhh ohh ohh ohh ohhh
Istanbul (Istanbul)

Even old New York
Was once New Amsterdam
Why they changed it I can’t say
People just liked it better that way

Istanbul was Constantinople
Now it’s Istanbul, not Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Why did Constantinople get the works?
That’s nobody’s business but the Turks’

Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo

So take me back to Constantinople
No, you can’t go back to Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Why did Constantinople get the works?
That’s nobody’s business but the Turks’

Istanbul

You can listen here.

In further preparation for travel to Istanbul (not Constinople) we watched The Edge of Heaven last night after the evening service. It is a very good movie about mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, and the relationships between the Turks and Germans. Lots of Istanbul (and Bremen and Hamburg).

The Incomparable Mencken

Published on by D. G. Hart30 Comments

As part of my preparation to submit a proposal for a religious biography of H. L. Mencken, I ran across a back issue of Menckeniana which had Jonathan Yardley‘s talk at the 2010 Mencken Day. The book critic for the Washington Post, here is how Yardley described his first encounter with Mencken:

I was absolutely bowled over. The power, wit, and originality of Mencken’s prose seized me and shook me to within an inch of my life.

Yardley would eventually pitch a biography of Mencken but could not complete the project. In turn he encouraged Terry Teachout to pick up the task. Yardley concedes that Teachout wrote a better book than he could have. One indication may be this astute observation by Teachout about Mencken’s style and its journalistic genesis:

It is, in short, a triumph of style. The fact that this triumph was the work of a common newspaperman has long served to obscure its singularity, especially among academic critics. “The smell of the city room,” Charles Angoff wrote in 1938, “was in everything he put between book covers.” But what Angoff meant as deadly criticism is in fact central to Mencken’s appeal. It was the discipline of daily journalism that freed him from the clutches of the genteel tradition. The city room was for Mencken what Europe was for Henry James: the great good place where he became himself.

And what would a post on Mencken be without a jolt of that prose? Here is Mencken on the joys of newspaper work when he started to write:

I believed then, and still believe today, that it was the maddest, gladdest, damndest existence ever enjoyed by mortal youth. The illusion that swathes and bedizens journalism, bringing in its endless squads of recruits, was still full upon me, and I had yet to taste the sharp teeth of responsibility. Life was arduous, but it was gay and carefree. The days chased one another like kittens chasing their tails.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Published on by D. G. Hart139 Comments

Fresh from the afterglow of a recent post on sex, I’ll take another stab with a remark about gay marriage. Noah Millman observes in passing an exchange between David Frum and Andrew Sullivan which went like this:

the question – as Andrew Sullivan posed it repeatedly to David Frum over the years, Frum being well-aware of these alternative approaches to the marriage “problem” and their potential normative costs – is: what, in your worldview, are you offering to gay people, if not marriage? And there was never a good answer to that. And, there being no good answer – good in the sense of being something that would be readily accepted as an answer – the marriage movement grew, and burgeoned.

I know some of this exchange had to do with policy alternatives to existing marriage laws, but I am still puzzled by the substance of Sullivan’s question — as if changing marriage law will fundamentally change gay life in the United States. As most married couples know, the respect of a spouse is as important to the survival of a relationship as is romance, more so. Right now in the U.S. gay men receive more respect without marriage than African-American men ever did before (and arguably after) the Civil Rights Act. The image of gay men may trade on stereotypes but compared to those associated with heterosexual young males, being articulate, having impeccable taste, knowing table manners, being able to throw a great dinner party, knowing how to decorate a room beat pretty much any day of the week being crude, unrefined, poorly read, wearing t-shirts and baseball caps backwards, drinking bad beer, and watching televised sports. In fact, it takes marriage to domesticate most heterosexual men. Gay men generally don’t need it.

Of course, this is not argument against gay marriage. It is only to say that marriage may not be the panacea that Sullivan imagines. Here the old line of Irving Kristol comes to mind. When asked about gay marriage, Kristol said, “Let them have it, they won’t like it.”