Sunday, November 9th, 2003

'Tis crisp enough here on the western edge of Madison, Wisconsin, where my lovin' spouse and I are ensconced in home of two cats, Mortimer and Oliver - one that they generously condone to share with my son Albert Hermanson-Albers and his lovely wife Bobbi. We arrived here last night just as the moon began to peek out once more from total eclipse - a spectacle we watched for hours on our drive during the early evening. My lovin' spouse, Leslie, got us here safely in the good ol' Subaru in about twelve hours - not bad. We did stop in Tower City for the weest slice of sour cream raisin pie - 'twas delicious. Here at the house that Morty & Ollie own, there are fresh muffins and a huge container of apple juice - God's plenty to get one through the small hours of what will be a glorious day - one nearly as grand as I know will be in beauuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful Dakota.

Al and Bobbi were entertaining their friends Nate and Molly from down the hall in this mighty-fine apartment complex. Nate and Molly have cats as well - so there's lots of tales about the strange and seemingly supernatural powers of these creatures that are willing enough to live with humans as long as they know their place and keep it. Nate, who hails from the wilds of Montana, continues his study here at the University of Wisconsin in Hebrew and Greek - don't run across that many classical language scholars at the turn of the twenty-first century. Hearing these young folk in their twenties laugh and enjoy life is a great treat - we are treated like visiting royalty at this emporium of good humor and cheer. There's no better place to rest up for the stuff to come at the place I go to stay alive.

It was Bobbi's mother, Judy, from Bobbi's hometown of Dawson, Minnesota, who called me and told me about the Midwestern Regional Medical Center at Zion almost a year ago, after I had been sent home to die by the medical miracle works of Mayo. She said a young man, Andy, who was a high school teacher and instructor in the martial arts had been so diagnosed a year before (he's going on at least a couple of years) with terminal pancreatic cancer and been given two or three months to live - more or less the sentence I was given in my exit from Mayo by a physician's assistant - the oncologist didn't even deign to see me himself. Bobbi's mom, Judy Clausen, recently saw Andy - he's gained back some thirty pounds, is doing everything he did before the attack of the insidious invader. Most astonishingly, after two years of chemo, there's no trace of the tumor.

I want to be like Andy, of course - who wouldn't? Critical to any chance is continuing to hope - and I continue to be less than pleased with any who suggests that such as I should abandon all hope. There's common sense, of course - and there's nothing wrong with an appreciation of what probably will happen based on the experience of so many - but there always remains hope. I also have come to think that a huge part of what are called miracles of recovery in medicine stem from within - at least I know that, without hope, one can give up and die with relative ease. Perhaps the great Russian nineteenth-century writer, Ivan Turgenev, who was born on this day in 1818 was right - he said, "Whatever man prays for, he prays for a miracle. Every prayer reduces itself to this -- Great God, grant that twice two be not four." Perhaps hope can be an empty triumph of hope over reason, but as Hamlet said, "There are more things . . ." One who never gave up was Carl Sagan, the man who introduced his to the concept of "billions and billions and billions of stars." Born on this day in 1934, he finally succumbed to a bone marrow disease after two years of a valiant struggle just about a month after his sixty-second birthday. The Planetary Society maintains a great site with links about this extraordinary man. The New York Times had it right when William Broad wrote "Even in Death, Carl Sagan's Influence is Still Cosmic" in 1998. Broad recalls a visit Sagan made to the headquarters of NASA to talk with chief administrator Daniel S. Goldin two weeks before his death. Clothed in jeans that hung on his dwindled frame - and Sagan was never a man who carried much extra weight - he came to outline a vision for the future of space travel. Wrote Broad, ""He was talking with intensity,' Mr. Goldin marveled. 'A man on his deathbed. This is the Carl Sagan I love, a man so full of hope and optimism that he never gave up. He never gave up.'" Now, there's a fellow human to look up to. What I find most remarkable about great souls like Sagan is their self-deprecating humor, their playfulness. A few years ago, during the Library of Congress' observation of the 250th anniversary of the birth of Thomas Jefferson, my friend Clay Jenkinson, the interpreter scholar behind the first-person characterization of Thomas Jefferson, met Carl Sagan at the White House event hosted by President and Mrs. Clinton on April 11, 1994 - nine years ago. Sagan probably had just found out about his death sentence - but he was in great form. Clay says that of all the dignitaries, scholars, and what my darlin' daughter calls "very important people" who were there to hear Clay in the voice of President Jefferson offer a few remarks, Carl Sagan was the one who both immediately understood and participated in the humanities event. Clay says that he Sagan told him, as though he were addressing Thomas Jefferson but knowing full well that this was a moment of exploration in the humanities, "If there were one person I could meet from your time, it would be you, Mr. Jefferson." Clay told me later, he could only reply, as though he had time traveled to that moment in 1994, "If there is one person I would want to meet from your time, it is you, Dr. Sagan." What an incredible human, what a great soul, Carl Sagan. I salute your memory today . . . may it be done billions and billions and billions of times as people remember you.

Sagan always reminded us to be a bit humble - especially in our sometimes grotesque and foolish posturing in some sort of Swiftian notion that we are superior to the rest of humankind or that humankind is superior to all other life. 'Twas Sagan who reminded us that "It is of interest to note that while some dolphins are reported to have learned English - up to fifty words used in correct context - no human being has been reported to have learned dolphinese."

Today's the birthday of a fellow who really didn't know much about the concept of humility - Spiro Agnew, Richard M. Nixon's vice president, who said when confronted with overwhelming evidence o doing rather unsavory things while in office, "I apologize for lying to you. I promise I won't deceive you except in matters of this sort." Agnew was born on this day in 1918, and he lived nine months beyond his seventy-seventh year in 1996. Out in front during something of a culture war before that term was invented, Agnew deflected criticism of Nixon's administration with such attacks as "A spirit of national masochism prevails, encouraged by an effete corps of impudent snobs who characterize themselves as intellectuals." He also called those who found fault "nattering nabobs," at least I think that was Agnew. There was, in those turbulent days beginning about thirty years past, the same sort of debate that goes on today about the cost in terms of individual freedom necessary for the collective safety of society. In short, how much are we willing to allow the government to snoop into and control our lives in our effort keep terrorists at bay? Agnew's answer was almost flippant, but indicative of many who thought as he - still do, for that matter: "Confronted with the choice, the American people would choose the policeman's truncheon over the anarchist's bomb." To some well-meaning, very patriotic (and God-fearing) Americans today, including no few who hold considerable power, the answer is more than "the policeman's truncheon" - it's detainment without arraignment or trial. Lock 'em up.

Kola, we, as all of those who have completed their passage in the middle world, all those who have struggled with the same questions we have, would do well to turn once more to the exemplary approach of Carl Sagan to finding the most in each day. All those who met him - and Daniel Goldin says it was true of the meeting he had with Sagan two weeks before his death - all say that Sagan brought questions and possibilities, not the definite answer or the gospel truth. So, as you take care of yourselves today, keep a special watch for those who know it all and are too eager to share their corner on truth with you - look out for each other and try best as you can to treat them as you would be, with dignity and respect. Whatever you do, don't tolerate a lecture or sermon that's all answers and no questions - therein in lies the road to the perdition of self-satisfaction, loss of humor, and righteous crusades for causes. Have a big swig or whatever's handy (mine's apple juice) and enjoy a bit of music - mine's gonna be the old songs rendered by Rod Stewart as I do a bit of work on a revision for North Dakota Humanities Council guidelines for Speakers Bureau.

Saturday, November 8th, 2003

Counting down to take off for Zion this fine, beauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful day in Dakota, the 8th November. How I'll miss my bed and comforter, this recliner and the gas fire place, the refrigerator with an ample supply of grape juice and so much more - you know, a bit of two-tone, or cheese cake, and, of course, pie. But my spouse and I wend our way east through some nine hundred miles of deer-running-amuck country - at least here in Dakota, where the season to deal with too many Bambis grown up complete their passage in the middle world and become butterfly breakfast steaks or sausage, cut with the weest bit of pork. Stuff some fourteen months past I would consume with considerable gusto - really can't think much about it, now. But the idea of the breast of a pheasant still appeals mightily, especially if it were fed on a cornfield in Hannover Township, Oliver County, the Garden of the Universe where I grew up, I love wild fowl - but I was such a lousy hunter as young guy that I just gave it up - and the near-combat conditions of deer hunting in some places is not for - or even on a couple of sections of land where I'm alone. I probably would have had one hell of a time surviving in a more elemental society - what do you do with someone of my ilk? He likes to eat well enough, but can't or won't go out and get it. Took me a long time to simply say, in the words of Herman Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener" - "I would prefer not to." Bartleby, of course, was being asked to move from his seat of work and partake in life, not go out and hunt. But you get the principle.

Among those who arrived in and left the middle world on this day is Minnie Riperton, Born on this day 1947, she was gone before her thirtieth birthday. She went down fighting, hard - the woman who had a five-octave range and sang with such haunting otherworldliness (listening to a voice like hers is the best evidence I know of more to the human experience than our passage here in the middle world). Among the first women to come out and speak on behalf of greater research into finding a cure and/or more effective treatment for breast cancer, Minnie Riperton turned her terminal disease into an opportunity to help others. But before that, she sang - one of her great albums was Come to My Garden -- the title song was her first in 1969, I think ( find out more at a great web site devoted to her memory. Here's the lyrics for "Come to My Garden":

Come to my garden let the stars fill your eyes
Come to my garden and walk with me
Come to my garden no more dreams filled with cries
Come to my garden please

I'll take your hand and lead you from these bad times
I'll take your breath and give you mine
I'll take your hand and lead you where the truth lies
I'll take you with me now

You know you've lived here all your nights; all your days
You know you've lived here inside my mind
You know you'll stay here for this you've lived all your life
You know you'll stay right here

So here's to Minnie's memory - give her a listen today if you have her - maybe I'll ask my son, Albert Hermanson Albers, if he has the album - he has lots. One of the great side benefits of going to that bastion of hope against all odds, the Midwestern Regional Medical Center, a Cancer Treatment Center of America at Zion, is that we pass through and spend a day in Madison, Wisconsin, with our son and his wife - we claim her as our daughter as well as our own Gretchen - Bobbi Hermanson-Albers. Bet Bobbi likes Minnie - who wouldn't? Well, perhaps those who prefer the sappy voices of the 70s - like Olivia Newton-John - of whom Minnie once said, "Australia's gift to insomniacs. It's nothing but the blonde singing the bland."

The great English poet who completed his passage today in 1674 after nearly sixty-years, John Milton, would have appreciated Minnie's wit, methinks. Milton gave us,

"Come and trip as you go
On the light fantastic toe.

If nothing else, he gave us the saying that we've used to describe everything from Fred Astaire and Ginger Rodgers to a guy like me, who barely shuffles along some days - but I do indeed "trip the light fantastic" in my mind's eye - yet another example of hope over all reason. Of course, a major power walk for me takes me from my chair some thirteen steps to a seven-step stair and another thirteen to my bed - or thirteen to the other seven-stair passage down and another thirteen into the garage and the Subaru Forester, Leslie Rae Kubik Albers, Pilot. There was a time when I served as occasional navigator --I don't remember if I'm still suspended for getting us lost in Chicago or back on probation. 'Twas Milton who penned Paradise Lost most days on my top five of really great books. He also wrote some really fine shorter works, including "On Time." If Minnie Riperton's voice is a hint of paradise (Milton also wrote Paradise Regained -- not as good as the one where we humans lost it), Milton's poem is the greatest affirmation of belief in God and an afterlife in the English language - I can't say that I join in his conviction, but 'tis a grand poem:

Fly, envious Time, till thou run out thy race,
Call on the lazy leaden-stepping hours,
Whose speed is but the heavy plummet's pace;
And glut thyself with what thy womb devours,
Which is no more than what is false and vain,
And merely mortal dross;
So little is our loss,
So little is thy gain.
For when as each thing bad thou hast intombed,
And last of all thy greedy self consumed,
Then long Eternity shall greet our bliss
With an individual kiss,
And Joy shall overtake us as a flood;
When every thing that is sincerely good
And perfectly divine,
With truth, and peace, and love, shall ever shine
About the supreme throne
Of Him, t' whose happy-making sight alone
When once our heav'nly-guided soul shall climb
, Then, all this earthly grossness quit,
Attired with stars, we shall for ever sit,
Triumphing over Death, and Chance, and thee, O Time.

I hope both John Milton and Minnie Riperton are in paradise - maybe sharing the weest bit of grape juice on day that crisp and beauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful hours before dawn. Those of us still journeying in the middle world salute you. ( Here's a fine web gateway to more on Milton, 'Twas Milton who said, "They also serve who only stand and wait." I've get to figure out what he was saying - "wait" for what? And why can't I sit in my recliner and wait, especially if I don't know what I'm waiting for? I do understand his observation that "The mind is its own place and in itself, can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven."

Well, my kola, 'tis about time this fine day to prepare for the journey. My lovin' spouse purchased for me a truly wondrous gift - something that I didn't know was around anymore - flannel-lined jeans. I used to have a pair when I was growing up - and those over long johns were enough to keep warm (well, we also had a primitive version of snow pants) in the buckboard sleigh we rode behind Kate and Ben, the team who got us there. Of course, they cost the weest bit more than they did out in the Hannover Store - maybe they couldn't even by bought there, that emporium that had all things - maybe they had to be ordered from Sears and Roebuck or Montgomery Wards. Here I have, more than fifty years later, pleased as Hubert Humphrey's proverbial punch to have another pair - of course, I never contemplated that I would wear nearly the same waist size I did as an eighth grader - but that's one of the benefits of dealing with the insidious invader - no more diets in my lifetime, methinks!

Can't seem to find Minnie - but I do have some Bonnie Raitt somewhere - Bonnie can't touch Minnie's mastery, but she's pretty good - she celebrates her fifty-fourth birthday today. 'Tis a great day for the weest bit of music. One never knows, but we might be hitting Tower City and that truck stop just off I-94 today just at the right time - and that means sour cream raisin pie, perhaps. Time to rise and power walk to the front door where the morning paper awaits. Trust you are taking good care of yourselves, friends - and that you're taking seriously your job of looking out for each other.

Ev Albers

Friday, November 7th, 2003

Aye, and 'tis indeed a great day to be alive this beauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful one is crisp and calm Dakota. I'm snug before the fireplace, no chills or shakes, and ready for rosy-fingered dawn and a productive day before my lovin' spouse wends us eastward for a Roto-rooter job on my bile duct and more tests this Monday and Tuesday next - and then possibly further treatment in an effort to shirk this insidious invader. 'Twill be something of a hardship on spouse, Leslie - traveling on a weekend without conservative talk radio to listen to and become outraged about. She's been mighty lonesome without Rush - 'tis talk radio that gets her on down the road. 'Tis easy for me, sitting there in the passenger seat - I can listen to music on my earphones, sleep, read - 'tis the easiest of passages.

There's wondrously brilliant light that continues to shine from the faces of some who completed their journeys here in the middle world on this day - including the great Russian novelist Tolstoy (1910), Eleanor Roosevelt (1962), John Nance Gardner (1967), and English writer Lawrence Durrell (1990). And this is the day in 1972 that Senator George McGovern and his running mate, R. Sergeant Shriver, father of yesterday's birthday girl, Maria, lovin' wife of Arnold Swarzenegger, were whupped soundly so President Richard Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew - the Nixon-Agnew team got just the weest bit more than 30 percent of the vote garnered by the McGovern-Shriver team. Within short years, both would leave office in utter disgrace. Such is the nature, atimes, of great victories. John Nance Gardner was Franklin Roosevelt's first running mate - he found nothing that great in the job he won. Also known as Cactus Jack Gardner, the man who helped FDR get into the White House lived to be almost ninety-nine - and he quite a career before his stint as Vice President, which he dismissed as not being "worth a pitcher of warm piss." I like fellows like Gardner, who aren't afraid to say what they really think of where they find themselves. He had served for thirty years in House as a U.S. Representative from Texas, including being the Speaker when he was tapped to help get FDR elected. Gardner was a rather conservative sort who had supported a graduated income tax and had opposed with considerable vigor the Klu Klux Klan. But there were aspects of the New Deal he found to be too much government - and he was most upset with FDR's running for a third term - in fact, he ran against him after serving eight years as his vice president. FDR triumphed, of course - and triumphed again on this day in 1944 when he won a fourth term as president.

FDR's wife, who completed her passage in the middle world at age seventy-six and outlived her husband by nearly two decades, did more in a spectacularly quiet and effective way to reach out to Americans suffering during the Great Depression than anyone else. Always smiling, she dignified the lives of all those she met. What a great gift - 'twas what Democratic candidate Howard Dean hoped to do rhetorically by saying he wanted to embrace those driving pickups with the Confederate flag on the back, Eleanor Roosevelt always did in fact, without fanfare. She worked tirelessly for programs to help youth, hard-pressed farmers, African Americans - go here for a summary of how great her contribution was to greater human dignity and recognition of all Americans as worth of respect and equal access to opportunity in our social compact. One of FDR's Brain Trust members, Rexford Tugwell, gave an indication of the power of this remarkable woman - "No one who ever saw Eleanor Roosevelt sit down facing her husband, and, holding his eye firmly, say to him, 'Franklin, I think you should . . .' or, 'Franklin, surely you will not . . .' will ever forget the experience. . . . It would be impossible to say how often and to what extent American governmental processes have been turned in new directions because of her determination."

There are many great souls, women and men would like to have known, born on this day - November 7 must be among the best of days to be born or to die. Among those I would toast this morning with a swig of grape juice is Joe Niekro, knuckle-balling brother of Phil, who also played for years in the Majors. Joe turns fifty-nine today - he played with seven teams, including a stint with the loathsome New York Yankees before playing with my beloved Minnesota Twins - he was with them when they won the World Series in 1987. Happy Birthday, Joe! And a happy birthday to seventy-seven-year old opera singer Joan Sutherland - what a great legacy and what a gift to her generations and dozens of those who will follow, a voice that brings chills of the best possible kind.

Can't tell you how great it is to be alive and feeling in pretty fine fettle, all things considered. I'm not quite sure whether the long life and legacy of Billy Graham should be celebrated by folks of my ilk - he turns seventy-five today. As you know, I have the weest bit of a problem with those who believe they have cornered truth - and Graham's either the Jesus way I'm preaching or hell, take your choice - bothered me even as a youngster. But it's more than that - I don't remember ever seeing Billy Graham laugh in all those television programs, have you? One has to be the weest bit suspicious of folks who can't laugh, but then, I have no experience in the kind of burden folks like Billy Graham take on . . . saving the world. Better, perhaps, to be a Vice President. Or worry about getting one's knuckleball over the plate - or enjoying a great piece of pie. Take care of yourselves, kola - but don't take yourself too seriously, for therein lies misery - and it doesn't help at all in doing what is the best of what we humans do, treat each other with the dignity and respect we would receive from our fellow travelers here in the middle world.

Ev Albers

Thursday, November 6th, 2003

Cool day, cool night, and long sleep. Time to get up and at 'em. 'Tis the birthday of Maria Shriver, who is forty-eight today. Niece of Senator Teddy Kennedy, who once told her uncle, "Don't think of him as a Republican, think of him as the man I love; and if that doesn't work, think of him as the man who can crush you." She was speaking, of course, of Arnold Schwarzenegger – that was before he became the Governor of California. There's no explaining love – what Maria saw in Arnold, the rest of the world, including her Uncle Ted, may never know. Life is full of such little conundrums. I do have a salute this morning to the memory of John Phillip Sousa, born on this day in 1854 – the March King lived on past seventy-five years. Think I'll play a few Sousa marches today at the office whilst I attempt to get things done before I leave for most tests and probably more treatment at the Midwestern Regional Medical Center, one of those great Cancer Treatment Center of America.

In the past few days, I've made the mistake of wasting a great deal of time trying to produce publicity for a program offered by a young, earnest historian from down in Iowa – one Michael Luick-Thrams who does programs about connections between Hitler's Germany and the Midwest. I finally asked myself why I would take so seriously one so serenely secure in believing that he is simply the very best that ever offered a public program – he may be, but finding out what he's going to do is no easy task. Whatever he says, he promises a multi-media production – and he travels with an assistant. He has toured Iowa for the Humanities Iowa, the state partner of the National Endowment for the Humanities in his home state and has received the Outstanding Project Award from Humanities Iowa. Dr. Luick-Thrams has a very interesting autobiographical sketch, which he has posted at the site of the organization he serves as executive director, TRACES.org. He traveled the world, often volunteering to care care of others – and he did a major stint with the Peace Corps. His sketch concludes, "I felt obligated to be a 'good steward' of the funds awarded me. Honoring the Quaker tenet to 'live simply so that others might simply live,' all my adult life I have treaded as lightly on the Earth as I could - for example, I haven't owned a car since 1988 and only submitted to acquiring a credit card in 1998 (I've never used it, but carry it to be able to rent cars when traveling). And traveling I do, as I have lots of catching up to do in order to see even a fraction of this fabulous, swiftly changing world of ours which I mostly missed during the first half of my life." Dr. Luick-Thrams' program requires video and computer projection – the kind of unit that costs about $5,000 – and he was utterly amazed that such equipment, let alone the "technicians" he expected to be around to run it, would not be available in most places in North Dakota – "I thought this was standard for all hosts of humanities programs, because they always had it in Iowa," he told me. He also said that neither he nor his assistant knew how to run such equipment, because it was always done for them. I find myself trying to get all things in order for his tour. That I'm spending hours upon hours redoing stuff that could be turned out by any competent eighth-grader who knows the weest bit about graphics programs bespeaks a kind of hands-on approach to my job that I had better learn to give up. That I'm cluttering my recently-cleaned office with the equipment Dr. Luick-Thrams needs to do his program seems the weest bit ironic – and I almost feel put upon – but, the irony of requiring so much by way of doing a program from someone so committed to the "simple life" brings a smile and shrug instead.

Rosy-fingered dawn is gorgeous this beauuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful day in Dakota – and a gentle breeze has shaken much of the snow from the pine outside my window. 'Tis a great day to get on with things more interesting than doing the same ads for different locations – but, then, not all of us can enjoy the "simple life" uncomplicated by such mundane tasks that so control my existence. But then, there's pie – and there's still some of Janet Bleth's two-tone in my refrigerator. And there's you, my kola, who send those healing waves of support and kind messages – and so much more. I wish you the "simple life," without having to complicate someone else's to live it – and I hope that you are taking care of yourselves and looking out for each other. Here is Ken Roger's article --

Begin Roger's Column in Bismarck Tribune of November 2, 2003
It's about pie, it's about the humanities, it's about life
By KEN ROGERS, Bismarck Tribune

Pie. That's a reoccurring theme in Everett Albers' electronic journal. Juneberry pie. Apple pie. Sour cream raisin pie. Pie spiced with baseball, music, poetry, philosophy, common sense, Thomas Matthew McGrath and tales from the Center of the Universe out in Hannover Township in Oliver County.
Oh, yes. There's also an invader.

Everett's daily Internet postings began a little more than one year ago, on Sept. 20, 2002. It began in darkness. At the keyboard in his home in Bismarck, Everett explained that he'd been diagnosed with a malignant tumor on his pancreas. He wrote then, and continues to write, about treatment. And he wrote that he would "bring my life in the humanities to this little problem before me."

Back to the pie. A week ago, Everett confided: "I've made no secret of my passion for all pie, and I confess that I've been mightily shameless in encouragement of its consumption - with myself involved, if at all possible. My favorite remains sour cream raisin - and the best I've ever had with a meringue can be found at the truck stop just off I-94 at Tower City. The best with crust topping was concocted by my dear friend Dorothy Kubik, who is also my mother-in-law. Some say I'm as crazy as a loon when it comes to pie - so be it. As one of the great novelists of the 20th century, Nikos Kazantzakis, said, 'A person needs a little madness, or else they never dare cut the rope and be free.'"

The postings, you can see, are not all some grim work, some awful dirge, darkened by Everett's struggle against the invader - a tough battle, indeed. Rather, they blaze with light - of family and friends, of the muse, of St. Peter's Lutheran Church and of the West Dakota sun.

Through his journal, Everett has allowed his mind to wander, offering readers comments on current events, providing insightful poems, quotes or song lyrics, supplying Web links, conversing with his audience, his kolas (Lakota for friends).

Reading the postings reminds me of my first meeting with Everett Albers. I had arrived at Dickinson State University, just out of high school, in a profound state of ignorance. Everett was teaching humanities to clueless (empty-headed) freshmen such as myself. I had never heard of the humanities, and their discovery was like having my at-rest brain jump-started by the global engine of ideas.

Everett became the North Dakota Humanities Council's first executive director in 1973, a job he continues to do. In other words, Everett is a good thinker, with an intellect nurtured by years of reading, listening and living.

Early in his electronic journal, Everett once more jogged my closed thinking. His postings offered a grand poem, titled "Daily," by Naomi Shihab Nye. As a result, I read Nye's "Winds Under the Words," an absolutely wonderful book. Nye was born in Palestine, grew up in Texas and her hybrid view is something to see.

And buoyed on Everett's enthusiasm for the Minnesota Twins, I nearly became a baseball fan once more. I did, at his urging, take another look at the work of North Dakota poet Tom McGrath. About McGrath, Everett, on Oct. 25, 2002, wrote:

"Not a day passes that I do not read a McGrath poem or think about one, and I seldom travel without him. All things considered, McGrath's poetry is much more essential to my continued 'life' than this battery-operated ambulatory infusion unit (part of his treatment) could ever be. Open beside me is my well-worn copy of 'Death Song.' Often called 'The Peasant Poet' or 'The People's Poet,' Thomas McGrath wanted poetry to be available to and understood by all the people. A World War II veteran with a deep hatred for war, blacklisted during the McCarthy Era for his daring to question what war accomplishes."

Everett called McGrath North Dakota's gift to the millennium. He would like the poet to receive the state's highest honor.

And for the record, "Death Song" is a remarkable collection of poems, rich and worthy of life. Many of McGrath's books, other than "Letters to an Imaginary Friend," are hard to find, even in the state's public libraries. He deserves better.

Through Everett's postings, he returns time and again to Hannover Township. There, he recalls growing up on the farm, family, going to school and the view of the world from Oliver County.

He identifies strongly with "beauuuuuutiful" North Dakota, especially here on the banks of the Missouri River.

On the first anniversary of this electronic journal, Everett wrote:

"Were I to choose a singular lesson I've learned this past year under sentence of death sooner instead of later, 'twould be the growing conviction that beginning a grand day, a beauuuuuuutiful day, as 'tis here and even more in my beloved Dakota - a grand day begins with setting aside the mistakes of the past, the garbage of yesterdays, but not the good times nor the tough lessons and vowing not to spend too much of the precious hours of 'this day' worrying about what tomorrow 'twill bring or spending too much time hoping 'twill bring better than today, which hasn't even been lived when we begin the morning. And each day I am reminded of what has brought me to the moment - in the words of Dakota's gift to the millennia to come, Thomas Matthew McGrath:

'How could I have come so far?
(And always on such dark trails!)
I must have traveled by the light
Shining from the faces of all those I have loved.'"

End Roger's Column in Bismarck Tribune of November 2, 2003

Wednesday, November 5th, 2003

Aye, 'tis a grand morn here in beauuuuuuuuuuutiful Dakota this first Wednesday in November, the day after whatever elections here and around the country. Quiet and quite brisk in the early hours of what is another great day to be alive, I'm ensconced before the fire place with a cup of coffee - thinking, of course, about food and what I can get by with eating and actually savor once it is in my mouth as much as I do in my mind. I spend between ten and eleven hours abed, with minimal chills and shakes - I hope that the insidious invader will consider this payment in advance and allow me a productive day - get thee behind me, chills and shakes and tiredness! Bone marrow, do your thing and get some white blood cells made, so fort (so fort is German for "at once," one of my favorite sayings - makes sense for a reforming life-long procrastinator.

I've received many kind notes and messages since Bismarck Tribune editor Ken Rogers wrote about my online journal last Sunday, including one from Irma Wittenberg Borth from here in Bismarck - she used to live out west of Hannover Township when I was growing up. Irma wondered if I remembered here - one doesn't forget the people we knew as youngsters if one is from Hannover Township. Her husband Herb died young of a heart attack more than twenty-five years ago, and she moved to town with their only child, son Charles, who became a banker. He was a little fellow with lots of toys when we used to travel the eight or nine miles to the Wittenbergs to visit back in the 1950s. Herb was a pinochle player with my dad and my uncle Otto in the cut-throat three-handed game, played with a single deck - fifteen cards to each player and a three-card "kitty" that could be used and substituted for other cards by the successful bidder. But 'twas at the Wittenbergs that all could play - including women and children old enough to be competitive at cards (an early age back when I was growing up) - in progressive whist games hosted and arranged by Irma, who also took great pride in showing up the other women with her "lunch" served at evening's end - a nearly full-blown meal with several meats, cheese and jellies served with homemade bread, kuchens, etc., etc., etc. I don't remember pie, but some of the kuchens were pies in substance if not appearance. Kuchen is a kind of sweet dough with all different kinds of an inch or two of topping, from a creamy custard featuring peaches to apples to a rather plain sugar kuchen (not often served at Irma's). Of course, I remember Irma.

Interesting news out of China this morning - folks there have cut their consumption of the giant cabbage, da baicai, that was the staple of folks over there for decades - really big cabbages that are harvested in about this time of year. The cabbages could be stored anywhere - lots of folks put them on their roofs - if seen from the air, whole villages would have green shingles. Twenty years ago, the cabbage was 95 percent of the Chinese vegetable diet, ten years ago, 50 to 70 percent - this year, 'twill be but 9 percent, and it continues to go down, although Chinese still eat more than 75 pounds of cabbage per person each year. Probably no people have greater variety in vegetables than the Chinese do now - there's some 109 different kinds available.

I'm trying to imagine the most populous nation on earth during the winter months, when everyone was eating cabbage almost every meal - often served with beans, if they could be found. Of course, we German-Americans out in Hannover Township, that Garden of the Universe out in Oliver County, had our own interesting diet - damn the consequences: sauerkraut and sausage. Cabbage alone without the meat probably produces a great deal of sound without fury, but we sausage and sauerkraut eaters definitely disturbed two senses of our neighbors - both sound and smell. 'Tis fine and dandy if one is among folks in the same condition, quite a different matter - one of some cultural shock - when a visitor comes among sausage and sauerkrauters without warning.

Enough of this - I have no excuse for this adolescent meandering this fine morning. No sausage, no sauerkraut, no fresh cabbage for me this morn - a bit of Malt O Meal can get me in enough trouble. I must hie me to work, perhaps to do and finish some tasks.

We live in difficult times, we Americans - never have so many living so well in the history of humankind been more reviled by most of the rest of the world than we are in the early years of the twenty-first century. Certainly, never have many Americans cared less about what the rest of the world thinks about us than in America in 2003. In my youth, young idealists were shocked and moved to action by the book, The Ugly American -- the very notion that we were less than sensitive to other cultures and ideas disturbed us mightily. Some forty to fifty years later, we really, for the most part, could care less. We're less than human because of the soul scabbing that's been going, methinks - we would do well to take better care of our spirits by paying more attention to the welfare of our fellow travelers in the rest of the world.

Ev Albers

Tuesday, November 4th, 2003

'Tis a gloriously pristine white afternoon - coming hard up early evening - here in beauuuuuuuuuuuutiful Dakota where we've had a great snowfall - the pines outside my window are layered on this windless, fine day. I arose this morning with the best of intentions to write an entry for this grand day. But then I was waylaid by a heavy tiredness, and I barely got myself together to get to the office for work for six hours before doing blood work - white count down to 1.4, which is not the best - have to watch out for sneezers and wheezers and germs of all sorts. Then there's this nagging business of chills and shakes that makes less-than-easy the transfer of lofty thoughts to electronic type, let alone trimming and enhancing photographs electronically with a mouse. Hence I hied myself home early today. This life of leisure and dependence 'tis not easy on a fellow who once was able to work for sixteen - eighteen hours without interruption - and I have things to do, kola, things to do. And 'tis particularly difficult for no good chauvinistic reason to see my spouse have to take on shoveling the walks and chauffeuring me to and from work and clinics, etc. But in conditions like those in beauuuuuuuuuuutiful Bismarck in the heart of Dakota today - the weest bit of ice and slippery conditions and no few folk not yet accustomed to dealing with them - my lovin' Leslie thinks it simply better that she drive instead of turning over the all-wheel-drive Subaru to one who may not get his foot on the brakes in time. And there's little sense in getting further chilled by going out and trying to shovel - best accept that I married a woman who can pretty much take care of the important things - although she still needs me to figure out how to hook up televisions, tape programs, and get a screwed up remote back to the way 'tis supposed to be - now that I can do.

Early this morning while I sat in semi-conscious reverie here in a lounger in front of a gas fire place (outside of my covers and the down comforter upstairs, 'tis the weest cold - and that's where the computer is typically hooked in for connection to the Internet and a larger world than my laptop down here where 'tis much toastier), I read a great newspaper article - one that probably could only be done by a Dakotan. Dave Kolpack writing for the Associated Press in today's Bismarck Tribune wrote about national bean campaign here in the state that leads the nation in the production of dry edible beans (pinto beans, navy beans, and others). We put out 600,000 tons each year, and bean growers in North Dakota are being joined by some in Minnesota in spending a quarter of million dollars over the next two years on a major ad campaign - "The Beaning of America," which will feature such slogans as "Live to be an old fart," "Who cut the cholesterol," and a bumper sticker inviting fellow travelers to "Toot if you like beans." The governor of North Dakota showed up at the kickoff event - Governor John Hoeven said "I'm truly pleased to be here to honor our magic fruit and, as we all know, the more you eat, the more you . . . become strong and healthy." Dakota will be taking the message to big cities like Boston, Denver, Phoenix, and Tampa - with a message that beans can reduce the some heart disease, cancer, and birth defects.

'Tis a long way to around to explain why I had an uncontrollable urge to have a bowl of chili this morning - for there was, accompanying the article, a photograph with the message, "Without beans, chili would just be a bowl of meat." 'Twas a concoction made by my lovin' spouse - and it had beans, but meat as well. 'Twasn't meant for me but for Cousin Norm and his wife Idell and for her. Had she witnessed me this morning, she might have taken measures. Not the wisest of decisions - might have stuck to Malt O' Meal or maybe some knoepla soup made by my cousin Norm - but no, I had to try it - and I ate a whole bowl. Let it suffice to say that I delayed the folks who do my blood work down at the clinic for quite a while in one of their restrooms. Sufficient unto this month, probably, is my consumption of chili, but not of beans - beans ala the little containers with beans and cheese on the top from Taco Johns or Taco Bells has become a staple of my protein diet - beyond the occasional egg and those drinks - Boost, Ensure, etc. But enough of this - I have to admit that one of the reasons I've so far behind in my e-mail correspondence with my good friends, my kola, is my giving into temptation of eating such as my snow-shovelin' wife's chili and dealing with the consequences.

My children's godparents arrived this afternoon with a variety of cheese cakes - three different kinds - no one was more welcome than Rose Marie and Warren Henke after the crises of this day, including a battle with software that refused to load major projects I'm trying to finish - I have the projects backed up, but no way to get at them at the moment. I have to find a way, sooner instead of later.

Tomorrow - tomorrow 'twill be even more beauuuuuuuuuuuuutiful than today - germs are being killed even as I type, I'm warming up, and you, my kola, haven't given up on me and my not responding to your witty, charming, and always comforting correspondence. Thank you, thank you. I must try this cheese cake - with proper precautions. Take care of yourselves, kola - have a great chili whilst you can, for the day will dawn when 'twill not go down all that easily - and look out for each other.

Ev Albers

Monday, November 3rd, 2003

'Tis a wondrously cool, crisp morning in beauuuuuuutiful Dakota, this birthday of William Cullen Bryant, known by most every North Dakotan my age by way of memorizing at least the last verse of his "Thanantopis." Born on this day in 1794, Byrant wrote most of his poetry when he was a young man and then went on to a successful career in journalism, serving as editor of the New York Evening Post for fifty years before his completion of his travel here in the middle world after more than eighty-three years.

To him who in the love of nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty; and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy that steals away
Their sharpness ere he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;--
Go forth, under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around--
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air--
Comes a still voice. Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix forever with the elements,
To be a brother to the insensible rock
And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mold.

Yet not to thine eternal resting-place
Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world -- with kings,
The powerful of the earth -- the wise, the good,
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulcher. The hills
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun, -- the vales
Stretching in pensive quietness between;
The venerable woods -- rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks
That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,
Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste,--
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. -- Take the wings
Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,
Save his own dashings -- yet the dead are there:
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep -- the dead reign there alone.

So shalt thou rest -- and what if thou withdraw
In silence from the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one as before will chase
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glides away, the sons of men--
The youth in life's fresh spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron and maid,
The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man--
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,
By those, who in their turn, shall follow them.

So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, which moves
To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

No one penned a poem more highly regarded by English teachers for some 150 years or so than this one on the theme, "It's not a matter of whether, but of when," one I heard from my old pal Ray Wheeler of Dickinson - and I don't know if he came up with it or borrowed it from someone. A most interesting fellow, Bryant was raised in a most religiously conservative family - so in his early teens, he wrote doggerel denouncing Thomas Jefferson, the president - in fact, he called for his resignation in a poem entitled "The Embargo" in 1808, the last year of Jefferson's second term in office. But poetry and the humanities were a way out of the prison of smug, self-satisfied, true belief in fundamental Christianity, and four years after his attack on Jefferson, Bryant wrote "Thanantopis" at age seventeen. He went on to become a Unitarian and made his newspaper an organ of support of such Democratic causes as free trade, rights of working people, and abolition (this is before the formation of the modern Republican Party, which he supported later - the Democratic Republicans of his youth was Jefferson's party, which stood in opposition to the Federalists of the Adams, Alexander Hamilton, and George Washington).

'Twas a remarkable achievement for a young man from such an oppressive upbringing to find the kind of freedom expressed in his poem about the common fate of all - completion of passage here in the middle world. Many never escape - including all those in a tizzy because of the elevation of the openly-gay Episcopal Bishop James Robinson yesterday - especially those folks outside the church with the signs saying "This way to hell." The Episcopal Church was established after a big fight with other Anglicans back in 1789, a few years before William Cullen Bryant was born - and folks are saying that making Robinson a bishop will cause the worst split since then, including all sorts of law suits. This last week, a really nice fellow who knows a lot about fishing in North Dakota wrote an indictment in a letter to the editor of coverage of AIDS in North Dakota by the Bismarck Tribune. He should stick to fishing. The wild, vicious attacks on gays by the fundamental Christian community bespeaks a kind of intolerance and general meanness of the human spirit that results in killing people for their own good sooner instead of later. Shame on 'em all. I think they should get up in the morning and have the weest slice of pie - that's what I did this morn: lemon meringue.

Begin Odone quote
So what are these subversive Christian views? We believe in authority. In an era that prizes individual freedom, Christians believe in a supreme being who dictates our words and deeds.

To modern ears, the concept sounds outrageously autocratic. From when to die to when to give birth, from whom to have sex with, to how to spend their money, the chatteratis believe they should enjoy unlimited freedom. But for the Christian, freedom is not an end in itself. Unfettered individualism can mean greed and selfishness, the evasion of personal responsibility, the destruction of the family.

Christians believe that from an all-powerful authority stems a clear system of judgement that teaches that there is a right and a wrong. Confide this to a member of the chattering classes and they'll choke on their ciabatta. In our pluralist society, one person's truth is as valid as another's. To pass judgement on someone's actions - to say abortion is murder, or that adultery and gay sex are wrong - is to be judgemental.

Moral certainty grates against the spirit of the age. Yet to the annoyance of the secularists, the Christian morality is only partly expressed in what may seem like old-fashioned rules about sexual mores. Yes, church leaders teach that adultery, homosexual acts and sex before marriage are sins. But they also preach virtues and values such as brotherhood, justice and self-sacrifice. This message is far more challenging, and proves a constant reproof to the chattering classes.
End Odone Quote

"The chattering classes" are the materially comfortable, educated, liberal folks, in Odone's scheme of things. One thing is certain, there's nothing "modern" in the view Odone so loathes - 'tis older than the Enlightenment, than the tolerance of the founding generation of this country that has been subject to wholesale revision of late. Nearly every family in Dakota, where most everyone knows someone who knows someone who knows someone who knows you (a long way of saying we're less than three people away from knowing all 650,000+ folks in the state), has someone in their extended family who is gay or lesbian - and the evidence is overwhelming that folks are born that way, just as they are born with genes that make it likely they will live to be more than ninety. To make so many second-class citizens who are born sinners is poppycock. I'm with the tolerant spirit of Thomas Jefferson on this one - if only people who condemn all homosexuals to hell are going to heaven, I'm not at all sure I want to join them.

Kola, I trust you are taking care of yourselves by finding a way to look out for each other, no matter how different they are from you. I wish you a day of laughter, love, a bit of music - and have some pie if you're feeling even the weest bit surly.

Ev Albers

Sunday, November 2nd, 2003

It's the birthday of North Dakota, this healthily crisp day – at 5:30 A.M., the temperature has already soared to 18°. Well, it's also the birthday of South Dakota, but she joined as the fortieth state – North Dakota came first as the thirty-ninth. Actually, it was the luck of a presidential shuffle of papers: President Benjamin Harrison did the shuffling because he wanted the order to be completely arbitrary. Of course, whatever goddesses or gods may be probably had something to do with North Dakota coming first – even though there were many more folks down in South Dakota, especially the southeastern corner. Happy birthday, beauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful, glorious Dakota – happy 114th (Harrison signed the paper in 1889)! It's also the birthday of two presidents: James K. Polk (born 1795) and Warren G. Harding (born 1865) – and a political pundit who wanted to president, ole "Lock & Load" Pat Buchanan, who turns sixty-five today – he shows no sign of retiring. I'm giving 'em all a little salute this morning – 'cause I'm feeling fairly chipper as I await rosy-fingered dawn. But a big swig of good ole strawberry breeze goes to the memory of Harry S. Truman, who was elected president on this day in 1948, even though he went to bed thinking that he had been beaten by Thomas Dewey – President Truman wasn't going to lose any sleep over it if he was beaten – my kind of guy. The famous photograph of Truman smiling and holding up the issue of the Chicago Daily Tribune proclaiming "DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN" was taken at short stop Truman's campaign train made in St. Louis.

Twenty-eight years later, Jimmy Carter was elected president – in 1976. Right after he was elected, he pardoned Vietnam War draft dodgers. Four years later, he was out of office, brought down by the Iran hostage crisis. But 1976, Carter was elected for four out of every five voters who went to the polls. 'Twas thirteen years before, this day in 1963, that the United States started down the road of involvement in Vietnam, big time – for this is the day that President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother were killed in South Vietnam – encouraged by the United States government and the Kennedy administration (Kennedy was assassinated three weeks later). President Diem was not a nice fellow at all – especially to the Buddists, whose protests he brutally put down in the summer of 1963. But encouraging his overthrow started us down the slippery slope of becoming increasingly more involved in Vietnam – the war that brought down President Lyndon Johnson, who chose not to run in 1968.

One never knows what is set in motion with the best of intentions – getting rid of dictator embroiled us in the most divisive war since the Civil War. Whether or not we as a nation have learned to take into account possible consequences, forty years after the assassination of President Diem in South Vietnam, remains to be seen.

And on that very day, November 2, 1963, Kate Smith gave her first concert for an audience that paid to hear her sing – "God Bless America" was heard by a full audience at Carnegie Hall in New York. Before this concert, Smith had done all benefits. Most of us Americans would indeed have God "stand beside us, and guide us, through the night with the light from above." I spent some time in that state 'twict sleep and full consciousness this morning – trying to decide to have the last slice of lemon meringue pie or another hunk of Sister Janet's (my lovin' spouse's sibling) two-tone dessert – haven't made that decision, yet. But an old hymn kept coming around – "Work for the Night is Coming":

Work, for the night is coming;
Work through the morning hours;
Work while the dew is sparkling;
Work 'mid springing flowers;
Work while the day grows brighter,
Under the glowing sun;
Work for the night is coming,
When man's work is done.

Work for the night is coming,
Work through the sunny noon;
Fill brightest hours with labor,
Rest comes sure and soon;
Give ev'ry flying minute
Something to keep in store;
Work for the night is coming,
When man works no more.

Work for the night is coming,
Under the sunset skies,
While their bright tints are glowing,
Work, for daylight flies;
Work till the last beam fadeth,
Fadeth to shine no more;
Work while the night is dark'ning,
When man's work is o'er.

As a son of the Garden of the Universe, Hannover Township in Oliver County, where I grew up in that patriarchal German-Lutheran tradition, I subscribe wholeheartedly to the sentiment of the song – even though I've not particularly done well as practicing the advice. Nonetheless, I firmly believe that "Arbeit macht das Leben süss!" – "Work makes life sweet." But I've never been one to work quite as frenetically as my father, who literally ran from task to task – although he was always happiest when he was sitting on a tractor – I think it's the only rest he got, outside of playing pinochle – and that, itself, is a pretty frenetic activity the way 'twas played out in the Hannover – cut-throat style. Nor have I ever been able to keep up with my spouse, Leslie, who practices the principle I mostly preach. Being awake is for work, not sitting around in contemplation. But she accomplishing tasks every hour and every day while I'm still thinking about them. I do try, especially since learning of the presence of the insidious invader, the cancerous tumor on my pancreas, to

Give ev'ry flying minute
Something to keep in store;

Just a hint of breeze in the pine tree outside my window this morning – and the ground in glorious, beauuuuuuutiful Dakota is still covered with that white snow that sparkles so brightly when the sun shines, as 'twill certainly do – after all this place gets more sunlight than Hawaii – at least that's what I read somewhere. And I read, this morning, while still contemplating whether 'twill be pie or Janet Two-Tone, a column in the Bismarck Tribune by my friend and former student from the days I taught at Dickinson back in the early 70s, Ken Rogers who hails from Hebron and lives on the west (and best) side of the Missouri River. The managing editor of the Tribune, Rogers wrote a most flattering overview of what I've attempted to do over this last year in my online journal. I'm mightily humbled by his kind words – and most grateful. With the admission that I might be less than totally objective, I have to say that I would give kola Ken an A+ for what he wrote. More than anything, I'm mightily honored that someone would remember a humanities classroom experience from more than thirty years ago. Thank you, Ken Rogers, for making my day. 'Tis enough to inspire me to get some work done – my lovin' spouse and her sister started helping me shovel out the office yesterday, and we're returning to do more today. But first I have to make a decision about what to indulge myself in to fortify myself for the work ahead. Kola, I hope you are taking care of yourselves this day – and that you're looking out for each other. Share a poem or a song with someone – you'll never know where it might lead. And may your work in the week ahead be challenging enough to make you feel you've accomplished something, but not so overwhelming that you don't have time for the weest bit of fun – maybe a slice or two of pie along the way.

Ev Albers

Saturday, November 1st, 2003

Not a pine needle moves on the big tree outside my window this crisp morn in beauuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful Dakota, the first day of November, just a year and day away from the next presidential election in this country. Wish that day were over. Don't know how much more political posturing and spin we Americans can take. My lovin' spouse has a great passion and what seems unlimited tolerance for the political - methinks she is mightily entertained by it all - in the way I project a good deal of any residual free-floating hostility on professional sports teams I have have come to categorize as the embodiment of no-goodness - as I do the mighty New York Yankees and the on-top-now-but-often-hapless Minnesota Vikings, Leslie finds politicians to loath. In the tradition of her free-thinking second-generation Czech-American father, Alfons Kubik, a certain political party is often found wanting. Now I'm not gonna divulge which party. I will say this: in a prominent place above the kitchen table in the Alfons Kubik home, there was a souvenir plate featuring President John F. Kennedy and his family. I never saw a Richard Nixon plate in that house.

Down in our kitchen, in the refrigerator, as I discovered last night when I wandered down for the weest sip of strawberry breeze with raspberry, there's a now nearly-full, huge glass baking pan of two-tone dessert, brought to town with Leslie's sister Janet, who arrived sometime whilst I sleep bearing this extraordinary gift. It was completely full, of course, before I had a four-by-six-inch square of this ambrosial layers of chocolate pudding and whipped cream topped with toasted coconut on the spot. 'Tis like pie - there's no really bad pie - and there's no bad two-tone, just stuff that's better than others. No one concocts a better two-tone than Janet Bleth from over in Dickinson.

Since I had retired last evening about seven, I awoke less than sleepy about 1:30 A.M. - that's when I discovered the two-tone. I stayed up for the weest and read a bit of Robert Ludlum's The Jansen Directive. Then I returned to bed - and vivid dreams I only vaguely remember - something about missing an operation and being waylaid out in the middle of nowhere between Wahpeton, North Dakota, which is in the southeastern corner of the state, and Winnepeg, Manitoba, which is, of course, north of the northeastern corner of the state. Except north was south and south was north, so 'twas as though Dakota was missing! I was at a rest area with banks of telephones - without a car, which I had lost. None of the hundreds of phones - all primitive versions of the old black payphones of the 50s - worked. When I awoke in a total panic, I was most relieved, for I had been trying to call my spouse to tell her that I had lost the car and didn't have the operation I was supposed to have, and that North Dakota had disappeared except for Wahpeton. I've never been happier to awake in my bed than after that one, kola - and now my bed will be graced and made even warmer by a new down comforter brought by Janet along with the two-tone. Ah, life is good this windless, crisp day. Life is good.

No chills or shakes, taking nourishment, and ready to wend my way to the office to a few things done without phone calls - fortified with two-tone, I shall wrought miracles today. Here's a toast to Janet Bleth. Here's another to the memory of Franco Corelli, the great lyric tenor who is being remembered by hundreds of thousands since he died a couple of days ago at age eighty-two. There's a funeral for him today in Milan - what a great voice! I remember sitting in the back seats of that huge white wooden building on the campus of the University of Minnesota to which the New York Metropolitan Opera traveled each year - 'twas my experience at a live opera back in the late 60s - Corelli entered and started singing - and I heard his voice echoing from the wall behind me in that huge house. 'Twas then I learned what the human voice was capable of - for a gifted few. Ah, 'twas grand. Methinks we need a whole lot more opera and far less politics as usual - but that's one man's opinion. I did look in the garage, by the way - the Subaru Forester is still there. Whew! Take care of yourselves, kola, and look out for each other.

Ev Albers

Friday, October 31st, 2003

Aye, and ah, 'tis a nippy but gloriously beauuuuuuuuuutiful day here in Dakota where the weest bit of pristine white snow covers the ground - ain't gonna be no more of those pesky West Nile disease carrying misquotes this year, kola. But the old annual flu has already struck - for those who want to worry about what might be coming their way. I've got my shot, and I'm hot to trot through the winter healthy enough to greet spring and then some. Ah and aye for this glorious day, but oy as well, for 'tis the last of the best of months in the best of places, Dakota. That's why I really don't think Halloween is such a great day. There's a tune that runs through my mind this morning, one I told you about last year on this day as I was being radiated and sapped with chemo daily. Johnny Mercer wrote the lyrics. Later on, Barry Manilow came along and wrote incredible music for the haunting song, "When October Goes":

And when October goes
The snow begins to fly
Above the smokey roofs
I watch the planes go by
The children running home
Beneath a twilight sky
Oh, for the fun of them
When I was one of them
And when October goes
The same old dream appears
And you are in my arms
To share the happy years
I turn my head away
To hide the helpless tears
Oh how I hate to see October go
I should be over it now I know
It doesn't matter much
How old I grow
I hate to see October go

It's been sung by many greats, including Rosemary Clooney. I like the rendition by Monica Mancini (of course, she's related to Henry, her father), of whom Barry Manilow said, "This music has been waiting for a singer like Monica."

This is the day that Harry Houdini (born 3/24/1874) died back in 1926. He said he would visit his wife from the other world if it were possible. Must not have been. But his legacy of illusion and magic continues, and he's not forgotten, for this is the day magicians and, yes, mediums still hoping he'll find a way to contact them, gather in his honor. 'Tis also the day in 1987 that Joseph Campbell (born 3/24/1904), the great humanities interpreter of our common human search for spiritual values and meaning beyond the material - magic, religion, ritual, and all of the other communal activities that find us joining each each other in saying, "we are related to all humans who have journeyed here in the middle world." 'Twas Campbell who told us, "When you follow your bliss . . . doors will open where you would not have thought there would be doors, and where there wouldn't be a door for anyone else." He also observed, "Every religion is true one way or another. It is true when understood metaphorically. But when it gets stuck in its own metaphors, interpreting them as facts, then you are in trouble." Campbell spent a lifetime trying to explain to his fellow travelers here in the middle world how myth - the great stories from Noah's Flood to the epic of Beowulf - are truer in a sense that the facts they contradict. Here's a huge gulp of strawberry breeze in salute to you, Joseph Campbell.

Campbell had a great deal to say about such as Halloween and letting the devil out just a bit - that Jungian shadow that's part of all of us. We even did it out in Hannover Township in Oliver County in the Garden of the Universe back when I was growing up there.

This is the birth date of one of the greatest mass murderers of all time, Nationalist Chinese leader Chiang Kai-Shek, born on this day in 1887. He lived long and prospered - completing his journey in the middle world in 1975. Between 1929 and 1949, his government on mainland China killed ten million people, and when he fled to Taiwan, he left the harbor filled with dead bodies. He was one nasty fellow, but the United States stood behind him and his government in Taiwan for decades. Sometimes, we've had to shake hands with the devil as nation in order to combat what we consider the greater evil. But, as Dakota's gift to the millennia said, "We're a people who forget our history about every five minutes." To tell you the truth, I do hope that Chiang Kai-Shek is not resting in peace, wherever he is.

Generalissimo Kai-Shek let the devil out big time. Carl Jung said that we would do well to find ways to recognize our dark side and allow it expression in mythic ritual - like Halloween - otherwise we're in for back trouble. Hope you enjoy the day, kola - and that you're taking care of yourselves and looking out for each other. The frost is one the pumpkin and 'tis a great day to be alive.

Ev Albers