Courtesy of BoingBoing, from the British variety show Goodness Gracious Me.
No particular reason for it. It's just funny.
Rude, sure. Insensitive, absolutely. And all the better for it.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Monday, March 24, 2008
The Things We Do Not Do
We were invited to a shabbat dinner last Friday night by the parents of one of Thing 1's new friends at school. This was strange for us on a number of fronts. In the first place, Thing 1 has only been in this school since January, and we're just starting to know various parents. In the second place, we don't really do the whole shabbat thing. Oh, we light candles from time to time, and remember to say blessings over wine and bread--on special occasions. But our Friday nights can be as busy and chaotic as any other night. We may be out at a restaurant. We may (if we're lucky), have a babysitter feed the kids so that we can go out to see a movie or something. The fact of Friday night--the fact that it is supposed to be special--passes by without notice most of the time.
The dinner turned out to be absolutely lovely--good food, wonderful company, and easy, friendly conversation all around. The kids all got along and behaved themselves admirably. And while there were some rituals which were odd--they being Conservative Jews and we being Reform, nothing was uncomfortable. Yes, we did ritual handwashing before dinner. Big deal? Hardly.
What was a big deal was the whole thing put together. Taking the time to make and share a large, tasty dinner with family and friends. Taking the time to acknowledge how blessed we are--not only for food and drink, but also for our children (and I mean really acknowledging it: placing our hands upon their heads and wishing them strength, knowledge, and honor). Taking the time to go around the table and share with the group what was best about the week. Taking the time to sit, and be, and share--and not to rush around, always worrying about the Next Thing and barely paying attention to what's in front of you.
These are the things we do not do, as a rule. And we suffer for it. And it makes me wonder: what must it be like to really observe the sabbath, as our forefathers intended it? What must it be like to just STOP? To stop everything. For an entire day. To let time crawl by at its natural pace--to let a day unspool at a normal rhythm, and to breathe in and out with it. To have no agenda for a day other than to live out a day, fully, and to acknowledge its absolutely mundane glory and wonder. To sanctify time.
You can argue that God gave us the sabbath, or that our forefathers were clever enough to create it and label it as God's to ensure its observance. Either way, it's an invention worth noting. Because, left to our own devices, we cannot help but fill our time with business, or at least busy-ness. We do need some sort of external force to cajole us into emptying a period of time, whether it's 20 minutes of meditation or a day of "rest." And it's hard to do by yourself--hard to take the day off work if you know everyone else is open for business--hard to resist the many temptations of Activity if you're the only one resisting.
I think it would be an interesting experiment some weekend. Saturday or Sunday, I don't much care. Twenty-four hours of just being together--playing, reading, going for walks...whatever.
But with trumpet lessons, karate lessons, knitting classes, and religious school, just to name the Fixed Activities, I can't figure out when we'd ever have the time.
The dinner turned out to be absolutely lovely--good food, wonderful company, and easy, friendly conversation all around. The kids all got along and behaved themselves admirably. And while there were some rituals which were odd--they being Conservative Jews and we being Reform, nothing was uncomfortable. Yes, we did ritual handwashing before dinner. Big deal? Hardly.
What was a big deal was the whole thing put together. Taking the time to make and share a large, tasty dinner with family and friends. Taking the time to acknowledge how blessed we are--not only for food and drink, but also for our children (and I mean really acknowledging it: placing our hands upon their heads and wishing them strength, knowledge, and honor). Taking the time to go around the table and share with the group what was best about the week. Taking the time to sit, and be, and share--and not to rush around, always worrying about the Next Thing and barely paying attention to what's in front of you.
These are the things we do not do, as a rule. And we suffer for it. And it makes me wonder: what must it be like to really observe the sabbath, as our forefathers intended it? What must it be like to just STOP? To stop everything. For an entire day. To let time crawl by at its natural pace--to let a day unspool at a normal rhythm, and to breathe in and out with it. To have no agenda for a day other than to live out a day, fully, and to acknowledge its absolutely mundane glory and wonder. To sanctify time.
You can argue that God gave us the sabbath, or that our forefathers were clever enough to create it and label it as God's to ensure its observance. Either way, it's an invention worth noting. Because, left to our own devices, we cannot help but fill our time with business, or at least busy-ness. We do need some sort of external force to cajole us into emptying a period of time, whether it's 20 minutes of meditation or a day of "rest." And it's hard to do by yourself--hard to take the day off work if you know everyone else is open for business--hard to resist the many temptations of Activity if you're the only one resisting.
I think it would be an interesting experiment some weekend. Saturday or Sunday, I don't much care. Twenty-four hours of just being together--playing, reading, going for walks...whatever.
But with trumpet lessons, karate lessons, knitting classes, and religious school, just to name the Fixed Activities, I can't figure out when we'd ever have the time.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
They Might Be Giants
Geez...first Arthur C. Clarke, now this:
Scofield was always wonderful. His King Lear--wonderful. His Nazi colonel trying to steal all of France's art--wonderful. But in this particular role, Thomas More, he stood alongside Gregory Peck in To Kill a Mockingbird as a role model of Absolute Integrity for me.
When I first saw the movie as a teenager, it was quite clear to me--crystal clear and irrefutable--that this was what manhood was all about, if it was about anything. Not macho posturing, not physical intimidation, not swaggering bravado, but quiet strength, deep self-knowledge, absolute integrity, and the willingness to stand firm for what was right, come what may. Because a legacy of Right was ultimately better protection for your family and your country than a temporary sense of comfort and security.
It also confirmed for me--along with Mockingbird and the example of my own, personal Atticus Finch--my father--that nothing was more awe-inspiring in the human animal than our ability and willingness to Make Law--and live by Law.
Yes, I know, the authors of the Torah have God delivering the commandments to us and saying, "Behold, I set before you the blessing and the curse, life and death. Therefore, choose life, that you and your people may live." But whoever or whatever may have inspired their writing, they were written by us. By us--as a defense against our own aggresive appetites. By us--as a way to live peacefully together, rather than endlessly at war and alone. We did that. And we don't give ourselves enough credit for it. All we see are the weaknesses, the breaches, the times we don't live up to our ideals. And there are plenty of those. But our ability to see those ideals--and want them--and set them down as codes to live by...that's nothing to take for granted.
I've certainly lived more by the breach than by the observance. But a man's reach must exceed his grasp, right?
So I'll leave you with Thomas More (as imagined by Robert Bolt), who did live (and die) by those principles:
Me, too.
The Oscar-winning British stage and screen actor Paul Scofield has died at the age of 86. Scofield, one of the finest classical actors of his generation, won his Academy award as well as a Bafta, in 1967 for his role as Sir Thomas More, the 16th century Lord Chancellor executed by Henry VIII, in the film of Robert Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons.
Scofield was always wonderful. His King Lear--wonderful. His Nazi colonel trying to steal all of France's art--wonderful. But in this particular role, Thomas More, he stood alongside Gregory Peck in To Kill a Mockingbird as a role model of Absolute Integrity for me.
When I first saw the movie as a teenager, it was quite clear to me--crystal clear and irrefutable--that this was what manhood was all about, if it was about anything. Not macho posturing, not physical intimidation, not swaggering bravado, but quiet strength, deep self-knowledge, absolute integrity, and the willingness to stand firm for what was right, come what may. Because a legacy of Right was ultimately better protection for your family and your country than a temporary sense of comfort and security.
It also confirmed for me--along with Mockingbird and the example of my own, personal Atticus Finch--my father--that nothing was more awe-inspiring in the human animal than our ability and willingness to Make Law--and live by Law.
Yes, I know, the authors of the Torah have God delivering the commandments to us and saying, "Behold, I set before you the blessing and the curse, life and death. Therefore, choose life, that you and your people may live." But whoever or whatever may have inspired their writing, they were written by us. By us--as a defense against our own aggresive appetites. By us--as a way to live peacefully together, rather than endlessly at war and alone. We did that. And we don't give ourselves enough credit for it. All we see are the weaknesses, the breaches, the times we don't live up to our ideals. And there are plenty of those. But our ability to see those ideals--and want them--and set them down as codes to live by...that's nothing to take for granted.
I've certainly lived more by the breach than by the observance. But a man's reach must exceed his grasp, right?
So I'll leave you with Thomas More (as imagined by Robert Bolt), who did live (and die) by those principles:
William Roper
So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!
Sir Thomas More
Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
William Roper
Yes, I'd cut down every law in England to do that!
Sir Thomas More
Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
Me, too.
Monday, March 10, 2008
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