Sad Guitar

I have a friend I see only rarely. But that's not a bad thing, since the friend I'm talking about is a guitar, and I only visit this friend when I am anxious or sad.

I used to have ambitions to play music, but those quickly subsided to using guitar as a form of therapy - some (my wife and many previous roommates) might call it obsessive-compulsive noodling, but it's therapy to me. And when it comes to bringing me out of a funk, my guitar is an effective friend.

I said I've only seen my guitar rarely, and that's true. It's been mostly sitting in a closet, because I've mostly been happy.

It has been used though:

It came out and helped me on 9/11. I strummed it from time to time when GWB's government started some 'war' somewhere; and I held it during thankfully infrequent, if terrible, natural disasters. It also helped when the 'recession' swept away most of my retirement. (I think my fingers, absent the calluses of persistent players, bled on that one.)

But lately I find myself picking it up at least weekly, and not out of some resurgence of juvenile rock dreams. The progress (or lack of same, I guess) with the 'war' in Afghanistan, and now the new 'war' in Libya; the Japanese Quaketsunamimeltdown; and a death in the family.

And there's general anxiety too. I am not sure why I feel it, when there is so much specific to be anxious about, but I am feeling a nonspecific unease that won't let up. Maybe it's a side effect of the failure of Hope - once promised but increasingly unlikely to be delivered by President Obama.

But perhaps not. It might be that I am getting older and not feeling any wiser. Or worse, that I feel there is a decrease in wisdom in the World in general, and there is nothing I can do about it.

Except play my guitar ...

War on War

Now, the politicos and the press aren't calling what we just started in Libya a 'war'. At least not yet.

And it's not a solo effort. It seems we found a couple of allies this time around, both eager to go at it. And we have the 'backing' of 'Arab nations'.

And I do believe He-Who's-Name-Is-Spelled-A-Thousand-Ways is a despot, a tyrant, a dictator, and as many other synonyms for autocratic madman as you can muster. He's also a self-proclaimed sponsor of terror, and a complete nutcase.

But I am stumped at what 'international law' (as claimed by Mrs. Clinton), Mr. Ghaddafi has violated (in the current situation). He's broken a million moral and ethical beliefs, but what law has he violated? Is what he is attempting genocide? What's the test for that?

At what point does a dictator's suppression of internal rebellion become something other countries have to stop? Why do we go and get him now, but not before when he blew up our people over Lockerbee? Why not back when we tried to assassinate him? Why this time and this moment?

I guess the answer is written somewhere in that 'international law', and our strategists must have puzzled through the labyrinthine wording to come to their conclusion.

Or maybe they are just stepping in to keep the oil flowing?

To the Libyans in the middle of all this, the reasons ultimately won't matter. In the end we will either have given them 'freedom', or we will have killed many of them with kindness, much like we have the Iraqis, Afghans, and Pakistanis. They will either end up saying 'Thanks (now please leave)", or "Thanks for nothing (and wait till we come and get you)".

To us (if not our allies), this will come as no surprise. It'll be business as usual. But I fear the broader implications.

I fear we may have entered an ironic phase in the War on Things game. In years past we have declared War on things broad, nebulous, and multi-faceted, like Poverty, Cancer, and Terror. Now we may have declared War on 'War'. What the heck - they fight fire with fire, right? And what did Ghandi know anyway - his act was so 1940's.

I'm not going to lose any sleep worrying over it, what happens happens. And it will be interesting to see who or what replaces the Old Crazy Bedouin. I just wish whoever is really running this world would put a consistent act together.

The History of Punishment: The 1600s

I wonder: in the 1600s, if you were placed in a device (frequently depicted in movies and therein called a 'stock'), that locked your arms and head in place holding you captive for active public abuse and shaming; would that have been called getting 'stocked'?

If so, would a repeat offender be 're-stocked', and was there a re-stocking fee?

The Unbelievable

I see it on television, and I trust what I see is not CGI, nor old footage edited to look current, but real images of a very tangible catastrophe.

But I am having great difficulty believing in what I am seeing.

For reasons I can't fully fathom, I was able to accept the 2004 Indonesian quake and tsunami as fact in a way I can't yet with Japan's horror. The same ease of acceptance was true with Haiti's nightmare. 'Connecting' with the cruel reality of those earlier disasters and empathizing with the victims came quickly, but I am struggling to believe this new one.

Maybe it's that Japan is so connected with my daily life: my wife drives her Toyota; I ride my Kawasaki; we spool up the Sony Blu-Ray for entertainment. Perhaps I'll strum my made-in-Japan Fender Telecaster, or dust off the Yamaha upright that's been lonely since the kids abandoned their lessons.

Maybe I'll tune in to the motorcycle races to see if Suzuki has anything competitive this year. Or perhaps I'll look again at the Japanese art my wife's cousin creates so well after years of study in Japan.

Japan and things Japanese permeate our lives. We are They, and They are Us. A culture apart yet entwined irrevocably. Their disaster is ours in a way that feels surreal.

But perhaps when I can bear to examine it closely, I'll find the reason I fear to absorb this reality is that I don't want to feel the anguish of empathy. What has happened in Japan is so real I want it not to be real. How else could I pull up behind a Honda in traffic and not cry?

Practicing Democracy

All learned skills need regular practice to maintain. Skills we've never truly learned require a lot more.

In California's recent election, only 12% of the registered 'voters' practiced voting, which may make them rusty for the next opportunity - one they might deem more interesting.

Up in Wisconsin, the Governor is practicing his particular form of democracy, where anything goes if it leads to winning. And the Wisconsonian Democrats played their hand by leaving the table and getting locked outside when they needed to be inside. Despite their bureaucratic waltz, neither team seemed very practiced at real democracy, and their ineptitude will cause great grief for Wisconsonites.

And elsewhere, a committee has formed to investigate the radicalization of American muslims. The leader of this team says this investigation is critical to the safety of Americans, but has any Congressional committee ever accomplished anything of value, aside from being a showcase for pet and very polarizing political views? Or as a launchpad for a political career?

All of this is just to hopefully make clear we need more (and better) practice in exercising the responsibilities of citizenship. It's needed at every level, but it starts with the polling place, and that means Us.