Saturday, August 31, 2013

The 'F' Word



This is a word, I think most people use at least once in a while, if not on a regular basis.  It's been around for a while as one learns from the piece below by Melissa Mohr, which I have reposted from The Huffington Post.  I wouldn't say I employ the 'F' word regularly,  but there are  times, good and bad, when it is the epithet that erupts instinctively.

My response to anybody who says they've never used the 'F' word is, 'I don't f*cking believe it.

_____________________


A F*cking Short History of the F-Word
by Melissa Mohr

Once upon a time, the English population was decimated by the plague. The King was so concerned about the shrinking number of his subjects that he ordered his people to reproduce. His proclamation, "Fornicate Under Command of the King"--"F.U.C.K" for short--was the source of our favorite swearword.

Unfortunately this story isn't true, nor is pretty much any etymology of a swearword that involves an acronym. Shit cannot be blamed on cargoes of manure exploding in the middle of the Atlantic (Ship High in Transit), while the British word naff cannot be attributed to "not available for fucking." (Why naff needed an acronym is puzzling. It originated as a word in the 1960s gay slang language Polari--isn't that interesting enough?) The two great exceptions are snafu (situation normal: all fucked up) and fubar (fucked up beyond all recognition), which grew out of the military's RFA (rage for acronyms) in World War II.

Fuck isn't an Anglo-Saxon word either. Some of today's swearwords did indeed originate in Old English, including shit, arse, turd, and the British bollocks. The f-word is of Germanic origin, related to Dutch, German, and Swedish words for "to strike" and "to move back and forth." It first appears, though, only in the 16th century, in a manuscript of the Latin orator Cicero. An anonymous monk was reading through the monastery copy of De Officiis (a guide to moral conduct) when he felt compelled to express his anger at his abbot. "O d fuckin Abbot," he scrawled in the margin of the text. We can be sure when this was because he helpfully recorded the date in another comment--1528. It is difficult to know whether the annotator intended "fucking" to mean "having sex," as in "that guy is doing too much fucking for someone who is supposed to be celibate," or whether he used it as an intensifier, to convey his extreme dismay; if the latter, it anticipates the first recorded use by more than three hundred years. Either is possible, really--John Burton, the abbot in question, was a man of questionable monastic morals. It is interesting as well that while the annotator has no problem spelling out "fucking" (except for the g), he refuses to write out a word that is most likely damned. To this monk, damnation is the real obscenity, the one that can be hinted at but not expressed in full.
There are at least two instances of fuck dated before that of our monk, but scholars sometimes deny them the glory of first use because one is Scottish and one appears in code, with a Latin verb conjugation. The Scots poet William Dunbar, himself a former Franciscan friar, penned these lines (translated here into modern English) sometime before his death, in 1513:

He embraced tight, he kissed and groped,  As if he were overcome with desire.
Yet it seemed from his behavior he would have fucked [fukkit].

The coded example is also from a poem, dated 1475-1500, this one attacking the Carmelite friars of the town of Ely. It is macaronic, that is, written partly in English and partly in Latin, with the dirty bits "concealed" in the most basic of ciphers:

Non sunt in cœli, quia gxddbov xxkxzt pg ifmk. ...Fratres cum knyvys goth about and txxkxzv nfookt xxzxkt.

For each letter of code, you simply substitute the previous letter of the alphabet. From the first line, making allowances for late medieval spelling, the decoding gets you "fuccant wivys of heli." So the first line comes out in modern translation, "They [the monks] are not in heaven, because they fuck the wives of Ely." The second bit of code unciphers to "swivyt mennis wyvis," with the whole line reading "Brothers with knives go about and swive men's wives." Swive was a direct word for copulation in the Middle Ages, familiar to readers of Chaucer. To this author, it was apparently as bad a word as its synonym, also requiring at least the pretence of concealment. It is unclear whether the words are censored because swive and fuck are thought to be obscene, worse in themselves than the other words in the poem, or because the sexual sins of which the author accuses the monks are so horrible they cannot be stated outright. What is clear is that you didn't want to mess with any Carmelite friar looking for oppljf.

Fuck appears to have hit its stride by the late 16th century. In 1598, John Florio published an Italian-English dictionary intended to teach people these languages as they were really spoken. Florio's dictionary is thus full of fucks. He defines the Italian fottere as "to jape, to sard, to fuck, to swive, to occupy," for example, while fottitrice is "a woman fucker, swiver, ... etc." and fottitore the male equivalent.

But while the f-word was common in the period, it was not a swearword. It was simply a direct and increasingly impolite word for sexual intercourse. Only in the early to mid-nineteenth century did it begin to be used non-literally, as most swearwords are, to insult and offend others, to relieve pain, and to express extremes of emotion, negative and positive. In other words, it took roughly three hundred years to make the transition from "he fucked her" to "that's fucking awesome!"

Melissa Mohr is the author of Holy Sh*t: A Brief History of Swearing

Friday, August 30, 2013

Monday, August 26, 2013

Chesher's Memory Bubbles


I have a friend that lives a life more than a few people dream about. He is a marine biologist. His name is Richard Chesher. He and his wife Frederique have been living on their sailing yacht, Moira for the last forty or so years. During that time, they have  anchored now and then in pretty much every island nation in the South Pacific. The last time I had a chance to spend time with Rick and Freddie, they were based in the harbor at Port Vila in Vanuatu.  For the last few years, they have spent most of their time in New Caledonia, a South Pacific island nation with ties to France. French is the official language in New Caledonia.

In recent years, Richard Chester has elevated himself from being just an excellent photographer to elite world class status.   His work showcases the remarkable beauty of the pacific islands and the mostly still pristine marine environment around them.  More recently, he's been using a rig he designed himself using GoPro cameras to produce images of the marine environment that are technically amazing and breathtaking. They showcase the beauty of his home environment in rotatable, 360 degree panoramic images. They allow the viewer to stand where Chesher stood, or, better stated, be where he was when he captured the image in question.  The latter is the proper way to describe what he does because so many of his images are shot in the marine environment, many underwater, and remarkably,  some straddling the surface interface of sky, land, and water. Chesher calls these images memory bubbles.

I am amazed at what Richard Chesher accomplishes from his home base, a 44 foot long motor sailing yacht named Moira. 

Take a moment to enjoy some of the great photography of marine biologist, Dr. Richard Chesher.

Each still image that follows includes a link to a 360 degree rotatable, 'virtual reality'  version. Prepare to be dazzled.


Sea Eagle Nest

Here is the link to Richard Chesher's amazing image of Sea Eagles on an uninhabited isle in New Caledonia...  http://www.360cities.net/image/ua-eagles#28.63,2.21,110.0

Click to the full screen version and rotate the next image.  You will see Chesher's vessel, Moira anchored in the background, and if you look closely, Rick's wife Freddie cane be seen in fins and snorkel.



 https://www.360cities.net/image/diving-spots-new-caledonia-ua-reef#23.43,1.87,80.0



 
 http://www.360cities.net/image/underwater-scenic-overlook-kouare-new-caledonia#356.90,6.30,70.0

If you take a moment to link to these images in all their virtual reality,  memory bubble glory,  click on the comments icon below the image and leave an expression of appreciation.

Thanks, Rick and Freddie. The world is better because of the wonderful contributions the two of you make to it.





Monday, August 19, 2013

Mr. Bumptious


In 1910, the Edison Company was making some of the very first movies designed to entertain.  They were silent. I mean totally silent.  No audio track at all. When these first movies were shown in theaters, they were most often accompanied by a pianist.  In the top theaters in places like New York and Los Angeles, these silent films might also have backstage people operating sound machines.




backstage wind machine


The definition of bumptious is a person overly confident  or arrogant.





A series of short movies were made around 1910 that featured a character named, Mr. Bumptious.  The one attached is about an arrogant fool from the Inspector Clouseau School of Acting. It's a very engaging reflection of the culture and technical sophistication of that era.


 
 
 Amazing how far we've come in less than a hundred years.

Here is a You Tube link to the Edison silent, Mr. Bumptious Papered the Parlor.      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXDOkdYtim4


Saturday, August 17, 2013

A Pilot Named Harrison Ford

Harrison Ford, 'A' List movie actor, is a big league aviation buff. I just ran across this video that features him talking about his love of flying as he pilots his single engine, DE Havilland Beaver.

Over the years, Ford has lived a relatively normal life away from Hollywood. He's kept his personal life private despite his fame.  This video offers a glimpse of the real person behind the Hollywood hype. When Harrison Ford talks about flying, it is clearly one of the great joys of his life.


Harrison Ford


Here is the  link to Harrison flying his DE Havilland Beaver...  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsgiEubacT0


Friday, August 16, 2013

Cascadia


Here is a beautiful seven minute video that showcases fearless young men in kayaks purposefully challenging giant tropical waterfalls.




When I see young people like this asserting themselves, risking their lives in harrowing adventure, I admire them, and at the same time I'm hoping they are also directing some of that energy and courage to the great  man-made challenges of our time. Climate change for instance. These are the kind of bold personalities that need to be on the front lines in the battle for social, economic, and environmental sanity. 

Here is the link to the very impressive Cascadia video... http://vimeo.com/57343365


Thursday, August 15, 2013

Kamala Lopez - Equal Means Equal


A few days ago, I wrote a blog piece called I Am a Feminist.  I am pleased that it resonated favorably with my women friends.

There was a very nice comment left with that piece by Kamala Lopez, who it turns out is a friend of Alexandra Paul, a much valued friend of my wife and me.

Like Alexandra,  Kamala Lopez is an accomplished actress and filmmaker herself.  She provided a link to a website of her own ERA Education Project. I went to the site. It's focus is on educating people about  the fact that women still do not enjoy equal rights with men under our Constitution. 


Kamala Lopez


Among other things, Kamala Lopez has directed her considerable talents as a filmmaker to making a series of very engaging and effective PSAs  that call for the passage of an Equal Rights Amendment.  Such an amendment to our Constitution would be a huge step forward, literally and symbolically.

I totally support Kamala's very impressive effort to elevate the public discourse on the need for an Equal Rights Amendment.  Like our mutual friend Alexandra Paul, Kamala is an irrepressible force for positive change. I can't say enough about her commitment to making a difference on the issue of equal rights for all.

I am revising my declaration on feminism... I am a Feminist and I support an amendment to the U.S. Constitution; an amendment called the ERA that recognizes that women have equal rights under the law with men.

Here are some links to a couple of Kamala Lopez's very well done PSAs on equal rights for women.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOsSw7MkX24

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxHLnQZLq20





Wednesday, August 14, 2013

The Pale Blue Dot


This is an achingly lovely ode to the beauty of planet Earth. Richly colored, high dynamic range video of our land, sea, and sky in all their natural splendor.  A mellifluous music track accompanies  the visual feast, along with a voice track of the great citizen of the Universe, Carl Sagan.

This wonderful media piece was created by gifted photographer/composer, Michael Marantz.

Here is a link to this gorgeous video...http://vimeo.com/2822787


Monday, August 12, 2013

Top Ten Insane Jet Fly-Bys


These are some crazy pilots pushing their luck to the limit, roaring by seriously close to the ground.  Number three is really nuts.  This is outrageous,  balls to the wall flying.  


Here is the link to this insane video... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Dr2ZB36p9Y

I found number three again in a separate video...straight down the runway, upside down...total insanity...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wa_KrNNebzU


Sunday, August 11, 2013

I Am a Feminist


I am also a mature, white heterosexual male.   So why am I making this declaration?  Because women are equal partners with men and should be treated as such.  There is no male person alive that didn't start life in his mother's womb.  For me, it feels good and right to be a  feminist.  Being a male feminist means that you embrace the best for women as being normal and basic as well as right. You want women to be treated equally with men.  You support equal pay for equal work. You support equal access to opportunity. You believe that  healthcare and reproductive choice are rights that all women (and men) should have. You believe girls have a right to an education just as boys do. You believe violence, intimidation, indeed any kind of gender based bias, has no place in human society. Shouldn't everybody be for those things?

I'm not suggesting there are no differences between men and women.  The socio-biological research conducted by E.O. Wilson and others suggests that the gender based behavioral patterns seen in other mammal species apply to humans as well. Human males can be territorial, and aggressive. Females are more often nurturing.  Broad generalizations for sure, but when we look at the historical record, isn't that pretty much what we see?

Author Riane Eisler, in her books, The Chalice and the Blade being one example, reveals clear gender patterns in the evolution of the human species. Long ago, when humans were nomadic, hunter-gathers, the anthropological record indicates that men and women lived more or less as equals in small clans. Their lifestyles revolved around the seasons and rhythms of nature. Women's fertility was celebrated as a part of the sacred mystery of life.

Things changed when the age of agriculture arrived 10,000-12,000 years ago.  Humans domesticated plants and animals, and began to grow their food and live in permanent settlements.  This was the beginning of societies ruled by dominant males.  Women were subjugated, with their roles narrowly defined around the act of child-bearing and nurturing. 

Male dominance brought us the hierarchical church. It brought us tyrant emperors, kings and warrior elites bent on bloody conquest, and an industrial age defined by a rapacious, male dominant economic system in which the few were hugely rewarded at the expense of the masses. To a large degree, it's still that way.

To be sure, early in the 21st century, in the developed nations at least, women have overcome many obstacles on the road to equality. In the United States, many women now hold political office. More and more job descriptions are free of gender bias.  Still, the issue of equal pay for equal work remains unresolved, and reproductive rights are under heavy assault from conservatives. In many developing nations, the situation remains far worse. In too many places, women are still treated as chattel, subject to violence, denied access to education, denied reproductive choice. 

Despite the often destructive nature of the male dominant paradigm, humanity has made progress since the age of cave-dwellers. But there are now seven billion plus humans on planet Earth. We are pushing the planet's resources to the brink. We are relentlessly exploiting our water, forests, soils, and other critical resources. We have polluted our oceans. Our dependence on fossil fuels like coal and oil have caused unprecedented climate change. We are approaching a point of no-return with the damage we have done to the biosphere each of us depends on. The way we live must change. That's true in the U.S., in  the developed nations, and in all of those places yet to achieve the dignity to which every human being has a right.

As a male of the species, it troubles me that I have to admit that it has been my own gender that has  gotten us into this mess.  I'm not saying every male is a rapacious sociopath, but that is an apt description for too many of those who  end up with power and influence. Bottom line: Men alone are not going to get us out of the trouble we're in.

I am a feminist because championing equal rights and treatment for women is absolutely the right thing to do.  The full participation of women is absolutely indispensable to any kind of sustainable future.

We must have a political system that is open and accountable to all citizens, not just the privileged one percent. Corporations must be reigned in and made subject to appropriate controls. Banks must be tightly regulated, putting the public interest first.   I see no possibility of this kind of human evolution until women are included at the table as equal partners to men. 

I'm with you, ladies. I am a feminist. 

I am making this declaration, with one caveat. I am a heterosexual male. As such. I have the same sexual cravings as other hetero males. I have no shame about that.  I mention this because there is one brand of  feminism that is quick to label expressions of male sexuality as objectifying and offensive to women.  I'm sorry. Heterosexual males are hardwired to have a sexual interest in women.  I'm not saying women don't get objectified. It happens all the time. It's men being men. The problem lies with men who are only able to see women as sexual objects. A lot of men are like that. Probably 30% are like that. These same guys are also, very often, stridently opposed to all forms of sexual expression and reproductive freedom. The way forward is to leave them behind.  Marginalize them. Ignore them. Vote them out of power.  In the U.S. at least, these Neanderthals are mostly older white males. They are already on their way out.

My guess is that 40% of American adult males are already sensitized. They may not describe themselves as feminists but they support reproductive freedom, equality in the workplace, etc.  If 40% of males are already with you, and another 30% will never be with you, that leaves 30% that are open to persuasion.

My point is this; let's not stigmatize all men because 30% of the male population are incorrigible  misogynists. The way forward is to nurture the 70% of adult males who are already feminists or who can become that way with some thoughtful encouragement.

Where sexual expression is concerned, the brand of feminism I subscribe to is reflected in the approach taken by a group called, Feminists for Free Expression (FFE). Co-founded by Nadine Strossen, who for 17 years was President of the American Civil Liberties Union,  FFE takes well reasoned positions on reproductive freedom, censorship, pornography, prostitution, and sexual expression in general.  Most of Europe is already where FFE believes America should be; sex work is legal and regulated,  most forms of consensual, adult sexual expression are tolerated. 
 
The world is not going to fully embrace a sustainable pathway until women have an equal voice with men.  There are many civilization scale challenges that demand our attention. All of them can be more effectively addressed with women fully empowered as participants in shaping the future.

I am a feminist...









Saturday, August 10, 2013

Polar Bears - Death by Starvation


The other day, a report appeared on the net about a polar bear that was found dead in northern Norway. The bear was little more than skin and bones. It had starved to death. 





Polar Bears are apex predators. They're very good at finding food in the short season of sunlight in the far north. They are biologically fine tuned to hunt and catch seals and other prey while roaming the permanent pack ice.  In the few months of summer, they have to eat a lot. They have to put on a lot of fat to tide them over during the long dark winters in hibernation.    The problem is the pack ice on which they depend for access to their natural food supply is going away. It used to be that these bears could walk on to the ice from the landed areas of the arctic during the entire summer season.  That is no longer true.  In many places, the ice recedes hundreds of miles, leaving bears in those areas no way to access the ice.  There have even been cases where polar bears have drown while trying to swim to the ice they are adapted to and which  has always been there in the past.  It's no wonder that these predators have become an endangered species.

Undeniably, the loss of the summer sea ice is caused by anthropocentric warming... climate change caused by human dependence on fossil fuels.  

The demise of the polar bear is but one tragic example of human hubris.  Our indifference to nature's rhythms is directly causing the decline of plant and animal species in every corner of our planet. It is deeply distressing to see life on Earth being destroyed purely because we humans are unwilling to practice good planetary stewardship.  We can and should be better than that...



Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Pollinator Pathways


So, we live in a lovely, quiet neighborhood on the west side of Portland, Oregon.   I have written in this blog before about how few songbirds we have around our home.  We never hear birds singing. When I was a kid, I grew up waking up to birds singing on Spring and Summer mornings. Not here. Part of the problem  may be crows and jays driving other birds out.  Part of it may be chemicals that people use nowadays on their lawns. Part of it could be kitties doing what comes naturally when they're free to roam.  

I would not say that bees are uncommon in my neighborhood, but I have to wonder if we're doing all we can to nurture them. In my mind, that is the proper role of humans when it comes to the places where we live. We should be doing all we can to shape our human habitats to be in harmony with the natural world.




Anyway, I say all that as a lead in to this blog piece, which is about a group in Seattle called Pollinator Pathways.  It's a  gathering of like-minded citizens in a residential neighborhood a half mile or so East of Downtown Seattle.  In 2008, in response to the increasing concern about bee hives being decimated by what is now called, 'Colony Collapse Disorder'  a group of neighbors came up with a plan to create an urban strip with plantings designed to encourage a healthy symbiosis with native bees and other pollinators. The group attracted a lot of support from the city government, local universities, and their neighbors.  They created a formal structure for their effort and called it Pollinator Pathways

I read about the Pollinator Pathway program and thought to myself, 'That's exactly what we need in my neighborhood.' 

I called our Home Owner's Association and asked if something like that might be encouraged in our Portland neighborhood. Their initial response was encouraging, so I'm going to talk to the good people behind Pollinator Pathways in Seattle, and see what I can learn about adopting their program here in Portland. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, for more blog pieces on this subject, click on the labels below for 'Bees' and 'Pollinators'



Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Electric Airplanes



I used to fly. Then, it got too expensive. It costs even more now. A gallon of aviation fuel goes for $5 or even more. Even a small, ultra light airplane could burn four gallons per hour. That's $20 or more just for fuel for an hour in a single seat aircraft that flies about 50 mph.  The Cessna 180 I used to fly burns about 14 gallons per hour. Do the math. That's $70 an hour just for fuel.  It's no wonder there aren't that many Cessna 180s still flying.  It's no wonder that aircraft manufacturers like Piper and Beechcraft are out of business, and Cessna makes almost no small, fixed gear aircraft anymore. They simply are not practical. They cost too much to operate.

Those us who love going aloft need some other way to quench the passion for flying. We need aircraft that don't run on any kind of fossil fuel.  The good news is a number of innovators have come up with new light aircraft designs that are powered by electricity. A few of them run on fuel cells that make electricity by converting hydrogen to electric power.  No one expects the fuel cell to come down in cost sufficiently to commercialize fuel cell powered aircraft anytime soon.

Battery powered airplanes are a different story.  There are a couple aircraft emerging that could make flying affordable again, at least for people who just want to have a little fun in the sky for an hour or two.

One company, GreenWing International,  is just now starting to market a single seat, battery electric ultralight aircraft.  It's called the eSpyder, and the list price is just under $40,000.  For that, you get an ultralight that flies for about two hours under optimal conditions at a cruising speed of 38 mph.




As aviation experiences go, flying something like the eSpyder is not exactly scintillating.  But, it's a lot more fun than being stuck on the ground.  

Greenwing also has another design, the two seat e430 with better performance for a lot more money.


e430


It could be that the eSpyder is the leading edge in a  revolution in general aviation that will again allow the average person a means to fly at a cost that is affordable.  I hope it turns out that way.

Here is a link to a video of the eSpyder on the ground and in the air... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iuFpkc5odWc








Monday, August 5, 2013

Food for Thought - Real Sex Vs. Porn


I saw this You Tube video the other day that uses edible illustrations to illuminate it's comparison of porn star sex versus the real deal.  Fun!

Here is the link to the video that apparently originated in Brazil... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q64hTNEj6KQ&feature=player_embedded


Sunday, August 4, 2013

George Clooney - Inspiration



As celebrities go, some are good, others not so much. They are a reflection of what you find in society in general. My definition of a good soul is someone who has a high level of awareness of the world in general, and enough caring and compassion to want to make the world better.  I would count in the category of celebrity good souls,  Matt Damon, Angelina Jolie, Ben Affleck, Don Cheadle, Leo DeCaprio, Charlize Theron, Betty White, Ryan Gosling, Elle DeGeneres, Bono, and Brad Pitt.  There are others, but the latter names always come to mind first. If there is one among them all who has elevated himself above everyone else, in my mind that would be George Clooney. 


George Clooney

George Clooney has got the world by the tail. He's remarkably good looking.  He's elegant. He's dapper and charismatic. He moves gracefully from one gorgeous woman in his life to another. He's got an amazing coterie of friends. He's a very talented actor, director, and writer. It could easily end there, but it doesn't. With all that he has going for him, George Clooney is also a deeply committed and compassionate champion for those in the human family who struggle for survival every day.

George Clooney lends his voice to many good causes, but he has chosen to give the greatest share of his activism as a voice for the long suffering, oppressed peoples of Darfur, in the South Sudan of Africa.

The Sudan is an arid nation in east Africa, directly south of Egypt. It is one of the poorest places on Earth.  The northern part of the Sudan is Arab culturally, the southern part, called Darfur, is ethnically African.



The political power in the Sudan has always been held by the Sudanese Arabs in the north. They didn't bother much with the Africans that had always occupied the southern, Darfur region of the Sudan. That is until oil was discovered in Darfur. When outside interests started sniffing around for oil and found ii in Darfur, the Arabs running the country decided it was time for some ethnic cleansing. What ensued was not much different than many historical instances of ethnic cleansing, including the one perpetrated by the US government on indigenous, native American populations in the 19th century.

About ten years ago, the Sudanese political power structure started sending planes with bombs and armed military forces into the Darfur region to terrorize the people and drive them from their homeland.  Since then, tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people have been killed in the  Darfur War by forces controlled by the Sudanese government. In fact, Sudanese  President Omar-Al-Bashir has been indicated on genocide charges by the International Criminal Court.

Anyway, this is a piece about George Clooney. How does he fit into the conflict in Darfur?  Turns out,  he is an important player in this real life drama. For several years, George Clooney has been using his celebrity to draw attention to the atrocities done by the Sudanese government to its own people in Darfur. Part of this effort is channeled through Not on Our Watch, an organization Clooney co-founded with several other celebrities.

George Clooney has seen the war for himself. He's traveled to Darfur several times.   He's gone to the White House on more than one occasion to ask for aide. He speaks about Darfur whenever he can. Where Darfur is concerned, Clooney not only talks the talk, he walks the walk.

Before I go on to his latest bit of assertive action for Darfur, I want to talk about how he inspires the masses with the movies he makes. I'm talking about films that wouldn't get made without him.  Good Night, and Good Luck, Michael Clayton, The Ides of March, to name a few. Sure Clooney makes movies that are entirely about entertaining and selling tickets. He's a bankable, 'A' List movie star. He uses part of the leverage he gets from his iconic status to get movies made that are about things that matter.  George Clooney is a very accomplished producer and director of quality films about things that matter. He's getting it done in an era when that kind of movie making is tantamount to swimming upstream against a very swift current.  You have to really admire the guy for that. 

Talk about a rich and very full life. George Clooney has got it in spades. It would be so easy for him to coast frivolously through life.  Fortunately, he's about as far from Charlie Sheen as one could be.

Now, Clooney's latest gambit for Darfur. He recently began to do a series of French TV commercials for a coffee called Nespresso.  He's using the money he makes from those commercials to buy satellite time to maintain a watch over the Sudanese government and its actions against the now autonomous region of the South Sudan (Darfur).  Buying satellite time to keep the bad guys in line. That is radically cool.

George Clooney is an inspiration.  I only wish he would consider politics at some point. Let's keep in mind that another actor became President. Ronald Reagan was not nearly as smart  as George Clooney. Reagan was a personality more than a person of substance.  It was charisma more than political savvy that got him elected to the highest office in the land.  George Clooney has at least as much charisma as Reagan, probably more political savvy, and for sure a whole lot more compassion. I would love to see Clooney as President.

Whatever George Clooney chooses to do with the remainder of his time on Earth, I'm sure he will have a good time doing it,  and I'm sure he will have a positive impact on millions of people in the process.  George Clooney is what every gifted person should be, a wonderful example for the majority of people, who need inspiration before they are willing stand and be counted.

Here are link to an article on Clooney and Nespresso ... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/31/george-clooney-nespresso-spy-sattelite_n_3681937.html#slide=more214630

Here is a link some of George Clooney's Nespresso commercials....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXru4Q7Lgxo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIbwrwWDXfc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBp1e9zzBow


Here is a link to Not On Our Watch,  a Clooney co-founded organization dedicated to highlighting ethnic conflicts, particularly in Africa... http://notonourwatchproject.org/






Saturday, August 3, 2013

The Power of Myth


Back in 1988, journalist Bill Moyers interviewed Joseph Campbell in a six part PBS TV series called, The Power of Myth.  It gave me an almost entirely new way to look at my place as a human person making my way through a life on Earth.




Joseph Campbell spent his life studying cultures and the role of mythology in shaping the lives of the individuals who were part of those cultures. As one might expect, the myths and legends that have formed around different cultures are extremely diverse.  Campbell found in a lifetime of studying myth and legend that there are many common threads in these stories that explain and give meaning to life.


Bill Moyers, Joseph Campbell

One of the common threads in myth and legend is what Campbell called, The Hero's Journey.  He wrote about it in a book titled, The Hero With a Thousand Faces.





Campbell found that the stories behind almost every human culture are about a heroic figure that risks all on a quest in service to his {virtually all heroes are male in mythology) people. Along this journey, the hero overcomes a series of challenges. In the process, he gains wisdom which becomes the foundation of his culture.

I was just thinking about Campbell and his wisdom this morning, and I realized that it was about that time, in 1988 when The Power of Myth was being broadcast, that my life went from a struggle to learn and find direction to one in which I began to see and follow a pathway that resonated for me and made me happy. In essence, I began to follow my bliss,  and I learned to enjoy the journey I was on,  and accept the failures along the way as part of the process that one grows from on the way to achieving something genuinely worthwhile. I'm still one that pathway. It has made me happy, and it has brought me some success, and I see even greater possibilities on the road ahead.

There are many pearls of wisdom in the work of Joseph Campbell. For me, it comes down to one very meaty aphorism...
 
 
“Follow your bliss.
If you do follow your bliss,
you put yourself on a kind of track
that has been there all the while waiting for you,
and the life you ought to be living
is the one you are living.
When you can see that,
you begin to meet people
who are in the field of your bliss,
and they open the doors to you.
I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid,
and doors will open
where you didn't know they were going to be.
If you follow your bliss,
doors will open for you that wouldn't have opened for anyone else.”

                                                         Joseph Campbell


Here is a link to a video trailer of the original PBS TV series, The Power of Myth... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdUaQNsjwNM



Friday, August 2, 2013

Robert Radin - Much Loved Friend


The other day, we lost a great friend.  Robert Radin was a mench of the first order. We loved the guy.

A few days after his 90th birthday, on July 31st, Robert passed away peacefully after a brief illness. It is heartbreaking to my wife Jenny and me to lose our friend, but we choose to celebrate the great life he had.

Robert was a very successful businessman. He was loaded to the gills with charisma. Even more, he had the heart of an adventurer.  I was fortunate to meet him when his close friend, the well-known author/filmmaker, Michael Tobias, signed on to write and direct my company's first documentary, Element One.  If Michael was Don Quixote, Robert was his Sancho Panza.  Long before I met Robert, the two had been traveling the world together making documentaries.  

One of the best parts about being in Robert's circle of friends was being invited to the soirees he held regularly at his home in Venice, California. Robert had an amazingly diverse coterie of friends.  Going to his house always translated to good conversation, good food, and good people.  Robert loved being the host and sharing his good will and food from his backyard garden with everyone. 

Every time we saw Robert, he welcomed us with a warm embrace. Robert gave great hugs. His willingness to show affection for his friends and to receive it from them was boundless.


Robert Radin
 

When my wife Jenny and I were married in 2002,  Robert was my best man. In that same year, Robert traveled with us to China to work on a segment of our documentary, The Hydrogen Age.

Our most memorable time with Robert came in 2004, when my wife and I traveled to Montana with him and our friend, Bettina.  We spent nearly a week  in Glacier National Park and Western Montana.

Glacier Park Lodge, eating Montana cherries

Robert at  Glacier Park Continental Divide

Then we went on to Seattle and to Robert's second home in Port Townsend, Washington, where his daughter Carol and her husband Todd live. Robert had a special friend named Cabot in Port Townsend.
 

Robert with Cabot in Port Townsend


In 2006,  when my wife and I were living in Salem, Oregon, I was unexpectedly diagnosed with a tumor on my pancreas.  It was the most terrifying time of my life. Robert and our friend Bettina came up from California and stayed with us through the ensuing surgery and some time after. Their support met so much to us.

Robert and I were also shareholders in a clean energy startup called, Element One Corporation. We traveled regularly together to Boulder, Colorado for annual board meetings. Robert was very anxious to see Element One succeed, not just because of the financial reward, but at least as much because the core technologies the company is built on are likely to have a big role in the  hydrogen part of the  clean energy revolution emerging around the world. Element One is doing quite well these days.  I'm so happy that Robert knew his investment in Element one was headed in a winning direction.

Robert Radin leaves two wonderful daughters, Janet and Carol, and four granddaughters, all of whom adored him.

I also must recognize and express my thanks to Bettina Gray, who has been an important friend of ours and of Robert's for the last twenty years.  It was Bettina who was at his side during his last few days.  I also want to thank Juanita, Laura, and George for their devotion to Robert these past years.

A review of Robert's life must include recognition for his wonderful photography. A website showcases the amazing images he created during his travels around the world. The link to Robert's photography webpage is  http://www.radinphotos.com/RadinExhibition/Welcome.html

A talented filmmaker named Elias Wondimu made a wonderful, 20 minute video about Robert and his photography just a short time before his passing.  I urge the reader to take a moment and see for yourself the beautiful, loving personality of Robert Radin in this video. The link is http://vimeo.com/71773680

There's no way to adequately sum up a life like that of Robert Radin. He lived it to the fullest and made many, many friends along his journey.  He was warm, and decent, and loving. He was kind and generous, and great fun to be with.   I count him as one of the best friends I've ever had. I already miss him a lot. I shall have a warm place in my heart for him the rest of my days.