Posted on by rjonakait

Snippets

Once a month local high school kids come into my old folks home to chat with some of the residents. The students get some sort of public service credit. It’s nice; the old folks have an interaction with young kids they would not otherwise have. This month the students came in with Valentine cards they had drawn and were distributed to us. I thought that was sort of sweet until I opened mine and saw that the inscription started, “Dear Senior.”

I learned from Janice P. Nimura, Daughters of the Samurai: A Journey from East to West and Back that after Admiral Matthew Perry “opened” Japan to the West, Japan concluded that it needed to modernize, which meant adopting more Western ways. The country ended its military rule by the Shoguns in 1868. Some new leaders concluded that part of the West’s strength was educated women. Three young Japanese girls were sent to the United States to be educated similarly to American girls. After ten years, they returned to Japan, and with much difficulty they helped establish some schools for girls. The book was an interesting read about a history I knew little about.

The local library has a program starting next month for eight sessions called “Postpartum Circle,” which “navigates the adjustment to parenthood.” Sounds valuable, but I am not sure it sends the right message by being held in the Teen Room.

I bought the on-sale cookies. When I saw that the package was already opened, I asked the spouse how they were. “Tasty,” she replied. “But not very satisfying. So you have to eat a lot of them.”

I wondered as I watched the winter Olympics whether if I had lived my life isolated at the equator whether I would believe that ice is water.

A billionaire stepped down from a position “saying he had exercised ‘terrible judgment’ in keeping contact with Epstein after the financier was convicted of a sex offense in 2008.” Many other people have been ostracized for having contact with Epstein after his conviction. If these people attended parties with young teenagers after 2008 or perhaps anytime (looking at you, Mr. President), ostracism may be appropriate, or perhaps it is appropriate even if they just knew of such parties. But otherwise? Who should be shunned? All people convicted of crimes? That happens too much now and makes offenders return to society, employment, and family almost impossible. Perhaps we should shun all sex offenders, but sex offenses cover a broad swath of behaviors, from a twenty-year-old having sex with a fifteen-year-old, to exposing oneself, to collecting pornographic pictures, to brutal rapes. Should all be shunned equally? Or is it that Jeffrey Epstein should have been shunned even if the one we now ostracize did not attend the parties or know of them? We need to make distinctions. Shunning everyone convicted of a crime who has served their sentence is not good for society.

“Crime and punishment grow out of the same stem.” Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Posted on by rjonakait

Snippets

It was only after the midterms that I learned the Urban Dictionary definition of “Red Wave”: “When a close group of girls sync their periods, which can be quite dangerous for everyone else.”

Another year where I was passed over for the title of sexiest man alive. And again I wondered how sexy someone is if they are dead.

Why is it I have never called any of my doctors by a first name?

You can praise a child after a completed task by saying, as many do, “You are so smart.” But then the child may see intelligence as fixed and feel stupid when they cannot do something. You can also praise the child by saying “You did a good job figuring that out.” Isn’t the message then that knowledge and intelligence are expandable with hard work?

“Don’t limit a child to your learning, for he was born in another time.” Rabbinic saying.

“I pay the schoolmaster, but ‘tis the schoolboys who educate my son.” Ralph Waldo Emerson.

On a recent walk, I passed within a few blocks of each other The Den of Splendor and The Gospel Den. I wondered if there was a correct order to visit these places.

When I first came to New York, before bagel shops or at least places selling Bagel Shaped Objects were ubiquitous, the owner of my local deli was offended if a customer asked for a toasted bagel. A bagel was only toasted if it was stale, but in a good shop, of course, no stale bagel was sold. Instead, they were warm from the water bath and oven so that butter or cream cheese would melt into the chewy interior without toasting. Since then, I never have a toasted bagel in a shop, but the other day, I bought a bagel at a place where I had not been before. I should have had it toasted.

Invariably after I watch what I was looking for on YouTube, I spend too much time on the accompanying recommendations. The other day I went looking for Josephine Baker dancing and ended up with the top thirty songs of 1965. But I was happy that I had. I knew the music, almost all of which was great, and I felt that my life had not been entirely wasted.

In a football game, sometimes after a penalty flag has been thrown and the play concludes, the referee announces, as happened the other day, “There was no penalty on the play for offensive holding.” That phrasing seems to imply that there might, however, been an infraction for offensive pass interference or some of the other myriad football possibilities. I think the official should click off the microphone and say, “There was no penalty on the play.” Full stop.

In a glance in the mirror, which are always kept brief, I thought I saw incipient jowls. On the one hand, I thought, jowls add gravitas to some men. On the other, they make Basset hounds look ridiculous.