Cherry blossoms, I believe, but probably of an ornamental cherry tree, which means no cherries, just blossoms in spring. Neatness in fall when no cherries mess up the ground. Symbolic of many things--all show, no fruition. 

This one reminds me of a Japanese postcard. 

And the sun peering through the blossoms. All symbolic.

And below the blossoms, on the ground, these dainty little flowers. I like patterns like this. 

Springtime is picture time. A thousand pictures of blooms and leaves and nature. As I have said before, my favorite of Newton's Laws is the Second Law of Thermodynamics. All the blossoms, all the leaves, and everything, everything, winds down, wears out, gives out, and dies. 

 

Other refuge have I none, hangs my helpless soul on Thee;
Leave, ah! leave me not alone, still support and comfort me.
All my trust on Thee is stayed, all my help from Thee I bring;
Cover my defenseless head with the shadow of Thy wing.

 

 

Spring is here, then goes away for a few days, then comes back. I wanted to take some pictures of blooms and blossoms that I could be happy with,  but nobody was cooperating. The sun would go behind clouds, the wind would shake everything, the purple little blossoms on some kind of ornamental tree came and went too quickly, and on and on. So I took some pictures anyway. Too many to show to anybody.

 

So another spring to live through, and then some kind of summer to live through, and then on and on, but not for long. Nobody knows for how long. Vita brevis, ars longa… not necessarily. To every thing there is a season. A time to be born, a time to die. We were born when and where we were born as part of a precise plan. And we will die according to plan, on the day, in the way, that was set. That is, unless we do something stupid like bungee jumping and the rubber band breaks; or luging down a crowded street and a car runs us over; or playing Russian roulette; or a hundred other stupid things people do, chancing it, risking death for a thrill. You can cut your life short, but you can’t stretch it out for long. And to even do that you have to make a deal with God, who is in charge of all this. So I wonder: if you get some type of cancer, should you try to beat it, thinking, it’s only right to fight for longer life, and modern medicine is here to assist; or think, well I guess that’s my way, and it’ll soon be my time? I don’t know the answer.

 

In the meantime, I guess I had better quit wasting time and get back to grading a stack of final exams that’s a foot high. And then classes start up next week, and I should make some adjustments to my lectures. Oops, I just admitted I give lectures. I hope the EdD Stasi aren’t monitoring.

 

Do not think that we say that these things are only to be received by faith, but also that they are to be asserted by reason. For indeed it is not safe to commit these things to bare faith without reason, since assuredly truth cannot be without reason.

—Clement of Alexandria

 

Truth is reason. Truth is reasonable. The mysteries of God are not irrational. In fact, they are mysteries only to the willfully ignorant. But God delights in revealing truth to those who earn it, who qualify themselves for it. Use reason as a measure for truth, even in matters of godliness, and the truth is unfolded. The Mystery of the Trinity is not truth, because it has no reasonableness. The truth that the Prophet Joseph taught can be grasped by reasonable minds. Yes, take things on faith until you learn the truth of them by their reasonableness. Truth is reason; truth eternal tells me all the wonders of God.

 

Words, words, words. Words and swords, two-edged, sharp to divide asunder, words: the tools of creation (What? Did you think it was done with a shovel?) Catch a man at his word. Make words into weapons. A word can change so much: Moses with horns because a word was spelt with r instead of without. A word can mean so much—said iambic or said trochaic, changes the meaning. Used with another it means something else, something different. Words can be the dough of dissimulation. If I have been niggardly with words, at times, can anyone blame me? What if, as in le Misanthrope, we only used words in their precise meaning and never played semantics, and only let our words convey the cold, stark truth? I am weary of measuring words so as not to unleash the caustic of hell. I forget sometimes to measure, and off guard I say the wrong words, and out pours the hot and hurting retort. KYDMS.

 

Aphasia: the loss or impairment of the ability to use or comprehend words.

Words are the essence of life. The life of the body, la vie du corps, depends on food, water, air, and physical things. But even alone, a person speaks to himself, thinks in words. Aphasia then is something analogous to stroke. In fact, a stroke impairs the physical usage of parts of the body and often the mind, and therefore can cause aphasia. But aphasia could come from turning away from mental exercise, as when someone ceases reading. I suppose it could happen in some degree just by being around ignorant people whose vocabulary is very limited. Hanging around with stupids could bring a degree of aphasia. Watching TV certainly could. (What is the vocabulary range of anything and everything on TV? Their audience can’t handle anything above the ninth grade.) The cure would be reading a wider range of the right kinds of materials and having conversations with people who have a better vocabulary than you. 

 

 

Professor Duke was a notable at Duke University, a distinguished biology professor. Most of the pre-med students had his classes. He was not one of the Dukes, not one of the Buch’ Duke or James B. Duke, or old Wash’ Duke clan—he was from Heber City, Utah, and I suppose that he would be kin to Kathryn Duke. He had snow white hair and a white goatee on a full and pleasant face. He was a member of the Durham Ward, and had volunteered much of his life in Scouting, in the Church, but even more in the community. He was always quite affable, and admired by everyone.

 

His laboratory classroom had a little office space behind a partition, a bit like a carrel in the library, and above the desk, which abutted the partition, on the wall, under a bookshelf that was just over the desk, was a neatly lettered—if not printed—sign, five-by-seven, that said, “People are no damn good.”

 

I laughed when I saw it. I thought it was humorous—and profound. The most humorous thing about it was that it was put there by a man who was universally considered one of the nicest, kindest, most generous men of his time. Even though a transplant to the South, he was the epitome of a Southern gentleman: a generation earlier would have called him “colonel.” So very few people knew about the sign. I don’t believe I ever told anyone in the Durham Ward about it. But later, as occasion would arise, I would tell the story of a man I once knew—the name didn’t matter—who was not only perceived as saintly, he was indeed saintly; but he had a sign….

 

I was taken aback by people’s reception of my account. They didn’t laugh, or smile. They didn’t think it was funny. I thought they would think it was funny. They were struck by the tragic flaw in an otherwise good person. They were saddened that a good man had gone bad. They just didn’t get it. They didn’t see the humor in it, in the paradox. He had not gone bad. He didn’t have a tragic flaw. He had a sense of humor, along with a wise perspective on humanity.

 

Maybe I didn’t convey how the sign had not changed Brother Duke, Professor Duke, how it was a humorous expression, a paradox, from a wise, generous, kind, saintly man. I suppose it was my fault that people didn’t see the humor. I did. I still do. But beyond the anomaly of the sentiment on the wall of a saint, I saw and still do, a profound verity: People are no damn good, in general, even if in particular there are so many who are, like Brother Duke, good. Mir ekeln die Menschen. Where do you find the highest concentration of good people? In the United States? Why have they voted in a President and a Congress so bound to decimate our core values? Why do people support by their money and their consent the concupiscence of modern entertainment? And is there a more virtuous nation on the earth today? God gave Abraham the chance to save a city if He could find fifty—or twenty—or even ten good people. But they were not to be found. There must be some good people left in this country.

 

 

How can you write something that would intrigue you? How can you intrigue yourself? You write what you know, even if you write the wildest fantasy—so how could you surprise yourself? What great pleasure to read something absolutely intriguing and pleasing, that you had not thought of yourself. But suppose you could write something that, even though it is not intriguing, since you cannot surprise yourself, would be very pleasing, quite satisfying. There’s the satisfaction of having finished something, of accomplishment, but beyond that there could be satisfaction with what you wrote, not just that you wrote it. And much later, having let it slip from the ready shelves of memory, you could be pleased to read what you wrote because of what you said, not because it was you who said it. Ah, but------- what would that be?

 

I broke with regulations (self-imposed) here and put up two pictures that I did not take. 

 

 

 

We have a volunteer Armed Services. There are no conscripts. They are for the most part a decent group (a cross-section of what Americans are), and a committed group—and today, a group that realizes the potential to be called into combat. They know when they sign up what they are going to do. They have a high sense of patriotism. And tha should be capitalized on and developed, nurtured and cultivated.

 

Here is my proposal:

As a recruit goes through basic training, I strongly believe that an essential element in that training should be indoctrination in the history and guiding principles of the United States of America. Yes, I used the word indoctrination. I mean just that. It denotes teaching doctrines, and connotes winning the hearts and minds—and wills—of each troop who will wear the uniform of this country and put his life in the service of this country. He should know more about this country, and what it stands for, than the everyday citizen. He should not be called upon to give his life for something he does not completely understand and support. I believe the indoctrination, or training, should continue throughout the length of service. I believe active-duty troops who are not deployed to a combat zone should have this training once a month, and Guard troops should receive this training as a part of each month’s drill. I believe this training should be on the core doctrines of our nation, and on the history of our nation. The first elements of this training should be an understanding of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. These should be studied in basic training to a certain extent, then throughout the career of service. Other core documents such as the inaugural addresses of presidents; certain documents elucidating the philosophy of our Founding Fathers; certain documents from moments of great import, such as the Gettysburg Address; and prominent “doctrines” set forth by presidents that have guided national and foreign policy, such as the Monroe Doctrine and the Bush Doctrine. Our military should study essential moments and elements in our history. They should study the thought and actions of our Founding Fathers. They should know something, for example, of the setting and the efforts of the Constitutional Convention. They should study major military conflicts of our history, with a view to understanding how our nation is like no other.

 

I believe the training in “Americanism” should be intensive in basic training; but thereafter should be short and sweet, in the monthly sessions. That is, it should be an hour once a month, impactful, packaged and produced in the most interesting way, then delivered partly as a prepackaged presentation, with follow up discussion. Then there should be a reading assignment to be completed before the next month’s session. But with all this, the challenge is to keep it from becoming politicized, co-opted in any way by any faction with an agenda. The agenda is to be knowledgeable about the country they are defending.