tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26355858938737512762024-02-20T08:14:56.440-08:00Gerald HausmanGerald at Home and on the Road...Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.comBlogger118125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-65911647890461627082021-10-13T11:45:00.001-07:002021-10-13T11:45:18.857-07:00<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggq7V6J7cxPnbi-T5U6XRrklTr6EkegVrZamoZWX4jmQYtmj558KPTWuAQbxQUoV2Wz6DWoJ0UGXj2lb59_fXyDwT-Mynd_Kt8El4HSx-RirL9-2dIblMJCvQr8qVa6_ltlruXJhkDirPT/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="499" data-original-width="333" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggq7V6J7cxPnbi-T5U6XRrklTr6EkegVrZamoZWX4jmQYtmj558KPTWuAQbxQUoV2Wz6DWoJ0UGXj2lb59_fXyDwT-Mynd_Kt8El4HSx-RirL9-2dIblMJCvQr8qVa6_ltlruXJhkDirPT/" width="160" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">REMEMBERING
ALEX <st1:place w:st="on">BLACKBURN</st1:place><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">A century ago, Robert Frost wrote his classic
poem, “The Road Not Taken” and a generation of writers, myself included, lived
by Frost’s credo, follow your heart. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Alex Blackburn, a distinguished
professor and award-winning writer, asks us to think about Frost’s mystical
road in his book <i>The Fire Within</i>: <i>Reflections on the Literary Imagination. <o:p></o:p></i></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Alex puts it like this --<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Unless
all roads lead to “planetization” there will be no forsaken road left to be
sorry about.<o:p></o:p></span></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">In addition, Alex speaks, quite
frankly, about how hard it is, on top of everything else, just to be a writer.
He speaks of the hazards of writing, living, teaching, earning a living, and publishing:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"> “When
inflation crippled England in 1968, I, broke again after having written 600
godawful pages, returned to big-time teaching, as they say, only big time
became full-time/part-time with no more time for writing, and still not enough
time to earn a living…”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">In <i>The
Fire Within</i> Alex speaks heartfully of how, “…in serious writing,
self-discovery, not <i>self-expression</i>,
we need to surpass our real experience. This is the point where imagination
comes into play.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Alex then discusses Frank Waters,
author of <i>The Man Who Killed the Deer.</i>
Waters, Alex states, was a proponent of “…a coming world of consciousness … a sense of
embracing the totality of Earth.” Alex defines this mystical power as “a new
kind of love.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">For those who find this a little
ephemeral, Alex says, “It’s necessary to “take into account we are all in the
same boat.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">The problem is, are we floating or
sinking?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">The
Fire Within</span></i><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"> helps to
explain that this question can be answered by helping others, by reaching out,
by writing from the heart as well as the head. Maybe that is why Alex became a
great teacher: he was always there for others, not just himself.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">We need to hear this now more than
ever. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">For, in my mind, in today’s world, the
boat isn’t just floating or sinking, We are.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Thanks for pointing this out to me,
Alex, old friend.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"> </span></p><p>
</p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"> </span></p>Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-16614054765555322282021-09-30T10:20:00.002-07:002021-09-30T10:46:11.270-07:00<h1 style="text-align: left;"> The UFO Story that wouldn't quit!</h1><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyxLMlY0yrSJFn8uV7zRJJKnjcKaoAJFnrOoAc7V5IM1gcXpi_TnO_T6lnIaH2V74h11Bo7q2SaJJTEMs0f7ys-35MB_qOreo3dTmjmEG3yFi2849ywzBU9IRJt1kGrDvGvGIKazm443iW/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="218" data-original-width="164" height="331" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyxLMlY0yrSJFn8uV7zRJJKnjcKaoAJFnrOoAc7V5IM1gcXpi_TnO_T6lnIaH2V74h11Bo7q2SaJJTEMs0f7ys-35MB_qOreo3dTmjmEG3yFi2849ywzBU9IRJt1kGrDvGvGIKazm443iW/w250-h331/image.png" width="250" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>In 1978 I wrote a novel about scientists, investigators, theorists and adventurers who were trying to figure out why animals in Northern New Mexico were being mutilated. I decided to write a book based on interviews with "ufologists", Navajos, Pueblo people, ranchers, and researchers from Los Alamos.</p><p>The truth is, the mutilators were never found, never seen, and their crimes were so grotesque that I found it difficult to write book. </p><p>The nonfiction, novelistic book (called Faction by reviewers) came out with Stackpole Publishers in 1980. It had a short shelf life and was soon sold out, but not reprinted. I believe the timing, the times were against it. It was too soon, so to say. <i>Au courant</i>, but not yet popular in the broader public arena.</p><p>Sometime later, in the early 1980s, I was asked to write another, fully updated, version of the original book that was called <i>No Witness</i>. In the years that followed the publication of this version, a film came out, <i>Endangered Species. </i></p><p>So, to make a long story endless, as we used to say, I did yet another iteration of the mutilation/UFO story in Northern New Mexico, adding in all that had happened since No Witness had appeared. I named this second book <i>Stargazer</i>. It was published by Lotus Press in 1988. Thirty years have gone by since then. Thanks to Santosh Krinksy of Lotus Press, <i>Stargazer</i> is still in print and available for purchase.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxubsvLeb9_JvkVvLefsxn3ejAxxcfC_P2PUW2uxFcks7UOrYou5GawCKvUSpEKdiLPURuV7J7DtzkWsSIk3M8OvlbpjTbdgoMPWTbpZqW7kbh__hXMtswm83406Moyx04fPzYqMLNuQNE/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="218" data-original-width="137" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxubsvLeb9_JvkVvLefsxn3ejAxxcfC_P2PUW2uxFcks7UOrYou5GawCKvUSpEKdiLPURuV7J7DtzkWsSIk3M8OvlbpjTbdgoMPWTbpZqW7kbh__hXMtswm83406Moyx04fPzYqMLNuQNE/" width="151" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p> online.https://www.facebook.com/LotusPress/photos/a.10150485693098390/10159602186983390/</p><p>https://www.amazon.com/Stargazer-Book-Hausman-Gerald-Paperback/dp/B011SJWYZA/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Stargazer+hausman&qid=1633022316&sr=8-1</p><p><br /></p><p>It would seem the "mute stories" as they were called originally, are still out there. Ranchers yet complain about untoward, mystifying visitations from high-tech helicopters as well as UFOs. Witnesses have seen the UFOs as recently as only a few days ago, but only a few stargazers claim to have seen any "little green men."</p><p>I explored the little green man theme in the following trilogy published by Speaking Volumes Publishers:</p><p><i>Evil Chasing Way </i></p><p><i>https://www.amazon.com/Evil-Chasing-Star-Song-Book-ebook/dp/B075FK7NZB/ref=sr_1_2?crid=7LXUB0XPIJWY&dchild=1&keywords=evil+chasing+way&qid=1633022060&sprefix=Evil+Chasing+Way%2Caps%2C197&sr=8-2</i></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkbh1OyCpl5jnHW636pf_urAry-wXWHYdlwnzPDpyRgFOmJ5lyyFxoBajcSQN_8jJARCx6OY_FMJsIPVwfAPsXWcQMz4Pkjljj2w6wFuABkSMUbBDuCpnIFnCQaJfb25rmmuh5TVmYPOYI/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="218" data-original-width="148" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkbh1OyCpl5jnHW636pf_urAry-wXWHYdlwnzPDpyRgFOmJ5lyyFxoBajcSQN_8jJARCx6OY_FMJsIPVwfAPsXWcQMz4Pkjljj2w6wFuABkSMUbBDuCpnIFnCQaJfb25rmmuh5TVmYPOYI/" width="163" /></a></i></div><i><br /><br /></i><p></p><p><i>Hand Thttps://www.amazon.com/Hand-Trembler-Star-Song-2/dp/1628158387/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1633022142&sr=8-2rembler</i></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidvq6QQozoDkFkOnygmDfr7_RFai5HaSIk5H3NMUtQ5A3tyufq9E9KqFomi9kdzQJAYfArGZgnKj257Q1xN5ANtRD-_RhQEh5t4HG-86BV1XlpwO5z6cfYtvzTrbL1Cdt50OlRffp4EA2W/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="218" data-original-width="146" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidvq6QQozoDkFkOnygmDfr7_RFai5HaSIk5H3NMUtQ5A3tyufq9E9KqFomi9kdzQJAYfArGZgnKj257Q1xN5ANtRD-_RhQEh5t4HG-86BV1XlpwO5z6cfYtvzTrbL1Cdt50OlRffp4EA2W/" width="161" /></a></i></div><i><br /><br /></i><p></p><p><i>Sungazer</i></p><p><i>https://www.amazon.com/SUNGAZER-Star-Song-Gerald-Hausman/dp/1628159502/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1633022227&sr=8-2</i></p><p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWTRnc3cV3hbSX9iA6A4QR84639fsdatbK-sqC9-BpSGgN5q98_r8Qcla5Zs0tAVmqjXzCVd3_RrU08p51541l63uS0bY6KKVLhaHWVHfml99U-PiEKtche875etQeX6xgRKblaM5CERHS/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="320" data-original-width="214" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWTRnc3cV3hbSX9iA6A4QR84639fsdatbK-sqC9-BpSGgN5q98_r8Qcla5Zs0tAVmqjXzCVd3_RrU08p51541l63uS0bY6KKVLhaHWVHfml99U-PiEKtche875etQeX6xgRKblaM5CERHS/" width="161" /></a></i></div><i><br /><br /></i><p></p><p>NOTE: If you read and liked <i>Stargazer</i>, you can continue my own personal tales with the above three novels that explore true stories as told by such storytellers as Joogii, my oldest Navajo friend. We go back to the Sixties when we first started swapping "stories from outer and inner space."</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-15812916500866874822020-04-07T13:44:00.001-07:002020-04-07T13:44:20.514-07:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh04bwsx6bk72KdQ723jrZom1RCgcTxjxK6kQsZECL84s-SLiwYNhoPraAWKKvd2WeiFdZpeDNttnK7jwQbIO4aXn96E9H_Fdp_Ly2cD0ogQjBFVuVvQ6XRsLBb-PG1sR-ATt5bxPPmpVoJ/s1600/Mark+Twain.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh04bwsx6bk72KdQ723jrZom1RCgcTxjxK6kQsZECL84s-SLiwYNhoPraAWKKvd2WeiFdZpeDNttnK7jwQbIO4aXn96E9H_Fdp_Ly2cD0ogQjBFVuVvQ6XRsLBb-PG1sR-ATt5bxPPmpVoJ/s320/Mark+Twain.JPG" width="240" /></a></div>
My uncle, William Lauritzen, was an incredible artist. He did this portrait of Mark Twain in 1953. I remember seeing Bill's art on American Bandstand when I was growing up. And I also saw his fashion illustration in <i>The New York Times</i>. In this portrait you can see Twain's ironic, humorous and mischievous spirit. It's fitting, and for me, a great honor to place Bill's lifelike Twain here in connection with my book, NOT SINCE MARK TWAIN which is now free on Amazon.com.Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-44089636695335230122020-01-30T15:06:00.000-08:002020-01-30T15:06:53.186-08:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyimqlO-lV4hfRpNTmOh0Qf_nmrewxo38Eyuh9RFD2q2J0HWWqdOuU06b8e66rf0SDql1rGj9F-d2Mf4w3yhX-UpS48ApOe4RB0YVCEXmC1X4vuEqEaQQcUTTgugaJzYBaY9-gQietnFok/s1600/IMG_1724.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyimqlO-lV4hfRpNTmOh0Qf_nmrewxo38Eyuh9RFD2q2J0HWWqdOuU06b8e66rf0SDql1rGj9F-d2Mf4w3yhX-UpS48ApOe4RB0YVCEXmC1X4vuEqEaQQcUTTgugaJzYBaY9-gQietnFok/s320/IMG_1724.JPG" width="240" /></a></div>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Number"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Bullet 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Bullet 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Bullet 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Bullet 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Number 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Number 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Number 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Number 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="10" QFormat="true" Name="Title"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Closing"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Signature"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="1" SemiHidden="true"
UnhideWhenUsed="true" Name="Default Paragraph Font"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Body Text"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Body Text Indent"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Continue"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Continue 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Continue 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Continue 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="List Continue 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Message Header"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="11" QFormat="true" Name="Subtitle"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Salutation"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Date"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Body Text First Indent"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Body Text First Indent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Note Heading"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Body Text 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Body Text 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Body Text Indent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Body Text Indent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Block Text"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Hyperlink"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="FollowedHyperlink"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="22" QFormat="true" Name="Strong"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="20" QFormat="true" Name="Emphasis"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Document Map"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Plain Text"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="E-mail Signature"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Top of Form"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Bottom of Form"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Normal (Web)"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Acronym"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Address"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Cite"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Code"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Definition"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Keyboard"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Preformatted"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Sample"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Typewriter"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="HTML Variable"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Normal Table"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="annotation subject"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="No List"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Outline List 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Outline List 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Outline List 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Simple 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Simple 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Simple 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Classic 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Classic 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Classic 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Classic 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Colorful 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Colorful 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Colorful 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Columns 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Columns 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Columns 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Columns 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Columns 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Grid 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Grid 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Grid 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Grid 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Grid 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Grid 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Grid 7"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Grid 8"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table List 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table List 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table List 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table List 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table List 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table List 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table List 7"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table List 8"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table 3D effects 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table 3D effects 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table 3D effects 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Contemporary"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Elegant"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Professional"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Subtle 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Subtle 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Web 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Web 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Web 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Balloon Text"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="Table Grid"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
Name="Table Theme"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" Name="Placeholder Text"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="1" QFormat="true" Name="No Spacing"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" Name="Medium Shading 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" Name="Medium Grid 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" Name="Dark List"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" Name="Colorful Shading"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" Name="Revision"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="34" QFormat="true"
Name="List Paragraph"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="29" QFormat="true" Name="Quote"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="30" QFormat="true"
Name="Intense Quote"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" Name="Dark List Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" Name="Dark List Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" Name="Dark List Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" Name="Dark List Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" Name="Dark List Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" Name="Dark List Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="19" QFormat="true"
Name="Subtle Emphasis"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="21" QFormat="true"
Name="Intense Emphasis"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="31" QFormat="true"
Name="Subtle Reference"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="32" QFormat="true"
Name="Intense Reference"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="33" QFormat="true" Name="Book Title"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="37" SemiHidden="true"
UnhideWhenUsed="true" Name="Bibliography"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
UnhideWhenUsed="true" QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="41" Name="Plain Table 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="42" Name="Plain Table 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="43" Name="Plain Table 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="44" Name="Plain Table 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="45" Name="Plain Table 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="40" Name="Grid Table Light"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46" Name="Grid Table 1 Light"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51" Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52" Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46" Name="List Table 1 Light"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="List Table 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="List Table 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="List Table 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="List Table 5 Dark"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51" Name="List Table 6 Colorful"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52" Name="List Table 7 Colorful"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="List Table 1 Light Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="List Table 2 Accent 1"/>
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WHAT MAKES A BOOK STICK AROUND?</div>
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Authors who have been writing for a long time sometimes say, “Things were different back then.”</div>
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I always ask,"What was different?"</div>
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And the answer usually comes back: "The book business. The publishing industry. The way things were done." </div>
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Yesterday I received a book in the mail that was very
special to me. It was edited by me nearly thirty years ago. But before that, it
was discovered, so to say, in an abandoned building after Hurricane Andrew
struck SW Florida in 1991. The book was a waterlogged copy of the original English edition of <i>The Kebra Nagast</i>. </div>
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One glance at the ruined volume told me that it was a find. A
glorious and fantastic find. It was, first and foremost, a photocopy
of Wallis Budge’s classic translation of the sacred book of Ethiopia, <i>The
Kebra Nagast</i>, which means“The Glory of the Kings.”</div>
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What I held in my hands was an Ethiopic, early version of
the Christian Bible, prior to the redacted passages, rewritten and bowdlerized,
by the mindless minions of King James. </div>
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As I turned the hurricane furled pages, I
saw something else. Almost as if a holy light was shining down on the poor
battered book, there were calligraphed, marginal notes on each page. These, it became clear, were written
by a mysterious Rastafarian named Sheldon. Obviously, he was also a scholar and his
insights on each page were illuminating.</div>
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The book that came out of this sacred work was mostly edited
by myself, and finally, years later, published by St Martin’s Press/Macmillan.</div>
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There were a number of Rastafarian elders and younger
initiates who helped with the work including some members of the Marley family,
especially Ziggy Marley who kindly wrote the introduction.</div>
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Yesterday, a new edition of this book showed up. The first paperback printing. Along with the proud feeling I had looking at the fresh, pristine volume, I also had a persistent question.</div>
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I asked myself, What makes a book survive for such a long time? </div>
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Was it the sacred nature of <i>The Kebra Nagast </i>that gave it such longevity? Yet there are myriads of scholarly
works that have not fared so well; books that are locked away in archival vaults and
have not seen the light of day for centuries. What got this one into the light of day? One day of terrible catastrophic darkness -- a hurricane?</div>
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I thought of <i>The Alchemist</i> by Paul Coelho. That book took a long time to catch on and then, almost mystically, it took off and has now sold more than
250 million copies. By and large, it too is a sacred volume, offering a helping hand to humanity. A visionary book for sure.</div>
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Another wisdom work of great value is T.E. Lawrence's <i>The Seven Pillars of Wisdom</i>. Thanks to publisher, Warren Lapine of Wilder Publications, it's back in print. A whole new generation may read it and get the same thrill I discovered when I was a college student. Among other things, Lawrence told the story of the Middle East, the wars and weathers of the vast desert he inhabited as a British soldier during World War I. He, of course, became the man he didn't wish to be: Lawrence of Arabia.</div>
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In 1975 I wrote a kind of oral narrative of the Navajo with the help of my long time friend, Jay Joogii DeGroat. Forty-five years later, the original book that I called <i>Sitting on the Blue-Eyed Bear </i>is still with us even though it has morphed into a number of other books. It gave birth to at least five other books, all of them celebrating Navajo mythology. From one I got five. How did this happen? </div>
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My conclusion is that, aside from pure luck, books survive because someone, somewhere, wants them. There is a need. And somehow that need is fulfilled at a particular time when it sheds light on a particular event or period of time.</div>
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An author friend of mine, David Kherdian, said to me,“Books
only go out to come back in.” </div>
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We are living in a time when books go out and come in in such rapid order that we almost can't see them appearing or disappearing. A writer I know said, "You never know. You might write a whole book and what survives, years later, is a single memorable line."</div>
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In that case I am profoundly fortunate. The second incarnation of The Blue-Eyed Bear contained this quotable line:“We humans fear the beast within the wolf because we do not
understand the beast within ourselves.”</div>
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I wouldn't mind seeing that on my gravestone.</div>
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And may that line go far and wide to educate the likes of presidents, poets,
pirates, parrots, paupers, and pretenders so that we can each embrace all that
is holy within and without <i>for-I-ver and I-ver</i>, as Sheldon once said in
the margins of <i>The Kebra Nagast</i>.</div>
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We may never figure out exactly what makes a book stick
around. But we can surely surmise why a single line outlasts another. It
refuses to go away. What is sacred is not scared or scarred. It is something that shines. That stays as Sheldon said it should. </div>
Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-49514945810603858872017-10-27T10:16:00.000-07:002017-10-27T10:17:15.280-07:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjU1XQhVN54zhpUJGX3govEl5RZ7LmupzFc_972703pH4ApoJJ1PnEMHVDhMPLnSAXDbLppjMPEeWReCGbO_cDaGYLvIBm8ydVHYGagwYDebx9BEOJ4cXP6Ie1qcueRVwQeKNL44cm5FDJ/s1600/cover+ECW.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjU1XQhVN54zhpUJGX3govEl5RZ7LmupzFc_972703pH4ApoJJ1PnEMHVDhMPLnSAXDbLppjMPEeWReCGbO_cDaGYLvIBm8ydVHYGagwYDebx9BEOJ4cXP6Ie1qcueRVwQeKNL44cm5FDJ/s320/cover+ECW.JPG" width="240" /></a></div>
Yesterday I was asked "How did you write this book?"<br />
<br />
In point of fact, I wrote it by hand, then I typed it on a typewriter, then I used my computer. But even then I wasn't done with the book. This one had the longest gestation of any novel I've ever written. I started writing it in 1978. I finished writing it in 2016.<br />
<br />
I think the reason it took so long to complete is that I wanted answers to some of the questions I had asked in the first draft. It took a good many years for those answers to come to fruition. I had a lot of help from my Navajo, life-long friend, Jay (Joogii) Degroat. He, more than anyone, kept me on my toes and kept the story going, little by little, while I took copious notes and added them to the novel.<br />
<br />
Anne Hillerman wrote that the story kept her up with the lights on at night. She said, "If you're hungry for a book to keep you up past bedtime -- with all the lights on -- this tale is for you ... this is New Mexico's own X File anchored in Hausman's elegant prose and finely tuned descriptions of the Southwestern landscape."<br />
<br />
Peter Eichstaedt wrote, "... then he draws deep from his well of knowledge of Navajo story and culture. (Think Tony Hillerman on steroids.) This is more than a novel. It's an experience you won't forget and it will leave you hungry for more."<br />
<br />
I feel that I have done what my karma commanded as a witness to some of the mysterious events of our hemisphere -- ghosts, werewolves, bizarre animal mutilations "extraterrestrials and crafty coyotes" as Peter has written. Maybe the weirdest moment in the book, for me, anyway, was when I was trapped in a fissure in the Grand Canyon. I found myself swimming in stone, not knowing if I was conscious or dreaming. The Supai man who saved me was amused. As if such a thing happened all the time.<br />
<br />
Maybe so, maybe so. The next two novels are in the works, and if I get trapped in stone, I hope it will be between the front and back cover ... buried in words.<br />
<br />
<br />Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-43957898576091758932017-08-06T10:58:00.001-07:002017-08-06T10:58:23.527-07:00<!--[if !mso]>
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<span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">PAUL ANNACONE SHARES PATHWAY TO SUCCESS, INCLUDING INSIGHTS FROM
CAREER WORKING WITH FEDERER, SAMPRAS, </span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">IN NEW BOOK <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">COACHING FOR
LIFE</i></span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro";">Tennis Coach Explains the
Process of Pursuing Greatness</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">NEW YORK (AUG. 7, 2017) – After his own career as a
tennis professional, Paul Annacone, author of the new book <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Coaching for Life</i></b>, became
coach for such greats as Pete Sampras, Roger Federer, Tim Henman and others.
His eye-opening, autobiographical book explains how each one of us can attain a
level of excellence. He uses tennis as a metaphor, as well as a guide, to teach
how we can strive toward a goal and overcome the obstacles. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Annacone
comments, “I am often asked, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">What makes
the great so great? What can we learn from their level of excellence?</i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I answer these and many more in <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Coaching</i></b>
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">for
Life</i></b>. The anecdotes are taken directly from the tennis court, and they
are presented in a step-by-step way that can help anyone in any walk of life,
regardless of the challenges. You can achieve success, the book points out, but
you have to follow certain procedures. As I say in the book, the will to win is
nothing without the will to prepare.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
secrets to success Annacone weaves through <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Coaching for Life</i></b> are not about
tennis, but rather about the process-oriented journey he has experienced
firsthand with some of the most successful players in the game’s storied
history. Annacone explains the ability of masters like Federer and Sampras to
keep perspective and clarity of purpose in spite of the worst kinds of
adversity on the court. </span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Coaching for Life</span></i></b><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">
reveals Annacone’s gentle, yet forceful, paradigm for focus, intelligent
planning, and following one’s own skill-set to success that rings true in this
uncertain age of frenetic activity. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Annacone
played professionally for 11 years, reaching a career high ranking of No. 12
while winning three singles and 14 doubles titles. He then turned to coaching,
spending over seven years with Sampras, three seasons with Federer, five years
with Tim Henman and a season with Sloane Stephens. Both Federer and Sampras won
Grand Slam titles and were ranked No. 1 in the world while working with
Annacone. His coaching tenure also included time in the USTA High Performance
Program and as Head Coach of Britain’s Lawn Tennis Association. Annacone has
been a commentator and analyst with Tennis Channel since 2014. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Coaching
for Life</i></b> is being published by IRIE Books and is on sale now online at </span><a href="http://www.iriebooks.com/"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">www.iriebooks.com</span></a><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">, </span><a href="http://www.paulannacone.com/"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">www.paulannacone.com</span></a><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">, </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">www.amazon.com</span></a><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">, </span><a href="http://www.bn.com/"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">www.bn.com</span></a><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> and </span><a href="http://www.booksamillion.com/"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">www.booksamillion.com</span></a><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">.
In addition, the book will be available during appearances and book signing
events with Annacone during the upcoming Western & Southern Open in
Cincinnati and the US Open in New York. Information about these appearances can
be found at </span><a href="http://www.paulannacone.com/"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">www.paulannacone.com</span></a><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">. </span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">To
request cover art or an interview, please contact: Pete Holtermann (</span></i><a href="mailto:Pete@HolterMediaInc.com"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Pete@HolterMediaInc.com</span></i></a><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Myriad Pro"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">)</span></i></div>
Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-18641749976372446372017-07-26T09:45:00.001-07:002017-07-26T09:46:33.481-07:00Shadows That Stay Forever<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
This anthology, long in coming, was deeply desired by the many fans of Sci-fi-fantasy master, Roger Zelazny. Everything in its right time. But it seems a long time, to me, since Roger was here on this earth. And yet it also seems he was just here, just passing through, just a moment ago.<br />
<br />
Time bends and sometimes we bend with it. Roger knew that all too well. He died June 14, 1995. Some months before he passed he phoned me to say he'd had a dream in which a bunch of characters came to him asking to be worked into a novel. <br />
<br />
Anyone who has read the Amber novels knows that time bends in Roger's books. And, for a while on the phone, he bent my ear to a proposal. He wanted me to write a novel about the dream he'd just had.<br />
It was a kind of detective story, in which the main character was a world weary martial artist whose specialty was ... he left that up to me.<br />
<br />
I suggested a stick fighter because I had just returned from Jamaica and had seen one. If you've watched any of the old Errol Flynn films (the actor actually lived on the North Coast of Jamaica), you can imagine what a stick fighter does to protect himself. Basically, Robin and Little John. Parry and thrust, pound and pummel, all done with the grace and style of a dancer.<br />
<br />
Roger went on to describe the main character as a kind of salvage expert, a guy like Travis McGee in John D. MacDonald's <i>The Deep Blue Goodbye. </i>It all sounded very exciting, this proposed novel, except that, unlike <i>Wilderness</i> which we had written together, Roger wanted me to write this one alone.<br />
<br />
He also asked for a character who looked and acted like Sean Connery in <i>Doctor No. </i>He wanted this fellow<i> </i>to pop into the tale at odd, inventive moments. "Could he be a stick fighter, too?" I asked. He said, "Sure." I described how the Connery character might appear and disappear and he suggested that he just walk out of a cane field in formal attire, as if he were going to a high stakes game of baccarat.<br />
<br />
Roger asked that the main guy, the salvage expert detective, be what he termed a flawed character. Someone between jobs, between affairs, between worlds. He might be a man of affairs with no affair, but with a flair for stick fighting. Then he caught me with his next comment: "How about an older man, or even an old man?" I laughed and said I knew one such in Kingston. A very urbane old guy who was actually the Queen's Magistrate. Roger chuckled. "Perfect," he said.<br />
<br />
I never wrote it. I wanted to. But after he was gone in 1995, I turned to children's books about Jamaica and the editing of a number of books written by Bob Marley that came out under the Marley family imprint of Tuff Gong Books.<br />
<br />
Long story short -- or rather long story long -- I was compelled to write Roger's tale when Warren Lapine and Trent Zelazny asked for a contribution to <i>Shadows and Reflections</i>. It came quickly, the story that was more than 15 years old and unwritten. Time bends. And I like to think Roger lent more than a helping hand. I like to think he's still here, don't you?<br />
<br />
Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-44133132329308327202017-04-23T09:37:00.000-07:002017-04-23T09:47:29.257-07:00<div style="text-align: center;">
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FRIENDSHIP</div>
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There are two towns named Friendship in the hills of Jamaica.</div>
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One Friendship is where the fried chicken is, a little stop-and-go where you smell the chicken frying from a mile off on the Junction Road that takes you to Kingston. On the road back at night you might see a rock-stone, as they say, burst into flame. I saw it happen once.</div>
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The other friendship is even more mysterious. If you go there and meet Mrs. Pet, you will have your palm read like a newspaper and she will call the saints and re-balance your brain and you will go home hungry and sane, and you will see duppies and mermaids.</div>
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Some years ago I left my heart in Jamaica. I left it in the hills of St. Mary, the same Parish where Zora Neale Hurston left her heart so long ago. She said St. Mary was "... the very best place to be in all the world."</div>
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Sometimes I smell the fried chicken of Friendship and see the candles of Mrs. Pet burning in the darkness, and I wonder how many friendships there are in the world, too many to count, like the numberless stars, like the saints of the night, like the peenywallies of a summer eve winking on the night breeze, like the salt crystals of the sea at Blue Harbour, like Mike Gleeson's endless stories, Sweet-Sweet's songs, Mr. Denzil's coffees and sugars, Roy's hugs, Mackie's deep voice, Raggy's ragged laughter high on the top of Firefly hill where Noel Coward once blew his blue smoke within sight of the coastline and the John Crow Mountains.</div>
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Ah, but once you have lived in Jamaica, Friendship is always coming into port, no matter where you are or what you are doing. Friendship, a town in the heartland of the heart.<br />
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Shadow box by Mariah Fox</div>
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Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-1584572704453080332017-03-12T12:23:00.000-07:002017-03-12T12:23:00.603-07:00Moments of TruthBack in the sixties when I was a college student at Highlands U. in Las Vegas, NM, I had a professor who was bright, funny, offbeat, and sometimes brilliant in the way he dealt with problem students. I learned as much from him about teaching as I did about poetry.<br />
<br />
Once, I remember, he asked us, my soon-to-be-wife, Lorry, and me, to a Simon and Garfunkel concert. It was by no means a class trip. The prof whose name was Bob drove us in his old Ford station-wagon from Manuelitas to Albuquerque.<br />
<br />
Before the concert, he asked us to help him load an enormous oak door he was bringing back to his home in the hills. Then we went to the concert. I still remember someone in the front row throwing a cowboy hat to Paul Simon, which he gratefully accepted and wore for the rest of the night. It was unusual seeing the classic New York folksinger, under that too-big hat.<br />
<br />
Right before the drive back home, Bob said his feet were hurting. He took off his shoes, and socks and then blew a breath of air into each sock before putting it on again. He said that refreshed the socks and the feet, and he claimed he learned the trick from WC Fields.<br />
<br />
Bob seemed his funny, quippy renewed self, and spoke passionately about ee cummings' poetry, an adobe wall he was building, and how he was planning a "Happening" at the university. A happening was usually a spontaneous outburst of talent and protest against the ever-present "system".<br />
<br />
We bore on into the moonlight heading toward Santa Rosa and then cutting up in the direction of Las Vegas. Why that drive is forever etched in my memory is not surprising to me. We had to shift a lot in our seats because the enormous door slid with every pothole. I sat on one side of it and Lorry sat on the other side, and the hatchback was wide open because of the length of the door. It started to snow and the road got tricky.<br />
<br />
The years have turned that snow-blown drive into Toad's wild ride from <i>The Wind in the Willows</i>. Bob drove fast, then slow. He turned the wheel a lot and the huge, hand-carved Spanish door bashed into one or the other of us. Bob told stories, Zen tales with no beginning and no end. Finally we made it to our doorstep. Yet even today, after almost 50 years, my bones remember every bump and grind on highway 84.<br />
<br />
Not too long ago I was doing a presentation at a bookstore in Corrales. For some reason I chose to tell some coyote tales. <br />
<br />
But whenever I mentioned the word coyote, someone let loose with a loud howl. And the audience cracked up. So did I. Later when I was signing books, a man stepped up and bought a few and when he set them before me, he howled.<br />
<br />
And so there he was, large as life, full of fun and pranks, and not looking any older. It wasn't until he gave me his business card that I realized that professor Bob had switched careers. He was now a horticulturalist. His business card said in embossed print: "Don't Let Your Plants Go Down."<br />
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Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-71679784666139839782016-11-13T14:52:00.000-08:002016-11-13T14:52:54.812-08:00Shine, Perishing Republic<br />
<br />
SHINE, PERISHING REPUBLIC<br />
<br />
<br />
While this America settles in the mould of its vulgarity, heavily<br />
thickening to empire,<br />
And protest, only a bubble in the molten mass, pops and sighs<br />
out, and the mass hardens,<br />
<br />
I sadly smiling remember that the flower fades to make fruit, the<br />
fruit rots to make earth.<br />
Out of the mother; and through the spring exultances, ripeness<br />
and decadence; and home to the mother.<br />
<br />
You making haste haste on decay: not blameworthy; life is good,<br />
be it stubbornly long or suddenly<br />
A mortal splendor: meteors are not needed less than mountains:<br />
shine, perishing republic.<br />
<br />
But for my children, I would have them keep their distance<br />
from the thickening center; corruption<br />
Never has been compulsory, when the cities lie at the monster's<br />
feet there are left the mountains.<br />
<br />
And boys, be in nothing so moderate as in love of man, a<br />
clever servant, insufferable master.<br />
There is the trap that catches noblest spirits, that caught -- they<br />
say -- God, when he walked on earth.<br />
<br />
--Robinson Jeffers<br />
<br />
<br />
This unusually great poem was in my mother's handbook of modern verse, circa 1924.<br />
She was fond of Jeffers and his love of nature and his fear of man. It seems like the bitterest<br />
of aspic, the toughest of thistle, the poison that finished off the Roman emperors. But Jeffers was a devoted father, loving husband and friend of humankind and his poetry shows that he was one of the deepest thinkers of his age and now our own. I read this poem aloud to an audience in 1965 and it was thought to be a current poem by a Beat poet. Today it reads like a critique of the election results. <br />
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<br />Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-71001801100092192792016-09-01T09:38:00.000-07:002016-09-01T09:52:45.247-07:00Running White Canyon with DanI remember our daily runs in the summer of 1983. We were in Southeastern Utah running the canyons. Often barefoot. Swimming the rock walled sink holes. Eating red meat over red embers. We outran a flash-flood. Burned our skin in biting dust. Soothed it cool shadows of willow. Dan and Fred were the runners, I was just glad I could keep up some as we went along and I scribbled my notes, following the path of Big Wanderer, the wolf of Navajo myth.<br />
<br />
Now -- in a sudden moment -- Dan is gone. But I keep him close; always have, always will.<br />
<br />
This is a celebration of his memory.<br />
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<b>Running White Canyon With Dan</b><br />
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How far to the bridge? I ask<br />
You can hear it, he says<br />
How beautiful the canyon wren<br />
At five hundred feet<br />
Playing the flash-flood<br />
Like a bowstring<b> </b><br />
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Canyon Lands, Dan and Mariah, 1984</div>
<b> </b> Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-68877552974081864692016-07-22T13:08:00.000-07:002016-08-07T16:50:49.746-07:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Self-portrait, William Saroyan</div>
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<b>Writers of the Purple Rage</b></div>
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<br />
<b> </b><br />
"We are all men of letters waiting for the mail." --William Saroyan<br />
<br />
I once stopped writing and vowed never to write again. The reason was that I had received a 10 page single-spaced letter written by a man who claimed I'd killed his mother. She was found dead with a copy of one of my books in her hand.<br />
<br />
I wrote the accuser back saying that the poor woman had actually died of boredom. The book she was reading happened to bore me as well, not to death, you understand, but to the point of distraction.<br />
<br />
So for three years I stopped writing. What a vacation ... from myself. But then I started getting more letters. Curiously, it seemed that those people who weren't dying to finish my book really liked it. I was in a quandary because quite a few begged me to write another book on the same subject -- cattle mutilations and alien space abductions. I went to my unread letter file and found that I'd tossed a bunch of letters into it. All of these were written to me during my so-called writer's vacation. There was a letter from a guy in prison who said my novel was "liberating." Another from a librarian in Ohio who begged to know when the second in the series was available. Still another from a woman in Alaska who said I had written in "the true vein and spoken to her people." Lastly, a Hawaii native who praised my book and said, "If circumstances direct you to write back, then we'd be happy to get your letter and we'll take it from there!" There followed an inscription in Hebrew and some indefinable codes.<br />
<br />
Saroyan used to say -- in addition to the above -- that real writers get letters. They do, they surely do. And I am happy to say that I have actually completed the cattle killer book and it was sent off to the publisher.<br />
<br />
I await the next accusation, implication, condemnation and infatuation. I am here. I don't expect any dead ravens, as George RR has received.<br />
<br />
Maybe just a hamburger or two. <br />
<br />
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<br />Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-87462370172617908622016-01-29T13:29:00.001-08:002016-01-29T13:30:40.834-08:00My Old Ford F-150<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">I saw a man in the parking
lot of a school I visited and he was bent over staring at the bumper of my 1993
Ford F-150 pick-up truck. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"Nice truck," he
said.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"Gets me around."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">The man sighed, shook his
head and laughed. "Just look at that bumper, solid metal." He banged
it with his knuckle. "All metal and chrome."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">I nodded. "You say it
gets you around? Where to and where from?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"Well, I said, "It
got me out of a mosquito ditch I was in."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"How'd it get in
there?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">I laughed, remembering.
"My best friend drove it into the ditch."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"What'd he think it was,
a flying horse? Any more?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"Well, it was in a
hurricane and made it through but my neighbor across the street, well, his RV
got picked up in the air and when it came down it flattened his mom's
caddy."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">He smiled. "What
else?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"Well, let's see. My
wife gave it those racing stripes. They were made by our farm gate."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"Took it a little close,
eh?"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">I nodded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">"Well I'll tell
ya," the man said, "one day you're going to thank this old gal for
saving ya when someone backs into ya."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">Yesterday in the parking lot
at Publix I was remembering that funny old guy when, right then someone backed
into my F-150. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">A loud grinding,
jaw-clenching crash. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">The driver couldn't see out
of his back window because it was all steamed up but that didn't slow him down
any. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">When I checked the damage the
score was Ford F-150 one, blind driver zero. His back end was crunched so bad
some of it fell off in the parking lot. "It wasn't my fault," he
sputtered, "I was just let out of the hospital, and now look what I've
gone and done."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">The old gal, my Ford F-150
didn't have a mark on her even though my jaw was still quivering from the jolt.
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">Old Gal, God bless you </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">and Henry Ford too! </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-29555033802951341562015-12-11T08:00:00.000-08:002015-12-11T08:05:42.842-08:00<br />
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<br />
<br />
If Roger Zelazny were alive today, and I tend to think he is, at least in the spiritual sense, for he never doubted that himself. He believed that books were more than books. And that humans were beings of light. I was thinking about Roger last night when I heard that Leonardo DiCaprio was nominated for an award for his performance in a film based on a novel called The Revenant.<br />
<br />
How does Roger fit into all of that? Well, in 1992 he and I wrote the novel <i>Wilderness</i>, which was the first historical fiction about two forgotten historical figures from the 1800s. Hugh Glass was one of these and John Colter was the other. Colter, pursued by members of the Blackfeet tribe, was chased 150 miles. He was barely clothed (some historians say he was only wearing a breech cloth). Hugh Glass was left for dead, some say buried, after a bear attack.<br />
<br />
Colter ran, Glass crawled.<br />
<br />
Colter ran for his life. Glass crawled for revenge.<br />
<br />
So goes the ancient tale. Nobody knows for sure how much of it is true and how much is fabulous fact rendered into imaginative fiction. In any case, Roger and I collaborated on the novel about these two adventurous souls who left their imprint on American history.<br />
<br />
Now it is a very visceral, imaginative movie which, in a very real sense, puts you there. Rivets or nails you there.<br />
<br />
Our novel, I am grateful to say, has run (and crawled over the years, but it has never gone away. Perhaps it is just as N. Scott Momaday said of it: "A valuable and stirring evocation of the American West and of certain original souls who inform its history." Rocky Mountain News called it "A dazzlingly poetic book, a rare reading experience -- reminiscent of Cormac McCarthy's prose."<br />
<br />
Beyond the reviews the novel received, my favorite praise quote came from an actual descendant of John Colter who said to Roger and me at a book signing in Albuquerque: "You told it straight, got everything right except for one thing: the ears!" Roger and I laughed. "The ears?" The lady went on to explain that Colter's ears were large, just like hers, and she took off her cowboy hat and showed us. <br />
<br />
Over the years Wilderness has survived, just like the mountain men who left their mark. Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-3490300416788817822015-10-23T14:13:00.000-07:002015-10-23T14:18:35.564-07:00Froggies in a Mailbox<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL4pl_lVwlKWQ_D-qemU2OjMmrU0yKh1ABGKji2lTsUarssIGTmBLnBCTdUB7Bx6HF9i5tJM8TBce3waPRo_8TUjzHradcYHiWeAVE-tLARPpzojRbfVcprGtaYSKIcAp1wgAz1SVFY0GP/s1600/photo.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL4pl_lVwlKWQ_D-qemU2OjMmrU0yKh1ABGKji2lTsUarssIGTmBLnBCTdUB7Bx6HF9i5tJM8TBce3waPRo_8TUjzHradcYHiWeAVE-tLARPpzojRbfVcprGtaYSKIcAp1wgAz1SVFY0GP/s320/photo.JPG" width="250" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
I go to our mailbox and open it up.<br />
<br />
This is a rural mailbox and as I walk to it an eagle flies overhead talking about something. I wonder what I'll find in the mailbox -- somebody talking about something? A check? An order for some books? A long overdue bill?<br />
<br />
I open the box and look within and ...<br />
<br />
What do I see<br />
two little froggies blinking at me<br />
<br />
I pick up a long flat sealed envelope<br />
<br />
One of the froggies is stuck to it<br />
<br />
jumps on my forearm<br />
sticks like glue<br />
<br />
Lorry asks, "What is that stuck to you?"<br />
<br />
Never a dull day<br />
no bill, no check, no order<br />
<br />
A gold-eyed frog<br />
the size of a quarterGerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-9443417887211053732015-09-26T13:09:00.000-07:002015-09-26T13:16:08.876-07:00Still Night in L.A.<br />
<img class="image-stretch-vertical" id="igImage" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41c2mtE1GXL.jpg" style="max-height: 500px; max-width: 328px;" /><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
Aram Saroyan's new book, <i>Still Night in L.A</i>., will be out in a couple of days and it reminds me that you really can judge a book by its cover. This one has a moody image of descending evening below which we see a flaming sky in a rear view mirror.</div>
<br />
The key words here are <i>descending</i> and <i>flaming</i> and Saroyan's prose weaves a tale between the two words, the two metaphorical worlds of fire and ice. Another way of saying it would be darkness and light, day and night, coming and going. This is a complex novel about dark actions between a small number of complex people, all of whom are in, one way or another, some deep trouble they've created for themselves.<br />
<br />
Saroyan is classically deft at describing less rather than more. <i>Still Night</i> is an edgy and urgent mystery in which the more that is left out, the more we are caught up in wonder. Therein lies the tension of the novel. The need to know and the author's smart dodge, leaking only what he wants known, one page at a time. Not surprisingly this is what all great detective novels do. <br />
<br />
First lines prove the novel, I think. <br />
<br />
<i>She was tall and striking with a face that betrayed her youth more than she probably realized.</i><br />
<br />
That sets the tone because every character is less, and then again, more, than what is exposed to the eye. Each character cracks in a certain way. The novelist does this lightly, and intuitively.<br />
<i> </i><br />
Deeper into the novel you may find yourself laughing. The humor is dry, very dry. But it's always there.<br />
<br />
One last note ... there are some classy, and once again, moody, photographs introducing each chapter. I haven't seen this done in recent years and the reason may be there are few enough photographer/mystery writers with an eye as sharp as Saroyan's. In this case the photographs are like the story itself. So well-crafted you may go back and look again. And again.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Still-Night-L-Aram-Saroyan/dp/1941110339/ref=sr_1_1_twi_pap_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1443298184&sr=8-1&keywords=still+night+in+l.a" target="_blank">http://www.amazon.com/Still-Night-L-Aram-Saroyan/dp/1941110339/ref=sr_1_1_twi_pap_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1443298184&sr=8-1&keywords=still+night+in+l.a</a><br />
<br />
<i> </i> Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-17993397847370410222015-09-11T08:38:00.001-07:002015-09-11T08:50:35.604-07:00pocket parrots, a pocketful of miracles<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
mural art by mariah fox</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
www.mariahfox.com</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<br />
In a parrot tree there is a family of pocket parrots. We watch them with the many students of our summer camp in Port Maria, Jamaica. I ask the students to write poems about the tiny, green-leaved, emerald-winged birds, and they do. They write beautiful poems.<br />
<br />
And this is the one I wrote with them on that day in August when the pretty pocket full of miracle pocket parrots flew from their nest for the first time. The next day they were gone.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
***</div>
<br />
<i>The pocket parrots come to the edge of their hollow almond tree,</i><br />
<i>a nestling, nook nest, and I can hear their twitters and squeaks</i><br />
<i>and sharp notes of joy -- "Come, brothers and sisters</i><br />
<i>there is so much to say, to see!"</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>When they leave their nest for the first time this August</i><br />
<i>after Independence Day in Jamaica, I realize</i><br />
<i>we too will soon be going back to New Mexico.</i><br />
<i>"Look," I say to Lorry, there is so much</i><br />
<i>to see, to say!"</i><br />
<br />
Blue Harbour, 1987Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-78411988819716709272015-06-04T09:12:00.000-07:002015-06-05T14:33:53.981-07:00ISLAND DREAMS<br />
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<br />
<br />
<i>Hi Gerry and Lorry.
</i><br />
<div>
<i>I just finished reading Island Dreams, all in one sitting. If I were a poet
like you, I could say all I want to say about the book in ten words. Being more
limited, it would take me 100 times that. It is a book of love on many levels.
Bob and Susan did a wonderful job in editing it and designing it. I like the
page-size and square format because there is a lot of white space for the poems
to breathe. The lack of illustrations in the main part of the book contributes
to that open space also. It says, these poems can sit by themselves, they need
no other support, and that space invites the reader to sit with each individual
poem as long as she wants, not rushing, crowding. Reading the poems was, as I
expected, a chance to visit some old friends and times, but meet a lot of new
ones also. There is a smoothness to the way Bob chose to group them. And the
poems themselves, the work, are just lovely. It is like you have a vision into a
crack in the world and you show us what you see, you give us light and wisdom
and touch our hearts, all with so few words. What a journey. I was happy to see
that you and Lorry ended up back at the reunion, slightly greyer in the hair,
but no less loving or loved. Congratulations. I hope you are as proud of the
book as we are of you.</i></div>
<i>
</i>
<br />
<div>
<i>Much love,</i></div>
<i>
</i>
<br />
<div>
<i>Alice</i><br />
<br />
Alice Winston Carney, author of <i>A Cowgirl in Search of a Horse</i>:<i> A Memoir </i></div>
<div>
</div>
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<div>
<br clear="all" />
<div>
It's such a great pleasure to wait and to have a book in mind that waits with you. In this case many years went into Island Dreams, actually about 50. That seems astounding to me, but yet this is my 70th year on earth. Our friend Alice W. Carney, a really fine writer in her own right (write), has said as much as I could say about this book of ours. One of the poems in the book dates back to 1963 and describes a hitchhiking trip from Great Barrington, Massachusetts to Quebec City where we -- two friends and myself -- sang for our supper and rode a few hundred feet on a freight train and spent a night in a Montreal jail for vagrancy.</div>
<div>
The poem "Quebec City" won a poetry prize and earned me (at age 19) a payment of $50.00 thus proving that a poet could make his way in the world, with his thumb out and his wallet handy. I was to learn as I went on down the road and Island Dreams tells the tale of living on island after island until the islands weren't islands any more -- they were just isolated pieces of earth, or sand, where we pitched our tent of love and went on from there. When I say "our" I am speaking of Lorry and Gerry, and later on, Mariah and Hannah, our daughters.</div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
Jack Kerouac called his days with thumb out, "A billowy trip in the world." I have always thought that's what it is to be alive ... to breathe deeply and look out of unjaded eyes at all that is around you. And that's what poetry is, a little eye-prayer to all the things a baby sees. My deepest thanks go to Bob and Susan Arnold, editors and designers at Longhouse Publishers and Booksellers. It was Bob's idea to have me reach back all the way to the beginning, thumb out, and expectant that a ride would come. And it's been quite a ride.<br />
<br />
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<div>
<a href="http://www.longhousepoetry.com/">http://www.longhousepoetry.com/</a></div>
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Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-31025446658901165042015-05-17T10:36:00.000-07:002015-05-17T10:49:23.937-07:00Famous Last Words Of People Close To Me<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">My aunt Glad in her 84th year looked at me from her rocking chair and said, "Can't be anything too serious ... I sleep too good nights." That night she died. A day doesn't go by that I don't think how much I loved her. She was honest and kind every day of her life and I hope some of that rubbed off, a little of it anyway, on me. I miss Glad.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I remember the day our housesitter passed. Among her last words: "Tell the Hausmans I'm sorry I didn't get over to take care of their dogs." Bless, Kathy for that, and for all the years she did take care of the dogs. You don't miss your water until your well dries up and Kathy was a good deep well. I miss Kathy.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I remember, too, my friend Phil, the painter, the jokester who, in middle age, finally found his true love. It was love at first sight, first kiss, first everything. He painted better, too. And his paintings started selling. Love is the foundation of all things but we got to see just how strong a foundation it was with these two. But one day after they were married, the two love birds were having a cocktail together and Phil got a strange look in his eyes. He died right there, drink in hand, smile on lip. "What'd you put in my drink?" he asked. And died. I was watching Madmen the other night and a painting on Don Draper's wall looked like one of Phil's. He was the kindest, funniest, madman I ever knew. I miss Phil.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">A friend of mine named Mike was in the hospital a few years ago and I had driven him there at 3 AM.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">We were in the ER and the doctors and nurses kept up a blue stream of visitations: "I am from Respiratory."</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">"I am from from Surgery ... I am from" etc. Finally a nurse stepped in and said, "I am from Breathing" and Mike's eyes opened and he said, "I am from dying." The only other words he spoke to me, later on, were: "Did you meet Natasha?" I asked who that was and he replied, "Someone from high school, long, long ago."</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">"Where is Natasha now?" Mike replied, "I don't know but she's sitting right next to you." There was no one there that could be there. I nodded. "Nice to meet you Natasha." Then Mike said, "You can't see her, can you?" I miss Mike.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">When my dad was on his deathbed in the hospital, he asked me if I thought the nurse was cute. I said she was, and he asked me to give her a pinch -- from him. "I'm too weak," he said, "or I'd do it myself."</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">I pinched her and she was about to retaliate when I said, "That was from my dad, he said he was too weak to do it himself." She shook her head, "The dear," she said. I miss my dad.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">My father in law, Roy, said before he died, "Life is a dirty business and then you die." He waited to see what I would say. I replied, "There is only life." After he died, Roy came back. I woke up in the middle of the night and there he was sitting on the corner of the bed, white hair all mussed and flaring and lit up by moonlight. He looked me square in the eye and said, "You're right. There is only life." Then he smiled and vanished. I miss Roy and all of them who have gone beyond the veil, as they used to say, and I wonder if they miss me.</span></span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGfn30heQ8XvluYQI0kb95DHKL2OXYbWeKYCc2pKr2Hl_Ef7TrdIS0jCDoONVUt5A1XdFXbcz24sb0IeL72OFdxTnvgpevEo16Dgiq3aXg_s771vmmBrOffnEapS9IV_JDgiy-iUWBv6bb/s1600/133721.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGfn30heQ8XvluYQI0kb95DHKL2OXYbWeKYCc2pKr2Hl_Ef7TrdIS0jCDoONVUt5A1XdFXbcz24sb0IeL72OFdxTnvgpevEo16Dgiq3aXg_s771vmmBrOffnEapS9IV_JDgiy-iUWBv6bb/s640/133721.JPG" width="504" /></a></div>
Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-72106413246852518472015-04-14T08:17:00.001-07:002015-04-14T08:23:41.412-07:00155th anniversary of the Pony Express<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiuRj-KUNkATKFuvIQXR6QlaPPokP-nmYcWi7EYT-Z6o2MOQsFzMrFaVgma3btMtOsScfeamTRSjT96f2WQ90nKd6DnQVngwTPFFryJCgxk1qu6f4CuHMHXJv305LUZdY6cJsfxv7hDid1/s1600/photo.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiuRj-KUNkATKFuvIQXR6QlaPPokP-nmYcWi7EYT-Z6o2MOQsFzMrFaVgma3btMtOsScfeamTRSjT96f2WQ90nKd6DnQVngwTPFFryJCgxk1qu6f4CuHMHXJv305LUZdY6cJsfxv7hDid1/s1600/photo.JPG" height="320" width="272" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
I was in Indianapolis telling stories to 4th grade students.<br />
<br />
They asked if I knew any historical stories, like the ones they were reading in school. I told them that my dad was born in 1900 and he actually saw Buffalo Bill a few years later at the Wild West Show at Madison Square Garden in New York City.<br />
<br />
No one in the classroom knew who Buffalo Bill was, so I said: "He was a Pony Express rider."<br />
<br />
"What's that?" a boy asked.<br />
<br />
"The first deliverer of the U.S. Mail," I said.<br />
<br />
"A mailman?" the same curious boy asked.<br />
<br />
"That's right."<br />
<br />
I explained how the Pony Express riders were kids, fifteen, sixteen years old, even younger. They had to be light on their feet and quick in the saddle and very determined to get the mail delivered, I explained.<br />
<br />
"How far did he have to ride to deliver the mail?" (same curious kid)<br />
<br />
"Well," I said, "He was a circuit rider. That means he had to go a certain distance, drop the mail off and then another circuit rider, a light-footed boy of the same age and height, would take off on a fresh horse and go the next distance with the mail until another rider took over and then --"<br />
<br />
Curious said, "-- all the way to California, I know."<br />
<br />
"Yes, that's true. The Pony Express linked up and went all across the country."<br />
<br />
Curious made a face. "I don't really believe you," he said.<br />
<br />
"Why not?" I asked, surprised.<br />
<br />
He said, "Do you have any artifacts from the Pony Express?" (He actually used the word "artifacts")<br />
<br />
"In fact, I do. Look at this book bag. My brother is a leather craftsman and he made me this replica ... this <i>artifact</i>, this re-creation of a real Pony Express bag!" I was so proud of my brother and my book bag in that glorious show-and-tell moment ... plus I knew I had him.<br />
<br />
Curious looked at the bag skeptically. "That's not REAL," he informed the class.<br />
<br />
"No," I pointed out, "It's a <i>replica</i>, something designed to look like --"<br />
<br />
"That's baloney," he said, cracking a sly smile.<br />
<br />
"No, it's leather," I said. "Cowhide."<br />
<br />
He stood up and faced the class like a trial lawyer. "How could such a tiny bag hold all the letters in the United States?"<br />
<br />
I had to admit. He'd won his case. But I had one last squeak left in me. "There weren't that many people back then, and not many could write letters in the first place."<br />
<br />
He wasn't sold on it. Neither were the others.<br />
<br />
"Buffalo Bill was a REAL guy," I remarked.<br />
<br />
"They'll learn about him next year," the teacher said. "Unless Core doesn't let us. They don't like things out of sequence."<br />
<br />
I shut up then and passed the hand-tooled Pony Express bag around the room and one cute, smart girl said, "I wish I had one."Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-17008565655100498022015-01-17T09:13:00.000-08:002015-01-17T09:13:08.388-08:00Ross LewAllen: The Wolf and the Typewriter<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd1SBqoziCuDnUd4N3cuZHMWkG8Qb7Fo2lcpzll254CConTBLHHxsosriqtG8G-UemJBwq0MVzJIgax2UgdlaASslm6KL5Zrq7hqmvxzd6C4JxEfPf5qYAFa9Hynlxi2v-GYYAS4CErRvT/s1600/Ross+2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd1SBqoziCuDnUd4N3cuZHMWkG8Qb7Fo2lcpzll254CConTBLHHxsosriqtG8G-UemJBwq0MVzJIgax2UgdlaASslm6KL5Zrq7hqmvxzd6C4JxEfPf5qYAFa9Hynlxi2v-GYYAS4CErRvT/s1600/Ross+2.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
This is a story of friendship. And of mutual love and reciprocity.<br />
<br />
My friend Ross once asked me, "How do you get rid of writing doubts?"<br />
<br />
I asked, "Where did they come from?"<br />
<br />
He thought about that for a while and then said, "From an elementary school teacher long ago, I was told that I was no good at writing." From that point on I stuck to drawings, painting, anything but writing. But you like my poems, so maybe I can write after all."<br />
<br />
"You could always write, Ross. But maybe you were carrying that grammar school teacher around on your shoulder."<br />
<br />
"I think I'll carry a wolf on my shoulder from now on. Thanks, Bro."<br />
<br />
A few days later I gave Ross the portable typewriter you see in his painting.<br />
<br />
A few days after this, he gave me the pen you see in our photograph.<br />
<br />
Ross is a love beyond measure, beyond friendship, beyond everything but the breath we breathe.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-73139917449196999832015-01-06T08:28:00.000-08:002015-01-06T08:31:52.201-08:00The Flying Chair<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSsQ78wR74L7gxrZJvTODqvk6Yx3aScGSW2dqX0zDAlFjrFGAEwJLnwd0ypaoo976bxTAOHcMtDEmDCxd0-zKNqifSsWXV2VR7l6J9puE8wpinVoYbDqkp6APufeiTX26flLXsRKltG6gr/s1600/!cid_B9978172-7BFF-43FE-907D-0EC9FC34C06A%40domain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSsQ78wR74L7gxrZJvTODqvk6Yx3aScGSW2dqX0zDAlFjrFGAEwJLnwd0ypaoo976bxTAOHcMtDEmDCxd0-zKNqifSsWXV2VR7l6J9puE8wpinVoYbDqkp6APufeiTX26flLXsRKltG6gr/s1600/!cid_B9978172-7BFF-43FE-907D-0EC9FC34C06A%40domain.jpg" height="239" width="320" /></a></div>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">We all have stories where something happens to us that we cannot explain. This one came out in my collection The American Storybag. Almost immediately I received some emails and other direct responses from kids who asked, "Is this story true?"<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">I would say to them: "All stories are true. This one happened as I said it did. But, then again, I was seven and my cousin was five."</span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">My cousin Kyle
said to me, “Do you remember the little room on the third floor of Grandad’s
lodge overlooking the lake?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“I remember it--not much bigger than a closet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There
were two pieces of furniture -- a marble table and an old rotten, horsehair
chair.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Kyle said, “When
we were five we’d go into that secret room when no one was looking.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“It was at
night," I said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">"Our
parents thought we were fast asleep."<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Kyle laughed, a little hysterically, I thought, but, yeah, it was kind
of funny the idea that we were together in the shadow room with the big gloomy
chair.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“Mmm,” Kyle
purred, “the big chair was our secret sharer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Remember?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“It's coming
to me -- something weird about that," I admitted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>"Did the chair have -- powers?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">It was coming
back in more detail. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
narrow steep stairs winding up to the third floor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The creaky door to the secret room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The knotty-pine closeness of the walls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The absence of breathable air.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The dust.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The secretness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The horsehair smell.
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The moon on a thousand year old, threadbare
oriental carpet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">There was the
old chair, so vast and solid, a kind of personage that beckoned children to sit
on it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, it had powers, all right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">We crept up to
the chair and inched our way up onto the sprung horsehair cushion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The chair smelled ratty and rotten.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The room so airless and close, as if whatever
lived within the walls needed every bit of oxygen that was available, and none
left for a couple of errant and disobedient kids.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Suddenly it
was clear to me why the chair was so special.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">It transported
us to places we didn’t want to go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Settled into
its cavernous bulk, the chair somehow blasted off like a rocket, flew us out of
the Lodge and skimmed us across the lake.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Not only that,
it skimmed us <i>under</i> the lake.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then it
soared us into the clouds, and above the clouds, took us into outer space, sent
us into the Milky Way where we tailed the tails of comets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">And then,
always and forever buried in my memory, the old chair turned around and brought
us home.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">We'd blink --
and there we'd be in that stuffy, small, airtight room that smelled of one
hundred years of dust.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">I remember
that, one night, Kyle met me in the darkened hall in front of the secret room,
and she whispered, “Tonight we’re going to do something different.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“What will it
be?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“Come, I’ll
show you.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Kyle was both mysterious and mischievous
and I often forgot she was my cousin, more like some magical, dreamed-up friend
from a storybook.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Soon we were
seated, elbow to elbow, in the chair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">I remember how
the chair was woven of twigs, millions of strands of twigs and it was, in
reality, a once upon a time tree that was now a square, squat painted tree that
looked like a chair and had horsehair cushions, bottom and back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">So we sat
together, Kyle and I, and the chair rocked out of the secret room and into the open
night of sundry stars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">All was well
until Kyle screamed at me -- “Let go of the chair!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">I wouldn’t -- but
she did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">And then my
cousin Kyle went spiraling off into space.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">She was tumbling
and rolling, while I held onto the arms of the chair until, at last, it upended
me and then I was floating around <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>in the
heavens with Kyle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We were flying, I
guess. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not like Peter and Wendy or the
Lost Boys because there was no sense of self, there was only space, emptiness,
void, air, wind, volume of nothingness, white noise of moonlight, and us moving
through it, invisibly and immaterially.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">We <i>were</i>, and
we sort of <i>weren’t</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">We were not
flying so much as we were flight itself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We were like the <i>thought</i> of flight. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>Miraculously detached, unloosed from the world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">And always, at
the end of the ride, the old trustworthy chair scooped us up and brought back
to the airless attic, secret room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“We must not
tell anyone about this,” Kyle warned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She was younger than I but so much wiser.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wanted to tell the whole world about our discovery. But I agreed
not to tell.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But – and I swear this is
true – when we got out of that room,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">we each forgot
about the chair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We forgot about flying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We forgot about the thought of flight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> We even</span> forgot about ourselves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Some months
later, Grandad lost all of his money and the lodge was sold <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>for petty cash.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">The old chair went
with the Lodge. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">We did not
think about the strangeness of this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
place where we grew up -- gone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not
lived in by us anymore, inhabited by someone else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Thus did we
grow up, and forget what it meant to be transported by magic.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Sixty years
passed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Kyle and I got
older, and then, just plain old, as I'm afraid we are now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But we still laughed a lot and from doing
this, we had laugh lines and lots of wrinkles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Well, as it
happened, one day a few months ago, we were sitting on the dock by the lake
below the hilltop where the Lodge had been – it burned to the ground in the
1970s -- and a big wind came up out of nowhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Kyle’s beach chair,
and mine, didn’t move because we sat hard upon them, waiting for the wind to go away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">It did,
finally, but then, when we weren't expecting it, the wind returned and knocked
Kyle and me into the lake.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Kyle laughed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Can you still hold your
breath like you used to?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“Sure," I
said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Kyle dived down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">I dived down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The lake<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>was as clear as the air above it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>We swam in circles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lots of seaweed, beer cans, stones,
bluegills, sunnies, bass, pickerel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
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<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">"Let's find the chair!" Kyle said.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">After swimming for a while, I felt chilled. “Kyle, I’m getting cold.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">“Pssh,” she
said. “Find the chair!”</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">I swam around
some more, staring into the wondrous clarity of the lake.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Then Kyle cried out,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>“There it is!”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"></span>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">The old
horsehair chair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Kyle and I were flying
above the ancient, rotten horsehair chair. We
touched the twiggy green-painted, woven arms and then the sprung matting of the
cushion . . . and . . . it happened all over again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></i></div>
<i>
</i><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<i>
</i><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">We were both
seated upon the chair underwater.</span></i></div>
<i>
</i><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<i>
</i><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">Then we flew, raced
in and out of spiral coves and caves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The chair took us to the swamp, scattering turtles and herons, and there
was that instantly familiar release that knows no bounds, that unlimited
non-human form. . . flying, we flew. . . out of body, we abandoned our bones
and entered that unknown, unknowable zone of pure flight, of the thought of
flight, and then of nothing, nothing at all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></i></div>
<i>
</i><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<i>
</i><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">When, at last,
we dragged the aluminum dock chair onto the dock, I was shivering and shaking,
and I started jabbering about flying but Kyle said, “Let’s not tell anyone
about this.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I haven't -- until now.</span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-1779671857551505362014-12-16T13:29:00.000-08:002014-12-16T13:29:39.741-08:00Those With Claws, Those With Toes<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">The king of the night callers
is the great horned owl. He comes on clear and cool, long and hollow -- <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Hoo,
hoo, hoo, hoo-hoooo</i>. A five beat basso singer. There is a dignity in his
call, a certain restraint, as if he knows, no matter what, he's soon to dine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">I love hearing them. But I'm
mindful of what they do when, soundlessly, they fall upon prey. Not even a
whisper of wings to warn rabbit or</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">flying squirrel that an
arsenal of claws is about to land.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">That's a swamp rabbit's tail
in the picture. And the claw marks of the great horned owl in the sand. He
landed right, this particular owl, but swamp bunnies will fight for their life,
and this one surely did. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">I found no other evidence of
his loss than this brown fluffy tail. But during the day I saw him sitting in
the sun, seeking to heal his wounds with kindly sunlight. He was alive and
would live but he was damaged. The fur along his spine was ripped clean. He
hopped away when he saw me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">Predators don't always win.
Crows kill owls during the day. They first harass them with raucous noise, and
then they come in number and chop the owl, blinding him first. I've seen it
happen and have written of the encounter in the broadside poem on this page.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">It's all give and take, in
nature.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All creatures giving and taking,
different times of night and day. The whole hullabaloo of life and death,
chance and change, luck and pluck. Pity the bunny? Praise the owl? If there's a
moral in all of this, Great Maker forgot to tell us. But he didn't forget to
give us five fingers and five toes, which to my mind is way better than claws. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1Qjs0BQ_Tp_iLsaFJf0tlwR4wJV7boXgxSYpCArOpTFG85XkqFxh8tY8PkGRRN6MGaPi6W6N4qRUOtf6by4eRGRaXd-m0dADA62e7jwnfFOLHKKJLA7Sg7zXyFiWEEajVXQbnv8rDzGpE/s1600/photo+4.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1Qjs0BQ_Tp_iLsaFJf0tlwR4wJV7boXgxSYpCArOpTFG85XkqFxh8tY8PkGRRN6MGaPi6W6N4qRUOtf6by4eRGRaXd-m0dADA62e7jwnfFOLHKKJLA7Sg7zXyFiWEEajVXQbnv8rDzGpE/s1600/photo+4.JPG" height="296" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgD2dyLjY3UhPdSPqWCwDWG4leGXutRy9VtvIGLChVuARqg-yE_U9QAufX1dboBRDQalenRmRXHr-lbmUGjjPdU8vN72LnnuSgrm5m6Ryv9auy7gL255hR9Alf5tFaOvFha_Kp2BOfAf8yy/s1600/photo+3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgD2dyLjY3UhPdSPqWCwDWG4leGXutRy9VtvIGLChVuARqg-yE_U9QAufX1dboBRDQalenRmRXHr-lbmUGjjPdU8vN72LnnuSgrm5m6Ryv9auy7gL255hR9Alf5tFaOvFha_Kp2BOfAf8yy/s1600/photo+3.JPG" height="313" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Pencil drawing by Sid Hausman </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"> <span style="font-size: x-small;">Poem broadside originally</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";">published by Giligia Press,</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Bookman Old Style";"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Fresno, California in 1968</span></span></div>
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Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-46250113821474023492014-11-14T09:31:00.000-08:002014-11-14T09:31:34.539-08:00The sun comes up and the moon follows <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijknaQxfAb_1x8SyZgeLN9zsLC2JjxWqLnFda0QNs2a6YgZKWySq4FJX2YzkeWT_1RIeOPPifKKz_GW1DsR0hTtqDWB75lZ2BBF1nx6Z6SuHCQ44QY4mcHVEzEI4tApWnvC6Uu8H-rl2Px/s1600/empty+mirror.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijknaQxfAb_1x8SyZgeLN9zsLC2JjxWqLnFda0QNs2a6YgZKWySq4FJX2YzkeWT_1RIeOPPifKKz_GW1DsR0hTtqDWB75lZ2BBF1nx6Z6SuHCQ44QY4mcHVEzEI4tApWnvC6Uu8H-rl2Px/s1600/empty+mirror.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></div>
The riddle of life yields more answers as you get older. You begin to see the pattern of beautiful repetition. The sun comes up and the moon follows. <br />
<br />
My riddle of the morning came to me with a voice I heard in my head.<br />
<br />
<i>The book awaits, yet waits not. The corn sleeps to make more corn. The egg is armored but easily shelled. The song sings though the singer is gone. All is well and not undone.</i><br />
<br />
The tendency is to think that everything is coming undone when, in fact, it only goes out to come back in. All of life is a riddle and a cycle that can be solved. For some it comes at the end of life. For others it begins at birth. For a few it occurs when a small pebble knocks against a column of bamboo.<br />
<br />
As to my personal riddles, here shared ... I gave many storytellings over the past twenty years where I was paid with corn. The book is coming: the love letters of my father and mother. It has taken a few years to edit them, but we're nearing completion.<br />
<br />
The significance of the egg is not a secret, but if you take a cold egg from the fridge and place it against your eyelid, it soothes the eye more quickly than Visine. My brother learned this from a Taoseno named Tieflo a long time ago. But I should add that Tieflo used round river stones about the same size of his eye sockets. Tieflo said if you did this quiet meditation for a few minutes every day you would never need to wear eye glasses. In my case I take them off after a long day and cool my eyes with cold eggs, in the belief that something may grow without my knowing it.<br />
<br />
The singer and the song -- everyone has a secret song of some kind, an exalted and uplifting melody with lyrics that soothe the heart no matter how many times the song is heard.Some songs I only heard once yet I hear them over and over in my head and remember the day the words were sung.<br />
<br />
The empty mirror needs polishing, again and again, every day. You will not see yourself in it. The mirror will only reflect emptiness. And in that emptiness the sun comes up and the moon follows.Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2635585893873751276.post-32377002643159258762014-10-02T09:43:00.001-07:002014-10-02T09:50:40.215-07:00Another Way of Looking at Jan Wiener by Joseph Koch<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Once in a blue moon, if then, something in a story resonates to such a degree that it becomes a life-changing moment. As Jan Wiener changed my life, Joseph Koch was changed by a story about Jan. I wrote the story in 1994 for an anthology edited by my friend Roger Zelazny. I remember when the book came out Jan read the story and smiling said, "Well, you romanticized me but that's all right. Don't worry, I'll never tell." My turn to smile, I said, "It's fiction, no need not to tell." We both laughed. </i></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><b>If You See Your Past
On The Road, Kill It</b> </i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
by J. Koch</div>
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“You don’t seem to understand,” he said, “that you are
alive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Who cares about your handicap?
You must turn your injury into something vital, a weapon to cancel the past.”
-- Jan Volta</div>
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I have been carrying the above quote around in my head since
1995. It has been like a personal koan for me. I found it in the short story
"Eye of the Falcon" by Gerald Hausman which was published in an
anthology <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Warriors of Blood and Dream</i>
edited by Roger Zelazny Recently Mr. Hausman told me that Jan Wiener was
the real name of the character in his story. I suppose by calling his friend
and teacher by the fictitious name of Jan Volta, the author got a little
distance and some added poetic license when he wrote his tale about the martial
arts. What attracted me to Volta though was
his tough, brazen disregard for self-pity of any kind.</div>
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I understood the "who cares?" aspect of Volta's
comments well enough, but I wondered for a long time how something I've put up
with, worked around, accepted, fought, and wept over<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>could possibly be any kind of weapon. How could a thing I've had since birth cancel my past? That was my conundrum.
And it is why I have called it my koan. I had to solve the question. <br />
<br />
At age 42, I think I finally have it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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In Mr. Hausman’s story, the protagonist arrives in Jamaica
after many years to run in a marathon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He encounters Jan Volta, master of an obscure, but venerated
Czechoslovakian athletics and martial arts regimen called <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Sokol</i>, or “Falcon”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our
main character is very fit, having welded his body back into working order
after a "crippling accident".<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While they train, Master Volta shows absolutely no mercy at all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The protagonist tells Volta
about his accident, the pain it caused, and what he suffered.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Volta is
unimpressed, our protagonist is offended, and tells him so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My opening quote is Master Volta’s
reply.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Master Volta lived through World
War II, trained men that fought the Nazis, and fought them himself.</div>
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I've had spastic cerebral palsy since birth. I fall
often. Forty years later I’m still painfully embarrassed, to the point of
growling things like, “I’m fine!” when people are just trying to help me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t walk well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have to plan my movements a piece at a time
in my head.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes I lurch about,
knocking things over when I reach for them, stumbling, almost throwing myself
into chairs when I sit. My first trip to the bathroom each day is always an
adventure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nevertheless, I’ve been drawn
to martial arts practice all my life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On
the days I can stand, I can throw punches and blocking combinations well enough
that my teacher thought I was “pretty fast.” </div>
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My wife is a big part of why I understand Master Volta
better now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A lesser being would have
shriveled up in a corner and died.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Instead, my wife used the need to take care of her daughter, and her
poor health to move past what came before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></div>
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Doing daily tasks is harder for us and takes more effort
that it does for a “normal” person.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not
impossible, just harder. We have a certain amount of mental, emotional,
physical effort to devote to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">anything</i>
at any given time. Filling up too much of our mental/physical/emotional hard
drives with, “Woe is me!” makes that even harder. </div>
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A disability is a weapon because you can use it, in that
way, if you know how, and if you have the will to do it. </div>
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We can sit and mope about our pasts, or use our troubles
walking across a room, doing laundry, and doing dishes, to cancel the past and
keep going.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re both far from perfect;
what I’m telling you doesn’t work perfectly every single day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But my wife told me something early on that
always stuck with me: “Effort always counts.” </div>
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As in meditation, “You became distracted? OK, stop and start
again.” </div>
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We have our weapons to cancel our past. We can always pick
them up and wield them. </div>
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Gerald Hausmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06530010306993020646noreply@blogger.com0