“In such a world of conflict, a world of victims and executioners, it is the job of thinking people, not to be on the side of the executioners.”- Camus
For audio version click here In one of Alan Furst’s superb WWII historical thrillers, an experienced inhabitant of the political realm suggests that the world runs according to “the seven deadly sins and the weather.” That summation might help to explain Dadaab. Dadaab, in Northern Kenya, is all of 20 square miles in size. It now contains the largest refugee camp in the world – 400,000 men, women and children — Somalis fleeing the terrible […]
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For audio version click here On the first day of class, a thin, tall, meticulously dressed older man, clean shaven, hair combed back, a twin of T.S. Eliot, instructed us to buy a History of Modern Art by Aranson. He told us to open our notebooks, he turned the lights down and he turned on the slide projector. A scratchy image of a rhino appeared, one facing to the left with an elongated horn.* “Do […]
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For audio version click here The pachysandra is dying. Corn stalk leaves are turning in on themselves. The fields look like green spears of cacti. When we walk along them even in early morning, big grasshoppers take off and fly erratically. Their buzzing joins the low grade constant zzzzz of locusts in the tree line 200 yards away. We have had no substantial rain for over a month. A hot unstinting wind blows from the […]
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For audio version click here I am not much of a killer. I did shoot a skunk once years ago. He was out in mid-day, wandering shakily through a field we had let go wild. He was lost to view in the high grass. He looked sick. We had a dog. Children regularly came to visit. I am not a marksman. I shot him seven or eight times with a .22. I wanted to make […]
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