Summer Thoughts

Tags

1968, 1974, Armenian coffee, sourj

Trying to wash a pair of demitasse cups while ruminating about summer. On a grand scale this summer’s disruption does not compare with other summers. The adrenaline did not rise to the level of Chicago and the 1968 Democratic National Convention, and the attention has not been as focused as it was in the summer of 1974 waiting for the inevitable resignation of Richard Nixon.

“No, it wasn’t as bad as the Watergate years,” I said with my outside voice.

“Ah, you’re old, Ms. Anne,” said Brutus Parker.

“Thanks, Brutus. Old beats—well, no need to insult anyone.”

And the weeks of summer moved steadfastly into fall. The coffee club moved from one city to another, from one site to another, and all the population relocated with the club. Our Punmeister began new work as pastor of a church and continues another writing project or two. Our barrista, who despises that word and prefers to be called “The Scourge of the Sourjaman,” deals with a new set-up. Despite the disruption, all our irregular friends continue to play backgammon and chess, talk politics and religion and nearly everything else, and drink Armenian coffee with loukoum on the side.

Deleting Chestnuts: A Morning Mini-Rant

Tags

advertising, language, mini-rant, US culture

Banality, bromide, chestnut, cliché, groaner, commonplace—OK, I visited my thesaurus because I saw yet another trite ad that began:

“Everybody’s talking about _______.”

Most of us ignore that lie, which is a banality and worse. Let’s retire the phrase.

US culture consists of so many different niche and specialized groups that generalists seem no longer to exist. That is the nature of a pluralistic culture and, affirming the obvious, why so many people who once felt settled and comfortable now feel culture’s foundations quaking. The only reason people unite in conversation is that the product or resource does not deliver as promised or is shoddily crafted—but we’re still far from everybody.

Here at Ms. Anne Thrope’s Wandering Coffee & Chess Club and Conversational Palace, all our friends engage in frequently feisty conversations, but never about the same subject. Talk with you soon over a cup of Armenian coffee.

 

Five Questions about the Nonprofit Entity called the NFL

Tags

football, NFL, nonprofit status, television revenue, US culture, violence against women

1. Does the violence in the elevator help us begin to take serious action concerning violence against women?
2. Why does the National Football League, with its massive wealth, continue to exist as a nonprofit entity?
3. If the NFL is considered a public trust, does the NFL leadership’s inability to provide a more clear rule call for an independent oversight committee?
4. Will any national leader investigate the NFL because of its inability to deal with its locker room culture, its sexual objectification, and its off-field violence, in addition to its corporate greed evidenced in threats of moving from municipalities that do not grant further tax breaks and financial incentives?
5. Do we prefer to abide in the bliss of this corporate weapon of mass distraction?

The Land of Make-Believe

Tags

Armenian, Chuck Mangione, Michael Brown, Warren Commission

Lately I’ve been listening to Esther Satterfield’s haunting vocals on “The Land of Make-Believe,” a tune written by Chuck Mangione. Satterfield delivers Mangione’s song smoothly and with appropriate wit. Flugelhorn and reed solos add to the pleasure of this 12-minute recording.

I don’t know what inspired Mangione to write this piece, but I like it very much.

When you’re feeling down and out
Wondering what this world’s about
I know a place that has the answer.

It’s a place where no one dies.
It’s a land where no one cries.
And good vibrations always
Greet you.

The song refers to childhood stories and includes the line, “Seven dwarves and Little Boy Blue, Uncle Remus and Snow White too.” and then comes the stinger–“Now that’s integration.”

I keep thinking about this land of make-believe in light of current reality. By the time we finish receiving all the reports about the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, we’ll probably have as many “facts” as the Warren Commission’s report on the assassination of John F. Kennedy, and we will still have questions unanswered. We will grieve the loss of yet another life and wonder what might have been. ISIS and needs of the Middle East and Asia Minor are for other days.

We’ve made believe for too long about too many facets of life in the United States and our problems may differ from cultural problems in other nations. One misperception is that all people have equal rights and equal opportunities. When I was much younger, I was asked—sometimes politely, sometimes not so politely—if I happened to be an African-American passing as a Caucasian. People, in their ignorance of history and geography, thought I invented being of Armenian descent. I still experienced opportunities that others, because of their backgrounds, did not receive. I saw others with lesser ability receive opportunities because their backgrounds contained far more privilege than my own. A simple outline of make-believe and privilege.

It’s a pleasant land, this land of make-believe, but moving toward our vision of justice is painful.