Covid Meditation--Episode One

1.
The decision has been made to meditate more often. (Why? Despair needs a drug, one without negative side effects, one whose beneficial effects last). These meditation blog entries will monitor progress, if any. The purpose of the blog is dual; the other facet is reaching others in a similar condition, and, it is hoped, to inspire them to change. Details of my state and progress will be revealed only to the degree that what is written may help others. Perhaps  these words will remain unread, or read only by a very few; if it reaches one, (even if  it's only me?), that will be enough. Comments are welcome.

We are, in Maryland, on day 67 of the 'lockdown,' that is, a gubernatorial shelter-in-place order to reduce the spread of the coronavirus. We are to remain at home; we are directed to wear masks in public. Walks and grocery shopping are allowed; we are to maintain "social distancing"--that is, keeping a six-foot separation from everyone we encounter. We wife and I, of course, don't apply the six-feet rule to ourselves; we have been following the guideline strictly, however. We are, after all, as seniors, in a high-risk group, doubly high for me, since I have a few underlying conditions.

It has been relatively easy for us, but it's still quite hard sometimes. I am retired, and most of the things I like to do--reading, writing, playing the piano. etc. I can do at home. Nirmala still works as a pediatrician, but has drastically reduced her hours and does telemedicine from home as well. She does her best to see to it that her patients receive their scheduled vaccinations, which is a very noble goal. She wears gloves, a mask, a face shield and a white coat--gowns remain unavailable--whenever she has to examine a patient. Only one patient and one family member are allowed at the office at a time. I am grateful for the extra time I spend with her.

2.
I am one of the lucky ones. So many people of working age have lost their source of income and are wondering how to pay for food, medicines and rent. The current rate of unemployment is 14.7%, the worst since the Great Depression; things are obviously going to get worse before getting better. The lack of health care, the provision of which should have been universal for a long time, as it is in most other countries, is especially acute, since loss of employment eventually results in loss of employer-based health care, the major method most Americans receive their health care.

Furthermore, our expenses are low; we  receive enough from Social Security and a small pension to live on.

Worse have been the number deaths from the virus. At the time of this writing, over 100,000 Americans have died from the current plague in a matter of months. To give you a good idea of how many this is, I include a picture of a stadium filled with 100,000 spectators:

Most of the deaths occurred in senior citizens. Many victims had underlying health conditions. The majority were men. In addition, the end-in-sight might be illusory. It is heart-rending.

I feel guilty.  Age is like a bone spur, an excuse from enlisting. Once things go back to, more or less, normal, I can begin volunteering again. Until then, I must work on myself.

Regarding the one little person that I am, increased free time periodically results in rumination and depression. Retirees often suffer from loss of purpose and loss of self-worth; these have been compounded for me during this period of not being able to do many of the things that eased these tendencies during normal times.

It runs in the family. My father succumbed to depression in 1967, for instance. Feeling increasingly bad, I recently took an online questionnaire regarding depression. If one obtains a score of 27 or above, the guidelines stated, one should get immediate treatment. I scored 70! Admittedly, I don't feel all the time as bad as I did when I competed the questionnaire, but still... I knew something had to be done. Professional treatment is not an option for me, for various reasons. I decided, on Wednesday, May 27, 2020 to increase time spent in meditation by a factor of six,  and document the results in this periodic meditation blog. What (as of yet, possibly) works for me, might work for you. Such is my hope.

A serious mood disorder, though common,  is a real killer. Killer of pulses and killer of dreams. Suicide, the tip of a very cold iceberg, has been increasing in the United States, especially among those of my gender, age, and ethnic background. Depression is like climbing a difficult mountain; "normal" might be pushing oneself uphill at a difficult incline and with a lot of huffing and puffing. Then "cliffs of fall frightful, sheer, no man-fathomed" arise--Hopkins knew a thing or two about depression--when one is dizzy, alone, and scared to death; painfully clinging to a jagged boulder, what is one to do? Yes, Hopkins, the mind has mountains, but they are, thankfully, metaphorical. You might feel that you are hanging onto a rock with no way of climbing down, but that is not the case. Our lives are short; metaphorical cliffs are even more impermanent that we are. Yes, time smooths all internal precipices, but time, if one is so inclined, might also result in having to climb another deadly mountain. And another.

I have decided to enable mind to guide two feet to choose level ground for as long as possible. I decided to train better  that entity which Hindus believe to be the source of everything.

3.
The type of meditation I have begun, and will continue to practice is called vipassana (insight) meditation. It is a very beautiful form of concentration, the benefits of which often spill over into daily life. More about this in later articles. I intend to spend two hours in meditation daily, in two hourly sessions.

I will use the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire to monitor progress, which is as follows.

1-strongly disagree
2-moderately disagree
3-slightly disagree
4-slightly agree
5-moderately agree
6-strongly agree

1. I don't feel particularly pleased with the way I am. (R)
2. I am intensely interested in other people.
3. I feel that life is very rewarding.
4. I have very warm feelings towards almost everyone.
5.  I rarely wake up feeling rested. (R)
6. I am not particularly optimistic about the future. (R)
7. I find most things amusing.
8. I am always committed and involved.
9. Life is good.
10.I do not think that the world is a good place. (R)
11.I laugh a lot.
12.I am well satisfied about everything in my life.
13.I don't look attractive. (R)
14.There is a gap between what I would like to do and what I have done. (R)
15.I am very happy.
16.I find beauty is some things.
17.I always have  cheerful effect on others.
18.I can fit in (find time for) everything I want to
19.I feel that I am not especially in control of my life. (R)
20.I feel able to take anything on.
21 I feel fully mentally alert.
22.I often experience joy and elation.
23.I don't find it easy to make decisions. (R)
24.I don't have a particular sense of meaning and purpose in my life. (R)
25.I feel I have a great deal of energy.
26.I usually have a good influence on events.
27.I don't have fun with other people. (R)
28.I don't feel particularly healthy. (R)
29.I don't have particularly happy memories of the past. (R)

Any question marked (R) must be scored in reverse.
Add the numbers for all 29 questions.
Divide by 29.

This is a very rough estimate of what is expected through insight meditation, so I will include some subjective feelings and findings to mark any improvement or deterioration. I estimate my score to be at the time I began to increase my meditation to be 1.7, or 'not happy'. Not surprised.

To be continued.

Our Fat-Shameless Version of Pee-wee Herman

It's hard for someone like me, who remembers President Truman, albeit fitfully, that there are many people alive today who are too young to remember Pee-wee's Playhouse, a children's TV show that was popular in the late eighties. In that series, a frenetic little guy named Pee-wee Herman (Paul Rubens) clowned around to the delight of many children everywhere.

He devised a routine which deflected insults back onto the insulter, a sort-of Anglo version of Y Tu Mamá también. If someone called him a derogatory  name, he would reply, "I know you are, but what am I?" The insulter would invariably lose his cool and call Pee-wee something worse, whose sing-song reply would be, "I know  you are, but what am I?" This would go on until Herman's belittler, now in a rage, stormed off the set, allowing Pee-wee to return to his frenetic shenanigans unfazed.

Little Pee-wee Herman made kids laugh. The modern master of deflection can sometimes make us adults laugh as well--but the joke is on us. I will provide a few examples.

During a recent meeting of Republican senators, Trump was informed by a journalist that Nancy Pelosi said that he, the President, being morbidly obese, should not take hydroxychoroquine as a prophylaxis against Covid-19 infection. (I think she was trolling him; technically, Trump, while obese, is not morbidly obese).The drug, which can result in a fatal cardiac arrythmia, has not been approved for this purpose. Any comments, Mr. President?

At first, Trump said that dealing with Pelosi is a waste of time. But, after a few questions, he lost his cool: "These people are sick. Pelosi is a sick woman--she has lots of mental problems."

Except she doesn't. Trump knows that many people--including this author--think Trump is suffering from mental illness. Dr, Brandy Lee, a Yale psychiatrist, wrote a book, supported by many other psychiatrists, about Trump's probable pathology and obvious decline. Lying the way he does; never admitting an error; lack of empathy; a narcissistic obsession with his own supposed greatness; all these factors and more signify a serious morbidity. Trump knows this. So the hidden "I know you are, but what am I?" question is Nancy Pelosi asking him, "Are you crazy?" I know you are, is his response, but what am I? A very stable genius.

Another Pee-wee moment arises from Trump's incompetence. During the first three years of his presidency, Trump was able to gaslight  his base into believing he was, well, perfect. With the coronavirus pandemic's arrival, a true emergency arose, demanding excellent leadership. Trump, as those who know his number would expect, failed miserably. He dithered, while fevers burned. There is no doubt that many would be alive today if he had acted earlier. No excuses--the medical community predicted disaster, and disaster arrived. He said he was not a clerk, and thus refused to see to it that health care workers received much needed protective gear. He is our naked emperor insisting that he is dressed to the nines. His lack of leadership continues to cost lives. If the choice--as he sees it--is between saving his presidency or saving grandma, good-bye grandma--If she dies miserably, alone in a hospital without the comfort of family or friends--so what? And when I say grandma, I also include people of all ages and both genders. Viruses, clever mindless creatures that they are, do not have the prejudices we do.

President Obama gave a virtual commencement address during which he alluded to the incompetence of the current president. A chaotic response, Obama stated without mentioning names, some aren't even trying. Another round of the Pee-wee defense--Obama's implication: Trump, you're incompetent. Trump's unspoken reply-- I know you are (Trump responded to this understood, unsaid assessment with fury) but what am I? A very stable genius.

My last example of the Pee-wee defense is regarding China and the W.H.O. China, an autocratic nation obsessed with its international reputation, did cover-up the initial cases of Covid-19; the World Health Organization did not criticize them at this point. Then they got their act together. Trump, however, had dithered for two months, denying the seriousness of the pandemic presumably to help get himself reelected. Trump knows that the majority of Americans now disapprove of his handling of the crisis.
Trump touts that he banned travel to China, which 'saved many lives'. Nonsense. First, he only restricted travel--43,000 traveled from China to the U.S. during the so-called ban. Second, the source of spread by this time was Europe. Once again, he was desperately trying to deflect blame. You delayed acting to help stem the spread of the disease, China and the W.H.O. --you're the bad guys. But what am I?  A very stable genius? 

Indeed.

Herman wore make-up that made him look like a clown; Trump wears make-up that makes him look like a clown. That's where the similarities end. Only Trump, because we let him, has been able to carry our country around as if we were a Fool's bauble. (Yes, he's unwell, but we can't afford to have sympathy for him until he is out of office; he's causing far too much damage.) Let us work together, Democrats and Republicans, to remove our national disgrace from the world stage.

Desultory Diary, Episode 25: A Classic Revisited

1.

One of my main activities during this period of home-confinement is reading. The libraries remain closed; what has been borrowed has been read. I needed a book; I've been watching operas which the Met has kindly been streaming, but I wanted to have something to hold in my hands while my mind soared, or, at the very least, found succor from the virus by being, imaginatively, somewhere else. Would I find what I was looking for in the basement? It's damp, it's dark, but there are a lot of books down there.

What I came up with was, "The Winter of Our Discontent" by John Steinbeck. I had never read it before; I didn't even know how it had come into my possession.

Upon further inspection, I discovered that this was a first-edition printing of the novel. If the site I consulted is to be trusted, a first-edition copy, with the now-valuable jacket intact, is worth $12,500! Well, the jacket is missing on mine.

Where did this book come from? I certainly hadn't bought it back in 1961. The only reasonable conclusion is that my father had bought it and read it. My father died in 1967. It was odd to hold the same book in my hands that he had held in his hands so long ago. Nobody on earth remembers him now, poor man, except me, with the possible exception of one with whom I've lost contact.  If he read it when it was new, which I assume he did, what was going through his mind? A few years later, everything fell apart for him, and, after several suicide attempts, he was dead.

I am more like him than I'd like to admit, but for your sake and mine, dear readers, I refuse to descend into that terrible ditch; I rise from the grave like Lazarus and return to better times, the plague of 2020, to review an outstanding book.

2.

This novel is an American classic, no doubt about that. Published in 1961, this, the last of Steinbeck’s many novels, was one of the main reasons the author won a Nobel Prize a year later. It is the story of a midlife crisis; the how and the why a decent man succumbs to corruption. For the epigraph of the novel Steinbeck wrote: “Readers seeking to identify the fictional people and places here described would be better to inspect their own communities and search their own hearts, for this book is about a large part of America today.”

In this respect, the book is very prescient. It was written at the end of the Eisenhower era, two decades before greed began its almost exponential upswing with the Reagan presidency. The novel’s protagonist, Ethan Allen Hawley, scion of a well-established family fallen onto hard times, is without doubt the smartest person in the book; he reflects, one easily assumes, many of the author’s views. Hawley knows that selfishness was nothing new; he called his ancestors, who were involved in the whaling industry, “Puritan-pirates.” His ancestors strove for a balance, however imperfect, between self-interest and community. The replacement of God, however understood, with money as the center of worship would have surprised them all.

In a recent edition of the New Yorker, (May 11, 2020), Evan Osmos, in an article about America’s shift to the right, writes, quoting a Dartmouth sociologist: “The underlying massive change is that wealth no longer needs to justify itself—it is self-justifying…I look back, and I think, That’s when we gave up on being ‘we’”

This shameless self-justification of money; the reduction of ‘We the People,’ to ‘I, the Person,’ Steinbeck saw coming, which gives the book an aura of prophesy. Hawley’s mid-life crisis thus is the beginning of America’s mid-life crisis; the banker in the novel, Mr. Baker, is a prototype of the oligarchs who have ushered in this, what might be called the Second Gilded Age, where terms like fairness and equality are old hat, traded for, as it were, the older hats of Gilded Age elites.

Some parts of the book, however, point back into the past. The role of women in the novel is limited. There are two types of females in the book: one is represented by Hawley’s wife; she stands by her man and pushes him to succeed. She is not nearly as intelligent as her husband; she remains in the confines of domestic chores. (At one point she says to her husband, regarding the banker, Mr. Baker: ‘But he might want a word alone with you. Businessmen don’t like ladies listening.’) The other type is represented by the childless Margie Young-Hunt, who has no qualms about using her sexuality to get what she wants. The only way she believes she can get ahead is by manipulating men to do her bidding.

This book was written decades before the acceptance of diversity; the Italian businessman, Murillo, is the butt of many ethnic slurs. No trace of political correctness here! There is also a tendency to blame foreigners for everything; this trend, unfortunately, is still with us.  Written a few years before the commencement of the Civil Rights era, the book contains almost no references to African Americans. Their wintry discontent is not mentioned at all, even in passing.

Despite these defects, the book is a classic, worth more than a single read.

Schiller wrote a story called, “Der Verbrecher aus verlorener Ehre,” (“The criminal due to lost honor”)—the title is a good characterization of the protagonist’s descent. Hawley, the scion of a respected family, has lost everything; to keep his family from hunger, he is forced to work as a clerk in a grocery store which he formally owned. His boss is Murillo, a shrewd businessman who barely speaks English. Hawley, in contrast, is a Harvard graduate, who majored in languages and literature.

Hawley’s education and intelligence provide no advantages. His frequent quoting of writers such as Shakespeare and Milton and his thorough knowledge of the Bible do not compensate for his lack of respect in the community.

His daughter asks him point-blank, “When are we going to be rich?” His son wants to go to camp. They can’t even afford a TV. Hawley’s resultant self-hate is expressed in the ironic nicknames he gives his wife: flower feet, fern tip, etc. They indicate an aggression of which his wife is scarcely aware.

H realizes that the values of the society in which he lives proclaim, “Gentry without money gradually ceases to be gentry.” He also realizes that once rich, nobody is interested in the means by which one’s wealth has been gained. After thinking things over, he decides, after attending Easter service, to resurrect himself as someone as dishonest as the banker and his ilk. He anonymously reports Murillo to the Immigration Department, which gets him deported; he betrays his best friend, now the town drunk, in order to obtain his property; he even plans to hold up a bank.

He is brought back to his senses when he discovers that his son, who has won an honorable mention in a coveted essay contest, has done so by plagiarizing historic texts. “Everybody does it,” is his defense.

This drives Hawley to consider suicide. Holding a family talisman, he decides to live for the sake of his daughter who still has a chance of not being corrupted. The book ends with the following lines:

I had to get back to return the talisman to its new owner.

Else another light may go out.

The novel, by the way is dedicated To Beth, my sister, whose light burns clear.

The book is brilliantly written. It contains many interesting passages regarding what has been going on in Hawley’s head. One of the asides I especially enjoyed is a Scottish grandfather’s response to his teenage granddaughter, who constantly worries about what people are thinking about her: ‘Ye wouldna be sae worrit wi’ what folks think about ye if ye kenned how seldom they do.’ Modern translation; “Put down the cell phone, Sweetheart; the hits you desperately want to receive are from kids who don’t really care”.

“The Winter of Our Discontent” illustrates the American past, yet also foreshadows the current American mess. When the pursuit of money and prestige triumphs over ethics and relationships, what are we left with? Read the newspapers; read this novel; else another light may go out.

Desultory Diary, Episode 24: Where are the Snows of Yesteryear?

Ou est la neige d'antan? Where are the snows of yesteryear? François Villon posed this question over five hundred years ago. Today we use different metaphors to convey the passage of time, e.g., "water under the bridge," "time waits for no man," or some version of the Latin, "tempus fugit," time flies.

We recently listened to a 1984 performance of Aida, which turned out to be for me an almost three-hour long memento mori; beautiful, but a memento mori nevertheless. (This is but one of the many operas we've listened to recently, streamed every day from the Metropolitan Opera as a public service during the current corona virus lockdown. I'm beginning to think in cracked Italian).

This performance was very poignant for me, not only because it was one of the last performances of Leontyne Price before she retired from the stage in 1985, but because I had attended it, as a much younger man, thirty-six years ago. Ou est la neige d'antan? 

The cast was first-rate. The conductor, James Levine, in his early forties at the time of the broadcast, was able to stand at the podium; we remember him more recently after his hair thinned and turned gray, and after he could barely walk. One could hardly imagine at the time that thirty years later his career would be over, having been fired form the Met and from the Boston Symphony Orchestra for  having been a sexual predator in his youth. Another Latin proverb, in addition to tempus fugit comes to mind here: sic transit gloria mundi. Nevertheless, he conducted Aida masterfully.

James McCracken, who passed away a mere four years later at the age of 61, sang beautifully and acted well. He ignored Verdi's notation of moriendo, that is, dying away, at the final B flat of Celeste Aida; most tenors do that, since going from quite loud to quite soft on a high note is notoriously difficult. (The only one I ever heard doing this successfully was the splendid Franco Corelli).

Leontyne Price was phenomenal. How beautifully expressive was her smokey voice at mid-range; how much more beautiful still were her high notes, especially her pianissimos at the end of the famous third-act area, O patria mia. Her singing and interpretation, to put it mildly, brought down the house; the applause and shouts lasted longer than for any other performance I have witnessed; and, over the years, I’ve witnessed a lot. It was nostalgic to think that my left palm, red from clapping, was present, throbbing in the balcony, during her well-deserved ovation. Her final performance of Aida, her forty-second, came a few months later, in January of 1985.

Simon Estes was imposing as Aida’s father, Amonosro. I especially enjoyed hearing Fiorenza Cossotto in the challenging role of Amneris, since I had admired her so much in the even more challenging role of Adelgisa in Bellini’s Norma, which I had seen at the Met in 1972.

Aida is the quintessential grand opera; I remember seeing a production, also with Leontyne Price, in which the Met went all-out. There was even a live elephant in the triumphant march scene! The stage for the last act at that performance was elaborately divided into two horizontal sections, the upper one being the altar, the lower one the tomb in which the lovers meet their fate. Amneris grieved from above. It was quite impressive. The 1985 production struck me as being a fine example of how to stage an opera in the middle of a Depression. (Not to mention a plague!)

Ou est la neige d’antan ? Tempus fugit. Now another adage comes to mind. This time a German one: Schön ist die Jugend, sie kommt nicht mehr. (Youth is beautiful; it never returns).

I must admit, the drama of Aida leaves me cold. I am, however, very much aware that the music is among the best music that one of the best composers ever composed. Opera, especially Italian opera, loves to depict triangulated love affairs, enabling the principal singers to emote before everything ends badly. The rivalry of a pharaoh’s daughter and a king’s daughter over the same man is more than a bit contrived, more fitting, perhaps, for a soap opera than for a masterwork. (When a Brazilian man I was working with long ago told me of the Brazilian national opera, Il Guerany, I guessed the plot before he told me: an Indian princess falls in love with a conquistador, what else?) Also, the final wonderful duet bothers me. Here are two people, sealed alive in a tomb, singing, "How beautiful and pure it is to die!"

Aida is a masterwork, nevertheless. I had attended so many performances that I knew all the music by heart.

I was dazzled by the performance, and even more deeply moved by the realization that time has irrevocably changed me into an old man, and will soon irrevocably change me into something worse.

2.

I come from a family that had no interest in music.The first memory I have of the effect music has on me was when I was about 8 or 9—I’m not sure. I came across—don’t ask me how—a recording of the William Tell Overture conducted by Toscanini. It was on two or three 45 rpm records. I distinctly remember that the entire records, grooves and all, were blood-red. I played it and when it came to that beautiful minor key melody at the beginning of the overture, I burst into tears. I didn’t know what hit me.

Later, as a teen, I borrowed from the library a recording of Mozart’s Magic Flute and played it every day. I was hooked.

I borrowed recordings of other operas as well, but had never attended a performance. This changed around 1964. I was attending undergraduate classes at Rutgers in Newark, and worked at the university library part-time.  A librarian, an avid opera fan, much older than us, agreed to take a gaggle of us students to the Met. He purchased a ticket for a score desk on the balcony. A score desk, for those unfamiliar with the term, is a dimly-lit monk-like desk whereupon one sets the score of the opera to be performed and reads it during the performance; the view of the stage is completely obstructed. If I recall correctly, five of us sat at the desk, while Rigoletto tangled with the Duke. It was not a memorable first night at the opera.

In 1965-1966, I spent my junior year in Freiburg, Germany. One of my fellow students asked me if I would like to attend a performance of Macbeth at the Stadttheater. I agreed. We thought we were going to see a Shakespeare play—it turned out to be Verdi’s opera! I don’t remember much from the performance.

At Freiburg, I attended a couple of performances of Weber’s der Freischütz as well,  and was fascinated. I remember the performances well. I recall, as if it were yesterday, the horns having trouble keeping together in the hunting chorus. I also remember the overture very well, especially the part of it that critics have called the birth of German Romantic Opera—a mysterious tremulo that gets loud and then fades away, very Schubert-like.

I remember a good deal more, but will leave it at that.

During semester break, I attended a performance of Falstaff at Vienna. Leonard Bernstein conducted; Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau sang the title role. I had a Stehplatz, a standing room ticket.What most impressed me was seeing Bernstein’s head pop up and then disappear from view as he exuberantly jumped up and down in the pit, whenever the spirit moved him--which I might add, occurred frequently.

When I got back to the U.S. in the fall of 1966, I needed operatic fixes on a regular basis. A co-worker at the library informed me that her brother was an avid opera fan. I asked whether he could pick up a ticket for me; instead, she told me how to purchase standing room tickets.

During the 1967-1968 season, I saw many operas. At that time, I was a graduate student in German Literature at Rutgers University in New Brunswick. I frequently traveled to New York to stay at my mother's on weekends. I would purchase standing room tickets for weekends—one performance on Friday, sometimes two on Saturday. I heard all the famous singers of that era: Birgit Nilsson, Monserat Caballé, Jon Vickers, Franco Corelli, Jesseye Norman, Fernando Corena, Monserrat Caballé, Jon Vickers, Renata Tebaldi, Joan Sutherland etc. etc. singing in major operas, most of which are still popular today—though I haven’t heard a performance of La Giaconda since 1967.

After I moved to Baltimore in 1980, attendance at the Met became much less frequent. (Did I attend operas in Baltimore and Washington? Yes, but irregularly).

Listening to opera broadcasts, which the Met has done on a daily basis since the coronavirus pandemic began, has brought back a lot of memories. I had forgotten what an opera fanatic I had been. I had a lot of recordings I listened to regularly, but that eventually stopped as well, A few years ago, I moved them all to the attic.

Fascination with opera became a thing of the past; I no longer kept up with Met performances. Happily married with a young son, I settled down to work hard. Middle age had begun.

Middle age is now long gone. How quickly time has passed! I suddenly realized that  all the opera stars I knew years ago are either  retired or dead. Although I attend broadcasts in cinemas now and then, I am somewhat unfamiliar with the singers who are in the limelight now.

I remember some of those old performances as if they took place yesterday. The young man I was then is gone forever. Next day—or so it seems—that young man is about to turn 75. How much time do I have left? I recall a little-known Bach cantata, “Ich habe einen Fuss im Grabe”—“I have one foot in the grave". In my case, it’s at least 1 ½ of my lower appendages dans la fosse.

It’s a sobering thought: the Met will go on without me, life will go on without me; soon, perhaps very soon, I will cease to exist.

One minute you’re listening to an ineffable passage from Mozart, the next minute you “see” the skeletal memento mori figure in the Southwark Cathedral, London.

Where has all the time gone? Ou est la neige d’antan?

4.

According to Camus, a longer life is always better. “One just has to be able to consent to this. There will never be any substitute for twenty years of life and experience.”—Albert Camus

The New Yorker recently (May 4, 2020) contained a profile piece of an unquestionably brilliant man, Frank Ramsey, who died at the age of 26. For Camus, it would have better if he had been a postman who lived to be 100—or even to 46. Although life might be objectively meaningless, subjectively it is not; once we accept life as it is and our position in it, life becomes much less problematic, even enjoyable. 

It is a mistake, according to Camus, to consider Ramsey’s brief life as superior to that of a longer-lived postman’s. It is quantity, the number of years of experience, that matters. Ramsey never had a cell phone; Ramsey never was able to stream a play by Shakespeare; Ramsey never knew what it meant to have a relationship with someone for, say, fifty years, or more. Ramsey was never able to experience, perhaps even to partly transcend, the diminishment of old age.

If we accept Camus’s stance, males are in trouble—everybody is, but males especially. We might call this the absent X syndrome, or the burden of the Y. Females have two X chromosomes, males have one X and one Y. The X chromosome is large and contains much information; the Y chromosome is much smaller: it directs the fetus to become a male, but contains little else. Most of it is junk. When something goes wrong with a gene on one X chromosome, females have a second X chromosome that takes over, often resulting in no morbidity. If something averse happens on an X chromosome and you only have one, as males do, you're out of luck. It is thought that the extra X chromosome supports ongoing cellular health and helps to explain why females live longer.

Confronted by my own mortality by the realization that my favorite opera stars, whom I’ve seen perform many times, are either dead or retired, I decided to contrast their fates by gender. If I were a retired male opera star in my 60s or70s, I asked myself, where would I be now? I chose 8 males and 8 females, all singers I heard many times. Where are they now?

Male Opera Stars                                  Age at death     Alive             
           

Franco Corelli                                        82

George London                                      64

James McCracken                                  61

Fernando Corena                                    67

Cesare Siepi                                           87

Jon Vickers                                            88

Sándor Konya                                        78

George Shirley                                                                 86                                                                                                                                   

Female Opera Stars                                    

Marilyn Horne                                                                 86                                                                                      

Fiorenza Cossotto                                                            85                                                                                     

Renata Tebaldi                                    82

Joan Sutherland                                   83

Leontyne Price                                                                  93                                                                                                                                                                                               

Birgit Nilsson                                      87

Monserat Caballé                                85         

What leaps out from this small study is that three of the women are still alive, while only one man is; all the women reached 80 at the very least, while several of the males died in their sixties. If we assume that they were all dead at present—a very incorrect assumption regarding the four who are still breathing, we can average the ages of death. For the male group, the average age of death is about 75 years, while that of the female is about 84 years. (Since three quarters of those still alive are female, the final averages will be skewed even farther to the female group).

This is a small sample, but the results are consistent with the fact that females live longer.

The horror of this personal memento mori brought on by the fact that my younger "opera days" were gone forever and the fact that most of the stars I admired so much then are now dead, was even more intensified by the realization that I am male, thus likely, at age 75, to die sooner rather than later.

And what about gender differences regarding the quality of life? 

Fates, we know your pleasures./That we shall die, we know; 'tis but the time/and drawing out of days that men stand upon.

                                                Brutus, Julius Caesar, 4.1. 99--101

Males unquestionably excel in at least five categories: suicide, sickness, violence, perversion and death. Regarding suicide: completed suicides occur in males with roughly twice the frequency; regarding sickness: an example of male excellence in this category is the fact that nearly twice the number of males succumb to Covid-19; regarding violence: this category is so male-dominated that there is no need to provide a statistic; regarding perversion: there are no Juanita Dahmers; and death: early death is, not exclusively, but basically, a male thing.

The male ego is still alive and kicking (kicking others, as other males kick them). Many men still strive to be alpha males. They are still acting like chimpanzees in an increasingly bonobo society. (Chimpanzee society is male-dominated and hierarchical, and violent, while bonobo society is female-dominated, peaceful, and based on relationships). Very interesting facts: chimpanzee life for males is much more stressful;  males in bonobo society live longer!--and, apparently, are more content.

Moral for heldentenors: put down your spear and concentrate on relationships. If you’re male, it’s the masculine thing to do; if you’re female, it’s the female thing to do—for it is the human thing to do.

Second moral: Occasional memento mori are good for the soul! We cannot be happy and wise until we accept life as it is, which includes death.

Final moral: males are more fragile and should take better care of themselves. Most men love women—why not learn from them? We’d all be happier.

A Boomer's Lockdown Blues

We have completed a month of a shelter-in-place lockdown with no end in sight, despite Trump’s plans  to “liberate” the economy by encouraging a number of red states to end their lockdowns. Bars are set to reopen, as well as barber shops, beaches, malls and restaurants. More coffins re likely to open as well, since America, unlike many countries of Europe, lacks adequate testing, not to mention contact-tracing, two quintessential ongoing tasks for any program of cautious re-opening.

Trump is not solely to blame here, he is merely the ugly, visible manifestation of an ugly, invisible disease. His press briefings are, as it were, a Shmo Play in which an oligarch rages behind an orange mask. We’ve got what we are paying for, day after day. The latest manifestation of that incompetent front for unregulated capitalism is 66,000 deaths (as of May 2, 2020) many of which could have been prevented if, (impossibly), Trump had been less concerned about himself than about people, and had instituted what science had recommended at an earlier date.

Those who have eyes to see and ears to hear know all this; besides, for those whose faculties prevented them from coming to terms with the mess we’re in, I’ve written countless  essays since 2016 about the need to face facts. The subject of this essay is, therefore, not another example of my bashing Trump’s bashing of truth and decency, albeit a related one.

1. Covid and the Inner Climate

Yes,  I’m suffering (somewhat) from metaphorical formication; yes, I’m feeling (somewhat) antsy. Cut off from my friends and acquaintances; unable to go to the gym; accosted by earworms after streaming a dozen or so operas from the Met, etc., I feel, that is, I imagine, that, at nearly 75, I am ready and able to run a marathon. Truth is, for the last two weeks, my wife and I no longer go for walks; after watching a riveting performance of Elektra with Nena Stemme in the title role, my wife rose from the computer, tripped on a wire and injured her leg. (Thank God it wasn’t her hip!) No doubt about it, those 8 to 10 thousand steps a day helped to keep the blues away.

We’re among the lucky ones, less affected by the pandemic than most. Nirmala will be ready, we hope, to resume daily walks very soon. I’m retired; my routine hasn’t been changed by 180 degrees, maybe only about 30 degrees. I enjoy reading, writing, and playing the piano, activities that I have been able to increase by being forced to stay at home. I live simply; my wife and I can live off Social Security and my pension. In addition, she still works as a physician, although her schedule has been severely curtailed. Do I enjoy the extra time spent with her? Indeed.

Yes, we are among the lucky ones. What about so many younger folks who are suddenly unemployed? So many already are having trouble paying rent or mortgage; so many already are having trouble putting food on the table. I live in America, which Trump has turned into the greatest third world country in the world. Things are likely to get much worse before they get better. I as an I have no reason to complain; I as part of a we, however, must.

2. We Must Change, and We Aren’t

What bothers me most about the lockdown is not the boredom from having too much time on my hands, but the refusal to realize that time is running out. The crisis of our time, as if the pandemic weren’t bad enough, is climate change. I had hoped that the present crisis would give us a chance—perhaps our last chance—to face a terrible fact: the Earth is getting warmer due to human activity, and if we don’t act with fierce determination soon, life on Earth will be diminished forever. In case you are unaware of the scope of the impending disaster, I will now provide a brief summary of the problem.

We live now in the Anthropocene Age, which began with the Industrial Revolution in the late 18^th century. It is the first age of unnatural history since life began billions of years ago; unnatural since it is the first age in which human activity has had a major effect on the planet.

Climate change has been gradual. Until fairly recently, Earth has been able to buffer the increasing pollution, thus avoiding precipitations of disaster. When a sponge is full, however, it is no longer able to sop up a spill; the sponge is nearly full now, yet we continue to spill and spill. This can’t go on, yet, so far, it has.

In 1998, James Hansen, then the  director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, testified before Congress that he was 99% certain that humans were responsible for climate change. Later that year, the World Conference on the Changing Atmosphere called for a 20% reduction of global carbon dioxide emissions by 2005. As reported in the Economist, “instead of emissions in 2005 being 20% lower than they were in 1988, they were 34% higher. By 2017, they were 22% higher still".

The climate change movement began at a very bad time; Reagan’s and Thatcher’s poisonous gospel of deregulation and laissez-faire business practices had become the new norm. The resultant  increasing inequality and increasing fossil fuel pollution have continued unabated to this day. The current president illustrates the problem, but is not its source; he is merely an orange mask behind which Late Capitalism rages.

Without major intervention, life on earth will be difficult and less biologically diverse. Storms and droughts will be more severe; rising sea levels will engulf coastal areas, wreak havoc on low-lying areas and even on low-lying countries, resulting in mass migration. The point of no return is rapidly approaching;

I get the impression however, that once the covid pandemic wanes, people will want to go back to the way things were. We cant afford to do that. We need a two-pronged approach: on the collective level, capitalism needs to be vigorously regulated; on the individual level, we must change the way we live.

3. A Modest Proposal

If I were more entrepreneurial, I would produce Globe Snow Paperweights—without the snow. Each paperweight would have the skyline of a city or emblem of an area (Mount Rushmore, for instance, for South Dakota). Each skyline would be submerged in liquid. On the face of each globe would be something like, "Baltimore, Submerged? It is not too late to fight climate change.”

I don’t think this project would be a success. Business, big or small, is not my area of expertise. I’m rather introverted and bookish, I admit it. As previously mentioned, There must be a two-pronged approach to battling climate change: the individual and the collective responses. I will leave the very important collective approach--political activism, for instance--to those who are better at this than I. I will therefore focus on individual action.

What can an individual do? Plenty.

My modest proposal is that we become vegan or vegetarian; if that is not possible, I propose that we drastically reduce our meat consumption.

If we do this, we can reduce an individual’s carbon footprint by up to 73%. As we approach veganism, we reduce the amount of land used for the production of food by 75%, thus increasing the habitat for wildlife, the diminution of which is responsible for many extinctions. The production of meat, especially beef, entails four times the amount of energy as raising vegetables. Methane, a far worse greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, would also be reduced very significantly. The horrible cruelties of the meat and poultry industries would become things of the past. (I’m convinced that the exploitation of animals and the exploitation of humans are connected).

Even the reduction of meat consumption—especially beef and lamb—would have a very significant effect. Eating less meat not only protects the environment and enhances health, it is a tastier option as well. As a famous chef has stated, bite into meat and the flavor fades quickly; bite into a vegetable dish and the flavors last much longer.

In conclusion, let’s return to the subject of the pandemic. Covid cases are skyrocketing in  meat-processing facilities. Many have been temporarily closed.  The deplorable working conditions have endangered the health of the workers, who are mostly Latinos. Trump’s solution: an executive order which declares them to be essential services. They are not! 

Endangering lives while continuing to endanger the environment is another example of the fossil fuel industry talking behind an orange mask. On a collective and individual basis, we must fight the rich ventriloquists who speak through President Dummy! Eating less meat is an essential part of that struggle.