As if you didn’t already know about the wedding of the century between Prince William and Catherine Middleton. They are now heirs-in-waiting and given a steady diet of Malvern Water and constant attention they should be ready to ascend the throne in, oh, about thirty years. Until then, you shall see them dressed smartly in every magazine and reality show on earth. So far they have even had a pizza done with their likeness as a topping. Top that Donald Trump (the T is silent). They have now performed (in Phillip Larkin’s wry phrase) “their tabloid fertility rites”.
I love the new titles: Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and the unbeatable new monikers Baron and Baroness Carrickfergus. As for us, The King of Queens is not listed in Burke’s Peerage and The Dukes of Hazzard were only a television dynasty, but we do have one person who outranks anyone produced by England: Duke Ellington.
Actually, I know a couple in San Francisco named Bill and Kate. They live a sane middle class life with their two sons and don’t have to worry a fig about the oppressive and omnipresent paparazzi. Human lives don’t really need 24/7 press coverage unless that’s what the great unwashed demands of them, until the day they die, and then it really heats up. (Pace Princess Diana).
Orwell said the English were just one big family, with the wrong people in charge. Hopefully, he is wrong about this couple. I won’t be around to see it. We still have to deal with Bonnie Prince Charlie and Dowdy Old Camilla
Friday, April 29, 2011
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Classmates, reunions and Hard Truths.
This is not going to be pleasant reading. If you do get through it I’ll have some comforting words for you.
I’ll be 76 next month. Same day every year, May 8th. It won’t be as joyous as May 8, 1945 when I celebrated both my 10th birthday and VE Day riding around Edmonton Alberta in an open car until way past my bedtime. As Scott Fitzgerald said, “the greatest thing life can give you is youth”.
I was at a reunion last week of staffers (not me) who worked together on the UC Berkeley Daily Cal newspaper in the 1950’s. They’re still a pretty spirited lot, have all their marbles, are courageous but are coming to the last chapter of the story. One has had a stroke and walks with a cane, one is recovering from cancer and has her head covered with a cap, the rest are balding, gray haired, widows or widowers. My zaftig wife is one of them but she still has hair the color of Rita Hayworth’s.
When Casey Stengel was showing his young outfielders how to play the ball off the fences one of them said, “How does an old guy like you know this stuff?” and Casey replied, “Jeez kid, I wasn’t born this age”. None of us were.
I have a high school reunion next month in Vancouver but won’t be going. It’s too far and too depressing. My best friend from the sixth grade and President of the Class didn’t even make it to the 25th reunion. He had drowned in his thirties. At the 55th I asked my “two kiss” girlfriend” of my Senior year if her feckless, divorced husband was still around and she just pointed up to the sky, the shortest, sweetest obit I’ve ever seen.
The giant scythe keeps mowing us down with a bumper crop on the horizon. But, as Jean-Luc Picard says, “It’s a condition of our existence”. However, what is the quality of our existence these days anyway? Recession, wars, poverty, terror, Newt Gingrich. “People in nursing homes die watching late-night television,” Garrison Keillor said, “ and if I were one of them I’d be grateful when the darkness descends”.
Orwell advised his readers to face the hard truth that we are all forgotten in one generation and in two no one will ever know we had ever lived.
So, here’s my advice to keep the ball rolling, no matter what age you are: read more poetry, more Hagar The Horrible, go to the movies but only if it’s a Pixar film, don’t waste time with Oprah or the evening news, compliment three people every day, including strangers. As Yogi Berra says, “It isn’t over till it’s over”. If this has left you depressed get out your DVD of “Singin’ in the Rain” or put on the Hi Lo’s cheerful version of “Life is just a bowl of cherries” with the life-reinforcing chorus: “Live and laugh at it all, you know, like Ha-Ha, Ha-Ha, Ha-Ha”.
I’ll be 76 next month. Same day every year, May 8th. It won’t be as joyous as May 8, 1945 when I celebrated both my 10th birthday and VE Day riding around Edmonton Alberta in an open car until way past my bedtime. As Scott Fitzgerald said, “the greatest thing life can give you is youth”.
I was at a reunion last week of staffers (not me) who worked together on the UC Berkeley Daily Cal newspaper in the 1950’s. They’re still a pretty spirited lot, have all their marbles, are courageous but are coming to the last chapter of the story. One has had a stroke and walks with a cane, one is recovering from cancer and has her head covered with a cap, the rest are balding, gray haired, widows or widowers. My zaftig wife is one of them but she still has hair the color of Rita Hayworth’s.
When Casey Stengel was showing his young outfielders how to play the ball off the fences one of them said, “How does an old guy like you know this stuff?” and Casey replied, “Jeez kid, I wasn’t born this age”. None of us were.
I have a high school reunion next month in Vancouver but won’t be going. It’s too far and too depressing. My best friend from the sixth grade and President of the Class didn’t even make it to the 25th reunion. He had drowned in his thirties. At the 55th I asked my “two kiss” girlfriend” of my Senior year if her feckless, divorced husband was still around and she just pointed up to the sky, the shortest, sweetest obit I’ve ever seen.
The giant scythe keeps mowing us down with a bumper crop on the horizon. But, as Jean-Luc Picard says, “It’s a condition of our existence”. However, what is the quality of our existence these days anyway? Recession, wars, poverty, terror, Newt Gingrich. “People in nursing homes die watching late-night television,” Garrison Keillor said, “ and if I were one of them I’d be grateful when the darkness descends”.
Orwell advised his readers to face the hard truth that we are all forgotten in one generation and in two no one will ever know we had ever lived.
So, here’s my advice to keep the ball rolling, no matter what age you are: read more poetry, more Hagar The Horrible, go to the movies but only if it’s a Pixar film, don’t waste time with Oprah or the evening news, compliment three people every day, including strangers. As Yogi Berra says, “It isn’t over till it’s over”. If this has left you depressed get out your DVD of “Singin’ in the Rain” or put on the Hi Lo’s cheerful version of “Life is just a bowl of cherries” with the life-reinforcing chorus: “Live and laugh at it all, you know, like Ha-Ha, Ha-Ha, Ha-Ha”.
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Faust Finds The Formula
The new film “Limitless” is a modern take on the legend of the man who sells his soul for youth, knowledge, wealth and power. Only he gets away with it and the devil goes away empty-handed.
As the promo line says, “What if a pill could make you rich and powerful (the way it does large pharmaceutical companies). It’s one of those faux literary films like “Inception” all full of the special effects that infantile young men love.
The lead character, Morra, starts out as a feckless loser, moocher, bum. He comes across the “pill” by chance and instantly is focused, energetic and quite brilliant. The pill wears off , so to keep supplied, he has many brutal adventures, kills a few people until he finally makes a fortune and learns how to make the pill safe and abundant (for himself, nobody else).
But what does he do with this power? Become a modern Prometheus, champion of mankind? Who dat? No, he goes to Wall Street, makes bazillions and in the final scene he is running for the US Senate. There are no ethics or morality in this film. For that you need to see “The Lincoln Lawyer”.
Morra doesn’t want to cure cancer, save Africa a la Albert Schweitzer, work out the gaps in Quantum theory, no, he wants to go to Washington, be on CNN, meet Katie Couric.
What an underachiever. As we used to say in high school, “what a pill!"
As the promo line says, “What if a pill could make you rich and powerful (the way it does large pharmaceutical companies). It’s one of those faux literary films like “Inception” all full of the special effects that infantile young men love.
The lead character, Morra, starts out as a feckless loser, moocher, bum. He comes across the “pill” by chance and instantly is focused, energetic and quite brilliant. The pill wears off , so to keep supplied, he has many brutal adventures, kills a few people until he finally makes a fortune and learns how to make the pill safe and abundant (for himself, nobody else).
But what does he do with this power? Become a modern Prometheus, champion of mankind? Who dat? No, he goes to Wall Street, makes bazillions and in the final scene he is running for the US Senate. There are no ethics or morality in this film. For that you need to see “The Lincoln Lawyer”.
Morra doesn’t want to cure cancer, save Africa a la Albert Schweitzer, work out the gaps in Quantum theory, no, he wants to go to Washington, be on CNN, meet Katie Couric.
What an underachiever. As we used to say in high school, “what a pill!"
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