A Pleasure to Meet You Mr.Shorthouse

The meeting has not been a traditional one. Mr. Derek Shorthouse, you see, died in November 2012, in England.

A glory of life is its moments of unexpected synchronicity.

I have, I think I have mentioned in these pages, a fondness for Blessed Cardinal John Henry Newman, that extraordinary thinker and convert to Catholicism from Anglicanism back in the 19th century. I have read several biographies and lately have been collecting some of editions of his letters and diaries. The latest one I received via an Amazon third party, a bookstore in the U.K., is of his Oxford Movement days when he hoped with his friends and colleagues to reform Anglicanism. This volume was in perfect shape, a pristine cover, and with not even the slightest marking in its printed body. It almost looked unread. But there was one clear indication of a prior owner, a colorful
"Ex Libris" with the name of one Derek Shorthouse. The name bespoke a literary time past. For a moment, it seemed impossible this book belonged to a real person.

And then I did what modern technology commands. I googled Mr. Shorthouse. There he was! He did not have a large presence on the net, but enough of one for me to get a sense of the man. His interest in Newman was not mere intellectual curiosity. At one time, Mr. Shorthouse had been the bursar at Oriel College Oxford, Newman's alma mater. I don't know how he came to it, the internet does not give that much information, but Mr. Shorthouse was scheduled to be received officially into the Catholic Church on December 8 but died on November 27. He had made the decision, but God took him to His Heart before the formality.

He was, as well, a chronicler of his family. I have printed out and saved photographs of Derek and his family which he gathered together.

He had four children, two girls and two boys; one boy appears to have grown up to be a successful financial expert.

Something touches me deeply about having this man's book in my little apartment in West Hollywood. There is an earthly immortality about it. I don't know if Mr. Shorthouse ever travelled to the States in his lifetime, but a part of him is now here, in the form of the book in my library, his memory now firmly in mine.

Postscript February 13, 2025. I noticed that there had been a few hits on this short blog entry. I also notice that what picture I had placed on the entry back in 2016, when I made the entry was gone. So, I googled again, and found less than I had back then, which saddened me. I found a brief obituary and an entry from the Gloucestershire Heritage Club which I now post here and hope it will survive. 

Derek Shorthouse was educated at Wolverhampton Grammar School and Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, where he read Latin and Greek. He worked in industry as a Chartered Secretary for most of his career, with an interval of a few years as Treasurer and Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford. He lived in West Gloucestershire for many years and was an active member of the local community, including the local church, Dymock Cricket Club, and serving as constituency chairman of the West Gloucestershire Conservative Party; he was also a councillor on the Forest of Dean District Council for many years. His historical interests included local history and late 19th and early 20th century English political history, and he was a member of many societies related to these subjects. He was a founder member and first chairman of the Friends of Gloucestershire Archives and was an active member of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, serving as a member of its Library Committee for several years. He died at the age of 80 on 27 November 2012.

45 Years: Mesmerizing

I am surprised that I was so taken by this movie, the tale of a 45 year marriage tested deeply by a husband's past relationship. The story unfolds so very slowly but I realized two things, first, that the various scenes felt like real life to me, unremarkable but yet meaningful and secondly, by the end I found that these two people had become real to me. And as the credits rolled, I wished I could know what would happen to them. But this is not a sequel film. It is more like real life in that. What's going to happen to these two individuals is up for grabs, but it isn't looking good at the end, although the husband (Tom Courtenay in a performance I wish had been nominated for an Oscar) may think his wife (Charlotte Rampling in a performance that was nominated for the Oscar) will be able to begin anew with him.

The slow pace builds not only the characters but the drama of the relationship between this childless husband and wife who appear restrained by nature and history.

Kate Mercer has been arranging a 45th wedding anniversary party for the couple. They did not celebrate at their 40th because Geoff had by pass surgery, from which, it appears as the movie begins he has not recovered entirely. He is functional, but, as he describes himself, he is decrepit. Their life together is quiet, and peaceful, walks with the dog and quiet meals at the kitchen table of their rural (Norwich, England) home. And then he receives a letter.

The body of a  woman that Geoff knew, and loved, in the early 1960s, someone before Kate's entry into his life, has been found in a mountain crevice in Switzerland. No, there is no issue of foul play. It's not that kind of film. The death of the young woman (Katya, note the similar name; though never discussed, it does not seem accidental) was an accident during a climbing expedition at which there had been a guide. The guide and Katya were ahead of Geoff and she simply fell. Her body had not been found then, but now, with various climate and topographical changes, it has. The girl is frozen, literally, and in time. Geoff had moved on to marry Kate. But what becomes an issue to Kate, had he ever moved on? Kate knows of Katya, and that she died. Geoff did not hide that when they met. But he also did not reveal the depth and nuance, contained in one fact that Kate discovers in going through attic memorabilia while Geoff attends, reluctantly, a party thrown at the cement factory of which he was once a manager:  Katya was pregnant when she died. He could have been a father, something not possible with Kate. Kate remains quiet about her new knowledge. But Geoff had already told her that he would have married Katya, had she lived. We can see the torment in Kate's eyes--she and Geoff would NEVER have occurred had Katya lived. The obvious torment for Geoff, the need he cannot ultimately fulfill for health reasons, is that he wants to see where the body still remains, visible, but not yet recovered.

The cinematography mirrors the mood, perhaps even reflects it more strongly than the tamped down interactions between husband and wife. The cold rain, the tempestuous wind, the darkening sky, with occasional flecks of sun--I could feel them via the camera. They have this party coming. They are pulling away from one another in the week before it.

When the night of the party comes around, there seems to be real hope. He is in tux. She is wearing the lovely necklace (which she tried on gloomily at her dressing table, having found it before the gathering) Geoff gifted her. She has been unable to buy him a gift, but he seems undisturbed by that. He has promised to, and does, act as a man who loves his wife of many years. He talks of choices made that refer, really, to his life before Kate, with Katya, and the one with Kate, after Katya. They dance to their wedding song, "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes". His movie long torpor toward his wife seems gone. He is a loving husband. She, we can see in closeup and in long shot, that she is questioning, and tense. You want her to relax, to trust, to forgive Geoff for having loved so much, and so long, someone long dead, for feeling somehow dismissed for 45 years.

And then the music stops, and Kate wrenches her hand from Geoff. He doesn't seem to notice. The partygoers continue their revel. The movie is over. Life goes on. Life bumps on.

What I Am Giving Up for Lent, Good Luck to Me!

There she is, the prideful one in progress. Or, as I find myself thinking, "The little executive who is not pleased."

That's projection, no doubt, on proceedings I don't remember. I remember generally though that I did not like it when my mother staged these little photo productions because I never adequately posed and I hated posing in the first place. I hated the itchy dresses and the carefully constructed curls. I know myself well enough that the rigid hand locks around my waist were not of my own doing. But the picture serves as a launch point for this day's posting.

Whatever else is going on in that picture, I know that the one thing I felt was annoyance. Somehow, though I was in the picture, I well, really wasn't. That what I perceived in my unformed brain I needed or wanted at the moment (to be able to be myself, whoever that was working itself out to be, for the photo, or not to take it at all) was not in any way being considered. Heck, I look like I am fuming in that photo.

I was a little bundle of hurt pride.

Over the years I have realized, as most of us, except deluded doted upon Hollywood Stars and the occasional millionaire/billionaire entrepreneur, do, that my pride hasn't been a good, or useful, trait.
Besides, it is one of the deadly sins. And when it comes down to it, it gets you nothing of that which you crave, validation, love, respect, attention.

But it's built in. It was built into at least some of the angels, Lucifer being the most obvious example. And clearly, it was built in to Adam and Eve, who decided that they wanted divinity on their terms. I suppose that it is a consequence of that free will given to us so that we could choose God, our Creator, over ourselves, in love and thanksgiving.  With free will, somehow there came pride and the inclination to be gods ourselves.

Pride is also cultivated by our parents, and society. I, at least, and I don't think my experience was unique, was given to understand that I was being watched very closely by the world, that I had to do well in everything. I had to achieve, and I had to worry about what things looked like. By my actions in achieving and being seen as achieving, I would, I must have come to reason, be "in control." Not to be exceptional and valued for that trait, was failure. The behavioral training that results in such distortion is innocent enough, and perhaps even necessary in molding the tabula rasa of a child's mind who would otherwise be inclined toward laziness. So, in my school, the measure of one's value as a student was either a gold bow or a blue bow, and if I recall one that was both. The bow was bestowed to be worn on your uniform blazer, if your grades were outstanding. The gold, of course, was for overall grades somewhere in the 95 region. I think the blue was in the region of 90-95.  I can tell you that my mother, as many a mother of the time, was not happy if I did not have a gold bow. I got it a lot. But not always. And that creeping pride was deeply wounded when I did not. Without it, my value appeared to diminish. This need to achieve to public consumption, or so it seemed this was the lesson, could arguably be said to have been at odds with the Catholic Christian goal (I was in Catholic School) of being last, rather than first. I know, its all more nuanced than that. It might have been that to be number one or as close as possible to it, was only for the Glory of God. But in my muddled child brain, I missed the nuance. I have apparently been missing it every since. I have a lot of growing up to do.

Two childhood examples. I am ashamed I should say up front that they still resonate with me, but there you are. I said I have a lot of growing up to do, and I ain't got much more time. But here goes. I had a partial scholarship to high school. Naturally, you had to maintain grades to keep it. I usually had that 95 average, but I was also very bad at algebra, and geometry, and anything having a number or curve. So, one year, my average fell to 93. The principal, or some other administrative staff nun, (at the time it was all nuns, now it is mostly lay people), called me to the office and told me I was in danger of losing my half scholarship. A 93 average wasn't good enough. Way earlier than that, back in say, fourth grade, though I was a good student, I liked to play with the other kids in our apple tree filled grassy knoll near the convent building. A classmate, and you can tell how much this affected me by the fact I remember her name, Claire Callahan, used to read during recess. As many a mother would do in trying to motivate their child to more approved behavior, she asked me why I wasn't more like Claire. In that Claire was number 1 in the class and I was close, but not there, as my mother and sister so and so reminded me more than once, this type of comment was bruising.

Like everyone else, I have a million examples, right up to the present day. I mean it cannot but be an assault on that carefully internalized prideful self to have a job for 25 years, to move up in the ranks, to be management, to have yearly commendable or exceptional reviews and then be dismissed in all of five minutes with the cliche, "We're going in a different direction. . . ." POW! It is today, five years after I was dismissed, to me, and to them, as if I never existed there.

It's a hard lesson, but trying to be number one, or getting the attention for our talents and achievements, is something a whole slew of people are doing, and we can't all get it. More than that, we aren't going to be consulted on most things, if anything at all. So being pouty about it is futile, and just plain stupid. Our hurt pride is irrelevant and corrosive. And doing things to be seen or rewarded, really is a mistaken notion, however motivating it might have been when we were young.

And it all goes back, in my mind, at least, to the Garden of Eden. Pride and grasping gets you precisely nothing. In fact, it loses Paradise.

Look at Christ. One day He was being lauded and hailed, with palms, as a king of the earth. As the Messiah who would conquer Rome in the way men expect to see victory. Another day he was being hammered into a Cross. He didn't view the moments in which he was lauded as having any meaning. He did not act out of pride. He lived and acted in utter humility. If He did well, He did it only to achieve His Father's mission, His own mission as the Second Person of the Trinity, to save the other, to save humanity itself.

I think pride, and its consequences, anger and resentment and fear, are my worst sins. I know this, because as I write, I feel them all with an intensity that makes me want to send the potted plant in front of me crashing to the terrazzo below.

I want to give them up. But it isn't as easy as giving up wine, or chocolate for forty days, and frankly, pride, anger, resentment, and fear, are things to shed completely, not only to obey God, but I believe in my gut, if any happiness on this earth is possible, before Eternal happiness in heaven.

My pride tells me I am being dismissed, all the time. Maybe I am being dismissed; maybe I am not. It shouldn't matter either way, if I am looking at the things of heaven rather than the things of this earth.
So, what I am praying about giving up for Lent is Pride. I pray God will give me the Grace, for the forty days, and for the duration of my days.

Ben-Hur, A Tale of the Christ: Life Has Been Answered

In this still from the movie, Judah Ben Hur tries to give water to Jesus Christ as he falls on His way to Golgotha. The cup is thrust from Ben Hur's hands by the guards who would deny any succor to the young rabbi who has aroused the wrath of Rome.

I have seen this three hour plus movie in whole or in part many times in my life and not until I saw it in its 70 mm technicolor splendor on a big screen at the Egyptian Theatre last weekend did I realize why the story of the fictional Ben-Hur is the "Tale of the Christ".

Before I explain, let me recapitulate the movie.  I shall try to condense the three hours plus to something manageable for this page!

Judah Ben-Hur (Charlton Heston) is a wealthy and prosperous young Jew, born at the same time as the Christ child. His best childhood friend is a Roman, named Messala (played by Stephen Boyd). When Messala returns to Judea to be right hand to the Governor of the region, the reunion of friends is marred permanently by Messala's request that Judah betray those in the Jewish Community who might be overtly rebellious to the Romans, which Judah rejects. He would do anything for his friend, but not that. Messala is outraged. The outrage goes beyond the political to the deeply personal. No one, especially Judah, can say no to Messala.

Circumstance and evil disposition provide Messala an opportunity for a vile revenge. While the crowd gathers to watch the Governor ride through the streets of Jerusalem, Judah and his sister, Tirzah, do so on the roof of their home. As Tirzah moves her hand along the tiles, several loose large ones fall and hit the Governor. It is an accident, but Messala allows it to condemn Judah and his mother, Miriam and Tirzah, they to the dungeons and Judah to the death work of being a galley slave.

As Judah is marched mercilessly to his fate, the Roman soldiers stop at a town, Nazareth, to water themselves and their horses. The guards forbid the townspeople from giving any to Judah. But one man, whose face we do not see, with long robe and flowing hair, brings a handled cup of life giving water to Judah. The man gently holds Judah's face as he drinks. Judah looks at him and somehow that man's act of kindness, interrupted by the angry soldiers only after Judah has managed to have his fill, gives Judah comfort. His will to live is supplied by his own desire to avenge himself and his family.

Judah Ben-Hur, for three years identified only as a number, "41", survives rowing below decks of various of Rome's battle ships, chained, whipped and starved. Most men survive merely a year of such deprivation and degradation. When a new commander, Quintus Arrius, is assigned the fleet, he tests the ship on which Judah serves for speed, a speed provided by the life's breath of these slaves. Something about Judah attracts Arrius, his strength, his rage,his faith in a God that will not abandon him, but also we come to realize, that the young man reminds Arrius of an only son who died. When battle is joined, inexplicably, Arrius orders that the chains which secure Judah to his place on the lower deck be loosed. When the enemy rams the ship, Judah is able to escape and help others escape. Arrius is thrown overboard during battle and Judah dives into the water to save him. Arrius is not amenable to being saved as he believes that the Fleet has been lost and tries to kill himself with his dagger, an attempt that Judah thwarts. The men are rescued. The battle was, in fact, won by Rome. Arrius is a hero. The Emperor gives Judah to Arrius as a slave, a reward to both of them. Judah becomes charioteer and victor of many races in the Circus under his benefactor's banner. Time passes and Arrius not only frees Judah, but adopts him as his son, with all the rights which pertain to adoption.

Judah longs for home and vindication, and he leaves Arrius' protection and returns to Judea. In time an opportunity presents itself, a celebration for another successor Governor, Pontius Pilate, a race among champions of horses and chariots. Messala is the champion for Rome. Judah is the champion for Judea. Judah believes his mother and sister dead, but Messala has located them in the depths of their prison, where they have contracted leprosy. They are released to the colony of lepers. Only one person from Judah's household knows where they are. She is Esther, who loves Judah, but who has been promised mother and daughter she will not reveal their condition or location.

Esther encourages Judah to listen to the young Rabbi who has been preaching salvation and forgiveness to the people of the area. But Judah is single minded in his mission to avenge.  As Esther settles onto the grass of a hill to hear the words of the Man, Judah at a great distance walks past the crowd unwilling to hear.

The day of the race brings Messala and Judah together. There are many champions, but Messala dispatches most of them using a device on the wheels of his chariot that cuts through the wood of those of the other contestants. His interceptions of Judah are dizzying in their intensity. He will be victorious over this Jew who defied him. Judah gives no quarter, but even in his desire for revenge, he acts with honor. Messala's rage has become madness. As he makes a final violent attack of his chariot on Judah's, he loses control and is thrown. Horses and chariots run over him. Judah is victorious. He is called a god among men by Pontius Pilate.

Mass is a mass of bloody flesh, but he is not dead. He calls for Judah. He is not finished with punishing Judah even as he cries out in pain on the edge of his end. In a last act of cruelty which he believes is triumph, Messala grabs Judah's shirt and reveals his mother and sister are alive, but are cast off lepers. In disgust and shock, Judah pulls Messala's dead hand from his clothes to go in search of his family. He finds them by following Esther, who has long been bringing them extra food and supplies.

Esther and Judah have heard of the miracles of the Rabbi who has been teaching in the country side. Judah is willing to do anything. even the remote possibility of healing. He will bring them to the man who preaches love and God's mercy. But when they arrive in Jerusalem, the people have gone to watch a Crucifixion. The itinerant preacher has been condemned to death. Judah wonders what the man could possibly have done to deserve such a fate. They find Him. Along with two other men, he has ben forced to walk to the place of their own deaths, carrying the crosses, the instruments of their punishment on their shoulders.

When the Man falls, and Simone of Cyrene, is pressed into service, Judah brings the water that the soldiers refuse Christ. Judah remembers Him. Their lives have come full circle.

As Christ is crucified, Judah watches transfixed.  Day becomes night. Miriam, Esther and Tirzah find safety in a nearby cave. The earth rumbles. The rain pours washing blood from the earth. Judah's anger and need for vengeance is, paradoxically, washed away as well.

As the tumult passes and the sun returns, Miriam and Tirze have been healed of their leprosy.

Christ's tale is Ben-Hur's tale. Christ's tale is our tale. That appears to be the take-away, at least for me. He made our tale His by becoming one of us, one of His creatures. It is Balthazar, one of the three Magi, whom the fictional story makes a friend of Ben-Hur, who remarks of Christ, "Life has been answered". We are restored to the possibility of eternity, that which Adam and Eve threw away of their own free will with their grasping of godhood, with their smug belief in their own power over their Creator's.  Ben-Hur was treated horribly by a person who had power over him. He was unjustly judged and punished. And yet, God in his mercy, put moments and people in his path that provide hope and promise of the Good.  Christ was treated horribly by Rome and his own people, who had authority over him. He was unjustly judged and punished unto death.  Anno Domini: After the Lord. After the Lord injustice and death look to be the victors (like Messala) but they are not!  When Christ died on the cross it only appeared that everything was over, but in fact, there was this miracle, this great miracle. Resurrection. Hope. And always, He is giving us little promises along the way, little intersecting comforts that keep us going, if only we will have faith, and not be angry and vengeful. Suffering still exists indeed, but no longer will it vanquish.  We have a choice to make, each of us. Will we see and accept that suffering is no longer an end of life, but a door? It is the same door that the Man on the Cross passed through and through which He holds his Hand to us.

Through His wounds we are healed. It is just a matter of faith. Therein lies the rub. We have to believe that life has been answered.

Blast from the Past

Funny how things pop into your mind. And what provokes them. I have been having a lazy day. Got up late. Talked to my Aunt Teri, the last of my mother's three sisters still alive, who called from Manhattan, which is already seeing snow and wind of the Blizzard of 2016. Had just decided to take a late shower and thought I'd switch on one of the DIRECTV digital stations in the 800s on the dial for some music background for my ablutions.

Wasn't feeling in a classical mood. Nor was I of a rockin' disposition. And then I lighted on the instrumental station. I went into the kitchen to see if one of the hummingbirds that have taken to the feeder was whisking about. I could hear them. Their wing sounds are palpable to the ear. The TV was playing "Send in the Clowns". I found myself tearing up and harking back to many years ago when I was a child in New York, in the Bronx, in that little apartment near the Grand Concourse. 

It might have been a day off from school, because of a snow storm, relatively rare in the city (just as this weekend in the City I left 35 years ago) but always welcome. And with my mother puttering around, windexing the many mirrors, dusting, making a list for the A and P, the background sounds were the instrumentals of WPAT. They came to call it elevator music, something you pay no attention to these days. But it was my mother's favorite station. And pretty much the only one allowed in our house when dad wasn't accompanying his vinyl Latin or Italian records on his mandolin.

When I think of it, I think of her, as I did, standing in the kitchen 50 years and 3000 miles away from that place and time. 

Cozy wouldn't be the word I'd use to describe life with my mother, but in those moments, warm and safe in the large tri-part five story brick building in that 50.00 one bedroom apartment with my mother silently shuffling around, cozy is the only way to describe the feeling then, and now, as I remember it.

My mother has been dead 42 years. I can hardly conjure that life of ours any longer, so much has happened since then, until I heard a little instrumental and there was WPAT, and my mother, as they were. As another song says, "The Way We Were". 

Back to California on a hazy sunny January 2016 day, and the shower I put off to bask in a serene sensation of the past.

Thoughts (Out of Left Field) about Janis Joplin

The other night I was flipping the television dials. How many channels do I have? Still, I could not find anything I wanted to watch. So I went on the paid DirecTV menu and found a documentary on Janis Joplin. For $5.99.  I could have seen it when it came out for free on PBS on American Masters. Well therein lies a lament for another time.

Anyway. I don't know what it is about Janis Joplin. She has been dead since 1970. I was 16 years old, and one would think that she was part of the tapestry of my baby boomer life of those days. She wasn't. Oh, I was aware of her. The sixties were not a decade to be ignored and neither was the change from what some might have called traditional and staid, to anti-establishment and free wheeling without impact on the most overprotected teenager. Still, at that point, as a Sophomore in high school, I was just starting to catch up to my generation. Well, truth be told, I never caught up. I was one of those few of my generation who stayed staid, as it were, while my peers were free wheeling it.

I probably, no, I did, mimic, my parents' disdain for rock and roll, while secretly wanting to partake in that small taste of the "illicit". Well, for a while. But I was immersed in the culture, even with all the boundaries placed by Catholic School and strict parents and the music at least leaked into my bedroom and onto my portable vinyl turntable. But I started in bubble gum, like The Monkees, not in blues inspired screaming (in Joplin's case) rock and roll.

But as the years have passed I realize that I have absorbed the music of my generation and much of it I like. When I had a career, I used to drive up to San Francisco to teach classes at our office up there, and as I drove on the 5, I reveled in singing along, as loudly as I could manage, to Janis' rendition of "Me and Bobby McGee".

I knew the story somewhat. She left home pretty young, feeling penned in by her small town family and their small town values. Now there was a girl, about 11 years older than me, so likely more easily captured by the changing culture, who bought it all. Free love and drugs. Lots and lots of both. She had her last meal at Barney's Beanery (which is probably still on the Hollywood Van Tours) and then went back to the Landmark Hotel where she overdosed and died beside her bed. She was 27.

But I would occasionally see clips of her, one in particular, that just made me so sad. She told Dick Cavett that she was going back to her high school for the tenth year reunion. It became clear that she was hoping to go back triumphant to a student body that had rejected her for being different. She didn't want the traditional. She didn't want the ordinary career. She just had to give in to her inner energy, call it even her inner animal. They thought her a fool when she came in her odd headdress and slightly addled presentation. There is a clip of her unwelcome visit. And she hurt again. And all that success, all that love on the stage from her millions of fans could not compensate. Did she have a spiritual life? There is no mention of religion in the documentary, old time or otherwise. Would that have given her succor?

In conversation, she seemed nearly shy and exhibited a lingering old school girlishness. When she sang, she exploded, and truth be told, watching her I was just a little wistful that I didn't, just a little, rebel when I had the chance (if I had the chance which I am not sure about).

I just couldn't take my eyes off her cavorting in these 45 year old clips. Such a walking contradiction this girl. I wish I could talk to her. I would ask her if it was worth it, burning through her life. 27 is very young. I cannot imagine that the answer would be yes. She had a brother and sister who lived, it appears, ordinary lives. Would she have wanted that, finally?

We have nothing in common right? We are all human. Of course we do. Paradoxically, perhaps, as the 60s concluded and the 70s began, those of us who did not join the rock train (with all its life style connotations and denotations) found ourselves unwelcome to members of our own generation. We weren't "groovy", or "cool". We were "repressed".  Well, maybe they were right about that. It hurt to be rejected. But I found my niche in this world. And am grateful for things as they happened in largest part.

I was whatever one calls a female nerd. Still am, truth be told. Do I regret being so determinedly a rule follower, now that I am approaching a senior hood that Janis never did? Yeah. Sometimes I do. It is ever so transient, but it is palpable. And then I dismiss it. I am alive. And there is still time to have adventures. I don't need to use drugs to have them. I just need to let go of long standing fears. There is something between staid and reckless.

"I'll Be Me"

I know. My entries of late, infrequent as I know they are, have also been on "serious" subjects. More than one of my readers have suggested that they have been downright depressing. So, given that my subject today is that disease, often put under the general labels of Alzheimer's or dementia, I realize that I am taking a chance on driving my few "fans" away.

For me, though, neither this subject, as poignantly presented by a documentary on the Wrecking Crew member turned famous singer, songwriter, and actor, nor the others on which I have found myself reflecting in these pages, is coming from a depressive place within me. Struggle as I have, and do, as we all have and done, with internal demons, I am actually mostly in one of the most psychologically happy places that I have been in many a year. I guess I just don't actually find the subjects of old age and the diminished condition that often (not always as I can attest in dealing with one 94 year old with a quick memory) is consequent to the gift of long life depressing. I wish I could explain why with any clarity. It might be the result of my faith, which fitful though it is, grounds me in a sense of purpose, notwithstanding the presence of struggle and suffering, or even because of the presence of struggle and suffering. As a practicing (emphasis on it being practice) Catholic, I have come more and more to immerse myself in the Theology of Suffering, that starts with the Fall of Adam and Eve, moves through the events of the Old Testament, into the New with Christ's entry into time and the paradoxical transformation of Suffering via Resurrection. But trying to talk about that just gets too knotty, even to me. Maybe it is more visceral than intellectual. I really see I can't explain why it is not depressing to me (maybe it will be when my version happens to me if I live long enough), except to say that in all of this is an experience of the heroic spark of life in we human beings. A feisty spark that makes me want to smile and cry at the same time.

Let me put it imperfectly this way as it pertains to the Glen Campbell documentary, "I'll Be Me", I never appreciated the talent, the essence of a person (in this case one I don't know personally, but it is true or truer to me in the case of someone I have known) until being exposed to the reality of its loss.
Until then, the brilliance, the warmth, the whatever identifies a friend, a relative, a performer, a writer, you name it, we/I take for granted.

Glen Campbell has been around for most of my life. I used to watch his television show. I loved some of his songs back in the sixties. I can still remember singing along to Wichita Lineman in our first Bronx apartment, wishing I had that depth of voice. He was this young, brash character in True Grit. It was only recently I found out that he was part of that sessions group that backed up many a famous album without credit in the 1960s, before singular fame found him. But in many ways, as many human beings are to us, he was a backdrop to my life. As if he'd always be there. Always as he was.

In 2011 besieged by forgetfulness, Campbell was diagnosed with Alzheimer's. He was forgetting major things. He was forgetting names of people he loved. His wife (he has had several and a number of kids, three of whom are musicians in this documentary) thought to take one more tour, a final tour. Glen Campbell probably did not realize it was a final tour. He heard the diagnosis, but as you watch, it is not clear he really understands the enormity of it. He does what we all do. He attributes the problems he is having to something insignificant--he doesn't need the information he can't recall any longer. What he still has, for the duration of most of the film, for about one year, is the music that is in his bones. When his wife suggests the filming of the tour, as if it is sort of a fictional movie, Glen provides the title. He says, "I''ll be me."  And that of course is what we see. As he is losing pieces of himself, the memories of a successful professional life, and the joys and sadness of his personal life, in the music he is still very much present and whole.

He is ordinary. He is extraordinary. At once. He is a human being whose brilliance is oddly not diminished through the movie, despite the soon to be crippling disease. We know how it's going to end. He won't be able to continue after a while. But we capture him while he still can, for posterity. For us. For his family. To give impetus to fight a disease that will affect many a baby boomer just behind him.

All Alzheimer's is a form of dementia, but not all dementia is Alzheimer's. I have known or do know several people who have had the stroke induced type of dementia. The symptoms are much the same. You become the repository of their memories because they no longer have them. And yet, in every one, there is this kernel, this insistence on remaining, "me". And it is miraculous even as each loss of the everyday person you used to know occurs. Words really can't express.

This movie. This following of Glen Campbell, who now I have read is probably close to death, three years after the end of this documentary, if you watch it, you come away with an affection, an appreciation, an amazement at the human spirit that just can't be expressed. But most of all for me at least it can't be summed up with the word, "depressing." Oh, to be sure, sad, depressing, are there, but the totality is neither. Awe maybe. Or maybe, because of my faith, I see something that is intended to be, will be, eternal, appearances to the contrary notwithstanding.

I'Anyway, I recommend the documentary, for what that is worth.