Perceptions

I've been reading the fascinating book, Musicophilia, by Oliver Sacks, a neurologist. He writes about musical maladies and phenomena, such as those of folks who get struck by lightning or are injured in an accident and suddenly discover a new interest in playing piano, composing or listening to classical music. He includes a chapter on "idiot savants," who typically are male and have one amazing ability -- such as total recall of music they've only heard once with the talent to play it on the piano and transpose it to any other key. Another chapter addresses people who lose hearing in one ear and then compensate for not being able to hear in stereo by moving their heads slightly while listening and/or compensating by developing additional brain skills.

A chapter on absolute or perfect pitch suggests that most of us might have been born with absolute pitch but failed to recognize and develop it, and therefore lost it, when we learned language skills. This is supported by the high percentage of people who speak a tonal language, such as Chinese, who have perfect pitch, compared to persons who speak non-tonal languages such as English.

The general concept that struck me most is that listening to music requires the coordination of a multitude of skills. Of course, we hear the basic elements of pitch and rhythm, but we also hear tone, timbre, loudness, tempo, contour (rise and fall), spatial location, and reverberation. People with absolute pitch notice another element, which some call "chroma" -- such as the personality of an F# or Ab. Hairs in our ears, the shapes of our inner and outer ears, and other aspects of our ear physiology receive these elements and our brains combine our receptions into a listening experience. Some ears and brains lack certain capabilities, bringing a different experience to their humans, which at times can be irritating or disappointing, especially in the event of a change caused by an injury or illness. Similar differences happen with sight and, I suppose, the other senses.

"So what I see and hear may be different from what you see and hear," says Virginia.

Exactly. I recently discussed this with an artist friend, who recalled that once upon a time when she was lying in bed with one eye closed, she noticed that the wall was -- I forget what she said -- let's say pink. She happened to close that eye and open the other and saw that the same wall was another color, let's say orange.

I had a similar experience about 25 years ago, but mine was auditory. I was on a telephone call. When I was put on hold I noticed that the music being played to entertain me while I waited moved up a half-step. I thought, "now, why would they do that?" A little later, it moved back down a half-step. Then it moved up again. Eventually I realized the pitch changed whenever I got tired of holding the phone with one hand and switched it to my other ear. This hasn't bothered me. My brain normally takes what I'm hearing through two ears and interprets it as one pitch, which happens to be the "correct" one. At least, people who hear me sing say I'm in tune. I suppose they could be humoring me.

I recently heard a singer performing flat, on every song. I had enough bad taste to ask a couple other people if they agreed with me. They did. Having read Musicophilia, next time I'll be more considerate.

Silent Spring

My online bookclub associate and I have begun reading Silent Spring by Rachel Carson as our "classic" for June.  Many credit this book for kicking off the "enviromental movement."  My father, a biologist, read it back in 1962 when it came out and promptly began using it in his university classes and occasionally at our dinner table.

I'm still near the beginning of this book, but I'm astounded how "current" some of it remains.  I read recently that the purple boxes hanging from trees in Virginia are part of an effort to study the movement of emerald ash borers from North to South.  When I heard a couple years ago that my hometown of Bluffton, Ohio has lost most, if not all, of its mature ash trees, I thought, does this mean the ash trees on our farm will soon follow suit?

Here's what Rachel Carson wrote about elm trees.  I imagine we could insert "ash" each time "elm" appears and it would remain fairly accurate:

"The same thing happens in other situations.  A generation or more ago, the towns of large areas of the United States lined their streets with the noble elm tree.  Now the beauty they hopefully created is threatened with complete destruction as disease sweeps through the elms, carried by a beetle that would have only limited chance to build up large populations and to spread from tree to tree if the elms were only occasional trees in a richly diversified planting."

I remember thinking back when elm trees were being destroyed that it was such a shame, that nature would do this to a variety of tree.  I didn't know then it was our fault -- concentrated planting.  Or that the same sort of thing happens when farmers plant thousands of acres of one crop -- and we find ourselves "needing" pesticides to control insects that descend on huge fields.  And then, as Carson wrote so long ago, the insects develop super-species immune to those pesticides, while the pesticide residues remain in soils, streams, water supplies, and eventually, human cells, mother's milk and embryos.

50 years later, the processes described in Silent Spring continue.  Most of us are oblivious.  History remains a class we suffer through and forget.

"Shame on us," says Virginia.

Living on a Few Acres

Michael Lewis, in The Big Short, mentions Ben Hockett, who like the two founders of Cornwall Capital, believed "that people, and markets, tended to underestimate the probability of extreme changes."  Unlike them, he was concerned about global warming and other real life disasters, so Ben "bought a small farm in the country north of San Francisco, in a remote place without road access, planted with fruit and vegetables sufficient to feed his family, on the off chance of the end of the world as we know it."  (Page 120)

Now, I like Michael Lewis and think he's mostly right about the subprime mortgage lending debacle, but this picture of buying a farm "planted with fruit and vegetables" is what gets many city slickers into trouble.  Unless the farm comes with hired help who are staying on top of everything, you might find it planted with fruit, but you won't find it planted with vegetables "sufficient to feed [a] family."  It won't get there without a lot of back-breaking exercise, experimentation and persistence.

Not that I know much about it.  Ask me in another ten years.

"Come on now," says Virginia.  "Tell the truth."

The truth is, we've barely started.  We still visit a grocery store almost every week and I'm not so sure I want to eliminate those visits.  I've been looking for chocolate, toilet paper, ice cream salt and new running shorts, and haven't found 'em yet on this little farm. 

Plain Vanilla

I normally prefer mint chocolate chip, but if I had to choose one flavor, I'd pick plain vanilla, to which I can always add chocolate, raspberries, chocolate chips, or whatever else my mood desires.

As I read articles by industry insiders, I'm struck by the generally negative attitude toward the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, as if it would be traitorous not to gripe.

If you think about it, you'll realize the bill is good for most of the commentators.  It basically offers lifetime security to compliance officers and banking lawyers.  They might as well gripe, if that endears them to the corporate teams who hire them.

Two provisions have wide support, even within in the business world.  Title I creates the Financial Stability Oversight Council to keep an eye on players whose activities "threaten the financial stability of the United States," a/k/a "systemic risk."  The Council's task is to identify risks like those created by subprime lending so it can head each risk off at the pass.

The other likable move is Title II, which sets up a liquidation process for firms that pose systemic risk and are on the verge of default.  The Federal government did not have a process like this handy the last time around, other than bankruptcy, which is chosen by a company or its creditors, not the government.  Now, the government can take over the firm and wind down its affairs, not perpetuate it by offering a bailout.  Once a firm enters the process, the only way out is its death.  The bill specifically prohibits the use of taxpayer funds, except for limited loans that can only be made if the firm's assets can and will repay them.  Shareholders and creditors are out of luck until the loans have been repaid.  They will get nothing unless money remains on the table after the firms assets have been liquidated.

These two provisions are easy to support because they don't affect "us."  They only bother the bad guys.

"But what about all the limitations, especially those on mortgages?" asks Virginia.  "Will we consumers be left with few choices, just 'plain vanilla' products?"

"Plain vanilla" seems to have gained currency as the favorite derogatory term to throw at Title XIV (mortgage reform).  Forget, shall we, that the most popular ice cream flavor remains "plain vanilla."  I seriously doubt that consumers are going to miss prepayment penalties, mandatory arbitration clauses or flimsy, virtually nonexistent underwriting standards.  Maybe lenders will, but prior to the 1990s, all of us lived without these features for many years.  Even back then, we had choices -- including adjustable rate and graduated payment mortgages.  Let me hedge the future.  I'm willing to bet that lenders will continue to offer many choices.

Flexibility

We met a couple yesterday who said their life's word is "flexibility."  They stole it from us -- more accurately, from Karen.

I've been thinking about moving to New Zealand.  People who know us may say, yes, no surprise, they've been in Virginia for 8 years.  They were in North Carolina 8 years, and Missouri 6 years, maybe it's time to move.

Actually, we're finally settling in, getting our little farm underway with productive gardens and livestock.  It feels comfortable here, usually.

Then I read a book like Wild Fire by Nelson DeMille, about a group of rich and "powerful" men who implement a plan to invoke the U.S. government's imbedded response to an Islamic fundamentalist attack on a U.S. city.  The response, with the code name "Wild Fire," has been set up to "automatically" launch nuclear attacks on Muslim world centers.  The President has only a 30-minute window to stop Wild Fire.  What does this group of men do?  They place four suitcase nuclear bombs in two American cities to fake an Islamic nuclear attack and provoke Wild Fire.

Of course, our hero, John Cory, and his wife, Kate Mayfield, save the moment, but John warns that it's going to happen one of these days.

I'm not sure New Zealand would offer a real refuge from the madness, but it might be as good as it gets.  Maybe we could find a farm for sale at a reasonable price isolated somewhere on the South Island.  A couple times a year we could visit Christchurch, Wellington or Auckland for some live music and city "culture."  Friends and family could fly in for month-long visits, stay in a bach somewhere on the 3000 acres we aren't using, and help us harvest beyond-organic crops and milk the goats and donkeys.

Virginia says, "When the bombs fall, we could hoe away until the breezes kill us."

Suits and Stuffed Shirts

Seventeen wonderful years ago I arrived at work on a Friday, rode the elevator to the ninth floor, strode the hallway to my office, and hung my sport coat on a hook. At my other office in St. Louis, this was "casual" Friday. In Stamford I was about to learn there was no such thing.

Two hours later, our director of human resources entered my office and closed the door. "James," said this guardian of political correctness, "[The boss] noticed you were wearing a sport coat this morning. Suits are required on this floor." (Even though we took them off as soon as we arrived.)

That was Citi then. Look at Citi now.

In contrast, consider Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia, a company whose benefits include flextime so employees can go surfing or skiing when the weather is right or stay home with a sick child, and the freedom to dress as they like, including bare feet. In 2006, this Moses published Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman." Last year, Patagonia experienced its most success in years.

Here's what Chouinard had to say: "I love recessions for business reasons. No. 1, a recession kills the competition [unless they're 'too big to fail]. No. 2, your customers stop being silly and stop buying fashion stuff. They buy things they need and things that will last a long time. They don't mind paying more as long as it's high-quality. What they do is what we should all be doing, which is consuming less and consuming better."

Meanwhile, our recent Presidents simply urge us to spend, spend, spend. Yes, but the spending should be on things we need -- alternative energy research, local production of food and other goods, and improved health care. According to Chouinard, one in 8 women will develop breast cancer. That's up from one in 40 before the widespread use of pesticides! We must reorder our priorities.

Virginia says, "Did you notice what he said about 'wait and see?' 'There's no difference between an optimist who says 'Don't bother, it'll all be fine,' and the pessimist who says 'Don't bother, it's all hopeless.'"

I'm afraid we'll be fighting over the environment until it's over. Chouinard quotes the "Pentagon" as saying war will be endless now because we're going to be fighting over the last resources. Maybe, just in time, as in a suspense novel, smart young people will create solutions.

I bet they won't be wearing suits.

P.S. (1/10/10).   Barbara Kingsolver, in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, observes:  "In 1965, U.S. farmers used 335 million pounds of pesticides.  In 1989 they used 806 million pounds.  Less than ten years after that, it was 985 million.  That's three and a half pounds of chemicals for every person in the country, at a cost of $8 billion.  Twenty percent of these approved-for-use pesticides are listed by the EPA as carcinogenic in humans.

"So how are the bugs holding out?  Just fine.  In 1948, when pesticides were first introduced, farmers used roughly 50 million pounds of them and suffered about a 7 percent loss of all their field crops.  By comparison, in 2000 they used nearly a billion pounds of pesticides.  Crop losses?  Thirteen percent."

The World of Nonfiction

We drove fifty miles, twenty-five there and back, along newly cleared roads to play piano while a huge crowd of six singers, later a total of eight after two late arrivals, participated in the first annual Messiah Sing-In. Years from now, someone said, stories will be told of this first attempt, two hundred fifty years after the first Messiah performance on Christmas Day. On another Christmas day, one also noted, the members of a church prayed while a woman went under the knife to have a huge abdominal cyst removed, without anesthesia. She lived 33 more years instead of dying as she and everyone, including her doctor, expected.

Wikipedia could, of course, be wrong. It says the first performance of Handel's Messiah took place on April 13, 1742 in Dublin, Ireland. (It's possible the date of Christmas Day has changed since then.) It also says the work is often incorrectly called The Messiah. I have two editions of the masterwork -- the Schirmer edition is entitled The Messiah and (the) Fischer version simply says Messiah. I'm sure this matters deeply to some people.

I remember speaking with a friend about books. After I mentioned a couple fiction novels, he said, "I don't know them. I read only nonfiction." I think I must have laughed. I said something like, "So when you read nonfiction, do you think every word is true?" He laughed, too. "I guess you're right. I do read fiction."

I sometimes wonder how much of what I write and say is true. In a way, I feel more comfortable with fiction because it contains truth without facts. Well, perhaps I should say "real facts." I realize many people fuss about the facts contained in books like the Harry Potter series, and some publishers have internal consistency fact-checkers. One of my editors is especially good at this. She can be a pest, but I know I need her, especially as my mind moves more and more into fiction.

It happens to most of us. As we age, we build one inaccuracy on another after another. I can wait (see my posting entitled "Speeding," November 30, 2009), but it should be great fun when I'm ninety and my life has become exponentially inaccurate. I hope I'm perfectly sane and well-minded when that time comes even though other people may think I'm living in a world of total fiction. I will ask them, now and then, whether they realize they are, too. Imagine an elderly novelist, fact-checking every day. "Is that for real, James?"

"You're nuts," says Virginia, "but who am I to say? After all, if you weren't, I wouldn't be here."

Boxed In

For the second day we're boxed in.  I'd say "snowed in" but that's not true.  The hard-copy roadways are clear.  Virtual highways are the problem.  Saturday's snow has given unintended meaning to the new name of Embarq (formerly Sprint).  CenturyLink has returned us to the twentieth century.  No Internet.  No Email.  Karen called in.  The message said Virginia's off-line, give us 24 hours.  How about 48?

So all I can do is work inside the box, my laptop.  It's too muddy to work outdoors.  If you're reading this on November 7, it's because I've made it to the library.

Gosh, look at all these books, all this paper.  They remind me of 35 years ago when I first started moving and had to carry tens of boxes of books.  Loaded bookshelves were a good way to brag about eccentric interests.  Now if you have interests, you must be and do or no one will ever know.

"Or you will never know," says Virginia.  There's a big difference between a bookshelf and a read book, and between a read book and knowing what you've read.

Moss: "Nothing Tastes as Good as Skinny Feels"

The syntax of Kate Moss's currently controversial quote intrigues me. The fashion model reportedly said, "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels." She deserves a poetry prize.

Disregarding syntax for the moment, I think the eating disorder critics might not be out of line: "Healthy tastes better than skinny hurts." On the other hand, I don't know her, but I suspect Ms. Moss meant to say "thin" instead of "skinny." "Skinny" means "unattractively thin." "Thin" offers alternatives.

That takes care of that. Now for the intrigue, her comparison of taste with feel. I know less about Ms. Moss than I do about Fyodor Dostoevsky, whose novel Crime and Punishment my online book club is reading. Giving Ms. Moss the benefit of the doubt, let's treat her as kindly as we would Mr. Dostoevsky.

1. When she said "feels," she probably wasn't, but might have been, attempting to compare two of the five senses (taste, touch, sight, smell, and hearing). Picture her hugging herself, thinking "thinness feels good. I'd rather feel this than taste my favorite food."

2. More likely, she was associating taste with emotional feeling. Now picture her sitting in her favorite armchair, eyes closed, arms resting lightly on soft upholstery, thinking how wonderful it is to be thin.

3. I doubt it, but she, like Tommy, the pinball wizard, might have been suggesting that someone else compare two of the senses, as in "Lover of mine, wouldn't you rather feel me thin than taste your favorite food?"

4. We could also consider her choice of the word "taste" over "eat," which casts a very different light on her possible intent. Think of a taster -- of wine or food -- who sees the object, smells it, touches it, tastes it, and maybe even hears it (compare, for example, marshmallows and peanuts), and doesn't swallow. Eat your hearts out, eating disorder critics.

Virginia whispers, "Nothing tastes as good as thinness feels with a little fat and muscle."

Black Friday

My oldest brother sent an email wishing his siblings a relaxing day. Each year we rent a log splitter for one day and split the pile of wood we've collected since the last rental. Today was that day.

After eight hours with the machine, I'm physically spent, but I'm relaxed. The exercise took me away from both my professional writing and piano practicing. I had to stay alert to move the wood and operate the machine, but otherwise my mind wandered freely and unfettered. I didn't worry about the credit troubles of Dubai, whether folks were trampling each other to death for store bargains, or about people spending money on things others don't want.

George F. Will's column yesterday foresaw another "huge, value destroying hurricane" beginning today -- that is, the annual Christmas buying binge that instantly destroys billions of dollars of value. Referring to Joel Waldfogel's book, Scroogenomics: Why You Shouldn't Buy Presents for the Holidays, he claims that the gifts people buy for other people are usually poorly matched to their preferences. What the gift recipients would be willing to pay for the gifts is less than the givers paid. That difference is lost value -- estimated by Waldfogel at $12 billion in the 2007 Christmas season. Interesting, according to Will, data from 1919 shows that Christmas sales as a share of the economy are about half as large today as they once were. Cheers!

Why is today called "Black Friday?" Wikipedia offers two explanations. Some say it originated in Philadelphia, where the police used the term to describe the traffic resulting from millions going shopping the day after Thanksgiving. Merchants and the media use it to refer to the beginning of the period in which retailers go from being in the red to being in the black.

I didn't worry about Black Friday, even though I was among the shoppers at the Lexington Wal-Mart at 7:45 this morning. (Minutes later, I was the only customer at Green Valley Rentals.) All I spent was about $7 on a 2" ball trailer hitch, so I zipped through a self-service lane while others waited nearby with loaded carts. Knowing all those people were juicing up our economy eased my mind until Virginia whispered, "Did you notice all of them are using credit cards?"

"Oh shush," said I. "Most likely, they're taking advantage of their free-ride period. They'll pay everything off in 30 days."

Cool. I relaxed today.

Selfishness

When I'm not bleeding, I don't think about band-aids unless someone close to me is bleeding or I've written "band-aids" on our grocery list.

Our home sits high on a hill above Elk Creek and the James River, so when it rains long I don't worry about flooding.

Because we've set aside a fair amount of savings, I don't fret much about the recession we hope is almost over. That's not true. I do worry. Some of our investments have taken it on the chin, and I have a sneaking suspicion we're not climbing out of this thing -- that there is much more to come.

It's easy not to worry when we feel safe and sound. Then, all of a sudden, something changes.

The highest point on the 1200-some islands of the Maldives is no more than several feet above sea level. If I lived there, I'm sure I would think a lot more about global warming than I do seven hundred feet higher. Where I live, we have the luxury of debating whether or not global warming is occurring.

An overwhelming crowd of experts says it's happening. Others dispute it. If I lived in the Maldives, I'd be getting pretty upset about the rest of the world's failure to take every step possible to reduce the globe's warming. We who think we're safe now must not be selfish. We must not ignore the Maldives. If the day comes when we watch islanders scramble for dry land, we'd better be prepared for more trouble.

I first heard that global warming is a conspiracy of the Democrats in 2000 when I overheard a conversation in the cafeteria of a children's hospital. Our son was recuperating from a bowel resection. Why, I wondered, would any political party engage in this kind of conspiracy? Since then, we've wasted nearly ten years of opportunity in nonproductive debate.

In Natural Capitalism, Hawkens, Lovins and Lovins not only pointed out that reducing our carbon footprint makes economic sense, they provided hundreds of examples of what businesses and countries around the world have done to take advantage of this cash cow. So, even if global warming were a hoax or not induced by human activity, the measures we take to reduce carbon emissions are likely to make sense.

Virginia says, "read the book even though it's ancient history by now." (It was published in 1999.) Or try to catch Lovins when he speaks near you. Maybe you've read some of the many depressing, doom-saying books. Natural Capitalism is an optimistic description of an approach that works.

All [Wo]Men are Created Equal

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal...."

This phrase appears in:
(a) the Bible.
(b) the United States Constitution.
(c) the Declaration of Independence of the United States.
(d) the Gettysburg Address.
(e) both (c) and (d).

If you're wondering about the right answer, perhaps a Google search will help you out. I suspect this is one question that would draw a lot of (a) answers in a poll of Americans.

Where did the statement "all men are created equal" originate? Some say Thomas Jefferson wrote it to express dissatisfaction with the privileges of royalty.

Now consider this: The phrase is -- (a) true, or (b) false.

A Google search may help answer this question, too. Think of the babies born around the world and whether their parents can do a Google search. Some can, some can't. Are those babies created equal?

Some would say they aren't. Certain babies clearly have advantages others don't have -- such as higher levels of wealth, intelligence, physical ability, and beauty -- yet we have seen that an abundance of one talent over another doesn't necessarily mean that person will "succeed" more than someone with less talent; Witness, Michael Jackson or John Forbes Nash, Jr. (whose schizophrenia is shown in The Beautiful Mind). Thomas Hobbes (The Leviathan) suggested that when all is taken into account, the difference between one human and another is not so great that one may reasonably pretend to be more valuable than someone else.

I think Hobbes was right, and that one of the mistakes we make is to over-emphasize specialized talent, such as a biologist, a mathematician, a writer, or a lawyer. Wendell Berry, in Citizenship Papers, writes: "Facts in isolation are false. The more isolated a fact or a set of facts is, the more false it is. A fact is true in the absolute sense only in association with all facts. This is why the departmentalization of knowledge in our colleges and universities is fundamentally wrong."

Time, the magazine, has struck out twice on this topic in recent issues. A couple weeks ago, an article bemoaned the fact that budget cuts have "trimmed starting pay at major airlines to $36,000 -- little more than a grade school teacher's." This week's article on five lessons we can learn from China quoted a young Chinese engineer as saying none of his descendants would ever work in the wheat fields again, as an example of the lesson, "Look over the horizon." What are we being asked to buy into -- that grade school teachers aren't worth as much as airline pilots and that farmers are less valuable than engineers?

Nonsense. If I were to choose people I admire for their expertise, I would include a fine farmer among them. A successful farmer is the quintessential "Renaissance" person -- meteorologist, mechanic, chemist, biologist, environmentalist, reader, scientific experimenter, athlete, economist, manager and more. I would also include an excellent grade school teacher, someone who, like the farmer, wends a wide knowledge of living into a class experience.

Karen, Virginia and I have discussed an ideal university. The students arrive in early summer (in our climate) to build a dormitory and grow food so as to be prepared for cooler weather in the Fall. As they pound nails and hoe weeds, they discuss relevant mathematical and engineering principles, as well as books they have read. Their entire learning experience is built around living experience.

And It Was Very Good

Many folks see evolution as a call to arms. Some of them judge anyone who thinks evolution has merits to be not a "Christian."

I don't get it. I thought "Christian" referred to belief in Christ, whose teachings appear in the New Testament, not the Old, and who, as I recall (my memory could be faulty) did not discuss evolution.

When I turn to Genesis 1, I find the 7-day creation story these folks think is critical to Christian thought. As I read it, Genesis 1 gives the following schematic:

Day 0: A formless, watery void.

Day 1: Light.

Day 2: Sky.

Day 3: Dry land ("earth") and the "seas."

Day 4: Sun, moon and stars.

Day 5: Living creatures (but not humans).

Day 6: Humankind.

Day 7: Rest.

I admit that making this neat list from the sometimes ambiguous language might be risky, but I think I have the basic elements "correct."

Don't stop! There's more. Genesis 2 mixes things up a bit. In Genesis 2, man is created earlier than the "animal of the field" and "every bird of the air," sort of throwing a wrench in the science of the 7-day story of Genesis 1.

Why, I ask, does the Bible begin with such a remarkable inconsistency? Could it be a warning that the words that follow should not be read "literally?"

When one of her neighbors welcomed Virginia to Sin Valley, she carried a gift. "If you're going to live in this church," she said, "then you need one of these." "Thank you," said Virginia, as she placed the new Bible on a dirty, dusty mantle and went back to work.


P.S. (1/10/10).  Barbara Kingsolver, in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle offers a real-world example of evolution:  "More than 500 species of insects and mites now resist our chemical controls [pesticides], along with over 150 viruses and other plant pathogens.  More than 270 of our recently developed herbicides have now become ineffective for controlling some weeds.  Some 300 weed species resist all herbicides."

Picking Peas in November

I picked peas this morning, enough for one good serving or to flavor the soup Karen's planning to make for dinner. I think Barbara Kingsolver (Animal, Vegetable, Miracle) is firming Karen's localvore resolve. We produce a large portion of what we eat, but haven't eliminated our grocery bill. I like to think that's coming.

The more I read and hear about the food sold in stores, the more I wonder if that's the biggest reason why each of us is at high risk for cancers. Most of us think either too little about what we put in our mouths or too much about it for the wrong reason -- "I'm too fat."

I'm looking forward to tasting goat meat. At the same time, I'm a bit queasy about eating Chaps or Telly. Maybe the best way to go about this is to find another goatherd and trade butchered animals (without mentioning any names). When my college roommate called this morning, he mentioned that a goat resides in their freezer. He said nothing about its name or breed. He said the one dish they've made so far, a curry dish, was very good, not at all "gamey" and more like beef or chicken than lamb.

Speaking of chicken, I'm working up to wringing my first neck, maybe next Spring. So far, each of our 10 hens has been focused on laying eggs so as not to draw attention to itself. The rooster, Puck, has come the closest to roasting, having not prompted anyone to go broody, but we've promised him leniency through at least one Springtime.

Virginia is a localvore, without being radical about it. Mung, down the road from her place, is the rich radical.

Rumors a/k/a Wishful Thinking

A friend recently gave me a draft of a poem about rumors. A rumor is the result of egos working, trying to lift up someone by pulling down someone else.

I've fortuitously found myself reading something else right on point, Kafka's "The Castle." The novel is a story of a village and a nearby castle that exists -- more than that, depends -- on rumors. Everything the reader knows about the castle comes from village gossip. At times, one wonders if the castle exists.

About three-fifths of the way through this book, Olga tells the main character of the novel, known only as K, why the village shuns her family. At first, we're led to believe Olga's sister, Amalia, is the reason. An official of the castle noticed Amalia at a village celebration and, as castle officials tended to do when they desired female attention, summoned Amalia by sending a letter via messenger. Amalia read the letter, not the least bit loving or considerate in nature, and tore it up in the face of the messenger. This was not how village girls were supposed to behave.

The villagers dropped by Amalia's home, in effect, to say goodbye. Each one retrieved any shoes left for repairs with Amalia's father, the cobbler, paid any debt owed to the father, and henceforth made no contact with the family.

Olga's (extended and aggravating) story suggests that her family perpetrated its continuing situation. According to Olga, the village would have "forgotten" the incident if the family had proceeded to act as if its supposed affront to the castle had been resolved. Instead, the father took as his mission a quest for Amalia's forgiveness, losing his health and sanity in the process. His pursuit of the castle's pardon hit a wall because the castle hadn't accused him or Amalia or his family of anything, so there was nothing to pardon. His co-dependent family sold almost everything they owned to support his hopeless, worthless quest.

Here we are, a hundred years later, continuing the tradition of Amalia's family. Think of the time we waste guessing what others are thinking. Marriages often fall apart -- Virginia's may have -- because spouses assume they know what the other one thinks. I'd bet many marriages are founded on a betrothed's fear of what x, y and z would think if the wedding were canceled. Family feuds thrive for years based on an incident interpreted differently by one another. Friends and acquaintances lose contact because someone thought this and that and no one bothered to check the facts.

Why do we do this to ourselves and each other? Because "I" am the most important. We like to think others think about us. We like to imagine what they think about us. In a long-winded way, Eckhart Tolle focuses on this in his book, "A New Earth." We'd be much better off if each of us recognized when the "ego" is talking and laughed it away.

Ayn Rand and Schumann

Persistent showers this morning cooled my weekly long run. By mile 10 I felt like a dishrag and decided to throw in the towel. Running shoes lose 40 percent of their bounce when soggy and so, it seemed, did the balls of my feet. I wasn't complaining, being grateful for the rain's coaxing of winter wheat sprouts, next year's bread. Then the rain stopped and, feeling much warmer, I kept on to mile 17.

Meanwhile I remembered Atlas Shrugged. Perhaps I owe an apology to Ayn Rand. When I named this blog I had forgotten her refrain, "Who is John Galt?"

I read Ayn Rand's novels 35 years ago while attending a Mennonite college. Her "me-first" capitalism appealed to me not because I believed in it but rather because it contrasted so sharply with the service-to-others philosophy of the Mennonites. Here was another viewpoint, a writer who boldly laid out what many of us realize but may be embarrassed to admit -- that "I" am the most important person. Nice and altruistic you may be, but get sick and try to think of others when your throat hurts and you can't keep dinner down. Consider the announcement that someone else got the promotion you expected. Was that the day you ran to volunteer at the hospital? Even Mother Teresa, in her posthumously published diaries, "Come Be My Light," appears to have been upset at times because Jesus did not reappear to her. Miserable probably begins with "mi" for good reason.

My long run finished, I drove 4 miles to our cabin to practice piano. I've put myself on a daily 3-hour practice schedule. Yes, I could be writing, but a month ago the conductor of our community orchestra invited me to play the first movement of Schumann's Piano Concerto in A Minor on February 20. Fortunately, he didn't ask me to play the other two movements.

I couldn't say no. I don't often get a chance to play with an orchestra. Have you ever wondered about the truth of program bios? If Placido Domingo listed everything he has done, it would have to be on microfiche (I know, it's an ancient term). My music bio could barely complete a sentence (think "Jesus wept").

By the way, Virginia was an opera singer. More about her later.